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mypersonmyg · 3 years ago

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808

pairing: yoongi x reader

genre: fluff, slight angst?, college au, established relationship, misery chick couple

wc: 2.6k

warnings: language, tiny bit of angst

a/n: idk i was bored and i started writing this instead of fulfilling my responsibilities. idek if it’s any good, but here it is <3

“You’re falling asleep.” Like habit your fists bunch the fabric of Yoongi’s sweater, burrowing into the beat of his chest, his heart running in tandem with the 808s penetrating the mesh of his speakers. It’s the eighth track of ten, but his ears were lost to all but white noise by around three. It was then that you wandered in, post study session with Jeongguk to find him sprawled on hardwood, eyes closed, hands folded to rest along the expanse of his loose tee. You don’t ask why he’s laying amongst the build of clothes and crumpled paper because you’re well aware of the meticulous logistics in his position of listening.

He didn’t have to look to feel your presence, a shift between the cream colored walls tangible as soon as you walked in. He swears he could smell the sweetness of you in the small distance, scent dancing in the flow of a crisp breeze. His arms pushed outward and welcomed you without pause, but he could feel you tipping around the room for longer than the space between should’ve granted your strides. It was then that he peeked a pupil to find you rummaging the chair piled high, pulling free his most oversized sweater. Too big for all of his roommates combined, you joked the first time you witnessed it swallow him whole.

He was powerless to fight the stretch of his muscles into the fondest of grins watching you tug at the sleeves until they loosened into cuffs around your wrists only to steadily slip back to hungry paws. He happily noted the push of your brows and the pull of your lips as you decided the distance was too great and the sweater not worth the extra time keeping you inches from floored comfort.

You discarded your phone on the far reaches of his desk and toed over to where he lay, gently lowering yourself to straddle his waist, hands resting at the push of his pecks through his shirt. Your trajectory is head to heart, aching for the pulse mixed with the pulsing beat, but you couldn’t completely settle until your lips molded the plush of his own dampened by the routine dip of his tongue to the cracked flesh. It was then that you crawled inside of him, drenched through and through in the feeling of warmth, devoured in a love unending and promptly began to fall asleep.

Yoongi doesn’t mind it, the lull in your breathing or the slight loosening of your fingers joint grip against the t-shirt covering his frame and the sweater covering yours. His fingers have found pleasure in the gentle stroke against the skin exposed at your waist and his chords have subconsciously begun to cling to the beat drastically polar to the aura settled like warmth in his stomach. His lips are slightly parted, wisps of air exiting with the vibration of his voice low and riding the perspiration concentrated in the speed of sound.

“I’m not,” You hush. It’s barely audible and he wonders if he should pause and guide you to the comfort of his new mattress. The one you spent hours exploring the furniture warehouse for, adamant that he should get a good one if he wanted you to stay over more often.

He’d decided long before that moment that he wanted you to stay forever, hopefully long enough to move on from the cluttered den of men he’s sentenced himself to for the duration of his college career. Only glad that Jeongguk has an ongoing affair with a hoard of fabric softeners and that Hoseok’s insistence on a weekly cleaning schedule keeps the place from smelling like the violent tossing of delicates he’s subjected to pulling from the crevices of the sofa far more often than he’d prefer.

“Come on. Get in bed,” He attempts to sway you from over top of him, but your limbs cling koala-like, a string of incoherency drowned in the climactic edge of the album's farewell. “Come on, I picked this out just for you ya know.”

He watched you walk to every mattress, his own refusal to try them for size proving the perfect ruse for your own push to the plush of each foamed bundle. He watched every line in your face and waited for the most minute of changes in your expression, his own fairytale in the making. He finds comfort is nestled in the way your nose scrunches and he prides himself in catching it whenever you feel triumphant in your endeavors.

It was only then that he felt it, sauntering over to the picture of perfection, your arms splayed out on the mattress like it was already yours. He felt like this could be his forever. Now there’s seldom a night left without occupation at his side in the shape of cuddled limbs and your light snores pushed against him with a heat akin to licking flames.

“You picked this out because your old one had springs practically stabbing you in the back.”

“Babe, the floor’s not comfortable. I promise you’ll sleep much better in bed.”

“I’m not on the floor, you’re on the floor.” Touche. He falls back from where his elbows attempted to lift you both, your hand gliding the length of his arm to rest at the pulse of his wrist. Your fingers dance along the skin until your palms rests flat against his own, fingers curling around until you’re clasped together. “I’m the most comfortable. I can hear your heartbeat. It speeds up at certain parts of the song.”

“It’s speeding up because you’re laying directly on top of me.”

“Oooh is it because you like like me?”

“Something like that.”

His reintroduction as more than just an entity of the beauty resting against him draws his attention to the length of his room. Your notebooks are piled high on his desk and your backpack is nestled beside his in the corner near the door where one of your hoodies dresses the hook beside the hinges. There’s more of you decorating him than even he realized.

Your clothes are peeking out from the drawer he emptied after your first month together, your comfort slowly filling it with the things you don’t steal from his own wardrobe. Even so he can see hot pink poking from the closet and he can’t recall which of you it belongs to, deciding that it doesn’t actually matter. Your

There are half empty bottles of water, doubled because you’re both horrible at finishing them. The habit of finding both your lips occupying the same plastic, doing little to dwindle your clutter before you switched to reusable fills. Your various rings and bracelets mingle with his own on the dresser trailing to the nightstand where chains dangle waiting to spill over with the accidental push of a charging phone to the wooden top. His favorite is the mixture of music piled to the brim of his stereo, the few and far of doubles now less concerning than it felt when you proudly added to his collection.

“You’re cute.” Your index pushes the button of his nose, head lifting from his chest to rise higher to the crook of his neck. Your body manages to shield him even more, both of your shirts riding up in the attempt and his breath hitches when the heat of your torso presses against his own. “Am I distracting you?”

“From what?”

“From your music.” It’s all but died out now, the last track falling to nothing but the sound of the current flowing through the ancient speakers.

“I’ll just listen another time.” He’s unapologetic in his preference to pay attention to you, the songs already harboring space on a healthy number of his playlists beyond enough to make up for the lapsed album. You push your face further into him, the bridge of your nose lifting to press against his collar.

“Ugh, I am.” He’s suddenly doused in the cold of the air vent violently targeting from the ceiling. The room is all but static, his ancient sound system run low on the flow of new tunes. He shifts so his back is pressed against the foot of his headboard and notices your eyes pouted and glancing toward the discard of plastic from the uncasing of his new cd and the sturdy holder left open on the floor beside the stereo. “You’ve been waiting for this album for weeks and I should’ve left you alone to listen. You’re allowed to kick me out, you know. It is your room.”

He doesn’t miss the emphasis of the latter half, adamant that you’re intruding on something he’s more than happy to share. Yoongi’s prepared to wipe away traces of the doubt dancing your features when your eyes trace the room and the lines of your lips fall to chase the edges of your chin flattered by your muscled divot. He’s sinking and he doesn’t quite understand why, the irritant of the spitting speakers forcing his gaze from you to haphazardly yank the cord from the wall. You don’t speak as you rise to your feet, following his previously coordinated trail of your mingled living space.

“What’s wrong?” He’s too wired to sit still, standing on his feet to rest his hands on your shoulders deflated by whatever you’re thinking.

“Yoongi, this is all my stuff.”

“Yeah, so?”

“Doesn’t it bother you that I’m in your personal space so much? I should take this stuff home. You already live with six other people, I don’t need to be taking up any more of your very limited storage.” You shrug the rest of his hand and begin sorting through your cohabitation, before Yoongi can grasp the rapid shift in the calm of the room.

He’s still stuck staring when you grunt, a frustration that pierces his chest when he witnesses your failed attempts at dismantling metal where a pair of necklaces have laced together in an impressive knot.

He almost laughs, your earlier comment about the beat of his heart taking hold ten fold. The rapid bump of the appendage now wracked with nerve pushing love to the back burn.

“Whoa, where the hell is this coming from? You’re my girlfriend, I want all of your stuff here.”

His hand falls atop yours, loosening your hold on the neck pieces. The movement of his fingers stutter when he catches sight of the build of wet at the edge of your eyes. The feeling that there’s more to your sudden change is achingly apparent now as he guides you to the mattress that’s known nothing but the two of you tangled beneath the sheets.

“No, this is too much. I practically live here now! You know my roommate asked if she should look for someone else to renew our lease with next month? She said I’m practically glued to your side.”

“I don’t mean to seem totally lost here, but is there something wrong with that?” He’s starved in the moments without touch, your bodies so close yet separated by a boundary created by someone he’s met in passing of the narrow lane separating the rooms in your apartment.

His ill will towards her, he can’t even recall her name, was previously nestled in your frequent complaints. They’re part of the reason your body warmed his bed so early on. Otherwise he’s not sure he would’ve had such an easy time convincing you he wants nothing more than to wake up to your sleep puffed cheeks and the adoring smile often met when he wakes to the trace of ghost fingers connecting sporadic freckles.

“I don’t want you to get sick of me or whatever.” You shrug, hand finding him to fiddle with the length of his fingers to allow the roughness of his skin to engulf you. He recalls your call for comfort in the feeling of him against you and his body nestles close, lips leaving phantoms against your crown.

“It’s funny.”

“What?”

