Valentine's Day Headcanons

Is Toph the only character in the Avatar gang and series to have a last name?

She is the only gaang member to have an explicitly mentioned last name, to my knowledge. However I think last names are more common in the atlaverse than most people assume.

Most aliases the Gaang use have surnames (the fire family and the Pippinpaddleopsicopolis family). I also don't think it's an "only rich people have surnames" type of thing, since Hiroshi Sato and Varrick both came from humble beginnings. Zhu Li also has a surname. Jargala Omo, a criminal, also has a surname.

I could imagine Aang and the Water Tribe siblings not having surnames not using their potential surnames since their names carry no weight in the Earth Kingdom. Also Aang's entire culture got wiped out, his full legal identification probably doesn't matter that much anymore. Similarly, Suki comes from a rather isolated village. Unlike Toph where her family line directly influences the plot several times. As for Zuko, I can see his family line having a surname but being widely known by their royal titles, as we don't always refer to for example irl british royalty by their surnames.

I have a few headcanons for Mako and Bolin's surname because I needed it for a wip I'm writing. My assumption is that they hadn't gone by their family's last name in a long time and may not fully identify with it, ergo them not introducing themselves with it.

Asami's family name is important due to their wealth and resources and, similairly to Toph, her family name is a big part of the plot.

Korra's the goddamn Avatar, so who gives a fuck abot last names here, she's pretty damn recognisable.

i’ve been thinking about riordanverse demigods and their mommy issues.

annabeth, piper, alex fierro: my mom is an absent goddess who’s kind of a bitch to me and my loved ones

jason, thalia, hazel: my mom was a messed up person when she was alive

nico, leo, frank, magnus chase: my mom died years ago but she was a wonderful person and i miss her every day

percy jackson and will solace: MY MOM 🤱 is my BEST 🤩 FRIEND 👯 she is so LOVELY 🥰 and KIND 💕 and COOL 😎 and i’m having DINNER 🍽️ WITH HER ON SATURDAY 🥳💫🤪

Cherik Fic

I've been looking through my old Cherik fic and found this in my drafts. It's complete enough to share, but not really worth posting on AO3. Set-during X-Men Apocalypse, a what-if Nina lived, but Magda didn't. What would Erik's next move be?

---

Charles senses Erik as soon as he turns onto the drive up to the school, and freezes, dropping the chalk he’s been writing on the board with.

“Professor?” one of the students asks.

“Um,” Charles says, trying to get over his shock. “Class dismissed. We’ll pick this up tomorrow.”

The children don’t argue, rushing out of the room as quickly as they can gather their things together. Charles weaves through them and makes his way towards the foyer. He gets outside just as the car Erik’s driving pulls to a stop in front of the fountain. (It’s old, with rusted wheel wells, a dented back door, and half of the front bumper missing. It’s the sort of car Erik had always turned his nose up at, during that road trip so many years ago, saying it was a crime to let a perfectly good car get to that state. Might as well melt it down for scrap at that point.)

Erik climbs out of the driver’s side and crosses his arms against the top of the car, looking over at Charles. “Hello Charles” he calls out.

“Hello, old friend.” It takes Charles a minute to tear his gaze away from Erik—he looks good, a bit scruffy and with a beard coming in, but then Erik always looks good. He’d come out of ten years trapped in an underground prison and he’d still looked good. There’s another person in the car, a child, and Charles doesn’t do more than brush against her mind. She’s tired and a bit scared, but awed at the size of the house.

Erik swings his car door shut and comes around to open the passenger door, saying something to the girl that Charles can’t hear. He takes her hand and leads her up the steps until they’re standing in front of Charles.

“Charles,” Erik says, “I’d like you to meet my daughter, Nina.”

Charles can’t help but stare. Of all the ways he’d ever thought about Erik coming here—and he’d thought of it frequently, at first, and less so as the years had gone on—he’d never considered this scenario. He swallows, and says, “Hello Nina.” He smiles at her, trying to look friendly and welcoming and not as surprised as he is. She looks to be about eight or nine, and doesn’t resemble Erik much at all. Perhaps she takes after whoever her mother is.

“Hello,” Nina says, voice quiet.

Erik lets go of her hand in favor of resting his hands on her shoulders. Nina leans back against him. “I told her you were a professor,” he says. “And that we’re old friends.”

