Blunderbuss

No, no, and NO.

AO3 does not live in “the cloud” because that is other people’s computers, and other people’s computers are vulnerable to censorship.

AO3 is on its own computers. It does still have to be housed somewhere, and I suppose a determined enough hater could try to find that place and go after it, but it’s a lot harder than sending spurious complaints to Amazon or whomever going “BadWrong things are hosted on your cloud service!”

AO3 is not “in the cloud.” AO3 is stored on physical machines that the OTW owns.

They take him home. They give him the Hebrew name Kal-El and the American name Clark so he will fit in. They know what it is to be different. There is no Hebrew school in Smallville so they teach him at home, and study Torah together. When he shows special abilities, they wonder to each other if he is the Moshiach. Not for the strength of his body, but for the strength of his kindness. He always seems to be helping others, delivering them from harm, as he was delivered to them. They never tell him this, but they teach him about the obligations without measure. He's a natural.

At school, he is side-eyed for being different. When he displays eccentricities, the villagers shrug and say "maybe it's a Jewish thing." The Kents make sure he values his education, and is always home for Shabbas dinner.

His is bar-mitzva'd at the nearest shul, a few towns over. They didn't know his birthday, so they chose one near Parshat Shemot. Now they worry that was too on-the-nose, but he gives a moving d'var about the obligation to speak truth to power.

As he comes into his own and tries to be a hero, he hides his identity from the public, not out of shame, but to keep his adopted parents safe. They've been persecuted enough.

When he moves to the big city for a job at a newspaper, Pa is so proud he cries. Clark uses his journalistic skills to expose corruption, give voice to the neglected and oppressed, and research his own origins. When he learns the truth about Krypton and his birth parents' desperate bid to send him to safety, Ma and Pa are not at all surprised that they were right.

When Clark brings Lois home, he assures his parents she is a nice Jewish girl, but they're just glad she's a mensch. They step on a glass to remember the destruction of Krypton, and stand under a chuppah quilted by Ma.

A white billionaire spews lies about him, trying to spread fear of the stranger in their midst. He comes out in public and says "There's nothing more American than being an immigrant."

When the government turns against immigrants, he stands on the side of the protestors and protects. Tear gass does nothing to him. He makes himself a shield. He writes article after article in the Daily Planet, making sure the public knows what their government is doing, that immigrants know their rights, that the powerful are put on notice. When they start rounding people up, he says "Never again."

They were! Superman was created in 1938 by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, two Jewish boys, sons of immigrants.

Two little girls playing gently with a daddy long legs.

Girl 1: can it die?

First thing is probably that Darcy Lewis isn’t (wasn’t?) just popular being shipped with Bucky Barnes - she’s just popular full stop. Darcy Lewis has been shipped with every character you can think of, and probably a few more you never would. That whole What If? Howard the Duck thing? Normal for Darcy.

The bigger question is why, and you’re hardly the first to ask. It’s even been covered in articles (confession: I am mentioned in this article, but genuinely didn’t know about it until earlier this year).

The answer in my opinion - or at least why I write Darcy - is that she’s a canon character but she’s accessible. She is, broadly speaking, normal - certainly in comparison to the enhanced characters of the MCU, or even the on he es that technically aren’t, like Nat & Barton. Even if you compare to other “normal” characters, she’s the most normal - Jane Foster has a Nobel prize and was still mentally calculating equations as she was actively dying. Great character, not so much of an Everyman.

Darcy on the other hand is pretty average - but we also just have the bare facts of her. As far as writing goes, she’s an open book. And for someone like myself who enjoys writing but simply doesn’t have the time to world build a whole original narrative and characters from the ground up, she’s a bit of gift in that way - she’s canon, but she gives me creative licence to explore and try new things when I’m writing.

Her ship names are epic, by the way. For whatever reason the fandom jumped on the idea of her tasing Thor that one time and absolutely ran with it, so you get things like:

Wintershock (Darcy x Bucky)

Shieldshock (Darcy x Steve)

Taster tricks (Darcy x Loki)

Taser torch (Darcy x Johnny Storm)

And so on - there’s plenty out there, this really doesn’t even scratch the surface, believe me.

If we want to focus specifically in on Wintershock (and why not, it’s mainly what I write after all), Bucky Barnes is also a creative gift for a writer who wants to write but doesn’t have the bandwidth to create a whole original world from the ground up. Aside from Natasha, he’s probably had the most appearances in the main MCU timeline, but with a tiny amount of screen time to match - despite two films ostensibly being about his character and journey.

He’s got backstory, but it’s not really explored - or, in the case of FATWS, questionably explored. If you’re a writer who wants to delve into grief, loss, PTSD, adjustment to modern life, and a whole host of other things - well, there he is. It doesn’t even have to be as dark as all that - the options are pretty open.

So putting the pair of them together again narratively speaking is great because the options are so wide - plus, he’s from a different time, and Darcy is generally written as pretty damn modern. Believe me, there’s a lot of “Darcy helps the 40s boy adjust” 2012 fics out there. She’s as ubiquitous in that tower as Barton’s vents and Thor’s pop tarts.

In 2012 the @fuckyeahdarcylewis blog was born, and this post adds to the commentary above as to why Darcyland was so popular, and why it meant (means, hopefully) so much to the people involved.

for any address to twitter you can replace the “x.com” with “nitter.net” and you will be able to browse as if you have an account. Lifesaver.