Anya is live and ready to show you everything. Watch her strip, dance, and perform exclusive shows just for you. Interact in real-time and make your fantasies come true.
✓ Live Streaming✓ Interactive Chat✓ Private Shows✓ HD Quality✓ Free Actions
Free to watch • No registration required • HD streaming
Active from 2003 to 2014, Crack Van was a multifandom fanfiction and vid rec community on LiveJournal that became, for a generation of fans, the first stop when exploring a new fandom. At its peak, it was one of the most organised and wide-ranging rec communities the internet had ever seen, with nearly 25,000 recs over ten years.
The community worked by recruiting volunteers from individual fandoms to "drive the van" for a month at a time, posting regular recommendations and writing fandom primers: overviews designed to help total newcomers understand the source material, the characters, the ships, and where to find the good stuff.
Crack Van closed permanently in January 2014, signalling a broader shift in fandom culture, as Tumblr, AO3, and Twitter had changed how fans discovered fanworks and connected with each other, making the curated, collaborative structure of Crack Van feel like a different era entirely. Many fans mourned it as the end of something irreplaceable.
Crack Van also inspired a wave of fandom-specific rec communities in its image, like Crack Impala for Supernatural.
Curious about the community that helped hundreds of thousands of fans find their footing in new fandoms? Head over to Fanlore to learn more!
------
We value every contribution to our shared fandom history. If you’re new to editing Fanlore or wikis in general, visit our New Visitor Portal to get started or ask us questions here!
Maybe he's the pivot or the hinge or the fulcrum on which the lever of this delicate and beautiful life they've all made together turns.
Or maybe he's just himself. Does it matter?
Everyone left; Buck stayed. Years later a grudge is held, a secret is revealed, and a kid comes out.
my authorized sequel to @screamlet's the ship of theseus is done!
Maybe he's the pivot or the hinge or the fulcrum on which the lever of this delicate and beautiful life they've all made together turns.
Or maybe he's just himself. Does it matter?
Everyone left; Buck stayed. Years later a grudge is held, a secret is revealed, and a kid comes out.
my authorized sequel to @screamlet's the ship of theseus is done!
Anya is live and ready to show you everything. Watch her strip, dance, and perform exclusive shows just for you. Interact in real-time and make your fantasies come true.
✓ Live Streaming✓ Interactive Chat✓ Private Shows✓ HD Quality✓ Free Actions
Free to watch • No registration required • HD streaming
fic: we're a thousand miles from comfort (bucktommy)
AT LAST: THE BARKLEY MARATHONS AU (CHAPTER ONE)
title: we're a thousand miles from comfort
fandom: 9-1-1 (ABC)
pairing: buck/tommy
description:
Shannon lives.
Buck takes the settlement.
Eddie runs the Barkley Marathons.
thank you to @weatherwaxed for being such a cheerleader and incredible beta!
also tagging @screamlet @rcmclachlan @chimneyschewinggum @liminalmemories21 @cecilyv @geddyqueer @dharmaavocado and anyone else who is procrastinating posting their fic!
The first two NeoG books were fun queer scifi books that verged into silly on occasion although I will never forgive Wagers for naming the robot dog Doge and having one character be obsessed with old media so she can make a bunch of pop culture jokes that were more miss than hit. The third one was a big swing at space horror. It was too big of a swing and the plot and character arcs were muddled and the plot was a structureless mess that really needed at least another editing pass to tighten it up. It still had fun moments but I can't get over that Wagers depicted the act of hacking as a platforming video game. The fourth one has swung back around to fun and silly because we get die hard in space and so far it's really working for me.
Speaking of books it's been a while since I've seen one of these posts going around & I'm curious so everyone could you tell me what you are reading rn in the tags please
Pleased to report that after a day of this i am not longer craving caper brine and my mouth is not dry as usual. There's some good suggestions in the notes too that I want to try.
-ancient roman posca: water, red or white wine vinegar, honey, salt, herbs (coriander, mint, thyme)
-switchel: water, ginger, vinegar, sweetener, lemon, salt
5 facts about an au where buck works on a ranch in canada and runs into rcmp tommy
Now this is cartoonish trap of loony toon proportions to trick me into writing more due south au, and baby call me Wil E. Coyote.
--
1. Buck had been at the ranch for eight months when news came down they were cutting a number of the hands loose. That was going to be him. He was one of the newer hires, originally brought on for the season; his time was up.
“So,” Jake said, dropping on the end of Buck’s bed.
All the hands, or at least the unmarried junior hands, bunked together in the same house. It felt a little like being back in the dorms. Buck hated the classes but he liked how they all lived together. He liked it now.
“So what?” Mitch asked from the other bed.
“I got us a job lined up.” Jake pulled out his phone. “You got a passport, right, Buckley?”
“Yeah,” he said. His parents insisted he and Maddie both had current passports, and he snatched it up with his birth certificate and social security card when he ran away. “Why?”
“Because my cousin works at this resort in Peru, and he can hook us up with a couple of jobs at the bar.” Jake kicked his feet up next to Buck’s head and BUck shoved them off the mattress. Jake lobbed his phone over “It’s sun, sand, hot girls on spring break, and us pouring shots for those girls.”
“Jesus,” Mitch muttered.
“Have you ever bar tended?” Buck asked, squinting down at the website. A resort bar meant a lot of tourists and entitled assholes and probably shit tips. He should go back to working gay bars. They were great tippers.
“How hard can it be? I’ve seen that Tom Cruise movie.” Jake mimed tossing a cocktail shaker and then pouring out a line of shots.
“Jesus Christ,” Mitch said again, suddenly sitting up and swinging his legs over the bed. “As someone who has actually worked more than one job and was a bartender at a shitty dive, let me make a counter offer.”
