Imagination is more important than knowledge

Stiles Stilinski. Super awesome guy. Killer friends. No, seriously. [independent RP blog for the Teen Wolf character. Mun is over 21. Multiverse and multiship]

[dylanholyhellobrien]

[vibranium-arm-deactivated202506]

(Insp)

[adderallandimagination]

❛ does this look infected to you ? ❜

That’s what started it. 

The nerdy little transfer student holding out the back of his hand to show a pus filled, red edged bug bite. While Stiles was getting ready to take a bite out of his tuna sandwich, thanks Peter. 

If he’d known then what he knows now, then Stiles would have morphed immediately to that guy from every cop movie ever who was ‘x amount’ of days from retirement. 

Yeah, he was just a sophomore, but you trying dealing with werewolves and crazy people and thunder foxes and see how young you felt. (Spoiler alert: You’d feel fucking ancient.)

But he doesn’t know it then, and Peter Parker is pretty cool, but still dorky enough that he doesn’t outrank Scott and Stiles socially. Or Stiles, at least. Lacrosse was making some social ladder climbing for Scott. 

So they hang out. And hanging out turns into Peter crashing on Stiles’ bed while he bangs out an econ essay about the Aztec ritual sacrifice culture. Which turns into a skittering sound and-

A mild heart attack to see Peter stuck to his freaking ceiling, and dripping what very likely was acid, what the fuck, onto his blanket, given the sizzling sound. 

“You gotta be kidding me.”

Since he doesn’t exactly have a broom nearby, Stiles settles for his lacrosse stick, using the non-netted end to jab at Peter’s ribs. On the ceiling. 

“Hey. Hey! Wake up! I like that blanket.”

[adderallandimagination]

spiderlingman:

“Yeah, I…—I saw it.” Peter shifts his weight from one foot to another. He’s not sure how to talk to Stiles anymore. It almost seems like he’s standing in front of a completely different person, not the goofy guy he ran into during free period. That probably wasn’t even by chance, now that he thinks about it. 

It’s good to know it was definitely Shield keeping an eye on him.

“Won’t that get you in trouble, though?”

Stiles shrugs. “Sucker for punishment, man. Doesn’t matter where I get it from, as long as I get it.” And maybe, for a little while, he’d thought about following orders, and staying away. 

But he was in between missions, and when he’d been looking under his bed for a lost shoe, Stiles had found a gold star that peeled away from the piece of paper he’d balled up and thrown away. 

[adderallandimagination]

spiderlingman:

“I’m…—I’m surprised you waited.” 

He thought he’d have climbed up to the roof to scream at the pigeons. Maybe he’d even get yelled at for making too much noise. 

It’s strange, seeing Stiles again. Even stranger to think that he ever believed he was just a teenager. There’s too much in Stiles’ eyes — jagged edges and numbness that a kid shouldn’t have.

“What can I say? I’ve always been a sucker for punishment.”

And if Argent or Shield found out that he was here? That wouldn’t even begin to cover it. Stiles had been told, in clear, cut and dry terms that he was under no circumstances to make contact with Richard Parker’s son. 

Shield had deemed him not a threat, and not a source of information. But that didn’t mean they’d stop watching. Not by a long shot. 

“You like your present?”

He inclines his chin down, towards Peter’s bedroom below. 

“Fresh from the Shield offices.”

[adderallandimagination]

@spiderlingman ( x )

“I should’ve left while I had the chance.”

He’s sitting on the edge of the building, facing away from the street, heels kicking idle against the bricks. It had been stupid to stay, but he couldn’t shake off that urge to see Peter, even if only from a distance. 

And it was worth it. 

Even now, even waiting to get (rightfully) yelled at, or have something thrown at him, or told to get lost. 

It’s still worth it.

[adderallandimagination]

His life is a graveyard. 

It’s been this way for as long as he can remember. Since his mother went into the ground, at least. His dad wasn’t far behind, those few years in between feeling more like minutes passing than the rest of his childhood. 

Scott is dead. Kira. Isaac. Allison. Friends who were never really cut out for the job, who truly believed in what Shield was selling. The closest thing to anyone that Stiles has left is his handler, Argent. 

And Chris Argent would sooner walk over Stiles’ flaming corpse than piss on it. 

Not that he blames the guy, Stiles is the reason his daughter is dead. That warrants an attitude. 

(And Peter, that little voice tucked deep in a compartment in the back of his head whispers. Once upon a time, he had Peter, too.)

But that’s bullshit. 

Peter Parker was a mark, and a mark who had fallen for a carefully crafted version of Stiles’ past, without all the PTSD and death. Peter had fallen for a fallacy. The second he saw the real guy beneath all that shine and deflection?