Charles looks at Erik for a long moment before turning back down to Nina. “Your father and I have known each other for a long time now,” he says. “And this is a school.” He glances up at Erik again, but he’s as unreadable as ever. Charles doesn’t quite dare to try and read him with his telepathy. “Would you like to see it?” he asks. The question is aimed at Nina, but he feels like he’s really asking Erik.

He’s not sure why Erik has brought her here. And if he’s learned anything, it’s that being unsure of Erik’s motivations and plans never ends well for anyone involved.

It takes a moment, but Nina finally nods. “Papa said it’s for mutants.” Her English is heavily accented, something European. It’s different from Erik’s accent, but Charles can’t place it immediately.

“Show him what you can do,” Erik tells her, squeezing her shoulders encouragingly.

Nina points to the bushes along the edge of the porch. “There’s a rabbit over there.”

Charles turns to look, but of course the animal is hiding. “You can sense animals?”

“I talk to them,” Nina says. “She’s looking for food to take back to her burrow for her babies.”

Charles turns back to her. “Really? That’s extraordinary.” He’s never encountered a mutant who could speak with animals before. They’re immune to Charles’ own powers. He grins at her. “It’s totally rad.”

Nina looks confused by the slang, but smiles at the praise.

“Come along,” Charles says, turning his chair around and nodding towards Erik in thanks when he waves a hand at the door to swing it open. “I’ll show you around. We have lots of students your age, and I think you’ll enjoy the back lawn and the lake especially. We get lots of furry critters out there.”

Nina and Erik follow him inside as Charles keeps playing tour guide. He tries to treat it just like he would any parent who’d brought their child to visit, but the curiosity about what brought Erik here, now, won’t leave him alone.

- - -

Charles doesn't find out why Erik’s here until that evening. Erik’s been upstairs putting Nina to bed in the room Charles had found for them, and Charles isn't surprised in the slightest when he wanders downstairs to Charles’ study.

“This looks different,” Erik says, surveying the room. Charles has replaced the desk with one that's more comfortable to sit at in his wheelchair, and there’s more space between all the pieces of furniture, less clutter.

The chess set is still there though, and Erik gravitates towards it.

“Did you want to play?” Charles asks, stacking the papers he's been grading into a neat pile to deal with in the morning.

Erik’s answer is to sit down in front of the chess set and spin it around, offering Charles white.

Charles pours them both a brandy before joining him. Erik closes his eyes as he takes a sip, and Charles can't help but watch his throat work as he swallows. “You always did have the best alcohol,” Erik says.

“There are some things that one shouldn't skimp on,” Charles tells him.

Erik tilts his head a bit in acknowledgment, but doesn't quite smile. “Your turn,” he says.

Charles moves a pawn without really thinking about it. It's going to come back to bite him in the ass, but this game isn't really about winning or losing. Chess has always been more of a conduit for them, an excuse to spend time together, deep in conversation.

Erik’s quiet this time though, concentrating on the game, and Charles isn't sure what to say so he waits as patiently as he can. He finishes his drink before Erik has even drunk half of his.

Erik moves his rook, capturing one of Charles’ pawns, and says, “My wife died.”

Charles, who was about to take a sip of his second glass of brandy, nearly drops his glass in surprise. A wife… He should say something comforting, he thinks, but what comes out of his mouth is, “You had a wife?”

Erik nods, not looking up from the board. His mouth is set in a straight line, the non-expression he always uses when he’s trying not to acknowledge how much something is affecting him.

“I…” Charles starts, then closes his mouth, unsure how to proceed. “What happened?” he asks.

“Some coworkers saw me use my powers and figured out who I was.” Erik leans forward over the board for a moment, as though studying it closely, then sits back and looks up at Charles. “They shot her. With a wooden arrow, so I couldn't stop it.” His expression doesn't change, but his eyes do, welling up a bit before he blinks rapidly and looks away, raising his glass to take a long sip.

Charles feels like every response he thinks of is inadequate. What can he possibly say that won't sound like an empty platitude?

“I'm so sorry, my friend,” he finally says. He can't think of anything to add to it. He is sorry. Erik’s been through so much already, and it seems impossible to Charles that the universe could let anything else happen to him.