Buck tossed the phone back to Jake. “What do you got?”
“I got some cousins that own a ranch in Canada. They’re always looking for some extra hands.”
Jake popped his head up. “Wait, your family owns a ranch? Why are you slumming it down here with us?”
“My cousins own a ranch up in Canada. Distant cousins.” Mitch frowned. “What are they when they’re the kids of your cousins’ cousins?”
“Second cousins once removed, I think,” Buck said absently. “Is this a long term gig or am I gonna have to look for a job like three months in?”
Mitch gave him a look. “Long term. I wouldn’t do that to you.”
“Dude,” Jake protested. “Peru comes with employee housing. Also hot girls.”
“I do like hot girls.” To Mitch, he said, “You got any?”
“Don’t be a gross asshole,” Mitch said. “You’re going to make rethink my offer.”
That made him feel small. “Sorry,” he mumbled.
“Peru,” Jake repeated. “Sand, sun, not having to repair fences for like thirteen hours.”
It was true that Buck hated having to check the fence line for damage, but he remembered what it felt like to be on his feet for eight hours dealing with bachelor and bachelorette parties or, worse, finance bros. Either choice got him out of the country and further from Pennsylvania.
He dug a quarter out of his pocket.
“Heads is Canada,” he said. “Tails is Peru.”
He flipped the coin.
2. Canada, or at least the little corner Buck found himself in, was beautiful with wide lakes and a wide open sky. Unlike in Montana, this was a pure working ranch and didn’t board tourists, and the lack of Brokeback Mountain themed pick up lines was a relief. It was such a relief that he didn’t even mind riding along the eastern fence line, taking a survey of what could be repaired and what needed to be replaced.
It was peaceful, just him and the horses, and Buck was mentally drafting the next postcard for Maddie when a man in a stetson nimbly vaulted over the fence and said, “I’m afraid I need to confiscate that horse.”
Buck blinked at him. “You want to confiscate the horse?”
The guy adjusted the stetson. He had blue eyes and a killer jaw line and cleft chin. “Constable Tommy Kinard of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. I’m in pursuit of a suspect who has been illegally fishing, and I need to cover some ground.” He handed over his credentials for Buck to examine.
“Wait,” Buck said, dutifully studying over the credentials like he even knew fuck of all of what he was looking for, “shouldn’t you, you know, have a horse if you’re a mountie? Like don’t they assign you one?”
Kinard had a killer smile to go along with that killer jaw. “You’d be surprised at how many people ask that. If you don’t mind.”
“I don’t have a spare saddle,” Buck said. Sugarpop, the newest addition to the herd, was only on a simple lead since Buck wasn’t expecting a super model mountie to stop by looking for a ride.
“I don’t need one,” Kinard said, and nimbly leapt onto Sugarpop, who did not try to buck him off as she did for every other rider. “I will return her once I—”
“Get your man?” Buck said.
Kinard smiled so wide his nose scrunched. “That’s the one. Thank you for the assistance…?”
“Oh, uh, Buck. Buckley. Evan Buckley. That’s my name.”
“Thank you kindly, Evan,” Kinard said with a tip of his stetson, and then he urged Sugarpop into a cantor and was gone.
“Oh fuck,” Buck said, realizing far too late that Kinard straight up stole a horse. “I am definitely getting fire.”
3. He did not get fired.
“Oh, that’s just Tommy,” Shelly said that night at dinner. “He got transferred here just a bit before you arrived. He’s always off chasing someone. He’ll take good care of our girl and get her back to us tomorrow.”
True to Shelly’s word, Sugarpop was back in her stall by mid-morning, freshly brushed and fed, apparently courtesy of Kinard.
“Does he do this a lot?” he asked Mitch as they got ready to ride into town for the weekly trip.
Mitch shrugged. “I’ve been just as long as you and I haven’t met him yet.”
That yet nettled him in a way Buck didn’t want to examine.
In town, they dropped off orders and picked up orders and then placed some orders, and their award for doing all that was a stop at the local bar. Inside, Mitch held up two fingers to Katie for their customary beers, and then went to join a darts game in progress.
“You want in on this?” Mitch asked, accepting the darts from Joseph, who worked the next ranch over.
At the end of the bar, head bent over some ratty paperback, was one Constable Tommy Kinard.
“I’ll get the next one,” Buck said, and slid onto the empty stool next to Kinard. “Hey, Constable. I don’t know if you remember me, but you stole my horse the other day.”
Kinard looked up over the rim of his, oh god, reading glasses. “I remember you, Evan Buckley. And I borrowed the horse and not only returned her but saved you a few chores. You can call me Tommy.”
“Do you make a habit of borrowing horses?” he asked, only for Tommy’s eyebrow to go up. “Sorry. Borrowing.”
“Only in the pursuit of justice,” Tommy said in a perfect deadpan. It was only the barest uptick at the corner of his mouth that gave him away.
Katie set his beer in front of him with perfect timing; it was too warm in the bar. “Right, the illegal fishing. Let me guess, he didn’t have a license.”
The reading glasses were neatly folded and slid into the front shirt jacket. “The license is irrelevant when he’s doing the fishing with dynamite.”
Buck choked on his beer, and it was only after a solid minute of coughing and Tommy slapping his back one that he managed to say, “He was throwing dynamite into the lake? I would have given you like ten horses if you need them.”
“Sugarpop was more than up to the task.” Tommy smiled; his nose scrunched. “But I’ll keep that in mind for the next crime in progress.”
“Do you get a lot of these kinds of crime?” he asked, curious. “Like ones using dynamite?”
“I’m not that lucky,” Tommy said bitterly, and then sighed at the face Buck was making. “Ignore that. No, we don’t get a lot of that kind of thing. It’s the occasional break in or kids stealing a truck to go joyriding.”
