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Dear MCU AU Writer,
Welcome and thank you for writing for me! Before you click on the cut, please remember that apart from the pairing and the AU specified, my ideas are all OPTIONAL. If you can write the ideas I've put down, then by all means go for it! If you find they're not in your style, then just go for whatever you envision as the relationship and the AU and it will be fine! Considering how rare these relationships are, I will be OVER THE MOON that anyone has written about them at all.
likes:
- femme centric stories, where the women have agency and use it to the best of their abilities
- male characters who don't mind women who know their own mind, who are willing to give way to women, who see women as equals
- action/adventure/drama stories that are character-driven
- slice of life stories, where we see the characters interacting with each other and other characters
- positive views of Maria Hill
DNWs:
- background pairings I haven't asked for, particularly ones involving Steve
- pure smut/sex
- hatesex, frenemies: basically relationships that don't have respect and admiration at their core
notes
About AUs: I like stories and retellings that maintain the dynamics between the characters, that allow for the characters to remain the same. eg. Maria is always going to be responsible, sardonic, and in most male-centric worlds, misunderstood. The exception would be in, say, the Blood society of the Black Jewels novels where a serious, responsible Queen who looks after her people (like, say, risking herself to rescue a Warlord Prince, a Black Widow, and the Prince they've randomly picked up) would be eagerly served and appreciated (although Nick and the rest of her court would almost certainly rage at her for risking herself, no matter how drained of power he was).
Relationships: I want the story to be about the characters listed in the AU specified. However, if you want to include the other relationships in my sign-up, then feel free. By all means, use other characters as a 'cast of thousands' - I particularly like Helen Cho, Melinda May, Melinda May's mom, the female characters, the Avengers, and the 'heroes' in SHIELD, but I want the story to be about Maria, and whatever other character we matched on.
Maria/Steve
I love this relationship, mostly as friends/colleagues coming to lovers since I've never read the comics and never been one for the hatesex kind of relationship. While the movies are not particularly elaborative of Maria, and the comics are downright negative, I see her as the epitome of what you want a 'mere human' to be in the mess of superheroes and alien invasions - practical, pragmatic, compassionate, personally involved, willing to ask questions and challenge the status quo. Obviously, this is going to conflict with how she manages a relationship with Steve and presents another obstacle/challenge for Steve to overcome in his relationship with her. Steve, for his part, clearly trusts Maria at her word, even if he doesn't agree with her opinions and perspectives, and is comfortable in taking her teasing.
AU - Hockey: I admit, my headcanons for a hockey AU tend to be based off Philyra's 'Get Ready For It' series, where Maria is the first female player in the NHL. However, if you want to do the current situation with the Women's Hockey Leagues and write the girls on teams, shenanigans, and EPIC chirping when they realise Steve Rogers is madly crushing on Maria Hill who thinks he's just a stats nerd like she is...I will not object. :)
AU - Psy-Changeling (Nalini Singh): I've written this before with Maria as a Psy Arrow and Steve as a Changeling alpha, but Maria as a Changeling alpha would be just as interesting, I think. However, one of the things I really enjoy about the Psy-Changeling series is the way the Psy work out ways around silence. Some of them broke silence, some of them are shielded, some of them never had silence 'take' in them in the first place. You don't have to set this in the timeline of change, as Singh does - you can set it before silence, or in the early years, or in the future of Earth.
Canon AU - Maria Hill Director Of SHIELD: I am presuming in this scenario that you're writing Maria as a goodie rather than a baddie. I'd like to see the power differential between Maria and Steve here, as well as the careful navigation of their relationship. In this situation, I imagine nothing would happen until after SHIELD was taken down - does he do this against her wishes? What if she uses him to bring SHIELD down: the key piece that she needs to unlock everything and make it fall apart - and then what kind of a spanner in the works is Bucky?
Canon AU - Maria Hill in Civil War : the idea of Maria and Steve in a relationship, with Maria siding with Tony but acting as the voice of reason and the halt on everything, really hits my id. To add to it, what if Extremis starts regenerating in Pepper, and so she's involved in all this and sides with Steve? Or even rewriting the matter of the Accords (which were never actually addressed in the movie, since it all devolved into being about Bucky) and what they mean, a practical way for superheroes to operate in a world that doesn't always need interference of the metahuman kind.