Erik meets his eyes again. “I killed the men who did it.” Charles doesn't say anything, so Erik adds, “I won't apologize for that.”

“I wouldn't ask you to,” Charles says. He glances back at the board, but can't summon up the desire to figure out his next move.

Erik takes a deep breath and blows it back out, not quite a sigh. “I need— Nina needs someplace she’ll be safe. If anything happens to me…”

“She’ll always be safe here,” Charles promises. “That's what this school is here for.”

“And when they come for your school?”

Charles doesn't ask who they are. “I won't let anything happen to the students here.” He catches Erik’s gaze again and says, “I can promise you that.”

Erik raises an eyebrow. “You can't promise anything, Charles,” he says. He raises his glass again, gulping down the rest of his drink and not quite slamming the glass down onto the table before he stands up. He leans forward, moving his queen. “Checkmate in three moves.”

Charles looks back at the board, startled, then back up as Erik steps away.

“I'm going to bed,” Erik says.

There's a long pause before Charles says, “Goodnight.”

Erik nods but doesn't turn back, leaving Charles alone in his study once again. Charles looks back at the chess board. Sure enough, Erik had led him into a trap. He raises his glass and takes a long drink.

REMEMBER HOW CUTE NINA WAS?! HOW DARE THEY KILL HER OFF!

GUYS READ ALL OF THIS PLEASE PLEASE PL–

It’s Jily but the reason they aren’t dating is because they did date… first year when they were 11 and then James had to go and be stupid! And say something mean to Snape!!

So then, they had to break up, and since they were 11, and had been holding hands for a whole week! It was a very dramatic breakup for the Gryffindor tower

So then for 5 years they barely talk to each other and Lily stays as far away from James as possible, partly cause he’s a jerk to her friend, but also because of the awful breakup from when they were eleven

Dear captives.

Hello.

As you all know, I tend to keep people in my basement. Probably not the best thing to do as ive come to grow as a person. Really. I pledge to no longer keep people in my basement. Look, I know its a dick move i'm sorry.

From now on, I will free my captives and no longer hunt you down. Obviously, im not happy about this but I will try. Or like, do it less? Love Stupid green owl.

Scrolling through the Jily tag when you have Jegulus blocked is exhausting.

i think (my memorys shitty so i could be hallucinating) that regulus used to be less broken and more just dark, which i really appreciated cause it shows you that characters can have so much nuance. in a way he reminded me of luke castellan from pjo (if youve read it). more recently hes begin to just be another 'sarcastic bookworm' character, honestly becoming way too similar to fandom perceptions of remus and lily. i think that people use his background for angst and not character development which is really disappointing for me. and in my head, regulus would NEVER be sarcastic, purey because of the household he was raised in (its the same with sirius but hes the complete opposite). regulus' trauma isnt so much overlooked as it is just made better, as if they had to tweak his personality to match james' (anotber reason why i prefer jily) idk i think a lot of people recently just completely disregard canon and give him a new personality that they explain througj headcanons

pls no one come for me on this but i feel like james is just so white boy coded. like he exudes british white boy energy. he just. i respect all those who hc him as poc but hes like (in my brain) the definition of a white boy. like in my head him and lily are the most annoyingly cute white straight couple that everyone still loves. anyways thanks for coming to my ted talk.

please please elaborate because i love it so much but cannot explain why

I can't overstate how much Maizula blows every other Azula ship out of the water. Unfortunately, understanding how and why requires some very attentive reading of the source material, so it's not nearly as popular as it should be.

sorry, i just removed the tag. hope this makes you feel better (not being passive agressive i swear i like spend 2 seconds on tumblr every month, i just thought it was relevant). i respect your opinion tho, sorry for the incorrect tagging :)

i can explain why zutata DOES NOT work because of maths. all anyone ever talks about is how they have so many parallels. fire/water, banished/respected, painted lady/blue spirit etc. "nono that only makes them a better couple" guys parallel lines never meet. they dont intersect. AKA THEY ARENT TOGETHER. AND LIKE IF WE WERE TO COMPARE ZUTATA TO ZUKKA YOU CAN SEE ZUKKAS BETTER

older brothers, prodigy sisters - similarities

fire/water, bender/non bender - differences

its a healthy balance smh