Buck took a cautious sip of his beer so Tommy would know that he could drink without killing himself. “Shelly mentioned you transferred here not that long ago. There’s gotta be a story there.
“Tell me yours first,” Tommy said, finger tucked between the pages of his book to keep his place. “How did an American end up at a ranch in Canada?”
“How do you know I’m American?”
“You’re extremely obvious accent. Sorry,” he said with with exaggerated flat and nasal vowels.
“Hey!” Buck protested. “What about you. Sore-y. Who says it like that?”
“Normal people.” Tommy grinned at him. “What’s your story, kid? I’ll show you mine if you show me yours.”
Buck gave him the cliff notes version. Kicked out of two different colleges, disappointed parents, his aimless travels, picking up what work he could, his post cards to his sister, the coin flip that ended up here in Canada, at this bar with Tommy, who had slotted a bookmark in place so he could listen intently. Tommy, who was taking him seriously.
“And you haven’t gotten anything from her at all?” Tommy asked when Buck wound down.
He swirled the dregs of his beer. “I move around a lot. And I’ve gone through a couple of phones by now. I think she ended up getting a new number, too.”
“But you still send her postcards,” Tommy said softly.
He shrugged. “I don’t want her to worry.”
“Hey.” Tommy nudged his ankle. “You’re a good brother.”
Buck ducked his head, flushing so hard that it almost hurt. “Oh, uh, thank you.” He chanced a glance up. Tommy was studying him, like Tommy was just as curious about him as he was about Tommy. “I showed you mine. Your turn.”
“This is going to sound obnoxiously dramatic,” Tommy said with a matching obnoxious sigh.
Sergeant Thomas Kinard Sr. was a decorated and respected member of the RMCP, at least until his corruption came to light. Kinard got away, and suddenly the mounties were desperate to keep it in house and under wraps, a task that was made exponentially more difficult by Sergeant Kinard’s only son.
“When I wouldn’t stop digging or shut up, they shipped me out here,” Tommy said in a breezy tone that Buck, a survivor of Philip and Margaret Buckley’s parenting, recognized only too well.
“How bad was it?”
“He ruined lives,” Tommy said. “And he’ll get away with it unless they find him.”
“And I thought I had it rough,” Buck said. He had a lot of practice of feeling out a person’s sharp edges and hearing what they didn’t say. “My parents only refused to see who I am.”
Tommy’s smile was sharp. “I had the opposite problem with mine.” He finished off his beer. “Okay, that’s enough with the childhood trauma. Let me buy you a drink and you can tell me the favorite place you’ve lived.”
Tommy bought him a drink and Buck told him about the couple of weeks he spent along Lake Michigan’s shore (“It sort of feels like the end of the world, but in a good way,” he said.) He bought Tommy a drink, and Tommy told him about being a helicopter pilot in Afghnaistan (“Coalition of the Willing,” Tommy explained when Buck asked how he ended up there, “and Canada was unfortunately willing). They moved to a table and ordered a basket of terrible fries, and Buck learned that Tommy had a dry streak of humor verging on mean, although Tommy never once made him feel left out of the joke, and that he liked to read queer romances and queer space operas, and that he had a furious moral center that was just as breathtaking as his smile. Buck would normally be embarrassed by how close he was leaning if Tommy wasn’t meeting him halfway.
He was so engrossed in Tommy’s story about learning to fly, that it came as a shock when Mitch said, “Hey, Buck, it’s late. We gotta get moving before Shelly sends out a search party.”
“But we just got here,” he said, weirdly annoyed at Mitch for making Tommy lean back.
Mitch gave him a very significant look. “It’s been, like, two hours.”
“No, it hasn’t.” He checked his watch, and this time the blush actually hurt. “Oh, I guess I’ve been, uh, taking up your time.”
“I’m happy you took it,” Tommy said.
“I gotta go,” Buck said, reluctantly pushing his chair back. “I have to check on the horses and I’m up on dinner rotation.”
Tommy didn’t look any happier about it.
“Jesus Christ,” Mitch muttered, and then loudly: “Hey, don’t you have a phone, Buck? And I’m sure Constable Kinard also has a phone. Maybe you two can exchange numbers and then, I don’t know, make plans to meet up later.”
“Oh, I forgot about that,” he said, fumbling for his phone.
Tommy was faster and held his phone out. “Put in your number.”
Buck did, trying and failing to bite back a smile at the simple contact name of Evan. He punched in his number and passed the phone back, their fingers brushing during the hand off. He never wanted to leave this table.
“Great,” Mitch said with false brightness. “Let’s go, Buck.”
“I’ll see you around,” he said to Tommy. He made it all of three step before turning back around. “Hey, you’re still looking for your dad, right?”
Tommy’s eyebrows rose. “What makes you say that?”
“You chased a guy like ten miles one foot, borrowed a horse, and chased him another five.” He leaned in close and dropped his voice. “I don’t think you’re the kind of guy to give up so easily. Let me know how I can help.”
For the first time in two hours, Buck had managed to strike Tommy speechless. He was so weirdly smug and even more weirdly proud about it, a feeling that lasted up until they got into the truck and Mitch said, “You know Shelly and Mary have been together for awhile now.”
“Yeah, they’re awesome,” Buck said, because they were. “Do you think they’ll ever get around to getting married?”
“Who knows with them.” Mitch cleared his throat. “My point is, you can tell me anything. No judgment.”
“Thanks, man,” Buck said, genuinely touched. He was good at making friends but not keeping them. Mitch was the longest one he’s had. “That means a lot.”
Mitch started at him with what felt like significance for a long moment before giving up and starting the engine. “Good talk, Buck.”
“Great talk,” Buck said.
They hadn’t even pulled out of the lot when the text came from through: What are you doing Saturday?
Buck grinned the entire way back to the ranch.