“You think I wouldn’t get in my car right now and pack up the rest of your stuff for you.” You do laugh and it’s progress, but he still appreciates the hesitance in the tense of your frame. It’s never his intention to pressure you into two steps forward because the tumble back might be too much to bear. But he’s comfortable in his feelings for you, and it’s uncomfortable to think that you think otherwise. “I will. If you want.”

“I know.”

“But you don’t have to.”

“I know.” He frowns. The lines of his face growing tired of the downward pull and the strings of his heart tightening to the strength of never-ending length so that his own eyes strain to see beyond the fluorescent glow that stains the white of the walls and reflects off the pane of sunset glass. “If you break up with me I’ll be homeless.”

“Well I guess I just won’t break up with you, dork.”

“I’m serious! You don’t have to worry about it because this is your house. I’m like a walking expiration date.”

“I’m really trying to take you seriously,” He tugs the weight of your arm, guiding you to his lap, his body falling back to the mattress to mimic your own movements on the day of purchase. “But all I’m hearing is that you wanna move in with me.”

“Well I do love you…” You trail the length of his chest, resting your index against the bow of his lips while your own tug between your teeth. “But-”

“I think if we broke up Jeongguk would be very happy that he can finally get bunk beds. But we’re not gonna break up so just shut up and kiss me please?” His bottom lip pokes out dramatically, wetting the pad of your finger with its sudden protrusion. You feign to oblige, your head dipping to meet inches from his own while his eyes flutter to a close. The warmth of his breath fans your face and you’re frozen in a moment of pure clarity.

You rest your head against his own, the kiss of your noses and the feathery touch of your cheeks distracting you from the task at hand. It’s enough for the flicker of deep brown to inquire beneath you, Yoongi’s mouth opening with a mumbled, “You okay?”

You're lost in him, inhaling his heady scent and shivering against the vibration of his voice against your chest. You feel silly, the past few minutes seeming like nothing more than a passing haze of uncertainty thrust from the valley of nowhere meant to infiltrate the wellness of your being. You fight the question of Yoongi’s intention, his graceful navigation of your momentary state, not something you’re used to experiencing so close to the capacity of love.

“I’m perfect.” You ghost your lips against his, pulling away when he chases the feeling forward. You roll off of him, body falling to the bare side of the mattress, the sheets cool against the skin of your neck. “I just…you were right. This bed is really comfortable, I think I could just fall right to sleep.”

Yoongi doesn’t miss a beat. Where you expected his gentle pile on top of you, he rose to stumbled legs and tossed a hand through his messily ruffled tresses. You can sense the amusement in his shoulders slightly shaking from behind, the words tossed over his shoulder enough to send you toppling after him before he can reach the door.

“I guess I better go talk to Jeongguk about those bunk beds then.”

#yoongi x reader #yoongi scenario #myg x reader #bts fanfic #bts scenario #yoongi drabble #min yoongi scenario #yoongi imagine #bts imagine #min yoongi #fic: the misery chick #myg drabble #bts drabble #yoongi fanfic #min yoongi fanfic #myg fanfic #min yoongi fanfiction #bts fanfiction

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incomingalbatross · 2 years ago

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Daniel and Jack: My favorite scene of them, A random headcanon I have of them, My favorite thing about them, A scene I wish we had of them, A scene with them that I want to rewrite/change in some way, Who I think is the ”crazier” one, Would I change anything about their friendship? (I know that is almost all of them so feel free to just answer a few if you prefer! I was too interested in hearing all your thoughts to narrow it any further)

Thank you for all of these! I'll answer the ones that come to mind first, at least. :P

My favorite scene of them: They have a lot of good scenes, but I am basic and a sap and I really like the climactic scene in "Need." It ties into my Daniel Feelings in a very strong way, because... I don't know. I interpret Daniel as someone who's spent a lot of his life assuming he can't let himself be a burden to others, or forgetting that personal vulnerability is an option (for him), because he's been so self-sufficient for so long that he's written off any other way of being as Not Applicable to him.

But in "Need" he IS very actively a burden to others, he is at once vulnerable and dangerous and as actively repellent as he could possibly be, and he wraps it up by brutally beating SGC personnel and then pointing a gun at Jack. (Involuntary Alien Drug Addiction is such a useful plot device.) And what does Jack do?? Jack HUGS him.

And I like to think that this is the episode that broke down some wall in Daniel's brain and forced him realize that, oh wait. He IS loved, and there's literally nothing he could do to break that. Which is big for Dr. Attachment-Avoidant over here.

A random headcanon: I think that after the end of Season 5 the team eventually packed up Daniel's apartment for real, and that most of his stuff ended up sitting in Jack's basement. Daniel maybe had a Moment when he found out, post-Descension-recovery, that it was all still there.

Related: the first time Jack sees Daniel in his stupid beige sweater post-Descension he throws something at him instinctively. Daniel learns to stop wearing that sweater.

My favorite thing about them: I think it's the way they balance each other, morally. Daniel is so insistent on respecting everyone's needs and rights, on seeing every side to a situation and empathizing with the Other, and on always seeking the ideal outcome. Jack is equally insistent on prioritizing the protection of his own people and of the obviously innocent and helpless, on maintaining objective morality and a focus on immediate issues, and on finding the best practical outcome. But I think they find a real freedom in that contrast!

Sometimes Daniel can focus on finding the ideal outcome because he knows that if he fails Jack will have a fallback. Sometimes Jack can focus on protecting the pragmatic outcome because he knows if there's a better one out there, Daniel will find it. They both want what's best and they know that, and so they can rely on each other's differing approaches.

A scene I wish we had of them: ...I'm mostly pretty satisfied with their scenes, as far as I remember now. I do wish we'd had a bit more wrap-up to Daniel's Descension and recovery, though... just a little bit more of a "they're back" scene somewhere in there.

A scene I want to rewrite/change: Again, nothing comes to mind! A lot of their Important Moments are weird, objectively, because they don't express a lot of stuff directly--but they do express things in a way that works for them, and I like that. (I mean, I'm sure there ARE scenes, but nothing that bugged me enough to stick in my head during a long period of not-watching.)

Who's the "crazier" one: I'm laughing a little because. Both of them? Both of them are crazy. In very similar ways that they use to annoy everyone else.

...But also, it’s Daniel.

Daniel's more chaotic. Also, when Jack does crazy things, it's often for effect and/or for reasonable motives. Daniel, meanwhile, thinks he's perfectly sensible even while he's doing objectively ridiculous things and/or embracing priorities like "completely useless knowledge to be gained at high personal cost".

Would I change anything about their friendship: I don't think so, really. I like their friendship as it is, and I don't think canon really messes it up at any point. It's maybe not always emphasized as much as I'd like, but it's never seriously damaged, and I appreciate that.

#asks #ask game #brambleberrycottage #stargate sg 1 #daniel jackson #jack o'neill #thanks!#love jack & daniel :)

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s1st3r · 3 years ago

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You Have No Idea (Hunter x Reader)

Warnings: Mention of blood and injuries.

Summary: A part 1? Hunter is smitten... :3

Author’s Note: I actually wrote this before I even knew about the Bad Batch series being released lol. Ok this isn’t fantastic but I wanted to share it with you guys to see what you think and if I should continue the story. It’s kinda slow and anti climactic soz. But I was thinking of making it maybe a multi chapter thing? Let me know what you think.

A loud bang and commotion just outside the Marauder had you and Crosshair racing to the entrance. The hull opened to reveal Hunter covered in mud and grime as well as an equally dirty Wrecker behind him; extended between the two, was a small makeshift stretcher.

Oh no. You stared wide eyed at the groaning Tech that rested atop the scrap canvas material as the two boys settled him gently on the floor. As soon as they were safely nestled in the hull, Hunter collapsed to the floor, resting his back against the nearest wall. His eyes flicked to you in exhaustion and you snapped from your daze.

“Cross, grab me some warm water and a cloth.” On your command, the sniper swiftly turned and made his way to the refresher as you stepped forward and knelt next to Tech.

“Wreck,” you called, as you efficiently assessed the wounded trooper.

“What can I do?” The big man turned to face you as he patiently waited for your instruction.

You marvelled at how much they trusted you now.

“Grab me the med kit from my quarters.” Before you had even finished your request, Wrecker was halfway down the ship, retrieving your pack.

Removing his chest plate and putting pressure on the chest wound that left Tech grappling for conscience, you briefly glanced at Hunter in concern as he stiffly shifted in his place.

A moment passed and both Cross and Wreck had placed your supplies to your side. You immediately got to work on cleaning and bandaging the wound.

Years of medical experience kicked in as you scanned the extent of the injury. Noting it wasn’t as bad as it looked, you made quick work of patching him up.

Wrecker, Crosshair and Hunter had been quiet as you worked. They had quickly learnt, when working with you, that you preferred silence when you were concentrating.

By the time you were done, the water had long since gone cold and was tainted a dark pink.

You sighed as you leant back to sit on your heels.

“He’ll be ok,” you breathed as Tech lay passed out before you. “There was no internal damage,” you report, “but he lost a lot of blood. He’ll need bed rest for the next couple of cycles.”

With a grunt of effort, you pushed yourself up from the ground and wiped a forearm across your forehead.

“Could um,” you sighed and tried again, “could you guys take him to his bunk?” With the adrenaline of the emergency gone, you felt smashed.

If that’s how I feel, these guys must be beat.

