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obnoxiouslylongandboring

4 years ago

I’ve been waiting for someone to say this for a long ass time

When Daniel Brühl's hair does that thing where one slightly curly bang falls out of place and on his forehead reblog if you agree

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obnoxiouslylongandboring

3 years ago

Me just looking at all the posts that are going ‘WHERE ARE THE FANFICS???? I want to read the fics ’

And just sobbing because I’m writing a long ass fic that I can’t upload anywhere because the ship is just too illicit

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obnoxiouslylongandboring

4 years ago

I ship WalkerBaron so hard it’s not even funny. I don’t even know why or how. Some part of me started headcanoning how they’d work together in Thunderbolts and it was all a spiral after that.

Someone save me from this fresh hell

😭🤧🤡

Interviewing Helmut Zemo, Prince of Sokovia

Written under the discord prompt: bird, peach, leave 🍑🦅🏃‍♂️

I had the great honour of interviewing - no, even being in the presence of Sokovia's Prince. He is rather fondly addressed as the Boy King by his fellow attendants, and Teufelchen (Little Devil) by his playmates.

There is not one person in America who has not heard about the great nation of Sokovia. The mammoth cereal brand Sok-Oats comes to mind, as well as Washington DC's obsessive mania over the gigantic feathery dreamcatchers that are infrequently gifted to them as a show of solidarity. I myself have one hung over the bed as a mantlepiece. However, this is not all.

Rather interestingly, Sokovia is one of the two remaining nations with a population of over 80% winged-folk. The other is a small island a few miles off to the north of Ireland, Jarthun Landon. Its size comparable to the Vatican City - the size of a pea compared to the likes of the USA.

Sokovia is a different story. Though less industrially developed than the USSR in 1917, it still resisted both the alluring grip of Communism and our very own Marshall Plan in the aftermath of the cold war, a near impossible undertaking. What resulted was a country ruled under a rather democratic-leaning monarchy (not nearly as tyrannical as old British imperialism).

Wilhelmina Zemo was a Queen who carved her name onto to the wall of fame in history, lying beside the likes of Germany's Otto von Bismarck, China's Sun Yat-Sen, and Britain's Winston Churchill. After taking the throne of Sokovia, she sent the country into a transition into statecraft (ie. strategies for securing national interest in the international arena). In eight years, she had built up a missile defence system modelled after Israel's Iron Dome.

However, the world was encountering another change. With a slippery launch into the 21st century, wings were starting to be seen as clunky, primitive contraptions rather than the sky-soaring, apex-predator tools as they once was. What was once regarded as a second limb for us had now become a burdensome weight, lead weights rather than a propellor. To quote the infamous poet Allen Duten, "Wings are the tools of destruction, of anarchy. They are unnatural. They represent elitism, classism, every antithesis to meritocracy. Would we turn those with chicken wings into poultry? Would we give a gun to every eagle-winged and tell them- 'off you go, this is what you were born for'?" Mr Duten's concerns were understandable, given that he himself had been born with the wings of a dodo bird.

Eons ago a kilometer square of air space could safely hold no more than twenty free-flying avian-folk. Now, it can hold three planes, and one plane can hold three hundred.

Additionally, after WW2's atrocities with Nazi Germany, it was understandable that eagle wings fell out of style as fast as the toothbrush moustache.

Wilhelmina's son, Heinrich, anticipated this change and prepared Sokovia for a long hibernation of isolationism. The monarchy was determined to preserve the avian-folk. While the rest of their world's wings grew small and brittle and shrank (suffering a fate similar to the tailbone), citizens of Sokovia preserved their original lifestyle and never underwent a similar change.

Currently, this country the size of Singapore, faces a slow population decline. Today, I will dive deep into the heart of Sokovia and figure out some of the most controversial questions involving this nation.

Heinrich's son, the sixteen year-old Helmut Zemo (aptly named after his grandmother - both their names translate roughly to helm or protection in Germanic) has reached out to me to hopefully answer some of those questions.

--------

As soon as arrive at Sokovia, I was escorted in a black military truck to the palace. Sokovia forbids all filming, so unfortunately no footage was captured.

A young man greets me. From the photos, I already knew what to expect - yet he still took me by surprise. He had no suit nor tie nor fur collar coat, nothing but a wide-brimmed hat and liquorice curls of amber-brown hair below that. Yet this young man had all the makings of a young royal - his eyes were nearly black in their intensity, and the catlike curl of his lips graced him with an enigmatic, inscrutable air. He gazes at me like observing an exotic creature, then steps to the side to converse with the guards in hushed whispers and minute gestures.

Of course the second thing I noticed about him were his wings. The Sokovian aristocracy was a long line of Eurasian magpies. And before this, I had never known that a magpie's feathers had that iridescent shimmer, now magnified to match the scale of a young adult, which shifted from purple to green to blue with every rustle and twitch. A joyful fluttering of the wings by the young prince revealed a stark white underside.

"Come with me," he says, and walks into the shade of the palace gardens, his feathers fading in their colour, a layer of vibrating black oil spilling over his shoulders and down to the back of his calves. It is times like this that I wonder whether we as a species were rather foolish to lose these magnificent gifts of nature.

"Did you enjoy the journey here?" The young prince asks me. His voice is clear and sweet, with the compelling style that is distinctively crafted for nobles and royalty. Faced with this gentle question, I felt a sudden urge to both reassure and impress him.

"I thoroughly did. Sokovia is even more beautiful than the pictures," I added, feeling rather pleased with my lie.

