Agents Of B.A.R.B.I.E. -> Phil Coulson

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B2MEM - "Hope"

@spring-into-arda (301 words; a continuation of my earlier AU where Finarfin arrives in Beleriand to find nothing but ruins)

There was someone outside the camp.

Finarfin should mention this to someone, probably, but he couldn’t prove it; there was no movement in the endless fields of high, stinging grass, no rustle in the dead limbs of the trees. No noise. No perceptible hint.

But there was an itch at the back of his mind that insisted someone was here.

Madness, probably. A manifestation of desperate hope after weeks of marching through Beleriand and finding nothing, nothing, nothing. Failing that, surely it was the Enemy, at last showing himself.

Surely.

But the itch at the back of his mind felt . . . not like the hunts he had never particularly enjoyed, but that he had gone on for his children’s sakes. It felt like the games they had played when they were small, and he would walk into his office and know they were there even before he had spotted a tiny foot peeking out from behind his desk.

The madness of hope.

Even if Artanis was still alive, was still free, surely she would approach the hosts her father was leading openly, not creep around the edges of his camp like a thief.

He shot one last look at the dead emptiness of the woods before nodding to the guards and letting himself back into the command tent. 

The flap fell behind him. The itch intensified.

He turned.

A gaunt figure was sitting at his desk. There was barely an ounce of flesh left on the figure waiting, in dead stillness, in the chair; just bruised and bloodied skin stretched across knife sharp bone. 

The only hint of life was in the eyes: dark and haunted with more horror than Arafinwe could even now imagine, but still burning with a hint of dread fire.

“Hello, uncle,” rasped Makalaure. “I’ve come to bargain.”

Diana Wynne Jones wins big once again for understanding that the funniest way to write an isekai/portal fantasy is from the point of view of the people living in the fantasy world who look at the character who got isekai’d from our world and are like ‘WHAT is that guy’s deal???’

Howl/Howell stumbling back into his moving castle drunk after a night with his rugby bros is like the second funniest scene in that book, closely followed by poor Sophie getting reverse isekai’d and taking a day trip to Wales and suffering the terrible ordeal of a ride in a car.

Fic Recommendations! (Sorry I’m a little late.)

A boy king learns connects to some unruly subjects and is nearly kidnapped by them. (https://archiveofourown.org/works/282977/chapters/450232)

In searching for his father across treacherous sees, a brave boy finds a dad. (https://archiveofourown.org/works/25320028/chapters/61389370)

A princess meets a hero, and he is not what she expected (not romantic). (https://archiveofourown.org/works/64745257)

Hope you enjoy at least one.

I chose the third option and really enjoyed it! I'm not very familiar with Legends of Zelda, but it was still a fun story without all the lore background.

Now that I've looked at the other fics, I'll definitely give the Narnia one a read as well!

As the ultimate dad, one of Coulson's many duties is to teach his kids to drive...

...

Driving lessons with the SHIELD family.

Agents of Shield for the fandom ask game!

Oh, sweet!!!!

Send me a fandom and I'll tell you...

The first character I ever fell in love with: probably May or Skye!

A character that I used to love/like, but now do not: *looks directly into the camera like I'm on The Office*

A ship that I used to love/like, but now do not: Skyeward. Ahhhh, for the good old days.... or something

My ultimate favorite character™: May, of course!!! She's AWESOME

Prettiest character: maybe Daisy? Wait. No. Sousa

My most hated character: you'd think it'd be Ward, because he sucks. And he's up there. But I think I'll go with AIDA

My OTP: Philinda my darlings. Also Dousy

My NOTP: Fitz and AIDA, naturally!

Favorite episode: As I Have Always Been kinda lives rent free. Also, FZZT is SO good. Ooooh, and I really love the season two finale

Saddest death: ohhhhhh gosh. Either Tripp or Coulson

Favorite season: Probably three or seven

Least favorite season: six

Character that everyone else in the fandom loves, but I hate: I have no idea🤣

My ‘you’re a piece of trash, but you’re still a fave’ fave: Lance Hunter!! I love him and yet I freely admit he's a trainwreck

My ‘beautiful cinnamon roll who deserves better than this’ fave: Fitzsimmons. If I had to choose one, I'd say Fitz

My ‘they’re kind of cute, and I lowkey ship them, but I'm not too invested’ ship: honestly? Probably also Fitzsimmons. Don't get me wrong, they're really cute, they're just not my personal favorites!!!