4. Dear Maddie, he wrote, mindful of how little space there was on a postcard. He was a goddamn pro and fitting everything in he wanted to say after all these years of sending them. The key was to draft an outline ahead of time. It really helped him to stay on target. He never crossed anything out now.
He consulted his bullet point list.
Got some exciting news. Tommy got a new assignment in California. That’s right—we’re heading to the US!
That maybe wasn’t strictly true, but it was close enough to count. Tommy picked up a lead on Sergeant Kinard, and so he put in for leave and they were flying out tomorrow for Los Angeles. One of Tommy’s old friends was stationed at the Canadian Consulate, and Tommy thought this Sal might help out. Not likely, given how the RCMP brass had fucked Tommy over so far, but Buck could spare a little hope.
We’re heading to LA. I’m not sure how long we’ll be there, but I’ve been thinking about joining the fire academy. I’ve volunteered for line duty during the last couple of wildfires up here. I think I could be good at it.
He almost crossed the last sentence out. That made him sound like the dumb kid who crashed his motorcycle and not a happily married man.
I’ll send you the address once we get settled in. You should visit sometime.
The last bullet point list taunted him. This was it, the place where he casually slipped in that he had a husband. He’s had a husband for almost a whole year now. Turns out he was secretly bi the whole time and all it took to bring it out was a beautiful mountie stealing his horse.
Buck set the pen to the postcard. He got as far as we’re m— before giving up and scratching it out. I really want you to meet Tommy, he wrote instead, because he did. He wanted his sister to meet his husband and love him just as much as Buck did. Well, maybe not as much.
The shower turned off. Tommy’s apartment had come furnished, and while it was about the size of the postcard he was writing on, it had the advantage of not being shared with four other guys. It was where they had their first night together as boyfriends and then husbands. Buck was going to miss it.
He signed the postcard the same as he always did (I love you) and said, “Don’t let me forget to stick this in a mailbox tomorrow. I want it to leave Canada before we do.”
“No way that is happening, but I like the optimism,” Tommy said. “Bathroom is all yours. Where did you put my old army shirt?”
Neither of them owned a lot of things, and if it didn’t fit into their suitcases, it wasn’t coming with them. He touched his wedding band. He was bringing the most important thing with him.
“It’s on the bed.” Buck stood and stretched until his back popped. “Don’t touch the suitcases. I just got everything to—” His mouth dried up.
“To?” Tommy prompted innocently like he wasn’t standing there with a towel slung low on his hips. A bead of water dripped from his hair onto his shoulder.
“Doesn’t matter,” Buck said, and pounced.
“Down boy,” Tommy said as Buck caught that water drop with his tongue. “We got an early flight tomorrow, and these little puddle jumpers are a rough ride.”
Buck hooked two fingers on the towel knot. “I’ll show you a rought ride.”
“Are your lines actually getting worse?” Tommy said, laughing. Buck loved the way Tommy laughed with his whole body. This was why he held out hope of Maddie finding him one day: he wanted to show her how good he and Tommy were together. For maybe the first time in his life, Buck was happy.
“You know I had no game when you married me.” He nuzzled at the underside of Tommy’s jaw, right where he smelled fresh and clean.
Tommy smiled, and Buck touched his thumb to those beautiful lines. “Sweetheart, you’ve got so much game. You had me the moment you yelled at me for borrowing Sugarpop.”
Buck pressed a lush kiss to Tommy’s neck. “Then let me give you a ride, if I’ve had you since then.”
“Christ,” Tommy said, reverent. “Yeah, anything you want.”
Buck tugged the knot free. The towel fell. He dropped to his knees.
In the morning, the postcard went to his sister and Buck went to LA with his husband. There wasn’t a single bump the whole way there.
5. Constable Tommy Kinard-Buckley of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and his husband Evan Kinard-Buckley first came to Los Angeles on the trail of Sergeant Thomas Kinard and, for reasons that didn’t need exploring at this juncture, remained, attached respectively as liaison officer with the Canadian Consulate and as a member of the Los Angels Fire Department.
“No, these reasons definitely need exploring at this juncture,” Maddie said. Her hair was wet and Tommy was standing at attention and refusing to meet her eyes in a way that made Buck desperately curious about what happened before he got home. “Wait. Kinard-Buckley?”
“I got issues with my last name, he’s got issues with last name, so we decided to hyphenate,” Buck said. “I wanted to combine it into a new name, but got shot down.”
“You wanted our married name to be Knuckle,” Tommy said with a pained grimace.
They hadn’t talked in years, and it’d been even longer since they saw each, but here they both were in Los Angeles, three thousand miles away from where they had miserable grown up, but this was what Maddie found unbelievable.
“Well, you know what they say about mounties,” Buck said, looking to his husband, who was was heaving a sigh in mock resignation of the punchline. “They always get their man.”
Anya is live and ready to show you everything. Watch her strip, dance, and perform exclusive shows just for you. Interact in real-time and make your fantasies come true.
✓ Live Streaming✓ Interactive Chat✓ Private Shows✓ HD Quality✓ Free Actions
Free to watch • No registration required • HD streaming
Written on my lunch break based loosely on something that happened in my office waiting room this morning. Counting this as my participation in Writing Wednesday as tagged by @corporatebanana and @devirnis. If anyone else is sharing you should tag me also I love to be nosy and see things!!!!!
Tommy doesn't get many FaceTime calls. Usually it's one of Sal's daughters, using his phone to show off an achievement or an injury. Occasionally it's Lucy when she's shopping for Harbor's snack cubpard and they don't have the specific brand of pretzels he likes and she needs him to pick an alternative.
So when Tommy answers his phone on instinct while working in his garage, he's shocked when a face fills up the screen. He's even more shocked that the face belongs to a little boy, one who's brow is scrunched up in confusion.