A content note here may be necessary: I think both sides have excellent points about the nature of power and the reins on it, and that it would be just as dangerous to have a crusader like Steve with no checks on him as it is to have a committee decide whether or not to deploy the Avengers. (My solution is having one or two individuals with the political and intelligentsia connections who are not Avengers themselves do the 'pointing' while the Avengers can then decide on intervention or non-intervention as necessary.
AU - Black Jewels (Anne Bishop's "Blood" series): The thing I like about this canon is the interaction between the various castes, the formalities and how everything is set up around a Queen and her court - the dynamics between the various roles and ranks and castes and Jewel strengths. In this scenario, I'd like Maria to be a Queen with the rest of the MCU as her court, and, as Queen, how she and Steve navigate the court as well as their caste dynamics. I envision this as a kind of a "everyone has a say in their relationship" story, only within the context of Blood society.
Maria & Pepper
This relationship is less seen and more implied in a phone conversation between Maria and Pepper in ep 1.20 of Marvel's Agents of SHIELD. But it implies so much - the casual conversation, the exasperation which Maria lets out to Pepper, the implication that she has the private number of Pepper Potts - the CEO of Stark Industries - on her phone and can call her simply to bitch about how awful her day was. (Really, do you think Pepper just listens to anyone bitch about their day? Tony, certainly. Rhodey, maybe. Anyone else? Questionable. But she listened to Maria complain about Congress.) Pepper, on the other hand, would appreciate a woman who rose through the ranks and respected what other people could do - and, yes, probably would be tickled by a woman who would challenge Tony in front of the rest of the Avengers and roll her eyes at him to boot!
AU - Pacific Rim/Jaegers
So they can be Jaeger pilots, discovering themselves Drift-Compatible. They can be civilians working together - Stark Industries as the technology and the PPDC (implied SHIELD) as the paramilitary organisation running the Jaeger program. You could do a 'fusion' AU where the big issue is the kaiju and the 'hero' characters are pilots, or a 'crossover' AU where the kaiju are the next alien invasion to hit the world after the Chitauri - either works!
Canon AU - Maria Hill in Civil War
This one comes with the implication that Pepper was also in Civil War. I may have feelings about this (see the notes on Maria/Steve and Maria In Civil War). If they're on opposite sides, that would be amazing, but even just the two of them working to defuse everything, to fight the politics, challenging the boys to keep their dicks in their pants (metaphorically), and triumphing. Work out whatever motivations you want, but I don't want a right/wrong divide the way the movies did it, I want a "this is what I need to do and you disagree, so we're going to go our separate ways" divide, like they're adults trying to do the best for who they are and who they love. Adults doing adulting responsibly and respectfully. We can always do with more of those stories.
Canon AU - Pepper Potts is Rescue
I think of this one as the "Pepper keeps Extremis" or "Extremis comes back" AU for the MCU, but, really, Pepper as a superhero and Maria as the friend/managing agent/person keeping her grounded? GOLD. Action-Adventure, snark and snap, from grudging respect to full-blown protective friendship...it's all good.
AU - Soulbonds
Soulbonds are usually seen as romantic, and if you want to do the romantic angle (for Pepper/Tony, Maria/Steve) with the women dealing with having soulmates (and really inconvenient ones at that) but it being about them interacting with each other (and how they see the soulbond and how it conveniences/inconveniences them), then that definitely works! Alternatively in a world where soulbonds are friendship and not just romantic/sexual, this could go some really interesting places, too! (If you want to mix this with any of the other AU scenarios I've listed, I'm good with that as well.)
AU - Space
The first all-female mission into space? All the sexist shit they have to put up with? Dealing with a mission situation that comes up competently and calmly? ("Houston, we have a problem.") Or...something else. A fusion with a space-related canon? I've done MCU into Stargate Atlantis with Pepper as the diplomatic head of the city (the Weir/Carter/Woolsey role), and Maria as the commander of the ship that goes between Earth and Atlantis (the Caldwell/Carter role), so you could try that. Or other space-faring canons I like are Young Wizards by Diane Duane, and Star Trek (mostly the Alternate Original Series). This one is very broad, take it as you will.