Thanks for the ask!!!

sometimes creation is just trying to impress

Good Friday

The more you think about it, the worse it gets.

No part of the Passion Gospel, the Gospel for Good Friday, has any hope.

Even the tender moments – Jesus asking John to take care of his mother, Joseph and Nicodemus making sure that Jesus has a proper burial – they’re just people dealing with the fallout from death.

You know what Joseph and Nicodemus are thinking about while they’re wrapping Jesus’ body up for burial? How much this sucks.

And whether the Romans will stop at killing Jesus. Or will they, and other followers of Jesus, be next?

The more you think about it, the worse it gets.

You know what Joseph and Nicodemus aren’t thinking about? How anything good can come from this.

Much less how God is already using all of it to do more good than either of them, or anyone on Good Friday, could ever imagine.

And yet, you and I know, that’s exactly what’s happening. Because you and I know something that Joseph and Nicodemus don’t know. Not on that worst of Friday’s.

They don’t know that Sunday is coming.

But that’s how it is, when you’re where they are. When you are right in the middle of the very worst.

When you and I are right in the middle of the very worst, there is nothing that human eyes can see to tell us that it’s ever going to get any better.

When that’s where you are, the only open question is whether it’s going to get worse.

In the middle of everything that you are dealing with right now – whether it’s death or illness, divorce or the end of a friendship, job loss or financial problems – while you’re waiting to see whether you’ve hit bottom or if it’s going to get worse. You get Joseph and Nicodemus. You are right there with them.

The more you think about what you’re dealing with, the worse it gets.

There’s nothing that our human eyes can see to tell us that anything good can come from what you’re going through.

And yet, you and I know, that’s not true.

Because you and I know something. Something that’s easy to lose sight of when you’re in the middle. Something that’s hard to hold onto when you’re scared.

But it doesn’t matter. It’s okay if we lose sight of it. Because it’s still true. Even if we’re scared. 

Today is Good Friday. And Good Friday shows us that none of it, not even the very worst, can hold down our God.

Because Sunday is coming.

Today’s Readings

Second Age De-Aging AU

(Title is a work in progress.)

The workshop looked as if it had recently contained a small to medium sized explosion.

That concerned Gil-Galad a great deal less than what had been left in the wake of that explosion.

Namely, a very small peredhel currently perching catlike on one of the few sets of shelves still standing and who was hurling every throwable object in reach at a wincingly placating Annatar.

The thrown objects were accompanied by what he first interpreted as a yowl, which was really only reinforcing the cat impression, right up until he belatedly realized it was actually a wail, at which point he had to remind himself that it was not at all appropriate for him to throw things at an emissary of a Valar. 

Even if he was almost entirely certain that, despite the seeming impossibility of the thing, the very small peredhel in question was Elrond.

Still. He was king. Kings did not throw things. Kings very calmly and not at all frantically demanded, “What happened?”

Elrond’s wail at last became intelligible words. “He lied!”

Gil-Galad switched his gaze to Annatar.

The maia was holding his hands out in a conciliatory fashion. “Dear Celebrimbor and I have been working on some things to better help Men preserve their minds as they age. Perfectly safe for both elves and Men, I assure you. Lord Elrond expressed a natural interest. I had no idea that with his . . . unique nature . . . it would react this way to his touch.”

“It exploded,” Gil-Galad said flatly.

“Not at all!” Annatar assured him. “It merely . . . affected his fea in an unexpected way. And it seems his hroa followed. At which point, he was unsurprisingly distressed . . . “

Gil-Galad reconsidered the explosion in the context of a highly frightened descendant of Luthien.

“ . . . and I am afraid that the resulting . . . incident . . . led to it . . . ”

Gil-Galad redirected his attention to the scorch marks on the workbench as Annatar very visibly searched for a word that was not “exploding.”