"You're not a game," he says somewhat petulantly. And loudly, the volume making Tommy move the phone further away from his face.
"No, I am not," Tommy confirms, now squinting at the screen to try and see who's calling him. "Sorry, kid."
"Theo, please give me the phone back," a strained voice calls out from off screen. A very familiar voice, one that means this whole situation makes even less sense than it did before.
"But the lady said to play a game on my Daddy's phone while you did boring grown up stuff," the boy who is apparently Theo yells out, just as loud as before. It's the same way that Evan's voice used to rise in volume when he got excited about something. "Who's 'Daddy?'" he asks just as Evan's face enters into frame, turning a furious red at the question.
"Um," he says, refusing to look at Tommy at all. He's crouching down, some sort of desk behind him and Theo, and Tommy thinks he can hear a phone ringing in the background. "J-just let me see the phone and I'll pull up a game for you, okay?"
"No I don't wanna play a game anymore," Theo whines. He apparently still has custody of the phone, Tommy's view blurring as he shakes the phone in his little hands. "I wanna talk to funny eyebrow man."
"Well mister, uh. Tommy is probably really busy right now so—"
"I'm not busy," Tommy finds himself saying. He tells himself that he keeps the call going just out of curiosity, a burning desire to find out what in the fresh hell has been happening in his absence. Deep down, though, he knows it's because he's never been able to see an Evan Buckley in need and not jump in to help.
From somewhere to the side, Tommy hears Buck sigh deeply. "Theo you can talk to Tommy while you wait for me to fill out paperwork, but only if you use your inside voice. Deal?"
Theo nods solemnly, phone moving with his head. "Deal," he says, in what is clearly a small child's impression of a whisper.
"Theo, did you know that I fly helicopters?" Tommy asks, making sure to keep his voice quiet. Just as he suspected, Theo's face lights up in excitement as he turns to face the screen again. Next to him, Tommy can just barley catch Evan standing back up.
"Woah," Theo says, bouncing a little. His hair looks sort of like Buck's does when he first wakes up in the morning. Tommy isn't sure what to think about that.
He and Theo talk about helicopters for maybe five minutes while Buck presumably fills out paperwork behind him, and Tommy only has to suggest they both talk a little quieter one time. Just like Evan, Theo seems to lock in on things he finds fascinating, and Tommy is half way through listing out the various instruments inside a helicopter when Evan ducks back down again.
"Alright, bud, the boring stuff is over but we still have to wait a little bit before the doctor comes to grab us. They receptionist says there are some toys and books in the waiting room, if you want to go play with those?" He says it almost hopefully, like he's worried that Theo is as interested in Tommy as he used to be, and that Evan will never get his phone back.
Theo shakes his head emphatically. "Nooooo, funny eyebrow man is telling my about the click click."
"Cyclic," Tommy corrects gently. "But that was pretty close. You'll be up in the air in no time."
Buck drops his head, sighing in defeat. "You can keep talking while we wait, as long as you stay quiet and hang up when the doctor comes." Apparently, Evan has yet to learn his lesson about bargaining with a kid.
"Yay!" Theo cries, drawing out the word, and pretty soon the sound of tiny sneakers running on linoleum fills the speaker as Theo bounces over to the main waiting room. Evan offers to hold the phone while he climbs onto the seat, but Theo insists on doing it himself, and pretty soon Tommy finds himself getting interrogated once more.
He can see Evan's arm in the corner of the screen, and Tommy tries not to spend the entire call staring at where the sleeve of his shirt wraps tightly around his bicep. After several more minutes of chatting, Tommy hears Theo's name called out, and the little boy groans, slumping in his chair.
"Hey," Evan says, leaning over. "Remember what I said? We have to say goodbye now because the doctor is ready for us."
Theo's pout is on full display, something else that looks achingly familiar to Tommy. "But I don't wanna!"
"Theo you promised you would hang up when it was time to see the doctor." Evan reaches for the phone but Theo pulls it away. "What…um. M-maybe we can call Tommy again later, after the doctor?" Tommy can't see Evan's face, but he can certainly imagine it.
Curious, Theo looks between the phone and Evan. "Can we?" he asks, directing his queation to Tommy.
"Or," Tommy says. "Maybe we could see each other in person sometime. I could show you what a real helicopter looks like."
"Really?" Theo is practically vibrating out of his seat now.
"Yeah, but you have to hang up and go see the doctor first."
"Okay!" Theo agrees happily, and before Tommy can say anything else the call ends.
Tommy blinks at the dark screen for a few moments, half expecting to get a call back, but when nothing happens he sets his phone down again and tries to focus back on the oil change he had started 20 minutes ago.
An hour later, his phone dings again, this time with a text.
Did you mean it Evan had asked him.
Yes Tommy sends back immediately.
At least, I meant what I said about taking Theo to see a helicopter.
He hesitates a moment before sending one final text. Some other things I've said in the past…I might not have meant those.
Tommy has just started to bite his nails, a habit he thought he kicked decades ago, when his phone screen lights back up.
Good the text reads.
And then: Me too.
And finally: Are you free Saturday?
The sigh Tommy lets out feels like one that he's been holding in for over a year, and he doesn't think he's imagining the tension leaving his shoulders. I am he texts back.
Evan reacts to the message with a thumbs up, and then moments later changes it to a heart. Tommy's own skips a beat.
Sounds like a plan is the response. This time, Tommy reacts with a heart straight away.
There's no other messages after, and he figures Evan is probably somewhere wrangling a small child, if he had to guess. Tommy sets his phone down, whistling while he finishes up the maintenance on his truck. For the first time in a long time, he's got something to look forward to this weekend.
Between working on 5 au fact fills, I've been noodling around with another Maia ficlet. Have some words.