Canon AU - Female Character Superhero Team (Not Genderswap)
Find other female characters in the MCU and make them the Avengers. What if Betty Ross experiments on herself? Sif wields the Hammer? Pepper ends up wearing the IM suit (which Tony tinkers at like the faithful sidekick in love with the hero)? Or maybe Pepper becomes Rescue/experiences Extremis rather earlier, and is one of the Avengers? I like Maria as the 'all human' character, so please consider leaving her as such and having to deal with the Avengers as a superhero team - perhaps even with the struggle of sexism. "It's just a bunch of girls!" And then Maria and the Avengers show what "just a bunch of girls" can do?
Maria & Sam
While Maria and Sam have barely interacted in the movies, I think that they'd get on pretty well - Sam's laid-back attitude with mission-focus-where-necessary contrasting and complementing Maria's serious responsibility and the hint of snarky humour she shows. I like the idea of their friendship starting around Steve, but rapidly taking turns into other dimensions. I'm not sold on the idea of a romance between them, I'd prefer a platonic friends working together scenario.
AU - Black Jewels (Anne Bishop's "Blood" series)
Once again, I really want Maria as the Queen of the Territory that encompasses the MCU, but where you put Sam is entirely up to you. I think his personality fits a Prince more than a Warlord or a Warlord Prince, but again, up to you. And I like the idea of a young male in Maria's court who's charming and casual - balls and sass - but without the head-butting that I imagine Steve and Tony and Nick engage in.
Canon AU - Maria Hill in Civil War
I always see Maria being on the 'more leashes on the superheroes' side of things, but with a clear understanding of what can happen when geopolitics gets involved, and a personal knowledge that the Avengers individually are not going to hold back if they feel intervention is needed. How this intersects with Sam's understanding of how power tends to view people whose views/actions they don't like would be the question that makes the Maria & Sam friendship interesting in a Maria-in-Civil-War scenario. As an American black man, Sam knows what it is to be under the thumb of expectation and that the authorities will shoot him down (literally or metaphorically) if they don't like what he says, does, or opines. And as his friend, I imagine Maria is sensitive to that; but as a woman who doesn't personally have the power to save the world, but has a whole lotta intel about what can be done and the connections to implement it, she'll do what's gotta be done.
Just thoughts.
Canon AU - Winter Soldier Has Different Identity
This might be an odd one for Maria and Sam. However, I was thinking of how CATWS might change if Steve is the Winter Soldier, and it's Bucky who's the defrosted American hero. The relationship dynamics between Bucky and Sam, Bucky and Maria, and therefore the dynamics between Maria and Sam (since a non-WS Bucky would be more like Sgt Barnes of the HCs than "traumatised vet trying to keep a grip on reality"). Think of this as more of an action-adventure scenario with Maria and Sam (and Natasha) trying to manage Cap!Bucky, who maybe isn't quite as emotionally isolated as Cap!Steve is.
Canon AU - Female Character Superhero Team (Not Genderswap)
Again, perhaps an odd one where one of the characters is neither female, nor a superhero. But out of all the male characters in the MCU, I kind of think Sam is the one who'd be the most okay with female characters being superheroes. (And, honestly, I think Sam would find it kind of hot. The second glance he gives the woman walking down the stairs at the Stark party in AoU...) And maybe he can add a layer of respectful and yet charming interaction with Maria and the other women? I don't know. Run with this one pretty much as you will!
AU - Apocalypse
Two practical, pragmatic people on the run, with a knowledge of how the world works at its technological best, and the skills to survive when the world breaks down at its absolute worst. Give me Maria and Sam holding it together, rescuing people with their bare hands, or managing whoever's left of the Avengers after whatever happened.
AU - Hockey
Again, I'm running off Philyra's 'Get Ready For It' series, in which Maria is the first woman in the NHL. In that universe, Sam is one of the wings on Steve's line along with Bucky, and while there's not much about him in Philyra's universe, I'd love to see his friendship with Maria - acceptance and understanding from a black man in pro hockey. Otherwise, if you'd like to slot him into the 'Women's Hockey League' as a supporting character and detail his interactions with Maria, I'd love to see that, too.