Carefully, the boys lifted Tech from the uncomfortable durasteel floor and made their way down the hall with Tech draped between them. As you watched them go, you saw Hunter flinch in your peripherals as he tried and failed to reposition himself.

Now your second patient.

“You’re hurt,” you state, already pulling out the appropriate instruments.

“I figured it could wait a bit,” Hunter mumbled as he let his head tip back to rest against the wall.

“You’re ridiculous,” you huff as you shuffle towards him. You felt the heat of a blush rise to your face as he smirked at you.

Fighting the ever-increasing blush, you set to work and lent forward to disconnect his chest plate. Now, with his top armour promptly removed, and his blacks peeled down to his waist, you chastised yourself as your thoughts wondered, and realigned your focus to the task at hand.

He looked so exhausted and, after running a quick scan, you realised that that might actually be his primary health concern.

You had noted a broken rib, bruises, strained muscles, but it seemed that the general wear and tear of mission after mission had finally caught up to him, causing extreme fatigue.

“Broken rib, couple of bruises and scratches,” you mutter as you move your hand over the expanse of his chest to evaluate. You could feel his gaze steady on you.

Hunter sucked in a sharp breath when you fixed the bone back in place without warning.

“Sorry,” you cringed.

He let out a breathy laugh, “no you’re not.”

“Nah I’m not,” you sarcastically agreed as you collected and reorganised your supplies.

Quickly, you rose to your feet, grabbing the bowl of bloodied water you had used for Tech and moved to replace the dirty water with warm, clean water.

You returned with the bowl and plopped beside the Sargent. Cautiously, you rinsed another clean cloth you had salvaged and proceeded to dab at the small cuts.

His forehead was still covered in dirt and mud, so you moved the cloth to gently wipe his face. At this, Hunter closed his eyes and sighed.

“You should get yourself cleaned up properly in the ‘fresher,” you suggest, scrunching your nose in exaggeration as you reluctantly pull away.

“Yes ma’am,” came the quick quip. You sat back and watched as the Sargent pushed himself to his feet and shuffled his way down to the refresher.

“And don’t forget to rest!” You call. You don’t know why you bother; you know he won’t listen to you even if he heard you.

As you hear his footsteps recede, you quietly sigh. You sit in the main hull alone, cleaning up the remaining mess.

***

Your gentle hand brushed over his chest as you scanned for injury. It’s strange how you knew so much about him. His biology, medical history, when his senses became too much. You could tell something about him was off from the other side of a starship cruiser just by a slight change in posture or tone.

Yet somehow, you had no idea what you could do to him.

Watching you work as you attended Tech’s wounds, he noted how calm and confident you moved. After a while of you joining the Bad Batch on various types of missions, he grew to trust and appreciate your skills as a medic. They all did.

Much like them, you were highly successful in your field. But only because your stubbornness determined that you were going to single handily ensure this war had no casualties. He knew the GAR was the closest thing to family you had in a long time, naturally, you would take any and every death personal.

It was your skill, intelligence, compassion, determination, and stubbornness that were qualities Hunter found increasingly irresistible. So, as he had observed your movements, he took the chance to admire you.

But when you attentively pressed the warm cloth to his forehead, he couldn’t help but sigh as he relaxed into your delicate touch. This was more than admiration for a fellow soldier. And you had no idea.

~ Sister

Let me know if you want to be added to my tag list!

#hunter x reader #tbb #bad batch #the bad batch #hunter #crosshair #wrecker #tech #reader insert #Sister’s Stories

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pi-cat000 · 3 years ago

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BNHA: something sad (Resentment)

Summary: The last time Katsuki sees Izuku alive the other boy is rushing to save him. A ‘the Sludge Villain incident gone wrong’ aka Izuku dies.

Characters: Katsuki Bakugo

Fandom: My Hero Academia

WARNINGS! Major Character death, swearing, heavy angst, graphic descriptions of violence

Other parts in this AU: (Something Sad), (Anger), (Grief)

This is the direct sequel to (Implosion)

......

“Not many people get hit with a concussive blast of this strength and walk away will so few injuries.” Is what the paramedic that looks Katsuki over says, hand glowing a faint blue as he uses some sort of diagnostic quirk.

“It looks like you have a few cuts, bruising, strained muscles and sprained wrist from what I can see. I’d recommend getting a proper examination at the hospital but there’s nothing life-threatening here.” The medic continues.

The emergency doctor at the hospital confirms the diagnosis and shakes his head in disapproval, adding, “…bruising on your ribs and a fractured finger. No concussion, thankfully, but you’ll have a nasty bump on the back of your head. If your quirk didn’t make you naturally resistant to these sorts of shock-based blasts, you would be dead..”

…

After that, everyone is practically falling over each other to lecture him on how irresponsible and reckless he is.

His mum arrives and there is a lot of shouting which just pisses him off.

“HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO REACT WHEN I GET WOKEN UP AT ONE IN THE MORNING BY POLICE TELLING ME THAT MY IDIOT SON, WHO SHOULD BE ASLEEP, IS IN HOSPITAL!!”

“WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU THINKING!

Then there is the quiet disappointment he gets from his father when his mum is done yelling which only fuels his resentment.

“I don’t understand why you did it son. Did you want to get into that fight? Or was it a mistake? Please. We can’t help if we don’t know what’s going on.”

Eventually, he finally snaps, “I fucking felt like it! That’s why I did it! And you know what, I’d do it again.”

It wasn’t like he could or even wanted to explain that he’d jumped out his window to wander the streets at midnight because he had had a bad dream and his All Might poster had looked at him funny. That the rage and anger were preferable to that sinking empty feeling that had turned his every waking moment into a pointless repeat of everyday routines and useless interactions. That every time he let himself pause and reflect, Deku’s stupid smiling face was mocking him from the afterlife.

Next, he spends an hour with Senior Officer Watanabe recounting every possible detail from his stroll through the streets to his climactic fight with Lanky, Tiny and Grease-Hair.

“Well, you definitely don’t do things in half measures kid. So far we have private and public property damage, unlicensed quirk usage, quirk usage with the intent to harm, vigilantly activity, assault...”

“Assault! Why the hell is that on the list. Those bastards started it.”

“You can’t go around beating people up no matter how good your intentions are!”

“So, you wanted me to just watch!”

“Yes!” A long breath, “I know it can be hard but you need to wait for the pros. You got lucky this time but what if things had been different? You had misread the situation. What if you had been badly injured? What if you had accidentally injured the victim or killed someone? There is a reason we make people get a license for Hero work. Seison Masuyama is a B-rank villain.”

“B rank? He wasn’t that strong.”

“His quirk, Kinetic-Force, collects kinetic energy and releases it in one overpowered attack. It’s deadly to most people. You were lucky he had already used it once that day and that you were resilient enough to withstand it."

After multiple repeats of the ‘you’re lucky you’re not dead,’ with a side order of ‘it’s a good thing you’re still a minor because you could go to jail for this,’ he gets to go home.

It is three in the morning by the time he arrives back at the apartment, two exhausted parents in tow, having been issued an ‘official warning,’ an order to complete 100 hours of community service and instructions to undergo a psychiatric evaluation. He has never felt angrier or more resentful.

A days later and he is back at school, wasting his time watching clocks and avoiding classmates.

Nothing had changed.

…

The car screeches to a stop at the school gates, throwing Katsuki forward in his seat. His mum turns to fix him with a stern glare, eyes narrow.

“If you’re not waiting right here by the gate when I come to pick you up or so help me I’ll be escorting you to and from your classroom from the rest of your school life,” she threatens.

“Lay off you old bat,” Katsuki snaps as was becoming routine since his mum had started driving him the short distance to school, “I got it the first million times.”

“I’ll believe that when I see it.” A finger is pointed at his nose, waving in an almost menacing fashion. “Remember. Here. School Gates. 4:00pm. Don’t you dare think about ditching again.”

Katsuki sneers and kicks open the car door, turning to slams it shut with as much force as possible in retaliation. He stalks through the gates, shouldering his way through a group of loitering students. They all scatter when they recognise him. In some ways, he prefers dealing with the anger and yelling of his mum than his father’s quiet disappointment. That doesn’t stop it from being annoying as hell.

A spike of pain runs through his hand from where he must have used a little too much force on the door. Maybe he should take his father up on those kickboxing classes. Sure, he had practised punching after reading a bunch of online guides, but reading and solo practice were completely different when compared with real actual fighting. That was assuming he was going to be getting into more real fights. He opens and closes his bandaged fist, feeling a slight sting in his wrist and fingers. He glares. Four days on and he can still feel the echo of adrenalin. The thrill of righteous anger had been so much more satisfying than the directionless rage he was accustomed to. It had rekindled some of that fire that drove him to be the best, to win, chasing away the sickening emptiness which had been dogging his every waking step.

He wants to feel that again…He wants to do something other than listlessly go through the same daily motions as he drifts towards his now uncertain future.

“Hey Bakugō!”

He keeps walking, ignoring whatever loser classmates wanted to talk to him.

“HEY!”

A hand lands on his shoulder and Katsuki twitches, a hairs breath away from spinning and firing a blast point-blank into the pest’s face. Instead, he stops and deliberately turns to glower at the pathetic piece of trash behind him. Murata Taheiji from his homeroom is standing there, one hand on his hip, flanked by two other boys he doesn’t know the names of. Two more appear to stand in front of him, blocking his way. They are all puffed up like they think they’re hot shit. Katsuki scoffs. Are these failures really trying to bully him? HIM!?

