Welcome to my little corner of fanfiction.net. This site is the original location of my Marvel universe fanfics, which I've also shared on Archive Of Our Own; I still go by "Shadows of a Dream" over there (but with underscores instead of spaces, as AO3 requires.) You can also find me on under "Laura Genn," and on Twitter @Reason2Write. There are trailers for two of my fanfics -- "Be My Shield (Five Times We Touched" and "Seven Devils" -- on YouTube, also posted under the pseudonym "Shadows of a Dream."

I've had this profile on fanfic since I turned thirteen, so many of the stories are outdated and, quite frankly, not well-written at all -- but since I remember how much I enjoyed the process of writing them, I can't bring myself to take them down. I can, on the other hand, advise that you don't click on them. They're not good reading material at all. Hopefully, my more recently posted stories have improved in quality.

I'm a relatively new convert to the Marvel fandom, but my enthusiasm level is ridiculous, and I've fallen in headfirst. I've developed a somewhat complicated fanon amongst my Marvel stories, all of which interconnect with each other (although they can be read seperately and/or out of chronological order.) The timeline of events (although some of them cross over each other) is generally as follows; hopefully this adds some clarity:
1. Icarus (In My Veins)

2. Give Me Love (Falling Slowly)

3. Liar (What If This Storm Ends?)

4. Seven Devils

5. in the valley of the dolls we sleep

6. compromise (and those who disagree)

7. be my shield (five times we touched)

8. across the worlds (our paths stream scarlet)

9. angels in the snow (outlines of our broken bodies)

"Skinny Love (Young and Beautiful)" starts before "Icarus" and ends post-"Be My Shield," so its timeline is much, much longer.

"persuasion (and other reasons why she bleeds)" begins before "Skinny Love," then time-skips to after it.

With any luck, that clears up any confusion, but you're welcome to ask me if you have any questions.

I love making new friends, whether they're fangirls/fanboys, readers, or writers, so never hesitate to drop me a line. :) I hope you enjoy my work!

Given that BE MY SHIELD (FIVE TIMES WE TOUCHED) was written right after I fell into the Marvel fandom and long before the release of CA:TWS on DVD, there are some minor continuity issues that I would like to acknowledge here on my profile. I don't have the time to correct every little error in what became a very extensive project that I've since completed, but I would like to fill in some plot holes (and clarify some that might be accidentally inferred.) I'll address them here, chapter-by-chapter.

1: Castle of Glass (Undone)

I mistakenly refer to the Battle of New York (from THE AVENGERS) as “the Loki Incident,” as I wrote this chapter before I had ever heard the proper term for the film's final showdown.

When I started this story, I had no intention of acknowledging the prior relationship between Bucky and Natasha, as I knew very little about it. But Natasha's question about Bucky (“Am I supposed to know who that is?”) is still on point because she wouldn't have known that Steve's Bucky and her James were the same person.

2: C'est la mort (Dog Days Are Over)

I was able to clarify the disputed timeline of events after finally purchasing CA:TWS on DVD, so here's the verdict. Fury died at night. We see both Natasha and Steve outside of the room where S.H.I.E.L.D. is operating on him. Fury “dies.” Everyone backs away from the window except Natasha, who was still staring. Cue fade-in/fade-out, and suddenly it's morning (I know this because when Steve leaps through the glass wall of the building, it's bright outside.)

The traditional assumption is that Steve and Natasha spent all night at the hospital with Fury's body before Maria Hill had to take him away. I challenge that assumption. Given the timeline of the film, Natasha and Steve could both have left the hospital and then returned in time for the scene where we fade back into them with Fury's body. And I imagine that if Natasha was going to get emotional, she wouldn't want anyone to see it and would have left.

Granted, I did still make one mistake: Natasha laying her hand on Fury's dead forehead doesn't happen until the morning sequence, though I write it as having taken place before. I suppose the easiest way to patch over that plot hole would be to say that Natasha laying a hand on Fury's forehead happened twice (once at night and once when she returned in the morning,) but I'll admit that this is a stretch. That aspect of my timeline was in error.

And there's a little kink in my dialogue towards the end of the chapter: “Fury didn't like me, either” should really be “Nick didn't like me, either,” but I'm just going to blame that one on the sheer amount of alcohol Natasha had in her bloodstream.

3: Here We Are (We Fall Apart)

Admittedly, this is the messiest chapter in the entire fanfic. First, as I stated in my notes on chapter one, I didn't know that this story would evolve to include past Bucky/Natasha. As a result, there's a notable dearth of references to that when Bucky shoots her, though I didn't write anything that would contradict the later chapters. In hindsight, I should probably have acknowledged that Natasha recognized him from the Red Room.

And finally, the greatest plot hole in the fic (*hangs head*). Natasha couldn't have passed out immediately upon exiting the van with the bullet in her shoulder – upon viewing the DVD of CA:TWS again, it becomes clear that Natasha was led to a room where she saw Fury alive. A revised version of the scene would probably use this shocking reveal as the final straw for Natasha and the thing that caused her to subsequently lose consciousness.

In its current version, the scene would have to be interpreted as simply skipping the reveal of Fury's survival and going straight to Natasha's subsequent passing out, which is admittedly clumsy. Such are the consequences of writing a movie-plot-centric fic before the DVD release (I refuse to watch pirated versions online.)

4: Shattered (Unintended)

“Taunts and laughs are exchanged” is slightly inaccurate, as the DVD mostly just shows Falcon and Fury yelling at each other as the helicopter swings away from the crashing Triskelion.

Similarly, Natasha actually does radio Maria Hill in the movie re: the whereabouts of Steve, so I probably should have used that initial line of canon dialogue in my sequence, but I digress. I did my best without the DVD, and that's not a particularly noticable mistake.

5: Little Talks (Somebody to Die For) PART 1

This chapter doesn't have any relevant mistakes, but since the release of the CA:TWS DVD, it does contain what I consider among the greatest things to happen with this fanfic. This chapter includes my version of Natasha confronting Fury about keeping his pseudo-death from her. On the Blu-Ray version of CA:TWS (and on YouTube, if you are like me and don't have Blu-Ray,) there's a deleted scene of... Natasha confronting Fury about keeping his pseudo-death from her. Both my fanfic version and the real deleted sequence have a similar atmosphere of silence, tension, and Natasha understanding what it's like to make difficult choices (even though Fury's was painful for her.) I had no idea about the deleted scene, but I predicted it fairly accurately. It was a wild coincidence.

6: Little Talks (Somebody to Die For) PART 2

Fanon dictates that Peggy suffers from Alzheimer's, not dementia. My mistake.

The remainder of the fic has no relevant continuity errors, as it no longer directly intersects with the movie timeline of CA:TWS. Hopefully this clears up any confusion.