AU - Space
A black man and a woman in space? The racists and sexists won't like that! Astronauts, cosmonauts, explorers in a space fantasy setting, survivors of a party that crash-landed on an alien planet (I'm not enamoured of the Alien series myself), or fused into a canon that involves space-faring travel? Stargate Atlantis, Star Trek, Firefly are the big ones I'm thinking of, but you can make up your own fantasy space universe if you so wish.
Canon AU - Bucky Not Left in Wakanda
So, my 'main' slash pairing in MCU is probably Sam/Bucky. Not just with Sam as the psychologist/healer/counsellor character, but with Sam as the vet dealing with his own anguish at being unable to help Riley. But I'd like to see Maria and Sam working around the idea that they have to keep Bucky out of the limelight - Maria with her pragmatism and her connections, and Sam with his connection to Steve (and Steve's complete lack of chill when it comes to Bucky) and possibly with his unexpected and slightly disconcerting strength of reaction to Bucky as someone he's attracted to.
Canon AU - Civil War Fix-It: Team Comes Around/Sticks Together
In this one, I want Maria and Sam to be brokering the peace from each side, getting people to work out how they're going to deal with the Accords and presenting a unified front to the UN and the world. And then Bucky turns up and they have to deal with him (and with Steve, and then with Tony when Tony finds out what Bucky did to Maria Stark while brainwashed)? I don't know, make shit up as you go? (Armageddon movie reference.)
I seem to have picked a few 'odd' AUs for Maria and Sam - background scenarios for an opportunity for them to interact, to conflict, to agree and be adults doing adult things. Feel free to use my ideas or not!
--
Once again, if none of these ideas fly with you, go with the character dynamic that we've matched on, in the AU scenario listed. You're writing a dynamic that is implied but unexplored in canon, and which has correspondingly minimal fanon, so just run with your ideas and I'll be glad to get the fic!
Welcome and thank you for writing for me! Before you click on the cut, please remember that apart from the pairing and the AU specified, my ideas are all OPTIONAL. If you can write the ideas I've put down, then by all means go for it! If you find they're not in your style, then just go for whatever you envision as the relationship and the AU and it will be fine! Considering how rare these relationships are, I will be OVER THE MOON that anyone has written about them at all.
likes:
- femme centric stories, where the women have agency and use it to the best of their abilities
- male characters who don't mind women who know their own mind, who are willing to give way to women, who see women as equals
- action/adventure/drama stories that are character-driven
- slice of life stories, where we see the characters interacting with each other and other characters
- positive views of Maria Hill
DNWs:
- background pairings I haven't asked for, particularly ones involving Steve
- pure smut/sex
- hatesex, frenemies: basically relationships that don't have respect and admiration at their core
notes
About AUs: I like stories and retellings that maintain the dynamics between the characters, that allow for the characters to remain the same. eg. Maria is always going to be responsible, sardonic, and in most male-centric worlds, misunderstood. The exception would be in, say, the Blood society of the Black Jewels novels where a serious, responsible Queen who looks after her people (like, say, risking herself to rescue a Warlord Prince, a Black Widow, and the Prince they've randomly picked up) would be eagerly served and appreciated (although Nick and the rest of her court would almost certainly rage at her for risking herself, no matter how drained of power he was).
Relationships: I want the story to be about the characters listed in the AU specified. However, if you want to include the other relationships in my sign-up, then feel free. By all means, use other characters as a 'cast of thousands' - I particularly like Helen Cho, Melinda May, Melinda May's mom, the female characters, the Avengers, and the 'heroes' in SHIELD, but I want the story to be about Maria, and whatever other character we matched on.