He was done. (Stiles isn’t supposed to blame Peter. He lied to him. Went after him with a cause. But he does. Bitterly, viciously in his heart of hearts, Stiles blames Peter. Because he cares.)

And now...now life was back to the status quo. 

A one man grave digging crew, with nothing more to look forward to. 

[mieczlw-a]

[adderallandimagination]

spiderlingman:

Richard Parker.

They kidnapped him because of his dad. Not because of Spider-Man. Not because of his internship with Tony Stark. They wanted his dad’s work. A man that Peter barely remembers. A man he only really knows from pictures that Ben kept, and stories he and May told.

Of all the reasons why he thought this might have happened, that was just about the last thing he’d have imagined.

But Stiles knew. Which can only mean one thing.

“Is that what you wanted too?” 

Is that why you pretended to be my friend? Why you pretended to like me, and— God, he’s going to be sick.

Stiles vehemently doesn’t want to answer that. 

It’s guilty kid syndrome, one hand in the cookie jar and the urge to lie so thick that you can’t open your mouth for fear of what kind of bullshit is going to come out. 

Because you know the truth is a noose around your neck.

“How much do you know about him?”

So he does what he does best. He sidesteps the rules and plays the game his own way. (Like he’s been doing since they threw him in Midtown.)

“How much do you know about what your dad did?”

[adderallandimagination]

spiderlingman:

“Yeah, well…” People try to kill him all the time. Okay, no. People try to kill Spider-Man all the time. But he’s pretty sure they’d try even if they knew it was a high school kid under the mask. Just like Toomes did.

“You didn’t have to kill them.” He knows it’s not the easy option. He knows it’s not the most effective. But Stiles fired five bullets, and killed five men, all without blinking an eye.

He’s probably got the training to just stop them too.

“Why…—why were they after me?” He’s trying not to think about why Stiles would know. Trying not to think about what the last few months have been about.

Trying not to look at the boy who’s only been pretending all this time.

A judgement call. 

That’s what Stiles has thrown back at his handlers, at Argent, when they called him out for the things he’s done. Kissing Peter. Letting him crawl in the window to his apartment. 

I’m making a judgement all, okay? This is going to help me get what intel I need. 

This was beyond a judgement call. These were things he wasn’t allowed to say, things that were classified. 

“Richard Parker’s research.”

[adderallandimagination]

@spiderlingman ( x )

“I did what I had to do.”

It sounds defensive, even to his own ears. But Peter is staring at him with hurt written across every line of his face and it settles beneath his skin in a way he hasn’t felt in a very long time. 

It’s not guilt. He doesn’t feel bad for taking out the Hydra agents. They deserve to die for the things they do to this world. 

It’s not embarrassment. This is his job, his life. Stiles has nothing else. 

But God help him, he feels sorry for hurting Peter. 

“You get that, don’t you? They were going to kill you.”

[adderallandimagination]

❛ no more caffeine for you. ❜

Lilo and Stitch: (Accepting)

“Sleep is for the weak.”

He scrubs a hand over his cheek, where he hasn’t shaved in a couple of days. He hasn’t been to school either, he’s been...off track. Stiles leans back in his chair, lower back cracking as he arches, arms lifted over his head. 

(He sees your eye drop, Peter.)

“Sorry, man.” 

He’d almost pulled a gun on the kid the first time he crawled through his window in the middle of the night, but thankfully he’d stopped himself in time. 

Stiles is getting used to it. (Don’t let it get personal. Yeah, right.) He’s starting to check his decrypted phone more often. Starting to hang around the library on his “free period”. 

It’s all for the mission. 

Just like the way he turns away from his computer to face where Peter is half inside of his open window, one foot still on the fire escape and one on the apartment floor. 

“...family stuff.”

[samflewaway-deactivated20211001]

Dylan O'Brien as Mitch Rapp in American Assassin (2017)

[duckysmemes-deactivated20171228]

