Icon by @ThatSpookyAgent. Call me Tir or Julian. 37. He/They. Queer. Twitter: @tirlaeyn. ao3: tirlaeyn. 18+ Only. Star Trek. The X-Files. Sandman. IwtV. OMFD. Definitionless in this Strict Atmosphere.
My favourite picture book when I was a kid was The Little Engine That Could and I’ll be honest, I think it gave me some serious misconceptions about the power of positive thinking and dangerously hampered my ability to accept my own limitations.
If I were a writer I’d write a sequel in which somebody points out to the little blue engine that it’s really OK if the boys and girls don’t get their toys until tomorrow, and that if the little blue engine keeps trying to live this way, it’s going to be burnt out by the time it’s 35.
Fic idea where after the whole Accords fiasco Steve just starts working as a bartender at a pub in a small town in Ireland.
And it’s just ridiculous.
He gets this thick Irish accent two weeks in, and at the beginning people don’t realise it’s him. But his name tag says STEVE and he never hides his superstrength.
You can see him carrying too many beer barrels for it to be normal, or cursing Stark/The Avengers/Accords new policies and its hilariously accurate/only an insider could come up with such detailed takes.
His bartending game is 10/10 and his sense of humour, no nonsense attitude towards bigots makes it so people in the town just decide that he is their local himbo.
So when he is recognised, his identity is kept like an open secret. Everyone in the town knows Cap is the guy serving Guinness down the street, but if a tourist/UN official shows up? That’s just Steven, he was born and rised here, he’s Siobhan’s grandkid, what are you talking about.
Bonus points if Rogue Avengers (Bucky, T'Challa, Sam, Nat, etc) just keep showing up with like: zero disguises and sometimes even Cap merch.
The UN is going fucking crazy, and one day Tony Stark himself goes there to check. Steve pulls a fake mustache and just pretends like he doesn’t even know who Tony Star, CEO of Stark Industries is. It gets on his nerves so much he starts rising his voice and all the regulars at the pub just kick him out. “How dare you speak like that to Siobhan’s boy!”
Bonus points if Grandma Siobhan just looks absolutely nothing like Steve.
Imagine evolving capsaicin specifically to stop mammals from eating your fruits, and then a mammal comes along that not only will eat your fruits, but likes them specifically because of the capsaicin, so much that it starts using its weird paws to distribute and care for your seeds, which turns into a strong selective force that literally starts evolving you into producing MORE capsaicin and makes you a WAY more successful and wider ranged species than you ever were before
simply because this mammal LOVES Pain Chemical. that evolved specifically to produce pain in mammals. It’s not that the capsaicin isn’t WORKING. It’s just that these freaks like it.
This is the same mammal with social instincts so goddamn strong that they literally try to form social bonds with their predators, and end up evolving the predators into a new species that fits into their social communities as a form of mutualistic symbiosis, and exists in several different forms with unique morphology and behaviors based on the function they perform.
Instead of, I don’t know, EVOLVING TO BE FASTER, this animal finds a faster animal and sits on it. Which shouldn’t even work because the faster animal is a prey animal and this animal is a predator, but SOMEHOW they FORM A SOCIAL BOND WITH THE PREY. So they can sit on it while it runs fast. And somehow the prey animal?? is cool with this?? and benefits from this relationship???
Literally how can you hate humans. Humans are possibly the most hilarious thing evolution has ever done.
other things humans have done
eat poison plants, decide they like getting poisoned, and evolve the plants to poison them more
evolve to not have hair, but they find mammals with thick fluffy hair and put the hair on themselves, and evolve the mammals to produce extra hair so they can both have a warm coat of hair
split up their parasitic lice species into two separate species because they start taking other animals’ hair and putting it on themselves so much
learn how to set things on fire on purpose. maintain body temperature by just standing beside some wood that’s on fire instead of literally any normal option
figure out that their prey tastes better and is easier to digest when they hold it over a fire after killing it. get smarter because they digest food so good after it’s been held over a fire.
find a poisonous plant and try washing it in boiling water until they don’t die when they eat it anymore
go across the ocean by making a floating nest despite not being able to breathe underwater, drink ocean water, or even swim naturally
drink milk from other mammals even though they can’t digest it and it makes them sick. Evolve those mammals to produce more milk than their babies can drink so they can drink the milk. Some members of the species evolve to be able to digest milk because they were so hellbent on drinking it.
find flowers, bugs and minerals that are nice colors and crush them up to try to turn other things that color
eat mushrooms that make their nervous systems malfunction because they like malfunctioning their nervous systems
humans worldwide looking up into the celestial vault of stars a million light years away, separated from Earth by the deadly cold and emptiness of space: I bet there are guys up there to form social bonds with
