The contents of these folders include declassified documentation regarding the inactive "STAR-EATER" project. These documents have been sanitized of confidential information and are safe to view.

General ideation, worldbuilding, commentary, etc. from the original run of project star-eater. A more up-to-date lore page for the STARCROSSED 'verse should show up eventually.

Many of the text-based notes tend to go into run-on sentence rambles, because these were mostly pulled from "conversations" I was having with Ven at the time where I was just infodumping some ideas.

STARK, HOWARD

i wonder what howard said about bucky. obviously tony knows everything about steve, his dad wouldn't stop going on about steve. were the surviving commandos like tony's uncles and extended family? did he even know them? or did howard just kind of fall out of that group? but obviously howard talked about steve—i wonder what he said about everyone else, i wonder if tony had an aunt peggy, i wonder if he heard stories about cap and bucky, because that was the thing, batman has robin and bucky has cap (or vice versa), did tony read comics? i wonder if tony read the comics they made about america's long lost heroes throughout the cold war and beyond.

i wonder if howard knew, before he died, who the hand behind the gun used to belong to. i wonder if it was a comfort or a pain? because we know he spent much of his life continuing to search for steve... if he knew whose eyes and hands were killing him, would that have given him hope? did he die knowing steve could still be found, with semi-living proof in front of him? did he think any of what was there before the soldier could be recovered?

(tony finds files. obviously the arc reactor involves fun star pseudo-science, as does most celestial marvel universe tech. tony finds files and files and files of his father's research on star stuff, how it worked—neither erskine nor steve lived to see man walk on the moon, but he did. he heard about relativity, he knew about the beginnings of modern quantum physics, hell, he was probably doing quantum physics when relativistic physics was still in vogue. howard probably knew as much about the serum as anyone possibly could. but for all of his amorality, for all of his grey-and-grey-and-grey-and-greys, he didn't reproduce it. i wonder why? did he respect steve too much? did he know how wrong it could go? he probably found a million and one more ways to infuse humanity with star stuff and he published none of it. some of it went into tony's research on the arc reactor, of course. tony had star blood in him from that, though it's probably cycled out of his system by the time the story takes place. ashes to ashes, dust to star dust. did howard know carl sagan? did howard know einstein? they must have been kindred spirits, but howard's amorality, his means to an end, his willingness to sell war, that would have angered albert to no end—they couldn't be friends for very long, and it had nothing to do with religion or drinking or autism. einstein died regretting the research he did, the letter he wrote, that lead to the creation of the nuclear bomb. i wonder if howard had similar regrets in his dying moments? i wonder if he had a realization, as he died, that SHIELD was HYDRA, always had been--he knows the parts he makes, he can recognize stark tech a mile away, there's a polish to that arm you couldn't find anywhere else but he's the only one who would recognize it. i wonder if he knew.)

STARK, ANTHONY

like to start he was always really far from what he thought his dad wanted. and that never really went away, obviously. he can try to fill that missing piece with friends or lovers or alcohol or w/e but it just never works. it won’t go away.

cue “IN A CAVE!! WITH A BOX OF SCRAPS!!” and he’s special. he’s treading territory that people never even imagines—bc as far as he knows, the only person person with starblood was frozen who the fuck knows where in the atlantic. nobody had? thought of, or at least succeeded, in making an artificial starblood “organ” rather than relying on giving it self-replicating and viral hijacking abilities. by the end of iron man 2, he basically has a miniaturized binary star system plugged into his chest.

ok so. he ditches it at the end of iron man 3. that doesn’t change. because he was relying on it instead of trying to deal with his insecurities. at this point, he knows three (living) people with starblood (steve, natasha, and bruce). he’s like, job well done tony, you did it, you took care of the thing.

of course he was really really sick during the first couple of weeks as his body adjusted to being normal again. once the starblood cleared his system, he was fine. kind of. insofar as he was alive and like, not dying.

it must have been hell inside because he couldn’t do as much as he used to. even without the suit he’d been able to do physical things in an above-average way? bc that’s what starblood does. not to the same degree as others with starblood, but his was specifically not self-replicating.