❛    why are you all wet    ?    ❜ ❛    it’s sandwich day.    ❜ ❛    do you know what tuna is    ?    ❜ ❛    i’d be an abomination.    ❜ ❛    why is this so important    ?    ❜ ❛    family means no one gets left behind.    ❜ ❛    if you want to leave you can.    ❜ ❛    i’ll remember you,    though.    ❜ ❛    i remember everyone that leaves.    ❜ ❛    you’re the cause of all this.    ❜ ❛    it’s little and broken,    but still good.    ❜ ❛    you’re vile,    you’re foul,    you’re flawed.    ❜ ❛    also cute and fluffy.    ❜ ❛    you wreck everything you touch.    ❜ ❛    why not try making something for a change    ?    ❜ ❛    no more caffeine for you.    ❜ ❛    he / she wanted me to join his legion of the undead.    ❜ ❛    i knew it.    ❜ ❛    oh good.    my dog found the chainsaw.    ❜ ❛    sorry i bit you,    and pulled your hair,    and punched you in the face.    ❜ ❛    i got a new dog    !    ❜ ❛    you are so finished when i get in there.    ❜ ❛    trust me,    this is not gonna end well.    ❜ ❛    ha    !    i win    !    ❜ ❛    a falling star.    i call it.    ❜ ❛    get out,    i have to make a wish.    ❜ ❛    can’t you go any faster    ?    ❜ ❛    gravity is increasing on me.    ❜ ❛    the same thing happened yesterday.    ❜ ❛    why do you act so weird    ?    ❜ ❛    you look familiar.    ❜ ❛    i’m lost.    ❜ ❛    don’t interact with her / him.    ❜ ❛    we know her / him.    ❜ ❛    look at the bright side.    you won’t have to yell at anyone anymore.    ❜ ❛    we’re a broken family aren’t we     ?    ❜ ❛    maybe a little,    maybe a lot.    ❜ ❛    i shouldn’t have yelled at you.    ❜ ❛    it’s our job.    ❜ ❛    you can never belong.    ❜ ❛    i didn’t teach him / her that.    ❜ ❛    you came back.    ❜ ❛    nobody get’s left behind.    ❜ ❛    come on,    what’s the big deal    ?    ❜ ❛    leave my mother out of this    !    ❜ ❛    oh great,    he / she’s loose.    ❜ ❛    did you ever kill anyone    ?    ❜ ❛    are you happy    ?    ❜ ❛    i’m adjusted.    ❜ ❛    he / she likes your butt and fancy hair.    ❜ ❛    no,    that’s from my blue period    !    ❜ ❛    oh,    you are such a pain.    ❜ ❛    stupid head    !    ❜ ❛    read the charges.    ❜ ❛    are they intelligent    ?    ❜ ❛    did you catch fire again    ?    ❜ ❛    answer me.    ❜ ❛    what was that    ?    ❜ ❛    i know you had something to do with this.    ❜ ❛    what are you doing    ?    ❜ ❛    you’re just jealous ‘cause i’m pretty.    ❜ ❛    i know what you mean.    ❜ ❛    i need someone to be my friend.    ❜ ❛    he / she’s very persuasive.    ❜ ❛    please go about your business.    ❜ ❛    oh,    i can’t complain.    ❜ ❛    you smell like a lawn mower.    ❜ ❛    ____    is troubled.    he / she needs desserts.    ❜ ❛    here,    educate yourself.    ❜ ❛    this is low even for you.    ❜ ❛    you’re all mine.    ❜ ❛    please don’t do this.    ❜ ❛    leave me alone to die.    ❜ ❛    does this look infected to you    ?    ❜ ❛    you’d better not have rabies.    ❜ ❛    don’t worry,    this is all part of a plan.    ❜ ❛    we are professionals.    ❜ ❛    hey    !    get that out of your mouth.    ❜ ❛    new rules.    ❜ ❛    that is the ugliest thing i ever saw.    ❜ ❛    listen carefully.    ❜ ❛    that would be a bad idea.    ❜ ❛    aren’t they beautiful    ?    ❜ ❛    uncomfortable    ?    good.    ❜ ❛    with pleasure.    ❜

[adderallandimagination]

andneverfall:

It’s sad how much the praise means to him. 

They’ve always been a little codependent - no, it’s not quite the right word, because codependency is inherently dangerous for both involved, and they never got to that point. They can thrive without one another, they’d just rather not. Their orbit’s always been a good thing, until it suddenly wasn’t, and Scott’s never been left wanting more until now. 

Stiles’ touch calms the beating tide faster than it should, buzzing thoughts and insecurities lowered to a volume that’s more palatable, easier to cope with. Scott still feels one wave away from being pushed out to sea, but Stiles is here, now, and he’ll fight tooth and nail to keep Stiles afloat. 

Maybe that’s when it gets bad: when both of them get on the same track, both trying to keep the other above the surface, when really they’re both drowning together. They don’t know it until it’s too late. 

Scott won’t let that happen. 

“That’s not,” Scot says, breaking orders because this is important. “I’ve never been anything without you, Stiles.”

He’s tense in the hug until he’s suddenly not, pliant limbs that feel like coming home. He’s so close it’s no longer chemosignals seeping into his pores, it’s just Stiles.

“You make me me.”

That was the meat of it, wasn’t it?

When you tried to save someone from drowning, the best thing they could do was lie still. Let you do all the work. That’s why he was able to keep Derek above water for so long, even as his muscles burned and ached from the effort. Because Derek was still as stone. 

And Scott was always fighting him.

Maybe Stiles was fighting too. After the Nogitsune, he’d been the one kicking and thrashing, dragging them down. It’s a wonder either one of them can breathe anymore. 