“How about you get the fuck out of my way and go find a first year to pick on. You know, someone more on your level.”

That gets him an irritated scowl that transforms into a patronising grin, “You were always such a stuck up prick Bakago…Acting so high and mighty all the time. Not anymore, I know the truth. You’re just like the rest of us.”

“Huh?” he drawls, dragging out the sound, turning so he is facing the boy, “What the fuck are you on about.”

“My dad works for Musutafu police dispatch and he told me something real interesting yesterday.” A dramatic pause, “He said that you got arrested a few nights ago.” There is a laugh that is echoed by the four surrounding him. By now the confrontation has garnered the attention of several onlookers, who are slowly drifting closer.

“All that shit about being a Hero and you got arrested. What’d you do? Steal some candy from a convenience store? We all know you don’t have money.”

Around them, the growing audience is eyeing him with varying levels of eager anticipation like they think he’ll break down and start crying because of some dumb-ass insults. Damn, if that doesn’t just piss him off. How dare these losers think him that weak.

“Don’t compare me to your loser selves,” he dismisses aggressively, making to turn and forcefully elbow his way past. He is stopped by Murata’s hand which is still on this shoulder.

“You know what I think. I think you’re all talk.”

Katsuki stills, letting the words sink and curdle in his stomach. In one short move, he turns and steps in close to Murata so they are almost nose to nose.

“Don’t fucking touch me,” he warns. The other boy tenses, looking like he wants to say something else equally stupid. If he remembers correctly Murata has some sort of muscle-enhancer, reflex quirk. One of the only worthwhile quirks in the school.

Katsuki jerks his elbow up and around in a quick jab. It smacks into the loser’s face. Crack. Guess having fast reflexes didn’t make a difference when you never saw the blow coming.

There is a cry of surprised pain and shouts of alarm from the peanut gallery. The other boy falls back, tripping over his own feet. It is ridiculously simple to lift a leg and deliver a kick to the stomach, not even a strong kick, so his failed bully thuds onto the ground, tossing up a small puff of sand. Unlike the fight in the ally, there is no rush of excitement, no spike of anger or adrenaline. No exhilaration. He is just irritated and maybe a bit disappointed. That’s what he gets for expecting anything out of the pathetic losers that went Aldera Middle School. They were more annoying than anything else.

Murata rolls around in the dirt, wheezing, trying to draw breath. He can almost imagine Deku running up to complain about his violent tendencies or sprout some shit about Hero’s needing to protect people like Murata didn’t ask for it when he decided to try his luck bullying someone obviously stronger than him.

The reminder of Deku sours his already shitty mood.

“Ah…you broke my nose. YOU BOKE IT…ah…it hurts. Do something!” The idiot calls to his equally idiotic friends as he tries to stop blood from pouring down his face.

Katsuki gazes coolly at the boy before directing his attention at the four other ‘bullies’ standing frozen around him.

“You extras got something else to add to that?” With Murata out of the game, the rest of the pathetic group shuffles about uncertainly.

“Ah…we’re good,” The tallest one says nervously, “Sorry about that Bakugō. No hard feelings right?”

He scoffs.

One of the boys moves forward to pull Murata upright, kneeling and pulling out a tissue to help stem the flow of blood. “Crap. I…I think Murata needs to go to the nurse. This looks serious.” There are a few more apprehensive glances in his direction like the other boys think he’ll insist on continuing the ‘fight’-ha! like this has been anything near a fight- until they are all bloody messes on the ground. Kaksuki rolls his eyes. As if he has the patience to deal with any more of these losers.

“Cowards,�� he mutters, shoving past. The crowd of students who had gathered to watch the failed confrontation, scramble to get out of his way. A strong breeze rushes through the school’s courtyard, drawing attention to how quiet it has suddenly gotten. Barely audible whispers follow in his wake and he can feel many sets of eyes on his back, watching.

“He always did have a bad attitude.” They murmur.

“Guess he’s a real delinquent now.”

“…did you hear what Murata said. Do you think Bakugō actually got arrested?”

“That’s got to be fake right? Murata is full of hot air.”

“No way. I believe it. You don’t have to share a class with him, I’m telling you, Bakugō’s gone nuts.”

“Kind of scary when you think about it. With a quirk like that...”

He doesn’t know why they’re all so shocked. This isn’t the first fight he has gotten into on school grounds. Okay, so maybe he’d held off doing any real harm before now, well aware that U.A. would probably check his school record. It had never mattered to him because there was no point in beating up weaklings when he was obviously superior. Except for Deku…the only person he had ever really hurt, the only person he could get away with hurting without repercussions. And now he feels like extra shit. God, what a huge farce it had all been. Kaksuki clenches his fist and growls, wondering if it isn’t too late to ditch and go find somewhere secluded to blow off steam. Anything to escape this feeling of frustration.

He doesn’t have time to make a proper decision because news of his ‘fight’ had obviously spread to the staffroom. One of the second year homeroom teachers comes barrelling out of the school’s front entrance, eyes immediately landing on him.

“What happened!” Their eyes move past him to the bloody Murata, “Go wait in the principles office. Now.”

Well, he didn’t want to deal with his annoying classmates anyway. He stalks away, the sounds of the teacher fussing over Murata growing fainter behind him. When he arrives, the principal’s office is empty and he flings himself down into one of the comfy couches, irritated. The bell for homeroom goes off and Kaksuki remains sprawled across the couch, arm across his face to block out the light and his view of the clock slowly ticking away.

Just as he begins to contemplate leaving, Principle Fukuhara comes strolling into the room.

“ Bakugō,” the man lets out an exasperated sigh, “Sit up please.”

Katsuki moves his arm to peek out and glare at the man, deliberately ignoring the instruction.

“I just finished talking to Ms Yuki and the school’s nurse. You broke Murata Taheiji’s nose. I hope you realise how serious this situation is and that there will be major consequences. Aldera Middle School does not tolerate this sort of violence on its grounds.”

Silence. That was a fucking lie. Slowly, Katsuki pulls himself upright, meeting the man’s hard stare with his own.

“Well, do you have anything to say for yourself and your disgraceful behaviour..”

Katsuki narrows his eyes, “The idiot was asking for it.”

Obviously, it's the wrong response going by how the skin tightens around the man’s eyes, “I see...I’m sorry you feel that way. Up until now, our school has been more than lenient. We have overlooked your shameful behaviour these last few weeks because we wanted to give you time to settle after going through such as tragic incident. However, I am afraid that this time you have gone too far. Your parents will be notified. You’ll see the school councillor. You will be staying back for after school detention. Since this is your first major incident we…”

“First?” He cuts the man off. He is sick of hearing the moron’s voice. “Hahaha and people say you don’t have a sense of humour.” He laughs an unpleasant laugh which increases in volume until he is almost shouting.

“What sort of shit hole are you running? Three years I’ve been beating up the dumb idiots that come here and now you decide to care. Why is that huh? Is it because I’m no longer going to put this shitty place on the map and become a famous hero! HA!”

He lets his voice quieten, sneering “I’ll never be a hero so you’re shit out of luck.” Finally saying it out loud is like throwing a bucket of water over the embers of an already struggling fire. It hurts deep in his chest. The expression of shocked disbelief is almost worth it.

“Thanks for proving what a worthless profession it is,” he finishes with another hash laugh, rage simmering under his skin. When he tries to stand and leave a hand lands on his shoulder, pushing him back down.

The principal, who still looks somewhat stunned at his sudden outburst, orders, “Sit back down Bakugō! I am far from finished.”

Why do people always feel the need to grab him. He is so fucking sick of everyone pulling and tugging on him, trying to control him and hold him down. Katsuki turns slowly, that simmering rage pulsing, running down his limbs. Pop pop pop go his hands. He feels as explosive fire gathering in behind his eyes and in his shadowy stare. It is not the dramatic, adrenaline-induced anger he had felt when preparing for the ally fight. No, this is a dark burning rage, fuelled by his growing resentment.

“Touch me again,” he growls, low and intimidating, “and I’ll kill you.”

The principal snatches his hand back like he has just been burnt. A poignant silence follows in the wake of his threat.

“Suspension,” the man says, swallowing, “You’re suspended. I’m calling your parents right now.” And is it just him or does he look genuinely worried? There is even a hint of fear in his wrinkled face. Katsuki takes vindictive joy in the achievement. Finally…finally the worthless morons are seeing him, truly seeing him and not whatever Bakugō -delusion they’d all cooked up in their heads.

#bnha #mha #boku no academia #my hero academia #bnha fanfic #MAJOR CHARACTER DEATH #Katsuki Bakugō #‘the Sludge Villain incident gone wrong’ aka Izuku dies #graphic descriptions of violence #angst #bakugou swears and gets into fights #coarse language #fanfiction #fanfic #something sad au

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jungnoir · 4 years ago

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destiny | 09;

⇢ summary: you’re just about ready to give up on life altogether; your love life is in ruins, you’ve lost your job, and your family couldn’t care less about you… and then you meet your blushing guardian angel, and maybe life isn’t so bad after all.

⇢ relationship: jeon jungkook/reader, min yoongi/reader.

⇢ genre: supernatural, angel!au, demon!au, romance, thriller.

⇢ words: 6.5k words.