Maria/Steve
I love this relationship, mostly as friends/colleagues coming to lovers since I've never read the comics and never been one for the hatesex kind of relationship. While the movies are not particularly elaborative of Maria, and the comics are downright negative, I see her as the epitome of what you want a 'mere human' to be in the mess of superheroes and alien invasions - practical, pragmatic, compassionate, personally involved, willing to ask questions and challenge the status quo. Obviously, this is going to conflict with how she manages a relationship with Steve and presents another obstacle/challenge for Steve to overcome in his relationship with her. Steve, for his part, clearly trusts Maria at her word, even if he doesn't agree with her opinions and perspectives, and is comfortable in taking her teasing.
AU - Hockey: I admit, my headcanons for a hockey AU tend to be based off Philyra's 'Get Ready For It' series, where Maria is the first female player in the NHL. However, if you want to do the current situation with the Women's Hockey Leagues and write the girls on teams, shenanigans, and EPIC chirping when they realise Steve Rogers is madly crushing on Maria Hill who thinks he's just a stats nerd like she is...I will not object. :)
AU - Psy-Changeling (Nalini Singh): I've written this before with Maria as a Psy Arrow and Steve as a Changeling alpha, but Maria as a Changeling alpha would be just as interesting, I think. However, one of the things I really enjoy about the Psy-Changeling series is the way the Psy work out ways around silence. Some of them broke silence, some of them are shielded, some of them never had silence 'take' in them in the first place. You don't have to set this in the timeline of change, as Singh does - you can set it before silence, or in the early years, or in the future of Earth.
Canon AU - Maria Hill Director Of SHIELD: I am presuming in this scenario that you're writing Maria as a goodie rather than a baddie. I'd like to see the power differential between Maria and Steve here, as well as the careful navigation of their relationship. In this situation, I imagine nothing would happen until after SHIELD was taken down - does he do this against her wishes? What if she uses him to bring SHIELD down: the key piece that she needs to unlock everything and make it fall apart - and then what kind of a spanner in the works is Bucky?
Canon AU - Maria Hill in Civil War : the idea of Maria and Steve in a relationship, with Maria siding with Tony but acting as the voice of reason and the halt on everything, really hits my id. To add to it, what if Extremis starts regenerating in Pepper, and so she's involved in all this and sides with Steve? Or even rewriting the matter of the Accords (which were never actually addressed in the movie, since it all devolved into being about Bucky) and what they mean, a practical way for superheroes to operate in a world that doesn't always need interference of the metahuman kind.
A content note here may be necessary: I think both sides have excellent points about the nature of power and the reins on it, and that it would be just as dangerous to have a crusader like Steve with no checks on him as it is to have a committee decide whether or not to deploy the Avengers. (My solution is having one or two individuals with the political and intelligentsia connections who are not Avengers themselves do the 'pointing' while the Avengers can then decide on intervention or non-intervention as necessary.
AU - Black Jewels (Anne Bishop's "Blood" series): The thing I like about this canon is the interaction between the various castes, the formalities and how everything is set up around a Queen and her court - the dynamics between the various roles and ranks and castes and Jewel strengths. In this scenario, I'd like Maria to be a Queen with the rest of the MCU as her court, and, as Queen, how she and Steve navigate the court as well as their caste dynamics. I envision this as a kind of a "everyone has a say in their relationship" story, only within the context of Blood society.
Maria & Pepper
This relationship is less seen and more implied in a phone conversation between Maria and Pepper in ep 1.20 of Marvel's Agents of SHIELD. But it implies so much - the casual conversation, the exasperation which Maria lets out to Pepper, the implication that she has the private number of Pepper Potts - the CEO of Stark Industries - on her phone and can call her simply to bitch about how awful her day was. (Really, do you think Pepper just listens to anyone bitch about their day? Tony, certainly. Rhodey, maybe. Anyone else? Questionable. But she listened to Maria complain about Congress.) Pepper, on the other hand, would appreciate a woman who rose through the ranks and respected what other people could do - and, yes, probably would be tickled by a woman who would challenge Tony in front of the rest of the Avengers and roll her eyes at him to boot!
AU - Pacific Rim/Jaegers
So they can be Jaeger pilots, discovering themselves Drift-Compatible. They can be civilians working together - Stark Industries as the technology and the PPDC (implied SHIELD) as the paramilitary organisation running the Jaeger program. You could do a 'fusion' AU where the big issue is the kaiju and the 'hero' characters are pilots, or a 'crossover' AU where the kaiju are the next alien invasion to hit the world after the Chitauri - either works!