--
"Is this it?" Maia said with heavy skepticism.
What do you mean 'is this it'?" Buck said, twisting around to face her as Tommy, taking their lives into his hands, squeaked through an opening barely larger than the car to pull into the 118's lot. They opted to just rent a car for their big LA visit so they weren't depending on family being available to cart them around. Well, that and the fact he knew his husband and daughter; at some point the trip was going to become overwhelming and they would need to escape for a few hours. They would probably go to the movies or to Tommy's favorite ramen place where Maia could show off her horrifying talent of swallowing noodles without chewing.
"I mean, it's fine," Maia said, shrugging. "Your station is bigger."
His daughter was talking about his station. His chest swelled with pride.
"We're in the suburbs. There's room to sprawl." Tommy pulled into one of the last open spaces. Looked to be a good turn out. "But yeah, Rombout is nicer. It's got a better kitchen."
When Buck went to reflexively protest, Tommy cut him a fond look from under arched brows. "Fine, it's a little nicer," Buck reluctantly conceded. The interior had been gutted and fully renovated a year before he took command, and the kitchen was large and airy with an abundance of counter space and an island he could exile Shawn to for prep work.
Tommy cut the engine and directed the full devastating power of that scrunchy smile Buck's way. "Sweetheart, it was love at first sight when you saw the range stove and oven. You'd elope with it if it was legal to marry appliances."
"It does cook two turkeys at the same time," Buck said, a little too old to play at being coy but doing it anyway. "But it can't fly a helicopter. So you're probably safe until the machines take over."
"Mm, probably," Tommy said.
Buck caught the tip of his tongue between his teeth.
"Oh my god, I'm right here." Maia flung open the door and then flung herself out.
Tommy's shoulders shook with laughter. "We're emotionally scarring the kid again. And right in front of her salad."
"She'll get over it." He darted in for a quick kiss before going after Maia.
She'd made it a dozen steps before coming to a stop, arms crossed so tightly over her chest that she was just about hugging herself. She regarded the open bay doors with familiar narrow eyed suspicion. Bobby never liked having them closed; it sent the wrong message.
"Everything all right?" he asked quietly.
"Fine." She'd been going lighter on the eye makeup since the got to LA--probably because it was just too hot to bother with--and it left her looking achingly young despite her deep seated suspicion of anything new. "This is where you worked."
"Me and Evan," Tommy said, slipping an arm around Buck's waist, easy as anything. "Not at the same time. I was here first and then Evan started after I'd transferred over to Air Ops. There's probably still some pictures of us hanging around."
"One question," she said in the universal tone of a teenager about to be a little shit.
"Shoot," said Tommy in the universal tone of a parent about to be a little shit right back.
"How did you get hired as a firefighter before man's discovery of fire?"
Tommy, always delighted by Maia making fun of them, grinned. "Good question. Mostly we dealt with mastodon tramplings and the occasional saber tooth tiger mauling."
Now,
In June,
When the night is a vast softness
Filled with blue stars,
And broken shafts of moon-glimmer
Fall upon the earth,
Am I too old to see the fairies dance?
I cannot find them any more.
Summary: On their way to Nash's first birthday party, Margaret and Phillip's rental car blows a tire. Luckily, an off-duty firefighter shows up to help.
Excerpt:
Phillip's smile tilts oddly, followed by his head. "I-I'm so sorry, this is going to sound strange, but do I know you...?"
"I have one of those faces," the man says, glancing Margaret's way and nodding in acknowledgment of her presence. It's unexpectedly nice. The clerk who rented them the car spoke only to Phillip the entire time.
Then he does a double take worthy of Bob Newhart. "Mrs. Buckley?"
She blinks, then gasps. He's not just familiar. "Oh! You're Ev—um, Buck's friend."
'Friend' isn't the right word. She winces a little the second it leaves her mouth, because you don't kiss your friends the way Evan did this man on Maddie's wedding day. She certainly never has, and Philip better not have.
Hello there. Do you know that I adore everything you write? Because I do. For the 5 au facts, what about if bucktommy are already dating by the time the Buck Begins/Daniel reveal arc happens.
hey dharma? i adore you too. this was a fucking demonic prompt. please enjoy.
---
a train derailed
bucktommy, 3k, complete
tags: alternate first meeting; alternate s4; past buck/abby; past abby/tommy; the buckley parents
Summary:
One train derailment can lead to endless possibilities.
Excerpt:
"You're actually my first stop on the Abby Clark Farewell Los Angeles Tour," Abby says as she sits down across from Tommy. "You get to go first, because I'm getting married in a month and I want to put to rest—" She motions at the dead air between her and Tommy. "All this."
She's clearly angry at Tommy, so that's why he says, right out the gate: "Listen. I'm gay, I didn't tell you, and I'm sorry, I know now it was never going to work, but you were my first real relationship, the first woman I actually felt something for, and I really thought it could work but—that didn't go away, no matter how much I cared about you."
Abby stares at him, then sighs. "Ugh. Alright, well. Fuck you. I'm—you're happy, right? You have to be. Tell me you broke up with me and now you're deliriously happy with someone hot and you have five dogs, and then I can go back to always hating you a little."
Tommy... can't tell her that.
She sighs again, her exhale hitting one of the luxurious waves of hair falling into her eyes in a beautifully annoying fashion. If only that was Tommy's thing. "Well. Please have a better life. I know I have, and I know I will."
Tommy thinks he deserves that.
Anya is live and ready to show you everything. Watch her strip, dance, and perform exclusive shows just for you. Interact in real-time and make your fantasies come true.