he might even feel a little guilty? idk. there were reasons howard didn’t ever let his tests with recreating starblood see the light of day. he got there. he was able to help tony with that research. but he never published it, probably for the same reason tony wouldn’t sell the suit designs: do you want war to be worse? he feels bad, he feels like he crossed a boundary and is a tremendous asahole.

ok given that he is kind of but not because of that.

so in this ‘verse wouldn’t it make sense for extremis to also have roots in attempts to reverse-engineer cap? it’s the closest anyone ever came (who wasn’t, y’know, literally fucking HYDRA) to something on the same level as erskine’s serum. [2025 note: hey remember how I completely forgot to follow up on that??]

so now tony effectively knows four people with starblood or similar.

sidenote in that at least tony’s able to figure out how to smooth out the kinks in pepper’s system as a combination of his and his father’s research.

so, y’know, insecurity abounds. like honestly. and then THIS OTHER GUY shows up and, look at this, he’s starblood too, isn’t that fucking incredible? and suddenly he’s in the dusty containment cell at the very bottom of the tower and also steve moves in at the same time, partially due to tony thinking he could outplay SHIELD in trying to hide basically a wanted terrorist and probable war criminal.

cue trying to figure out how HYDRA had two successes (albeit, uh, rough successes, at least in bucky’s case) in recreating starblood and oh would you look at that there are all these convenient files talking about the use of starblood as a supplement. would you look at that. and tony’s got a decent amount of his own blood stored, just in case, because he’s tony, and so he has JARVIS pull it out. and he’s faced addiction, he can deal with it, can’t he? he just needs to be able to feel important and able and special again. that, on top of a week or two of literally desperate amounts of research and attempts at decryption, he needed the extra energy.

so he fucks up. he fucks up a lot and some of it’s due to his own arrogance. but honestly it’s damn hard for me to blame him for taking starblood.

[2025 note: this starts around chapter 12 or so of Project Star-Eater.]

ROGERS, STEVE

Credit: Sloan Digital Sky Survey.

NGC 3953, a barred spiral galaxy similar in structure to the Milky Way.

ROMANOVA, NATALYA

From notes: "emission nebula or HII region, similar to the Swan Nebula"

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Wisc.

The choice of the Swan Nebula was most likely meant as an allusion to the ballet Swan Lake.

BANNER, BRUCE

Credit: ESO/J. Walsh

NGC 7009, the Saturn Nebula.

The greenish coloration stems from high levels of doubly ionized oxygen. I was so excited to find out that doubly-ionized oxygen often appears green, because green doesn't otherwise show up with a lot of nebulae.

Dark Nebula Concept

Credit: NASA, H. Ford (JHU), G. Illingworth (UCSC/LO), M.Clampin (STScI), G. Hartig (STScI), the ACS Science Team, and ESA

At some point relatively early in the planning process, I considered tying Bucky to a more conventional celestial structure like the others. If I had gone for that idea, then he would have been connected to a dark nebula (aka an absorption nebula) like the Cone Nebula, pictured above. Absorption nebulae occur when very dense matter obscures the light from another object behind it, creating "dark spots" in the sky.

me: okay this is going to be a breather chapter

me: *writes about nick fury's bunny slippers*

me: *writes about tony's secret matchmaker side*

me: *writes about steve making better coffee*

me: *writes about tony's difficulty in creating a home-feeling environment*

me: *writes about tony secretly missing the celestial arc reactor*

me: *writes about bucky in the middle of a shut down*

me: yep. breather chapter.

reader: and who are you?

me: why, I'm a metaphor.

reader: what kind of fool do you take me for? he's a metaphor, he's a metaphor, you're a metaphor, I'M A METAPHOR! are there any other metaphors I should know about?

every character: meow

reader: that's it, I'm outta here.