He turns into the hug, burying his face against Scott’s neck, trying to breathe in the scent of him. He can’t smell emotions, he can’t know anything beyond what his eyes and his instincts tell him, but he wants to believe that he’s making a difference. That finally, he’s doing something right. 

“Yeah? I was starting to think you didn’t need me any more, buddy. You’re the big shot, the hot girl. And what am I?”

It’s the question he’s been asking himself steadily since the pack first came together. 

What am I to you?

[adderallandimagination]

andneverfall:

He wants to fight it, he wants to stick his head above the current and kick, but the more Stiles talks the more Scott’s yanked under, the more he doesn’t want to fight it anymore. 

He can’t hear much of anything past the loud beating of his heart, and it’s his body telling him he’s gonna black out if he doesn’t take oxygen in in the next few seconds, so he relents to Stiles’ ministrations, even if he feels like he’s doing nothing but using him. 

I need you, he says, and you need me, and Scott inhales, stars winking to life in his vision and chasing the black away. It’s pathetic how desperate he sounds, and he tries slowing it down, but his throat still feels way too small, and he feels all of twelve again, helpless against his body, against the larger workings of the world around him. But it doesn’t matter, because if Stiles needs him to, he’ll breathe for him. Through all of the bullshit he’s drug Stiles through, Scott knows he can’t refuse him with this.

Nothing is more important you breathing. Scott shakes his head but does as he’s told, an alpha brought so low. (He never wanted it in the first place.)

Slowly, hyperventilating turns to panting, turns to something maybe comparable to normal breathing. 

Just you and me. 

“Stiles,” is the only thing he knows how to say anymore, head still spinning, because it’s all he’s ever been. ScottandStiles. 

“Sorry,” he says after, throat catching on it. He steps forward, eyes still closed, wanting to smell something, anything but debilitating misery. 

“You did good.”

Free hand moves up to hook around the back of Scott’s neck, pulling him in. When was the last time he hugged his friend? Jesus, the last time Stiles can remember hugging him, it was sitting on the MRI table. Why has he let it go on this long?

Because their lives have become this never ending current of misery, bashing them against the rocks over and over again. How fucked up were they, that Stiles has come to distrust the calm, and the quiet low tides of emotional serenity?

“Listen to me, Scotty.” Freshman year was the last time he uttered that nickname, right around the time that everything went to hell. How much of them had they sacrificed to the moon and it’s pull?

“You breathing, you being okay that’s all that matters. Don’t--don’t shake your head at me.”

He holds tighter into the embrace, clinging. Stiles is all out of dignity. He’d rather have his best friend.

“The most important thing in the world, is you.”

[adderallandimagination]

andneverfall:

If anything, things get worse, and Scott should have known, should have seen that it was going to get twisted up even more. He’d hoped Stiles would want the contact too, that it would help, touching for the first time since before they’d confronted each other in the rain. But no, if anything, he seems more distressed. 

No matter what he does, it’s not going to help. He’s broken something vital, blueprints to fix it scattered to the wind. His efforts to fix things feel blunt as the blow of a mace, and why can’t he do this anymore? 

He stays still for about four seconds, the frantic beat of Stiles’ heart more audible than tangible, and he can’t track his breathing at all, doesn’t want to anymore - just let him drown.

“No,” he says, and pulls his hand away but doesn’t move backward. He’s tired of sending mixed messages (even as he knows he’s sending one now). “That’s not - Stiles, I didn’t mean to do this to you. I didn’t-” and he has to stop to wheeze, and this really is getting ridiculous, how thick the air is, no room to breathe through the haze of misery, “I won’t lose you over this, I won’t.” 

“Scott.”

He can’t--he can’t fucking deal with all the steps backwards that Scott has taken. Even this one, where his feet don’t move but the ocean between them just keeps getting deeper and Stiles doesn’t know how much longer he can keep fighting the undertow. 

“I need you to do this for me, buddy. I need you to breathe how I breathe.”

He reaches out again, uncurling Scott’s hand from a fist and laying it flat against his chest. Away from his heart. Stiles curls a hand over top of it, swallowing around the thick lump forming in his throat. 

“Because I can’t do this alone, okay? I need you.” It isn’t the right words, and he knows it. Scott has been buckling under the weight of other people’s needs for so long, but Scott asked him to be honest.

“And you need me.”

That hand is pushed flattered against his chest, each breath slow. Five counts in, seven out. Come on Scott, count it out with him. 

“Close your eyes if you have to. Don’t listen to my heartbeat, just feel my breath. In...and out. Don’t think about anything. Just listen to the sound of my voice.”

Swallow. Breathe. Be.

“Pretend it’s seventh grade again. Just you and me. Nothing is more important you breathing, Scott.”