⇢ warnings: mentions of depression, violence, vomiting. slightly nsfw toward the end.

previously | next

a/n: happy new year! I know it’s been quite a while (literally an entire year since I’ve updated) but I’ve had this chapter pretty much ready in my drafts and just hadn’t gotten around to finishing because. everything. regardless, I hope this sort of makes up for it. love you all! hope you’re doing well. also WOW I swear a lot in this one.

His hand on your neck is meant to silence any screams that might slip out. He applies the perfect pressure to avoid crushing anything vital (and just by the feel alone, you know he’s got quite an amount of strength to pull that off) while simultaneously stealing all your air and forcing you to cower in fear. You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to know this guy isn’t someone to be fucked with, and all you can think about is the fact that Jungkook is right outside and has no fucking clue what’s going on. The very thought fills you with dread.

“Then again, you’ve got someone helping you.” What once was just a particular, calculated press against your skin becomes a deliberate act of violence as he begins to choke you harshly. You know the pain of his grip might last for weeks, and that’s only if you don’t die in the next minute. “Just makes me wonder what’s so special about you.”

“Nothing!” You rasp out, clawing at his hand now in some weak attempt at breaking away. If you could make enough noise, enough commotion, surely someone-

-but the stranger has already stopped you quick. You aim to throw the door open or something but his free hand quickly apprehends you until you’re just a squirming mess on the verge of passing out. Even your legs are pressed firmly to the wall by his own body, holding you fast so that you can’t help letting a few tears fall. There was no doubt in your panicked mind that this was Seokjin, the angel who’d been trailing you from the shadows for what felt like centuries. His grand act of approaching you, something you’d dreamed up to be a major climactic brawl in a battlefield made for a spectacle, turns out to be so simple. Perhaps that’s what you got for thinking biblically. Why go through all the trouble when he could just squash the problem the minute a chance presented itself?

Now, all you can think is “I can’t die like this”. A sobering thought of pure contempt. Drowning in the river was preferable to this.

You muster what breath you can, eyes blazing, “How does it feel… being God’s lap dog?”

Seokjin is, funnily enough, stunned for a moment. All bravado slips through a teeny crack in his demeanor when you say that, and even though it’s a low blow, it’s also enough for you to thrust a semi-powerful kick to the dressing room door to make the entire thing shudder like an earthquake. That sound, coupled with your comment, makes Seokjin release you in a panic. You hear some gasps from outside, a few people inquiring if you’re alright. An employee sounds most worried amongst the voices. You’re just shy of swinging the door open and forcing Seokjin to be revealed or to disappear all at once, but then he’s grabbed the back of your collar as you scream in frustrated fury. Seconds later, you’re no longer in the dressing room anymore.

Instead, you fall flat on a rough, sandy surface. You’re overwhelmed with nausea, pain, and fear, so your whole body is struggling to pick up on the most important things outside of that, but you do realize quite fleetingly that it’s sweltering. It takes you a few seconds as you curl up on the ground to peek behind your hands that shield your face and discover that it’s blindingly bright where you are, almost like a…

For fuck’s sake. “Of all the places…” You whine with a sore throat, coughing right after from the strain.

Seokjin stands above you and uses his foot to kick you onto your back so that you’re staring up at him and the baby blue sky. His hair color plays against it in an unfittingly gentle contrast, “I thought we might need somewhere safer to discuss things. Oh, and speaking of discussion,” he waves a hand near you and you instinctively flinch back before you feel the pain in your throat subside. You wait a few seconds, but it seems whatever he’d just done had no effect on the rising bile in your throat, so you assume that’s something you’ll have to deal with on your own. What an ass. “Feel better?”

“Fuck you! Maybe if you hadn’t choked me out in the first place-”

“You’d have listened?”

“Maybe if you hadn’t hunted us down to kill us, we would have!”

Seokjin frowns, “I didn’t bring you here to talk about you and that boy, I brought you here to talk about you. I am only concerned with you.”

Whatever that entailed did not sound good in the slightest.

You scramble to your feet and immediately regret the movement as it makes you sick again. The more than 100 degree weather does nothing to fix that either, the sun beating down on you and bouncing off the dusty white sands directly into your eyes. You’re feeling something nasty rising up from your stomach, ready to projectile…

Just as the scene changes, you paint a Victorian rug with streaks of your vomit.

Seokjin immediately groans out loud, placing a rough hand at the back of your neck like one would grab the scruff of a kitten. You’re far too weak to protest, rubbing at your mouth with the back of your hand, so you let him toss you into a chair. The jerkiness of the action should have sent another eruption out of you, but you recognize the relief that has overwhelmed you from the touch of his hand. Had he fixed that too?

“Never the matter,” the angel growls, waving his hand and making the mess evaporate from the very fibers of the rug, “you’re all very fragile. I should have prepared you first.”

“How can you do all that…?” You couldn’t recall Jungkook or Jimin showing off any power like that, and whether it was because of Seokjin’s status or their modesty (and adherence to rules), you were unsure. Most likely both.

Instead of answering right away, Seokjin reaches forward a moving cart and you finally notice there’s a glass pitcher of water (hopefully) next to an array of empty glasses. You take the time he spends pouring some water for you to examine your surroundings.

It looks like a secret room in an old English manor house. The walls are painted a deep charcoal and with the absence of natural light, you could mistake it for the void. The only light that does exist is a strangely dim white light coming from the ceiling. What looks like a rather ornate shell of a skylight (sans the window to actually reveal, well, a sky), seems to hide said white light somewhere in it. It’s such a vague glow that you can’t pinpoint if it’s coming from a lightbulb or magic.

The rest of the room is just as ornate as the “skylight”, filled with deep oak bookshelves, golden artifacts, and shining decorations that already look like they cost more than your house. It doesn’t really matter the longer you think about it. All of it has to be an illusion… right?

A glass is placed into your hand and you break out of your thoughts to make eye contact with Seokjin. He hovers over you with narrowed eyes and when you look back at your surroundings again, you notice all the little decorations have disappeared. Why had he- “We can negotiate those bits of the deal later if you so wish.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” You ask, hesitant to drink the water despite how much the heat of the desert had made you crave it.

“Like I said before, I brought you here to discuss you. I’ve been watching you and lover boy for a while and it has become clear to me that you’ve been pulled along for quite the ride. I’m sure it’s all very daunting.”

“It wouldn’t have been so bad if you hadn’t shown up.”

“How much do you know about our Lord and Savior?”

It was tricky to say the least. You’d grown up on tales of him, an over-powered being of immense stature. No one could come close to him, not even the devil. However, you’d learned bits and pieces from Jungkook, Yoongi, and the others to the point where your ideas of the figure had become skewed. There was no linear understanding of him. You honestly had no idea, “Probably not enough.”

Seokjin huffs, taking a seat from across from you in a chair similar to yours. Crossing a leg over the other, the angel stares you down, “Do you know why I’m after you both?”

“You want to kill Jungkook. Because he committed your sin.”

“Jungkook is my main target, yes, but it wasn’t my sin. My sin was sullying myself with a demon. Jungkook’s sin was sullying you.”

You frown, “He did no such thing! You had a fucking child! Jungkook saved my life!”

“You mean to say he ruined it. You were supposed to be dead a long time ago.”

You’d known that much, Jungkook had told you already. Even if he hadn’t, that had always been the plan. “It was… it was my choice and I wanted it then, I admit it. But I was hurt. I was overwhelmed. I wanted it because I was scared there would be no reason to keep going.”

The angel angles a brow upwards, “And the fallen was that for you? A reason to keep going?”

“It was- it was a lot of things. I was reminded that I existed, and that there are people who can love me the right way,” frustrated at the situation, you glare at him, “what the fuck? Is this some fucking therapy session?”

He has the gall to smile, “God knows you need one. I’d like to be the one to get inside that mind of yours.”

Shit. What if you’d given him just the right information to use against you?

You snap your lips shut and sink back into your chair, bubbling with more dread. He notices your sudden resolve and appears to want to ease your worries, “I’m not doing this to break you. Unlike God, I find you, as a person, quite redeemable. A gentle, pained soul who fell victim to the perversion of her guardian angel. It’s all very sad.”

So God did think you were a lost cause. Jimin had been right after all. However, you don’t want to keep talking when you’re so close to getting the information you’ve been waiting for. It seems even Seokjin isn’t fazed by your silence, continuing on without missing a beat. “You see, usually these angel and human matters can be chalked up to the angel getting too big for their britches. They think they can change things like fate: God’s very flawless plan from the beginning. They are simply… glitches in the matrix, you could say? That’s where I come in. I make sure these issues are handled and that everything goes back to normal. You see, God loves his humans. Truly. He has a bit of a temper, but it’s justified, you know? He loves you all so very much that seeing you stray from a holy and righteous path is heartbreaking for him. He can only excuse so much.

“So he doesn’t. But… sometimes I help him. I change his mind. Even Jesus had to convince God not to blame his executioners. The big guy gets real impassioned about those he loves. It’s all part of the territory of being in heaven’s sovereignty,” at this, Seokjin shrugs, “you were an unfortunate casualty of it. However, I brought you here because I think that you could be saved. You’re simply confused. I’m sure I could convince God to rethink... his punishment for you.”

Your eyes widen, nearly dropping your glass, “He’d do that?”

The angel nods, pleased, “Of course! After all, he just wants you to repent. If you show that you will, well, I could put in a good word for you. He and I are very close.”