plot arcs and motivations in my stories range from

• finding an identity in the midst of extreme trauma
• reconciling the emotions you’ve hidden for literal decades with your newfound ability to express them only for the subject of the emotions to have changed drastically
• struggling with addiction from an old coping mechanism that was originally a stopgap method but became a dependency while surrounded by people who naturally have that thing
• meeting someone important from your upsetting past and finding out that they were never the person you thought they were

to

• finding out why people throw eggs at you

me: okay this is super cute and domestic

me: you got your stucky cuddles here

me: and now sam and tony throwing eggs at clint

me: and now agent latour is going to insult bucky to steve's face

me: and now steve's gonna get really pissed off

me: and bucky's probably going to break another mirror

me: why can't i write a fucking breather chapter

more plot things.txt

ok chapter 9 is going to be great in hindsight because Natasha suggests bending the truth to Fury to see if it's possible to get a cleartext version of the codes sheet and explain that Bucky needs to be safely "reset" because in his current state, he's very pliable and the wrong person with the right code could send him into kill mode. that's a thing that could happen, but they don't think it will.

that was hydra guy's plan all along. Bucky's the Ultimate Sleeper Agent. if things go to plan, there's a very low chance of the agent being found out. if the Soldier fucks up SHIELD enough, he'll reveal himself. if not, then the predicted outcome is that they'd kill Bucky--meaning that the asset can't be used against what remains of HYDRA.

also, ideas for c 11:

• Bucky has good days. he also has bad days
• brief discussion of maybe inviting him to the communal kitchen (bc fury is seeing less and less reason to keep him locked up)
• JARVIS is very much on Bucky's side for some reason idk he's like Baymax if Baymax were a fucking. yeah
• "sir if I may add in the six weeks he's been here, sergeant barnes has made no attempts to harm anyone but himself."
• maybe meet Agent Laaters for the first time
• hints that Tasha notices something wrong with Tony that Steve is too tired/busy to pick up on
• someone probably throws an egg at Clint

plot notes and arcs.txt

• the overarching plot is the hydra mole.
• most everyone has a sub arc.
• Bucky's is figuring out who the hell he is now (including what that means for his relationship with Steve)
• Steve's is realizing that Bucky isn't the same person he was (and it's okay because Steve isn't either) and reconciling his feelings for him
• Tony has the addiction thing and healthy coping mechanisms
• I think Tasha might have trouble reconciling seeing her former mentor being so very different now than he was? and realizing that the Soldier who taught her was as much of a construct as the ballet school she remembers. (also it's odd because Bucky still has a soft spot for her and treats her kind of like his younger sister and/or QPP)
• Fury's is putting everything back together
• idk about Bruce's involvement yet
• I don't think Thor will show up sadly
• Clint's is finding out why people throw eggs at him

also i didn't even do this on purpose but the sleeping aid really works as a good bit of foreshadowing tbh...

1. why would tony still have the pills if he didn't need them and if it's been probably more than a year than he's actually had natural starblood?
2. the Mole is going to use this to his full advantage to incapacitate anyone who tries to stop him, meaning that clint, coulson, hill, and fury are going to have to save the day.

oh also another thing i figured out...

the Mole's "official" mission is to Eliminate The Asset. so he's very pushy on the whole "he's super dangerous we have to kill him before he starts killing again that's literally all he does 24/7" thing until fury shuts him down. then he's like, "okay then well it looks like the asset might be around longer than planned but I KNOW I AM GOING TO CONTROL IT AND RESTORE OUR GLORY" so that's where we are, with the codewords (which will come up again later), and then he tries to replicate the sleeping aid at a ridiculously high quantity to get rid of the asset at the very least, and hopefully cap, widow, stark, and banner too.

• the mole's name is Agent Jacob Latour

tbh one of my favorite things so far to write is. how much tony fucking ships steve and bucky. like he grew up hearing stories about how they had this fairy tale romance thing going on (stucky shipping is apparently a stark thing) and that they were like, the pinnacle of romanticism. he was disappointed but not surprised when he found out that they were never actually involved, only kind of implicitly involved.

random timeline shit.txt

• tony was born in 1978
• therefore tony is 37ish in 2015 (fws)
• howard was born in about 1920, making him two years younger than steve and four younger than bucky.
• he was about 58 when tony was born.
• maria stark was about 35 (b. ~1943) at the time.
• howard and maria were killed in 1985. tony was 7. howard was 65, maria 42.
• bruce was born in 1969, making him 46 in fws.
• pepper was born in 1976, rhodey in 1978
• natasha was probably born in the late 50s or early-mid 60s.
• clint was born around 1981