“And at which point in this process did you lie to him?” he asked pleasantly.

Annatar winced even more deeply. “He asked where his brother was,” he said apologetically. 

Gil-Galad went very, very still.

He remembered, very clearly, just how closely the twins had stuck to each other in the early days of their being sent to Balar.

He remembered, very clearly, the grief on Elrond’s face when Elros had sailed.

And he remembered, very clearly, the grief that even still had not vanished when the bond between them at last had fully snapped.

“I’m afraid in my distraction that I said that was an interesting theological question.”

And Elrond, even at this age, had put the pieces together between that statement and the aching void Gil-Galad was sure he still felt in his soul when he reached for his brother.

Maiar, he had to remind himself very firmly, did not view death as Men or elves did. Annatar had not intended his statement to lead to . . . this.

This was even now changing. Whatever expression was on Gil-Galad’s face must have convinced Elrond that it was not a lie after all because there were no more objects being thrown from the shelf.

Unless, of course, you counted Elrond himself, who was slowly but surely turning the color of bleached bone and sliding inexorably off the shelf.

Gil-Galad sprang for him, catching the far too light body just in time.

“Fix this,” he ordered Annatar, clutching Elrond to his chest. Elrond had gone deathly quiet, and he had to move his hand on Elrond’s back until he could feel the heartbeat through the ribs just to be sure it was still pumping.

It was not the correct way to talk to an emissary of the Valar.

Gil-Galad did not have enough left in him to care.

. . .

Several hours later, he still had not determined what precise age this version of Elrond was.

This failure was mainly because of what else he had discovered. Namely, that this version of Elrond did not want to talk.

Or eat. Or sleep. Or do anything, really, but curl up into the smallest ball he could manage and block out the rest of the world.

He did not object to Gil-Galad talking. Or singing. Or pacing.

He did object, after those first few moments, to being touched. Gil-Galad had set him down in the window seat of his borrowed office the moment he could. As far as he could tell, Elrond hadn’t moved since.

He also objected to Annatar’s entrance. At least, that’s what Gil-Galad assumed the infinitesimal tensing of his shoulders meant. It was tempting to drag Annatar into the hallway to just meet there, but that would mean leaving Elrond alone, and Gil-Galad felt . . . uneasy about that.

(The window was narrow. The window was covered with beautifully stained glass that some of the artisans here had apparently been experimenting with. The window was not that high off the ground, really, as elves usually considered things.)

(On the other hand: Elwing. Maedhros.)

(Even if Elrond currently remembered only one of those formative experiences, Gil-Galad was not in the mood to take any risks.)

“You have a solution?”

Annatar shook his head mournfully. “I have a better idea of what went wrong,” he corrected. “A solution will likely take weeks. Longer, perhaps. It is a good thing you accompanied Lord Elrond on this visit; I am not sure a messenger could have found Celebrimbor in time.”

Gil-Galad paused in his pacing. “In time,” he repeated.

“Since the dwarves have been so reluctant to share the location of their sacred places to others in the past . . . ?” Annatar’s voice hinted gently, embarrassed to repeat what Gil-Galad already knew.

He knew full well why a message might take a while to find Celebrimbor; the complications of Celebrimbor’s expedition with the dwarves of Khazad-dum falling, he was assured unavoidably, in tax year, coinciding with a few mix-ups in delegation and communication . . . 

But “in time.”

Were the effects going to get worse or - ?

“He’s a child,” Annatar said, very slowly, in response to the confusion Gil-Galad feared was on his face. “His fea will need to be nurtured. Preferably by a relative.”

“That’s just superstition,” he protested.

Annatar looked at him very oddly.

“ . . . I’ve heard,” Gil-Galad tacked on, like an elf who had certainly had two very present and alive elvish parents to nurture him throughout his childhood, and not at all like a feral former fugitive who had been raised by human bandits in the woods.

“From whom?” Annatar asked incredulously.

“Elrond,” he said after a slightly too long pause. He flicked his eyes hopefully to the child on the window seat; Elrond hadn’t so much as twitched. “He survived the first time around, didn’t he?”

