MCU Ladies Ficathon Reveals

[scribblemyname]

I wrote two stories for the main MCU Ladies Ficathon collection. Treats will be happening later.

First, I wrote "Mitigation" for enigma731, whose work I adore and who I met through Clint/Natasha, so even though she said she was totally up for Bobbi/Clint on her request, I still ended up needing handholding to be sure this was going to work. I turned to findthesea because I saw her name in cahoots with enigma a lot and thought she'd know her taste. She did and major shout-out to my first reader for giving me the bravery to post this piece because I am actually very proud of it.

Basically, I fell in love with Bobbi/Clint as characterized in the MCU and am multi-shipper enough to dive right in. Then throw in Natasha and I wanted to respect the close relationship Clint and her obviously have and give Bobbi and Natasha a relationship and it all came out of this comics backstory item that Bobbi's been brainwashed and she's a spy's spy and these women have common ground. And the idea that Clint wouldn't kill Natasha because her situation hit too close to home. She was brainwashed. He wasn't about to mete out judgment on her for that.

Then Odessa and all the theories there and finally New York and "you know that I do" and this is where that post I wrote about I am not. writing. this. scene. again came in because seriously, I'm kind of done with writing the Helicarrier fight and scenes immediately surrounding it. I had to get creative because I was seriously not going to revisit it. Done and bored now.

So that's kind of how I got this epic (for me, miss flashfic writer anyway) friendship fic about Bobbi and Clint and Natasha being close friends. I also homaged a lot of other fics and the headcanons they gave me: "And Then There Was Us" gave me the three arrows scars for Clint, "Say Anything (Else)" (by my marvelous recipient) gave me Clint's broken arrowheads he eventually gets around to fixing, and there were others. I also wanted to go with Whedon and Renner's concept of Clint doing mostly just fine in the aftermath of Loki because this is SHIELD and the job is beyond weird and he knows how to compartmentalize and deal with this stuff.

So much love to my recipient for the prompt and my first reader for the encouragement.

Mitigation (4152 words) by scribblemyname
Chapters: 3/3
Fandom: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Relationships: Clint Barton/Bobbi Morse, Clint Barton & Natasha Romanov, Bobbi Morse & Natasha Romanov
Characters: Natasha Romanov, Bobbi Morse, Clint Barton
Additional Tags: Aftermath of brainwashing, partners, SHIELD, Recruitment, Established Relationship, Developing Friendship, Trust
Summary:

They should kill her. Hawkeye should have tried to.

But he didn't and he's staring at her now as though she just randomly stood on her head rather than asked him why.

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Second, I wrote "We Are Not Who You Made Us," which actually started with this poetic title dropping into my head and I went, "Huh, muse? What's that about?" But the muse did not answer until I was going through the requests looking for another fic to write and bumped back into hiddencait's. Now I loved her requests when she wrote her letter, so I just moseyed back on over and read the Jemma/Bucky bit again.

I love the prompt, so let's talk about why I wrote the fic: it's the little things in that prompt. Someone pointed out recently my obsession with writing in little things, and so yeah, that's what got me.

That Jemma calls him James. That she's not the most obvious pick to work on his arm, but it makes sense anyhow. That she has a super-science crush on Bruce. How she's grown as an agent and a person, enough that Coulson sent her undercover in Hydra. That she's growing now without Fitz and how she had to back away because she was doing the opposite of helping by being there for him.

Then I read a post about PTSD and how people who have gone through trauma are changed by it; they have to become a person that includes the experiences they've gone through, and the healthy goal is NOT to get back to who you were, to reclaim the original, but to stabilize with all the new bits and pieces and gaps.

Throw in the title and there was no way I was going to not write this fic. Huge thanks to geckoholic for the beta on it.

We Are Not Who You Made Us (2035 words) by scribblemyname
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Captain America (Movies)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Jemma Simmons, James "Bucky" Barnes & Steve Rogers, Leo Fitz & Jemma Simmons
Characters: Jemma Simmons, James "Bucky" Barnes, Steve Rogers
Additional Tags: Aftermath, Coping, Trauma, Developing Relationship, Pre-Relationship, Friendship, Break-Up of Friendships, Angst, Emotional Hurt, Unexpected Friendship, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Summary:

There isn't any one thing that she can articulate. It's the way he copes so well but it feels like the difference between homesign and an actual sign language. It's his own way of coping, his own way of incorporating her suggestions but not actually having the talk with Steve that he can't be the person was before. It's the way James holds himself stiff and rigid and doesn't tell Stark when it hurts but winces for Jemma when she asks. It's all these tiny, little details that are all James and not therapy.

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Funnily enough, I was super surprised no one guessed they were written by me. On "Mitigation," I totally forgot to replace the em-dash scene breaks with hr lines instead. Then there were my stylistic and storytelling quirks scattered all over it. I had a shot at the story for hiddencait not being completely obvious, but "Mitigation" was so me, I felt like it wasn't even anonymous.

All in all, this was an amazing ficathon to participate in, and I absolutely love tielan for hosting it.