Canon AU - Maria Hill in Civil War
This one comes with the implication that Pepper was also in Civil War. I may have feelings about this (see the notes on Maria/Steve and Maria In Civil War). If they're on opposite sides, that would be amazing, but even just the two of them working to defuse everything, to fight the politics, challenging the boys to keep their dicks in their pants (metaphorically), and triumphing. Work out whatever motivations you want, but I don't want a right/wrong divide the way the movies did it, I want a "this is what I need to do and you disagree, so we're going to go our separate ways" divide, like they're adults trying to do the best for who they are and who they love. Adults doing adulting responsibly and respectfully. We can always do with more of those stories.
Canon AU - Pepper Potts is Rescue
I think of this one as the "Pepper keeps Extremis" or "Extremis comes back" AU for the MCU, but, really, Pepper as a superhero and Maria as the friend/managing agent/person keeping her grounded? GOLD. Action-Adventure, snark and snap, from grudging respect to full-blown protective friendship...it's all good.
AU - Soulbonds
Soulbonds are usually seen as romantic, and if you want to do the romantic angle (for Pepper/Tony, Maria/Steve) with the women dealing with having soulmates (and really inconvenient ones at that) but it being about them interacting with each other (and how they see the soulbond and how it conveniences/inconveniences them), then that definitely works! Alternatively in a world where soulbonds are friendship and not just romantic/sexual, this could go some really interesting places, too! (If you want to mix this with any of the other AU scenarios I've listed, I'm good with that as well.)
AU - Space
The first all-female mission into space? All the sexist shit they have to put up with? Dealing with a mission situation that comes up competently and calmly? ("Houston, we have a problem.") Or...something else. A fusion with a space-related canon? I've done MCU into Stargate Atlantis with Pepper as the diplomatic head of the city (the Weir/Carter/Woolsey role), and Maria as the commander of the ship that goes between Earth and Atlantis (the Caldwell/Carter role), so you could try that. Or other space-faring canons I like are Young Wizards by Diane Duane, and Star Trek (mostly the Alternate Original Series). This one is very broad, take it as you will.
Canon AU - Female Character Superhero Team (Not Genderswap)
Find other female characters in the MCU and make them the Avengers. What if Betty Ross experiments on herself? Sif wields the Hammer? Pepper ends up wearing the IM suit (which Tony tinkers at like the faithful sidekick in love with the hero)? Or maybe Pepper becomes Rescue/experiences Extremis rather earlier, and is one of the Avengers? I like Maria as the 'all human' character, so please consider leaving her as such and having to deal with the Avengers as a superhero team - perhaps even with the struggle of sexism. "It's just a bunch of girls!" And then Maria and the Avengers show what "just a bunch of girls" can do?
Maria & Sam
While Maria and Sam have barely interacted in the movies, I think that they'd get on pretty well - Sam's laid-back attitude with mission-focus-where-necessary contrasting and complementing Maria's serious responsibility and the hint of snarky humour she shows. I like the idea of their friendship starting around Steve, but rapidly taking turns into other dimensions. I'm not sold on the idea of a romance between them, I'd prefer a platonic friends working together scenario.
AU - Black Jewels (Anne Bishop's "Blood" series)
Once again, I really want Maria as the Queen of the Territory that encompasses the MCU, but where you put Sam is entirely up to you. I think his personality fits a Prince more than a Warlord or a Warlord Prince, but again, up to you. And I like the idea of a young male in Maria's court who's charming and casual - balls and sass - but without the head-butting that I imagine Steve and Tony and Nick engage in.
Canon AU - Maria Hill in Civil War
I always see Maria being on the 'more leashes on the superheroes' side of things, but with a clear understanding of what can happen when geopolitics gets involved, and a personal knowledge that the Avengers individually are not going to hold back if they feel intervention is needed. How this intersects with Sam's understanding of how power tends to view people whose views/actions they don't like would be the question that makes the Maria & Sam friendship interesting in a Maria-in-Civil-War scenario. As an American black man, Sam knows what it is to be under the thumb of expectation and that the authorities will shoot him down (literally or metaphorically) if they don't like what he says, does, or opines. And as his friend, I imagine Maria is sensitive to that; but as a woman who doesn't personally have the power to save the world, but has a whole lotta intel about what can be done and the connections to implement it, she'll do what's gotta be done.