“Yes,” Annatar agreed after an equally baffled pause. “Forgive me for any indelicacy here, but you do realize that no matter how forsworn the sons of Feanor may be, they do still count as relatives . . . ?”

Right.

And Gil-Galad . . . did not.

Which shouldn’t matter, he told himself firmly. He had survived, hadn’t he? And he was perfectly fine.

Perfectly alive, at any rate. And any of his various moral shortcomings were just down to his personal failings. And the more practical side of his upbringing.

Definitely.

His eyes flicked worriedly to the very pale, very still, very small figure in the corner.

“I don’t suppose you have any advice in that direction?”

(Annatar did, as it turned out.)

(It did not turn out to be enough.)

. . .

He had felt guilty before about lying about his place in the Finwean family tree.

None of it came close to what he felt watching Elrond slowly wasting away.

He had lied and cheated his way to this point, and if this point got Elrond killed -

No.

He could stay here and pray Annatar finished fixing the device before his own deficiencies got Elrond killed.

Or he could take his company and ride hard for Galadriel.

Probably that would be the end of his masquerade; probably all that sharp edged suspicion in her eyes would turn to certainty and that would be that. Definitely of his career and possibly of his life.

But Galadriel was Elrond’s cousin; Galadriel was a mother. Galadriel would know what to do. Elrond would be alright.

(“I’m sure this isn’t necessary,” Annatar said as Gil-Galad’s guards prepared the horses. Elrond had let himself be hauled like a terrifyingly heartbroken statue onto one of them. “You must be a closer relative to him the sons of Feanor were; surely with a few more days of trying to bond with him - ”)

(He considered just blurting it out. ‘No, actually, he might be more closely related to you, considering that maiar blood.’ ‘No, actually, I wouldn’t know Finwe from a dead toad on the ground.’)

(‘No, actually, there’s something terribly wrong with me. Possible more wrong than there was with thrice kin slaying Feanorians.’)

(He smiled, instead, with a closed mouth. “I’m really not father material,” he said. “Lady Galadriel, I’m sure, will prove as ferociously competent as always in my stead.”)

(Annatar did not argue with this.)

. . .

(There weren’t any Feanorian guards with them. Gil-Galad had insisted after what had happened the last time he had let Elrond bring Farande to Eregion. He wasn’t sure if that was for the better or the worse now; if Elrond would be relieved to have a face he recognized or terrified due to how he recognized it.)

(At least that might be better than the terrifyingly hollow look that was currently in his eyes.)

(But it would be better soon, he assured Elrond. They would reach his cousin Galadriel soon, and wouldn’t that be nice?)

(Elrond remained curled in the tightest huddle he could manage by the campfire. He no longer bothered to wince when he was touched.)

. . .

Galadriel met them at the edge of the forest she had made her new home in, so at least the messengers he had sent had managed to find her. She gave her usual shallow courtesies to her nominal king, but her eyes were locked on Elrond.

Now, at last, was the moment to confess.

Gil-Galad slid from his horse. Carefully, oh, so carefully, he helped Elrond down. 

His ribs had been less prominent when the Feanorians had sent him to Balar.

“I couldn’t help him,” he said, his quiet voice sounding like the crack of doom through the silence.

“Of course you could not,” Galadriel said. 

Of course.

“His fea was orphaned once; it will not accept a replacement again. Not - ” And here, in the face of Elros, even she faltered. “Not under these conditions.”

A different, more dreadful doom wrapped around his heart.

If Celebrimbor had been deemed too difficult to find -

He noticed, dully, that Galadriel had come alone.

And that despite wearing a fine woven cloak against the snap of the late autumn chill she was carrying another one.

And a flute.

“Lady Galadriel,” he said slowly.

“Do you want to help him or not?” she snapped. She paused. “My king.”

“Oh, I want the help,” he said instantly, fervently. “I’ll welcome him into Lindon with open arms if he can do this.”

“Well,” she sniffed. “I don’t know that you need to promise that.”

“Especially since it seems you came well prepared with bribes yourself,” he said, nodding with considerable relief to the goods in her hands.

She looked down at them. “ . . . Yes,” she said. “Bribes.”