recs and links

There's always the possibility that he won't remember her tomorrow, a metaphorical sword hovering over her head. Not that they've been tinkering with his memories during the time she's known the Winter Soldier, but Natasha knows what they must have done before. She knows, because she has a pretty accurate idea of her employer's tactics. And she knows, because last week he woke up in the middle of the night, or almost woke up, and began talking about the forties. Shortly, melancholy look at Bucky's time with Natalia as the Winter Soldier.

"It's just different." "Different?" "From last Christmas." Bucky tilted his head curiously, and gave Steve half a smile. "Yeah? Doesn't have to be." really lovely.

He doesn’t give compliments - not verbal ones, at least. Still, his fingers linger on her skin like she’s made of fine porcelain - the fragile clay of which she was formed, not the immortal flesh which she has become. His hands skim her thighs, her hipbones, her waist, her breast as he moves under her in rhythms that grow rough as his body succumbs to pleasure. Lovely bit of Bruce/Diana.

Really lovely look at Mal and Zoe's relationship as he watches her marry Wash. He took her hand as the sky cleared, took it and spun her as Wash looked on, raised a glass. Zoe smiled with great tolerance, and right then, right there, he couldn't help thinking that maybe things were on the right compass. They were a small family on a small ship, about to fall into that longest and most difficult war there was in these parts: survival. They might just do okay.

"Yep," Bucky laughs. "No matter what I say, he won't give it up. All of them actually." He shakes his head and drinks. "It's strange being accepted for something I'm not," he says, starting to slur his words, and he lies down on his back. "They're great guys though." Everyone thinks Steve and Bucky are fucking. They're okay with that. This is adorable.

Sharp, sensual snippet of Bucky and Cap during the war. (comicsverse)

Bucky likes to smoke and Steve likes to watch him. Really lovely and full of UST.

Dean feels special, for knowing the truth: that the F.B.I. guy is just this dude who’s getting older and who’s trying to do the right thing. He can’t kill a vampire with only the power of his mind, but Dean knows that he’s got floppy hair and a big nose and the sort of smile that lights up a room. Dean and Mulder cross paths a few times over the years. Nicely done.

The granddaughter of a famous comics author and illustrator comes to the team for help in recovering the rights to one of her grandfather’s last creations. Really nice Hardison POV, and some lovely Hardison/Parker UST. (could use a good line edit )

Steph, Damian and Dick help out Wonder Woman. Even Damian is impressed with her, because she is FLAWLESS.

He doesn’t need the contrition and he certainly wouldn’t listen to an apology if Steve offered. He would be asking forgiveness for being who he is, or who he was. He would be apologizing for being small and asthmatic, for not being just another goddamn grunt in the mud, slogging through Europe next to Bucky. As though he would have made a difference in that battle. As though he wouldn’t have been killed long before he got this far. Lovely, achy Cap/Bucky set just after Bucky is rescued. (movieverse)

He's not allowed to feel bad about Steve. This isn't Bucky's story. "This isn't my story," he says angrily to the dark water. "Never is, is it?" a voice by Bucky's ear asks. When he whips around, there's no one there. Fuck Gotham. Bucky and Jason hook up and try to move on. Sharp and lovely.

Kon sees Tim unmasked for the first time and it totally blows his mind. This is both hot and hilarious.

Jason and Steph meet at his dad's funeral. Sweet, melancholy AU in which things hopefully go better for them than in canon.

Tony and Pepper work out a friends with benefits arrangements, but things don't go as planned. Sweet and hot (though some of the sex is a little romance novel-y).

He was angry enough to cry, if he cried. But Damian did not cry. He did not cry for himself, he did not cry for his mother and father, and he certainly didn’t cry for Batgirl. But if he did, he might have. Damian keeps vigil outside Steph's hospital room during Batgirl 24. Oh, heart.

Steve hypnotizes Bucky, who reveals that he has feelings for Steve. Really lovely first kiss, set prior to the movie.

If Bucky was trying to convince himself of his sanity, he'd say that he'd started fantasizing about sucking Steve off after he showed up to save him that day, newfound strength in every limb as he helped Bucky up and out of that hellish place. But it wouldn't be the truth. Now, if Bucky was being honest, then he'd say how that was a complete lie, and that really he'd started fantasizing about such things long ago, long before Steve had become the star-spangled super soldier they all now knew him as, long before either of them had considered enlisting. Maybe even before there was a need to enlist. Sweet and hot.

Kate keeps trying to connect with Bucky, but it doesn't quite work out the way she'd hoped.

Brief glimpses of Steve and Bucky's friendship over the years. Lovely.

Warm, funny, heartbreaking AU where Damian has become Batman and Steph is the only one left to keep him human. This story hit buttons I'd forgotten I had, and it really works to make Steph/Damian believable. The ending is as inevitable as it is heartbreaking, and yet it's still shocking when it arrives. The author's already written an AU with an alternate ending (index here: http://quipquipquip.tumblr.com/post/7952436349/fic-no-dawn-no-day-timeline) which helps after the brutality of the ending. (could use a good beta, but definitely worth reading)

info about how olivia's and lincoln's military service probably played out

Tim and Kon get stuck in a closet. Tim's strategies for dealing with Kon never took this situation into account. Hilarious and adorable.

It's not every night and it didn't happen right off the bat, either. It takes a few weeks of build up--of Charles carefully avoiding the spilling colors of Erik's mind; of soft, fuzzy broadcast confusion that slowly congealed into jealousy and then hate hate hate--and another couple of days of dithering dilemma (moral, mostly). Just that Charles is a little bit of a lush sometimes, and even when he isn't, he likes it when the world spins a little oddly so that the voices in everyone's heads blur together beautifully. It's easy, then, to focus on one mind without getting all, well, handsy, for lack of a better word: he can have someone in his awareness without learning all her hidden secrets. Or his hidden secrets. That's another thing about Charles: mind-to-mind, he doesn't think that gender's a big deal. Lovely, achy Charles/Erik.

"I taught him to fly you know, Tom Riddle." Minerva knows, but Xiomara's not telling her the story so she'll listen to the words. She's speaking because talking is what makes them human. They have to talk, keep talking, find stories that remind them they are more than silent, suffering warriors facing another long night. Quiet, lovely McGonagall/Hooch in the aftermath of the Battle of Hogwarts.

This story is amazing. It is the Fringe/X-Files Dunham/Scully fic of my dreams. Nails all the character voices and features mentions of Scully mentoring Olivia and Astrid at Quantico and old X-Files cases popping up for the Fringe team and just ALL the awesome Dana Scully and Olivia Dunham bring to the multiverse. ♥

Exactly what it says on the tin. Agent Coulson is awesome and this is hilarious.

Lovely bit of Bucky ruminating on how Steve has - and hasn't - changed since becoming Captain America.