✓ Live Streaming✓ Interactive Chat✓ Private Shows✓ HD Quality✓ Free Actions
Free to watch • No registration required • HD streaming
what if Buck was an ecologist and Tommy was the pilot flying him to his extraordinarily remote study location
truly the least equipped person to handle this prompt but i appreciate your faith in me. 💖anyway, i've filled this over on ao3:
---
swimming with sharks
bucktommy, 1.4k, complete
"You know what's crazier than a guy flying out here several times a year to research shark breeding grounds he can't find?" Evan asks. "The guy who flies him out there."
Tommy smiles. "Guilty."
For the AU game, I think you may hate this but I think you could do justice to a Multiverse, however you want to interpret that 😋
Oh, the multiverse, a fun little idea that now has to be crammed into everything because if the MCU is doing something then everyone has to do the exact same thing, even if the MCU is doing it in the most boring way possible.
The multiverse is like any other kind of narrative trope or tool in telling stories, in that it is neutral and depends on the skill of the artist wielding it. I personally think the multiverse works best on a narrowly focused character level. When a character is literally confronted with themselves and the choices they've made, what does that reveal about them? Are they jealous of their alternate self? Do they regret not taking a certain road? Does seeing a version of themself that did take that road give them a kind of peace? Or does it enrage them? Do they even like themself? Is this alternate timeline/universe in trouble and the characters have to grapple with the morality of helping or using their resources to save themselves? Ultimately, what does this say about who the characters are?
The MCU approach to the multiverse is extremely boring to me. Oh look, here's the Fantastic Four and Professor X from another reality are we going to do anything with that? Nope, we're going to explode their heads. The MCU isn't doing anything interesting with the multiverse other than just bashing dolls together. And look, I write fanfic, I write au fanfic, I love playing dolls, but I'm not being given millions of dollars to make movies that have dominated the past twenty years of popular culture that ultimately do nothing and say nothing. (Someone give me millions of dollars and lfj's contact info and I will turn the time loop fic into a movie.)
I think Spiderverse strikes a good balance between these two. You have the fun gags and visuals of the various spider-people--I particularly like Noir Spider-Man and the looney tune hijinks of Spider-Ham--but they are there to support Miles's story. As they tell him when he loses his Uncle Aaron, they've all lost someone they love and they all understand and grieve with him. Spider-Man is defined by having great power and the great responsibility that goes along with it, but they now know that great responsibility is shared among them. (Across the Spiderverse's use of the multiverse is different than Into the Spiderverse's and while I like Across the Spiderverse and love its animation, on a story level I think Spiderverse is the better movie.)
Anyway, that's enough media criticism. Here's some weird bullshit.
(cw: for referenced past child abuse)
--
1. The Council of Tommys meet for the first time when they’re seventeen. They’ve always been there, flickers of shadow that move with or away from him: Tommy turned left, others went right; he opted for AP Physics instead of Biology and meant Shawn, another Tommy took Bio and met Beth; he skipped class to drive up to the lake with Shawn, the other Tommy lost his virginity to Beth; he learned to keep his mouth shut at home, another Tommy showed up to school with a broken arm. Tommy spent most of his life alone, but he was never lonely.
“I’m just saying,” says a Tommy with long hair and pierced ears, “there’s other options than enlisting.”
“Like what?” Tommy says. He was too slow last week; his finger is splinted Some days all he wants to do is scream himself to death. “Where else are we going to fucking go?”
“Not into the fucking army,” another Tommy spits, lip split and furious. “Do you know what they do to guys like us?”
There are infinite Tommys at the Council, a recursive fractal stretching without end, and they all shift and press knuckles to their mouths. They all feel it, the need to start screaming and never stop. In the words of Tracy Chapman, leave tonight or live and die this way.
“I got an aunt in Pennsylvania,” a Tommy at the far end of the rooms says. His hair is shorn close to his scalp and he holds himself so small and scared, a prey animal. “I’m going there.”
“That’s crazier than the army plan,” the angry Tommy says with an ugly laugh. “I’ve never met her. I don’t even know her name.”
“It’s Anne,” Tommy says, but it’s lost in the ensuing arguing.
Pennsylvania Tommy, as scared and small as he is, is still a Kinard, and he stands up and says, firm and unforgiving, “I saved up money, and I got a car, and I am not dying here.” He looks to Tommy. “Do what you gotta do to get out of here.”
And then that Tommy leaves the Council for his own life.
Into the desperate, terrified silence, Tommy says, “My birthday is in a couple of months. I’m going. You do what you want.”
Tommy goes back to his life, and enlists the day he turns eighteen. He leaves home and he, at least, never looks back.
2. They wait until they've been transferred to Germany and weaned off the good drugs before holding another Council. Once he's been cleared by the doctors for travel, he'll be back on a plane to the US where his discharge will be processed and he'll be back to being plain old Tommy Kinard, civilian.
"This is why I said not to enlist," the Tommy with pierced ears says. Instead of spending the last few years dodging every bullet but the last one, this Tommy had apparently been stretching out his ears with increasingly lager earrings and getting tattoos and experimenting with different hair colors. Tommy is as jealous as he is furious. "What are you going to do now?"
He looks at his fellow soldiers, the ones who made it. There are fewer attendees to this Council of Tommys—for every Tommy who had survived, there was one who didn’t—and there was no sign of Pennsylvania Tommy since he packed his car and took off. He wasn't dead. They knew what it felt like when one of them died, like when a tiny Tommy Kinard was knocking into the corner of the coffee table and never got up again. These had gone to Pennsylvania and never bothered to return.
"I know how to fly," Tommy says, shifting in vain along with the other Tommys in other hospital beds as they tried to find a position that didn't hurt. "I can get a job doing that."
"What, running tours?" says one Tommy, who had been dishonorably discharged under DADT because he'd been dumb enough not to turn away when Jax looked in their direction.
"There's medevac," Tommy says because he had spent the long hours stuck in a hospital bed thinking about this. "Search and Rescue. Some fire departments have an air ops division."