“But only for me.”

Seokjin’s smile dims some. He was so sure he’d had you on the hook just then, “Well… yes. There isn't much I can say about angels. Humans are born sinful, but angels are born knowing better. If they succumb to sin, I cannot do anything about that. But… if you feel that you’d be leaving Jungkook behind, and if that would cause you to feel guilty, I can assure you that that would be taken care of. Your memory of him would be wiped clean and you’d receive another guardian angel in an instant. You’d be granted everything you ever wanted. You’d be able to live out a new path of life contrary to the one your fallen so selfishly carved out for you.”

At this, you begin to frown deeper than you ever have. It’s not out of confusion but deep, deep understanding. Seokjin’s deal was asking you to sell Jungkook out and in return… he’d make you happy. You’d forget all about what had happened and carry on a new person, virtually safe. You could only assume that meant forgetting Yoongi too. Everything you’d accomplished so far would be rearranged until the you that you’d become would be so unfathomable you wouldn’t ever consider it.

What scares you the most is that you actually consider it.

This all could end right now and you’d get out alive, maybe all the ordinary people you knew would get out alive too. You’d be completely removed from the situation. You’d just have to forget Jungkook.

“You asked me how much I know about God,” you start, thumbs twiddling, and Seokjin perks up, “the stories humans told of him always kind of scared me. He’s so powerful… he knew everything before it was even created. Nothing can get past him. And yet, he let humans have free will and the right to choose what their path in life would be. That part always boggled my mind. God’s supposed to love us unconditionally, but if we don’t return the favor, we suffer eternally. It seemed like a pretty big plothole in the otherwise ‘flawless plan’ you claim he made.”

“Yes, well, it’s not God’s fault that Lucifer’s so conniving.”

“But it is. Isn’t it? God created him. Lucifer is the one who brought sin upon the world but God is the one that created him. If he knows everything, why make him in the first place? It’s a fallacy,” Seokjin’s eye twitches just a bit as you lean forward, “that God knows everything. Isn’t it? He wouldn’t be so stupid. He had no fucking clue what he’d made when he made Lucifer.”

“I’d watch your tone. God hears all.” The angel’s ominous reply is all that you need to hear. He doesn’t tell you that anything else you’ve said is false or not. Of course not. You know as well as he does that you’re spot on.

You’re so stunted by the arrogance of it all that you have to laugh, “Allegedly.”

In that same moment, the white light above begins to flicker. A distant rumbling sounds from somewhere and that fear you’d felt earlier comes back with a vengeance. Seokjin looks annoyed, if anything, “I only have so much time to sit here with you to chat.” He stands up and walks over to you, seizing you by the arm, “So I’m telling you now that you still have a chance. No one else has to die. Do me a solid and make that a reality.”

Did he really not want to kill you? He’d had so many chances to. Even now, he could just… what did you have that made him hesitate? “You think I believe that?”

The ground rumbles underneath you and then you fall through, Seokjin’s grip slipping off your arm… or maybe being pried off.

Where you land next isn’t as disorienting as the last few times, but it doesn’t feel any better to be ripped away again without so much as a warning. For a moment before you land, you halt, almost floating. Then your feet make contact with stone and then your knees follow under the sudden press of gravity. A quick look around tells you that Seokjin is nowhere to be seen… and that where you are looks vaguely familiar.

The stone continues up the walls to the ceiling, creating a naturally cold room that expands no more than the size of a restroom (no toilets in sight, however). The furthest edge of the room from you is completely dark, while the other is helped by a fire stretching from one long, narrow wall to the other. There is no wood crackling beneath it though, nor is there an actual controlled area for it to burn. Flames simply lick up the bottom of the wall as if commanded by magic. While the rest of your body feels chilly, the warmth of the fire keeps your head warm like a fever.

You lay crumpled up on your knees and hands, staring into the flames with the most bemused expression, wondering what to do now. You’re definitely not intent on travelling to the other side of the room in fear of being met with something sinister you can’t see, but the fire only illuminates so much of the place and there doesn’t seem to be a door in sight. If Seokjin wasn’t here, you doubted this was a place he wanted to be.

Maybe he was torturing you? Intending to keep you in a dark, scary room in order to break your resolve? You didn’t know the extent of power he was allowed to wield but this whole transportation thing was starting to get really annoying. You chance a meek, “Hello?”

Your voice doesn’t echo like you expect it to. It sounds like it’s right up against your face, like you’d spoken into a pillow, the sound eaten as soon as it came from your mouth. Where the hell were you?

“...not exact, okay?!”

You pick up on a voice to your right and turn over with such speed that you land on your ass. Some stones move on the narrow wall, and then the room is illuminated from an entirely different source of light. It takes you a few moments to gather your bearings as your eyes attempt to adjust. Voices are frantic and coming closer, you can hear that much. You pick up on one instantly, “Jungkook.”

Your voice is weak with relief just as he comes into view. He looks an absolute mess as he throws himself at your feet and wraps you up into a bone-crushing hug. The strength of his hug doesn’t even bother you as you cling back with just as much force, grateful tears beginning to gush out of your eyes. You didn’t realize until then just how terrified you’d been, really. It was always there underneath the surface, but something about Jungkook’s sudden presence makes the reality of it all hit much harder. He smells like your shampoo still.

After a couple of minutes in his embrace, you pull away to examine his face, “Are you okay?”

He laughs and the way his tears have clogged up his throat make it sound more like he’s choking, “Who cares about me? Are you?”

You smile, tucking some of his hair behind his ear, “Better. With you here. Where are we?”

“Limbo, hell’s limbo.”

You’re not sure what to say in response to that. After what you’d been through in the last… however long it’d been, that seems the most plausible to you. “Is that like purgatory?”

“No,” another voice speaks from above you and only then do you realize that Yoongi is here too. He looms over the both of you but his gaze is fixed heavy on your face, “purgatory is where the dead go on their way to heaven. This is where the living come on their way to hell. Was a hell of a ride trying to get your ass down here.”

“Yoongi…” You peel back from Jungkook and stand up, a little wobbly as you lean against the wall, “...thank you. How did you do it? The places Seokjin took me… I felt like we were in a dream.”

His upper lip ticks up in a snarl, “It was. The place where you were is a void, heaven’s version of limbo. It’s where angels bargain with humans on the edge of death to repent. It’s an open playing field for angels to present themselves to their humans without them having to be dead or breaking a rule… not like the latter really applies to Seokjin, though. It’s only as strong as your will to be there,” with that, Yoongi reaches toward you and brushes what feels like sand off your cheek, or perhaps he just meant to touch you to make sure you were really here with the way it lingered, “and that’s the only reason I could pull you out.”

It was a lot to digest. You still couldn’t totally understand how he’d pulled you from heaven’s limbo if he was a demon, but that was beside the point. Right now, you just wanted to get out of this creepy box of a room for good. And it seemed you would be getting your wish.

Another figure became clear to you through the doorway, though this figure looked much more intimidating than the two by your side. Dressed immaculately with a sly smile that felt strikingly familiar, a man makes his way into the room, pressing a hand to his chest and bowing his head to you, “He had my help too, of course. A pleasure to meet you (Name), I’ve heard very little about you.” The man holds out a hand to you and you can feel both Jungkook and Yoongi stiffen on either side of you, but neither makes a move to stop him. This had to be another demon, no doubt.

You take his hand and shake it firmly despite your nerves, “T-Thank you for your help as well. May I ask who you are?”

The man grins wider, “You can call me Lucifer. Are you hungry?”

An entire array of human food is set out before you but you don’t have much of a stomach to touch any of it, though Jungkook seems right at home as he fills up his own plate. You can only guess he’s enjoying the hell out of having so much food at his fingertips without having to pay for it.

You can hear his delighted sound effects from the left of you as you both sit on one side of a long table. Lucifer sits at the head of the table to the right of you, also refraining from really eating anything. Yoongi sits right across from you on the other side with an annoyed expression on his face, fingers tapping the heavy oak table top in a rhythm you can’t decipher. It couldn’t be any more awkward.

“No appetite?” Lucifer asks, pointing to the food. There’s meat and vegetables and cheeses that you know and don’t know but none of it seems particularly appetizing to you at the moment.

You shake your head, “No. Actually, I have a few questions I’d like to ask you.”

“Ah, bet you’re bursting.” He chuckles and takes a swig of something you think might be wine. “Go ahead. I’ll try to recap the last couple of days as well as I can.”

“Days?!” You don’t mean to yell, you really don’t (especially not at the king of hell, but-), “It’s been days?”

Jungkook stops chewing to give you a concerned look, “Of course… how long was it for you?”

“Barely… half an hour, maybe more? But not days.”

“Yes, well,” Lucifer sighs, tucking his hands together in front of himself, “time works much differently in heaven and hell than it does here. Especially for those who end up in heavenly limbo. It’s essentially cut off from the rest of the universe which makes it that much harder to track those who end up there. Seokjin was smart in bringing you there than somewhere else on earth.”

Your head is throbbing at this point. If days had gone by, you could only imagine how much had changed since you’d been gone… “So… what has happened since then?”

“Apparently quite a bit, seeing as I was a last resort.” Lucifer’s tone almost sounds irritated. Like a petulant child, he glares over at his son with an unspoken tension that you would like to delve into much, much later when the important things have been moved out of the way. “These boys have been pretty busy trying to get you back. But we are all eager to know what happened while you were with Seokjin.”