Much to my surprise, the young prince let out a silvery peal of laughter. "Nonsense. As soon as you came out of the airport, we stuffed you into a windowless shuttle bus for three hours. You must be tired."

He left me in the dust, completely bewildered. This was not the innocent cherub of a young prince that our media depicted him as.

"You're different from what the papers depicted," I told him dryly, feeling very foolish from stumbling into his trap.

The little prince slowed his pace and narrowed his eyes (although I spied a dangerous little smirk dancing on his lips). "Well, you're here to set the lies straight, aren't you?"

It was at this moment that the nickname Teufelchen started to make sense to me.

War of Hearts

Stay with me A little longer I will wait for you Shadows creep And want grows stronger Deeper than the truth

Zemo helps John Walker put on his combat gear for an upcoming mission.

John stretches out the taut piece of fabric. It’s inlaid with kevlar (even a supersoldier goes down when they take a bullet), slightly thinner than usual for mobility’s sake. He turns to Zemo, raising an eyebrow. The man in question was tugging a pair of boots from the trunk where his uniform was.

“It will do the job, but the bullet will still hurt.” Zemo remarks. Often, when shot, the pain will not register fast enough. John had experienced it before. He would feel a blinding fire in his gut, and his feet would still be moving even when his body crumpled and folded under the hit. And lying there, in shock, he had thought- I’ve been shot. I’ve been shot. Over and over, blood spilling out of him, before it registered that he’s been hit again by another bullet.

“Just don’t freeze,” Zemo reminds him again.

“It’ll hurt just as much as being shot normally, just that the bullet won’t penetrate. You’re betting that I can handle the pain?” John knows he could, but it’s fun to rile Zemo up.

“You will handle it.”

“And if I come back with a shit ton of internal bleeding because of your negligence?”

Before he knew it, Zemo was centimeters away from him, gloved hand digging viciously into a blackened bruise on his torse. John grits his teeth to prevent himself from making any sound. Zemo leans in, close enough that John could feel the heat of his breath and inhale the delicate scent of cherry blossom tea. “Then take it as your punishment, and don’t be so foolishly careless again.”

Zemo takes a step back from him, fixes him with a searching gaze. John inhales slowly, recognising these moments as the eye of the storm, the silence and bated breath before thunder cracks the sky. He has learnt to treasure them. “And- I will not be negligent around you,” Zemo says, voice catching in his throat. Then he says, a faint sterness in his voice that told John it was a reminder- “Not in anything I do.”

The words what do you mean are on the tip of his tongue, but John presses his lips into a tight line. He doesn’t want Zemo to spell out the obvious for him- attachment is negligence as well.

Zemo seems to be pleased by whatever minuscule reaction (or lack of) that he showed. The man nods to himself, satisfied, as he turns away and reaches for John’s shield.

John puts on his suit with quick, practiced tugs. Then he buckles the buttons, alternating red and black, one by one in a slanted line down his chest; he squats down, yanking on his sleek combat boots. When he looks up, Zemo is observing him silently, head cocked to one side. John freezes, wondering if Zemo had been standing there the whole time, motionless, looking at his every movement. He reaches for his laces by the side table, but Zemo’s hands find his.

Oh. when had he taken off his gloves?

Wordlessly, Zemo lifts him from the floor. John could smell the leather still lingering on his bare fingers, and the softness of his touch, calloused only on the middle finger where a stylus rests. These are hands that hold heavy gold chalices and silver letter-openers, sharp as a knife. And they stamp royal carvings into hot wax, sealing letters that will decide the fates of millions.

John’s blood turns molten all of a sudden, pumping hard and fast under his skin. He wanted to spill blood all over those dainty fingers, and knowing Zemo, it could be golden ichor. He imagined it crusted into fingernails, could nearly taste it hot on his tongue, war paint befitting of royalty.

He lifts Zemo’s hand, holding that wild gaze, and plants a chaste kiss on the back, chapped lips sliding against soft skin. “Baron,” he says, reveling in the shaky inhale that he hears.

Zemo’s eyes are wide, pupils dilated. His hand hovers over where John’s heart is. After a few seconds Zemo retracts his hand as if burnt and glances away, with the expression that John has come to associate with cornered and run. But he does not take a step back, doesn’t even make up some bullshit excuse to run away.

John knows that neither shock nor fear can make Zemo come to a standstill. So here, there is something inexplicably different that has pinned him to place like a dried butterfly to a corkboard.

“Hold still.”

He watches, mesmerised, as Zemo sinks to his knees and begins to lace up his boots, fingers working deftly to thread string through metal rings.

When the job is done, Zemo straightens again and looks at him square in the eyes. Fully clothed and ready for combat, something deeply calm has settled into John, reducing the world around him to a gentle hum. “US Agent,” Zemo says. His expression is not loving or warm, but his brows are furrowed in worry and John knows it’s the closest thing to kindness he’ll get.

“I’m here,” John says. It might have been a trick of the light, or his brain hallucinating some source of comfort, but he could’ve sworn there was a smile on Zemo’s lips just then, for barely a second.

But walking away and out of the equipment room, he hears a soft good luck behind him, and knows there’s no doubt about it.

I can't help but love you Even though I try not to

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More Posts from Obnoxiouslylongandboring and Others

Interviewing Helmut Zemo, Prince of Sokovia

War of Hearts

Zemo helps John Walker put on his combat gear for an upcoming mission.