"Bet you wish you had more experience in conducting rescue ops," says the Tommy who eschewed the army in favor of the coast guard and hasn't stopped being smug about it since.
"I'm just saying we have options," Tommy says.
Three beds over, one of the quiet Tommys says, "Simpson invited me home. He's got an uncle and some cousins that own a ranch in Montana. He said we could stay with them while we get back on our feet."
There wasn't a Tommy Kinard who didn't have a bit of an asshole streak to him, and so it wasn't a surprise when several made the cymbal rimshot noise. Simpson had gotten it worse and his leg was amputated just below the knee.
"What are you going to do in Montana?" long haired Tommy asks, curious rather than judgmental. "Ride horses?"
Quiet Tommy shrugs, a small gesture. All of their fathers were angry men, but some were worse than others. "Why not? We learned how to fly, didn't we?"
"But Montana," says another one.
"A lotta sky there," Coast Guard Tommy says.
They all nod. There is a lot of sky out there.
"What about you?" a different version of himself asks him. "You want to go play cowboy?"
"I think," he says slowly, carefully stretching out his legs, teeth gritted against the pain, "I want to go to California."
They all nod again. There is a lot of sky in California, too.
They don't take a census—they never have; it's never needed—and the Council ends. Each of them go and live their singular life.
3. “I’m going to ask Abby to marry me,” a Tommy says when the Council meets again. There were less and less of them every time. Their shadows remained, those little flickers of choices not made, but they stopped showing up, too different for even the Council.
Tommy sucks air between his teeth. He met Abby through a holiday party for first responders, and he liked how hard won her smile was, how bright her laughter, the careful way she held herself, and, for just a moment, he thought maybe in the same way way he thought about the Tommys who went to Pride and wore nail polish and had been brave enough to kiss Jax, and he had slipped away before she could ask for his number.
This Tommy had stayed. This Tommy gave Abby his number. This Tommy desperately wants what he is supposed to want: a marriage to a beautiful woman, a house, kids maybe.
“It’s not going to work,” says a Tommy with bright green nails.
“Why not?” that Tommy asks. “Why can’t we be normal?”
“Because,” Tommy says, the only thing he’s said at all, “I’m a fag. You know that.”
They do know that, and they weep, some out of terror, some out of pride, and some just for the joy making it out and being alive.
4. There is no time for a Council. Evan calls; he needs a pilot. Every Tommy Kinard who exists, every shadow and recursive fractal spread out through every universe, answers. There is no world in which he doesn’t.
He picks up Evan and Moira BLake. He flies them away from SoCal Biomed. He evades the army. He does not crash. Bobby Nash dies.
When it’s over, those few who remain interrogate themselves at the Council. Was it a mistake to engage instead of withdrawing? Should they have tried to climb instead of hiding among the buildings? This wasn’t Afghanistan; the tricks that kept them alive are useless here. No, they would have been forced down sooner. Did they see Evan? Did they see how he looked at them?
None of it matters. Bobby dies and dies and dies. Evan screams his throat bloody. Tommy is alone with himself.
5. The final Council is held on a Thursday. It is only him and the Tommy with pierced ears and full tattoo sleeves. The ones who went to Pennsylvania and Montana and Peru, who kept their mouths shut in Eddie’s kitchen, who touched Evan’s elbow after the funeral, are long gone. Those Tommys don’t need each other anymore.
“You know why it’s just us,” says the other Tommy.
“I know,” Tommy says.
The other Tommy fiddles with the heavy silver ring on his index finger. “I never met him. I don’t even know if I can. Maybe I’m too different from you.”
Before, when the others were around, Tommy could feel the weight of a wedding ring on his finger. He always assumed it belonged to the Tommy who married Abby. But maybe he got it all wrong. He usually does.
“I’ve always wanted to get my ears pierced,” Tommy says. “And I wanted tattoos and to grow out my hair and paint my nails. I never did. I was too afraid.”
Tommy shakes his head. “Dad would have killed us. He nearly got me, but I was faster.”
There is a phantom scar on his arm and a phantom nick on his neck from a flung plate aimed at his head. They survived their father; they can survive this.
“I keep hoping,” this Tommy says, wistful. “It happened for you. You found Evan. Maybe it will happen for me.”
He feels that weight again. “Try Pennsylvania again. He might be a teacher. That’s what Evan thinks he might have done if Daniel lived.”
“Do you think so?” Tommy asks, overflowing with hope.
“Worth a shot.”
“And what about you?” The silver ring spins and spins and spins. “Are you going to try?”
“Worth a shot,” he says, again.
And that is how the last Council of Tommy Kinard ends, with hope.
6. Tommy is ten minutes early but Evan still beats him to the coffee shop. He’d claimed the good table, the one that did wobble and was in the shade.
“I, uh, got you coffee,” Evan says, wiping his hands nervously on his pants. He’s lost some weight, but he’s still so beautiful. “I know how you take it now.”
“I hope so.” He sits without being asked. There’s only him; he’s so nervous. “You’ve made it for me often enough.”
Evan ducks his head, cheeks pink and blushing. Of course the other Tommys stayed gone. Why come back when they could be with Evan?
“I’m really happy you called,” Evan says, glancing up through his lashes. “I kept meaning to, but it’s been so long. It feels like we maybe missed our window.”
There are no other Tommy Kinards. There is only him. What a responsibility. What a gift.
“I don’t think there is a window. We get to decide.” He holds out his hand. “Are you ready for something?”
Evan’s smile is brighter than the Afghan sun. “I am,” Evan says, and takes his hand.
turnnoffyourmind
stormborns
gummygunk
izzy806
kaledo-art
tangentwithtanner
andulkaphoto
theartofmadeline
jbbartram-illu