Jungkook places a gentle hand on top of your knee under the table. For whatever reason, you note that his grip feels stronger than you’d grown used to. You’d thought the hug was just because he missed you so much, but even this simple touch was- “He… he found me in the dressing room, cornered me there and told me he’d been trying to get me and Jungkook alone. Somewhere he could really do some damage.” You recite all that you readily remembered, some details slipping as you focus on Jungkook’s touch. Yoongi’s eyes never stop boring into you. “He said a lot. He… he said he wanted to give me a second chance.”

Lucifer raises a brow at you, “At…?”

“Life. He said that if I… if I ratted out Jungkook, he’d work things out with God to set my life back on track. Memories wiped, a new guardian angel, the works.” You can feel Jungkook stiffen next to you.

“And did you take him up on it?” Lucifer inquires.

“No! No, I would… I would never. But he was so insistent… It sounded like he really wanted me to say yes. I don’t think he was planning to betray me if I took him up on it either.”

Lucifer heaves a heavy sigh. Folding his hands underneath his chin, the king of hell spares a glance at Jungkook, “He’s got a thing for innocents: those he believes did no actual harm in a situation. He’s always been soft that way. He has more of an affinity for humans than I ever did, but I have more reason to loathe humans than he does, so I guess it’s understandable.”

“He did… mention that none of this was my fault.”

“Of course! You were only following the path life laid out for you. It was the fallen angel you have beside you that decided to shake things up, and aren’t you lucky he did? It doesn’t surprise me one bit that you’re still alive. You’ve done nothing but suffer the consequences, it seems, against your own will.”

“But what about the demon he fell for? Or his child? Weren’t they killed so he could keep his spot in heaven?”

Lucifer leans forward, “I’m assuming your friends haven’t made it known to you yet, but they aren’t dead. They are both very much alive. In fact, the child in question was one of the people that helped in tracking you down. The mother… she is here, in hell, meant to stay imprisoned for all eternity. Or at least until the rapture,” with that, Lucifer drinks again, maintaining eye contact with your shocked stare, “but it was best that no one knew of their whereabouts. Only a handful of people even know that Inhui still exists. It’s become something of a legend amongst the demons and angels, shrouded in confusion. None of the angels would care for the mother, but the child would start an earthly war if they knew one still walked the earth. As far as they’re concerned, the child probably died from the natural complications of being an abomination.”

You frown, “How is that possible? An angel for every human on earth… that’s billions of angels and no one has even noticed the guy?”

“I was wondering about that, actually. He told us that he’d been walking the earth for a while now. Surely someone would have taken notice, right?” Jungkook speaks next, having abandoned his food entirely.

Yoongi snaps out of his bored stance, “Tae’s an anomaly. He’s forgotten everywhere he goes. His impression barely lasts long. Those people he encountered early on considered him a dream, or a hallucination, or a possession of the mind. His actual presence is… hazy. It’s easier to remember him by his name or his number, but everything else is-”

“Intangible.” His father finishes with a flourish. “No ordinary angel or demon could ever put a face to the name, only a feeling. Along with the rather excessive amount of glamours he employs when amongst the public, it is no wonder no one has sounded the alarm. Go ahead and recall his face in your mind, fallen. I’m sure you couldn’t piece it together even if you wanted to.”

Jungkook’s face screws up a little as an attempt, stricken dumb moments later when he can’t utter a thing. Your stomach churns at the thought, soiling your appetite even more.

It seemed like there was more to that story than you were being told, but you imagined that it would be quite a lot to relay to you in more than one sitting. After all, you still had no clue what you’d missed since you’d been gone, and it only hadn’t terrified you senseless because you were at least certain that the biggest threat to everyone’s lives had been right there with you the whole time.

“If you’re not planning to eat anytime soon, is there anything else you’d like to know? It’s not every day a mortal like you gets to talk to Lucifer.” With a small flourishing wave of his hand, Lucifer smiles at you, charming as ever. It was so strange. Yoongi acted nothing like his father, and yet you saw every bit of him in his expression.

You imagined Yoongi felt the need to distance himself as much as he could from his father’s intimidating image and had ended up creating his own in the process. Where Lucifer was inviting, however, Yoongi was… not for everyone. Even as he stares over the table at you, eyes hooded with what appears to be indifference rather than lasciviousness, you can’t help but see the other in him.

“I suppose not,” you murmur, “but now that I have the chance, I don’t really know what to say.”

Lucifer continues to smile, “Don’t fret! I’m sure after the doozy you’ve been in, you’ll need to rest up. You’re more than welcome to stay here until you feel it’s safe to go back topside.”

The thought of treating hell like a hotel to stay in was tickling to say the least. The minute you rise, Jungkook follows suit, nearly knocking his chair over in the process to follow you. “I’d appreciate that. Is there… perhaps a room I could cool down in? Maybe a bathroom?”

Lucifer had deposited both you and Jungkook in a rather nice room, fitted with all the things you’d find in a nice resort room overlooking somewhere like the Bahamas. The dark, brooding colors of Hell follow you even here, and what little light you are allowed in the room comes from fire or mysterious ambience. Still, it’s enough to splash your face with (what you’re definitely sure is) water in the ensuite bathroom.

Jungkook sits at the foot of the bed, watching you, “I missed you.”

Since the moment that the Lord of Hell and his son had left you to your devices, you’d become increasingly aware that something was off about your angel. You had imagined that it had been from the sheer worry he felt over you, but it was starting to feel different from that. Something not so easily explained. If only… if only you could figure it out.

You pat your skin dry and look over at him, measuring him up and down. Appearance wise, he still had the same haircut, same clothes, same shoes. It was the aura that felt different.

Slowly, you approach him from the bathroom and wish that there would be more light in the room to examine him with. In that same moment, what appeared to be a ray of warm light halos above you both, giving you exactly what you had wished for. When Jungkook looks up, he looks… radiant. “I missed you too…” You whisper, reaching out a hand to cup his jaw. At your touch, he shudders, melting into you, and those eyes then laser focus on your own. “Are you okay?”

“I am now.” He answers without hesitation, then turns to kiss your inner palm with such a sensual drag of his lips that you grow hot instantly. The surprise makes you yank your hand away and you swear you hear him whine at the missing contact.

“Y-You just look different.” You squeak, holding the aforementioned hand to your chest as if he’d burned you.

Jungkook’s bushy brows furrow. “Do I?”

When Jungkook had been an angel, he’d had a distinct glow about him that set him apart from others. It was cliche, but it made sense then. You knew that you were dealing with someone from another world. When he’d turned human, he’d felt softer, normal. He didn’t glow in any particular way lest the light hit him through the window just right. But now… that glow was back. In a way that didn’t feel familiar.

You reach your hand out again, but this time you let it wander. You push his fringe back from his forehead, then behind his ear, then down his neck to where a sweatshirt hides his collarbones. In a daze, you fall to your knees before his seated frame and push the fabric back some. You find… nothing. You don’t even know what you’re looking for. A vampire bite? What is so different?

Your hand starts to fall mindlessly as you wrack your brain, but it’s all for naught when Jungkook catches hold of it and intertwines his fingers with yours. His grip is warm and solid. But it’s still- “I thought he’d hurt you.”

You look back up into Jungkook’s eyes as he now leans over you with an intense stare. His hair curls around his cheekbones and twists away from his face at the nape, each strand fluttering as he inches closer until the longest ones are touching your face. “Not much. He healed what he did anyway.”

At that, your angel’s eyes narrow in their scan over you, “What did he do?”

You instinctively swallow. Perhaps because you remember the feeling. Perhaps because Jungkook looks like he could kill. “He… he had to get me to limbo. He had to…” You touch the skin of your throat the same moment you break eye contact, feeling the ghost of Seokjin’s fingers there. It wasn’t so long ago that it had happened after all. You could honestly still feel it.

The silence grows until it’s nearly unbearable, you eventually finding that Jungkook will say nothing while you continue to avoid his gaze. Against your better judgement, you chance a look up at him.

You don’t get very long to look. Jungkook takes both sides of your face and lunges forward like a man possessed and you are forced to follow. In your surprise, you stumble back onto your elbows and Jungkook slots himself between your legs, latching onto your lips in a searing kiss. It’s hot and fast and immature, the kiss of a person who has never kissed before and may never get the chance to kiss again. Youngho had never kissed you like this.

A gentle whimper escapes your mouth but Jungkook inhales it into his own. You feel something primal burn inside you when Jungkook growls out, crouching over you now like a predator cornering his prey, and he’s practically consuming you when you start to kiss back. Can you blame yourself? You easily fold into the feeling because it’s Jungkook and goddamn if you hadn’t wanted to kiss him badly before.

His inexperience does very little to dissuade from how good it feels too, and as you start to take over to guide him, he is all too eager to feel your reciprocated passion. The heady feeling he gives you in his sudden attack pushes all thoughts of Seokjin or the last few days out of your mind like a fast-acting asprin. All you can think of now is how tightly coiled you’d been and how Jungkook is loosening you up one press of his lips at a time.

He lays you on your back and you happily oblige, no cushioning found on the hard floor but you couldn’t care less. Jungkook is careful not to be too rough, aware of your needs as much as his own, and it’s jarringly sweet the way he cradles the back of your head to keep you from hitting it on your descent.