Just thoughts.
Canon AU - Winter Soldier Has Different Identity
This might be an odd one for Maria and Sam. However, I was thinking of how CATWS might change if Steve is the Winter Soldier, and it's Bucky who's the defrosted American hero. The relationship dynamics between Bucky and Sam, Bucky and Maria, and therefore the dynamics between Maria and Sam (since a non-WS Bucky would be more like Sgt Barnes of the HCs than "traumatised vet trying to keep a grip on reality"). Think of this as more of an action-adventure scenario with Maria and Sam (and Natasha) trying to manage Cap!Bucky, who maybe isn't quite as emotionally isolated as Cap!Steve is.
Canon AU - Female Character Superhero Team (Not Genderswap)
Again, perhaps an odd one where one of the characters is neither female, nor a superhero. But out of all the male characters in the MCU, I kind of think Sam is the one who'd be the most okay with female characters being superheroes. (And, honestly, I think Sam would find it kind of hot. The second glance he gives the woman walking down the stairs at the Stark party in AoU...) And maybe he can add a layer of respectful and yet charming interaction with Maria and the other women? I don't know. Run with this one pretty much as you will!
AU - Apocalypse
Two practical, pragmatic people on the run, with a knowledge of how the world works at its technological best, and the skills to survive when the world breaks down at its absolute worst. Give me Maria and Sam holding it together, rescuing people with their bare hands, or managing whoever's left of the Avengers after whatever happened.
AU - Hockey
Again, I'm running off Philyra's 'Get Ready For It' series, in which Maria is the first woman in the NHL. In that universe, Sam is one of the wings on Steve's line along with Bucky, and while there's not much about him in Philyra's universe, I'd love to see his friendship with Maria - acceptance and understanding from a black man in pro hockey. Otherwise, if you'd like to slot him into the 'Women's Hockey League' as a supporting character and detail his interactions with Maria, I'd love to see that, too.
AU - Space
A black man and a woman in space? The racists and sexists won't like that! Astronauts, cosmonauts, explorers in a space fantasy setting, survivors of a party that crash-landed on an alien planet (I'm not enamoured of the Alien series myself), or fused into a canon that involves space-faring travel? Stargate Atlantis, Star Trek, Firefly are the big ones I'm thinking of, but you can make up your own fantasy space universe if you so wish.
Canon AU - Bucky Not Left in Wakanda
So, my 'main' slash pairing in MCU is probably Sam/Bucky. Not just with Sam as the psychologist/healer/counsellor character, but with Sam as the vet dealing with his own anguish at being unable to help Riley. But I'd like to see Maria and Sam working around the idea that they have to keep Bucky out of the limelight - Maria with her pragmatism and her connections, and Sam with his connection to Steve (and Steve's complete lack of chill when it comes to Bucky) and possibly with his unexpected and slightly disconcerting strength of reaction to Bucky as someone he's attracted to.
Canon AU - Civil War Fix-It: Team Comes Around/Sticks Together
In this one, I want Maria and Sam to be brokering the peace from each side, getting people to work out how they're going to deal with the Accords and presenting a unified front to the UN and the world. And then Bucky turns up and they have to deal with him (and with Steve, and then with Tony when Tony finds out what Bucky did to Maria Stark while brainwashed)? I don't know, make shit up as you go? (Armageddon movie reference.)
I seem to have picked a few 'odd' AUs for Maria and Sam - background scenarios for an opportunity for them to interact, to conflict, to agree and be adults doing adult things. Feel free to use my ideas or not!
--
Once again, if none of these ideas fly with you, go with the character dynamic that we've matched on, in the AU scenario listed. You're writing a dynamic that is implied but unexplored in canon, and which has correspondingly minimal fanon, so just run with your ideas and I'll be glad to get the fic!
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