When he’s had enough of your lips (as if he could ever), he starts attacking your neck. He’s lapping at your skin and biting away as if he’s trying to remove all traces of Seokjin’s hands… as if he’s replacing the feeling with him and him only. “I’ll kill him,” Jungkook whispers, a foreign fury in his voice that makes your haze disappear in an instant while he continues to work at your neck, “I’ll kill him for ever touching you.”

Your hand shoots to his hair, feeling your heart beat faster from more than just the kisses, “Kook-” But any attempt at sobering up washes away when, to your surprise, he ruts against you. Youngho had never been that good at using his hips like that either. There was something definitely off with Jungkook.

As much as it pains you, you grab at his hair and yank back, ignoring (or trying to) the filthy groan that he gives in response before peeling away from your skin. You gasp for breath, absolutely winded, “What is going on?”

Jungkook pants past wet lips, “What do you mean-”

“Did Yoongi do this to you?” The sudden heated moment is over when you say that.

Jungkook’s blood has run cold. You have a very strong, haunting feeling that your mounting suspicions have proven correct. His eyes… as gentle as they always were when they looked at you, told you everything. He was not the same Jungkook you’d come to know. Something had happened to him. Something irreversible. You touch his face again and this time Jungkook does not move to embrace it. He looks like he’d rather be anywhere else in the world. “Why?”

In an attempt to escape your pitiful gaze, Jungkook’s eyes flutter shut, cutting you off from seeing him vulnerable any longer. It breaks your heart the longer he stays silent. There’s no denying it now.

A tear of his touches the palm of your hand instead of his lips this time, “How else could I protect you?” He chokes, weak, “I’m not your angel anymore. I can’t be like you. This is the only way... the only way I could stand to look you in the eyes again.”

#majwrites #jungkook scenarios #jungkook imagines #jungkook au #angel!jungkook #jeon jungkook #bts scenarios #bts imagines #bts au #yoongi scenarios #yoongi imagines #yoongi au #demon!yoongi #min yoongi #bts #jungkook angst #yoongi angst #angel bts #demon bts

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lakemojave · 4 years ago

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Supergiant Games: Same Bones, Different Skeletons

I just finished a retrospective of all 4 games by Supergiant on my twitch channel, and I have a few thoughts I wanna connect and questions I wanna explore. My love for these games is real strong and i could write a whole essay just gushing about them, but I wanna give some thought to what makes them so compelling: not just to me, but to damn near everyone I’ve talked to on their discord who feels the same. I myself rank Bastion among my favorite games ever, and Hades is climbing that list at a clip. And even though I could take or leave Transistor or Pyre, they keep pulling me back.

But I could talk a whole lot about each game’s appeal and waste a lot of time. I’ve gushed enough to my friends about how Bastion and Pyre’s rugged, apocalyptic atmospheres draw me in with their incredible vibrance to contrast. I could talk about how Ashley Barrett’s vocal tracks carry Transistor on their shoulders, or what makes Hades so much goddamn fun that the game doesn’t really need to be much else. But I realize that if the Supergiant library is so universally appealing to me, there must be some sort of connective tissue between them--some sort of fundamental similarity that makes them work. After thinking about it for more than five minutes, it turns out there are many; some are pretty obvious, and some less so. This brings me to the conclusion that the Supergiant library, with its four wildly distinct and different games, still follow a noticeable formula--one that is flexible enough to allow such completely different games.

Game Design

The Supergiant library are all essentially top down action rpgs, Transistor having the most elements of the genre. This is still a pretty weak connection, given how different they all play from each other. The only two that have much overlap in the most basic sense are Bastion and Hades, with the same general fast paced, real time combat. On closer examination, the two games have enough differences in the variety of mechanics at play, (Bastion with its multiple weapon slots and a shield, Hades with its sheer number of commands) that even they are hard to compare.

There are, however, several mechanics that the library loves to use. The first that comes to mind are the difficulty conditions: idols in Bastion, limiters in Transistor, titan stars in Pyre, and the pact of punishment--and arguably Chaos boons as well--in Hades. Their function is simple: increase your challenge for a little extra reward. Bastion and Pyre go the extra mile by fixing in world building elements to this mechanic; Bastion’s idols inform about the game’s pantheon, while Pyre informs about its, well, evil pantheon. The use of these conditions is indicative of Supergiant’s game design philosophy as a whole--you, the player, can make the game as hard or easy as it takes for you to have fun. The inclusion of infinite lives in Bastion or god mode or hell mode in Hades further builds on this point. This library is designed for all sorts of audiences, whether they want to be challenged by their games or simply immersed in the story.

Another repeating mechanic in these games are the use of challenge rooms, which started in Bastion as the training grounds and, to a lesser extent, Who Knows Where. In Transistor they are the sandbox test rooms, and in Pyre they are the beyonder crystal’s scribe trials. They appear in Hades a little more ambiguously; the infernal troves or Erebus rooms are not quite the same, but they serve a similar function. This function is a momentary break from the gameplay loop for a little extra reward, much like the previously discussed conditions. Transistor and Hades’ challenge rooms offer relatively negligible rewards; the sandbox rooms simply offer xp and unlock tracks for the jukebox, while the Erebus tiles offer double the reward for any normal tile. Bastion and Pyre go the extra mile by giving specific, long term rewards for their challenges. In Bastion’s training grounds, the Kid earns weapon specific abilities that are among the game’s most powerful; in Pyre’s scribe trials, exiles can earn character specific talismans that feed their specialization. For the most part, these rooms give the player a low stakes opportunity to practice, hone their preferred playstyle, and reward the effort, all while being completely optional.

Akin to these breaks in the game loop are designated resting areas/hub worlds. The Bastion, the Sandbox, the Blackwagon, and the House of Hades each offer a moment to interact with characters and lore, goof around with the environment, buy permanent upgrades, or just take a break. Transistor utilizes this function the least of the library, since it never once requires the player to enter the space. Pyre utilizes it the most since it has the most breaks in both frequency and number. In a way, this decision is both a game design and storytelling choice. Between all four games, perhaps excluding Transistor, this is where the majority of story beats take place. It is where the player can read up on some fresh lore or meet the ever growing cast of characters, and eventually grow to cherish them (as I often do playing this library). Without little breaks like these, the climactic or world/story shaking events that take place out in the actual playable space have no impact or narrative weight. The fact that all these sort of interactions are completely voluntary also rewards the player in the storytelling sense; by choosing to engage with the figures of the story rather than having that choice decided for them, the player feels as though they themselves have agency in the story unfolding.

Style

Perhaps the most distinct part of the Supergiant library, (and perhaps what I personally love most about it) is its aesthetics. There are few games that look, feel, and sound the way these games do. Yet, the four of them hardly resemble each other. Bastion is a rugged, frontier-esque sci fi apocalypse, Transistor is a sleek, cyberpunk apocalypse, Pyre is a high fantasy purgatory space, and Hades is simply stylized Greek mythology. It is a shock to remember, then, that these four games are all designed by the same artistic team.

I confess I don’t know much about art, so I don’t have anything too profound to say about Jen Zee’s art style, besides that I like it a lot. It is also worth noting that despite her spearheading art and character design for the whole library, each game still looks visually distinct, and not just in their overall aesthetics. Take the character design of the library, for instance. Bastion’s human figures tend to be short, stocky, with exaggerated facial features. Their colors are highly saturated, with a soft, almost blurry quality that gives a level of warmth to the fatalistic atmosphere. Transistor’s characters, barring Red, tend to be based around palettes centered around a single color, such as the Camerata red and the spectrum of the function character profiles. Pyre is the first of the library to use talking portraits, which contrast robed figures with stark color palettes and simple designs with unrobed figures with much noisier details. Hades is easily the most distinct of all four, using simple colors and thick outlines on all its characters. The most consistent feature of all their designs, as usual, is how wildly different they are. For Hades, Zee makes sure that characters only look alike in any way if they have some relation to each other, such as the Furies, Achilles and Patroclus, or Zagreus and his parents. On the whole, the versatility and variety in the character design is impeccable.

What I most enjoy about these games is Darren Korb’s soundtracks, which continue to vary wildly. From the closet-recorded Bastion soundtrack to the whole two and a half Hades score, Korb’s scoring keeps improving and changing in the 10 years Supergiant has operated. His music, which adds and changes motifs as each game progresses, contributes to the atmosphere just as much as the visuals do. Whenever he teams up with Ashley Barret to add vocal tracks to certain parts of the game, they always manage to place them at critical narrative or emotional beats, turning them into the games’ most memorable moments. The team goes one step further every game by incorporating a musician or source of music into each game, giving the music just as much character as the one performing it. It also sneaks its way into the aforementioned hub worlds by providing the player a means to play their favorite tracks whenever they want (except in Hades, where they have to pay in game for that privilege). In essence, Korb makes sure to give each game a distinct feel through its music, but familiar enough to connect the library in the player’s mind.

Just as Supergiant gets so much mileage from Korb and Zee alike, they also manage time and time again to make use of Logan Cunningham’s top notch voice over work. Originally the sole voice actor at Supergiant Games, Cunningham continued on from famously narrating Bastion as Rucks to remaining a ubiquitous voice throughout the library. His role as the Transistor in the game proper drives the emotional core of that game, and his role as the Voice/Archjustice proves to be a solidly effective, yet distant antagonist. In Hades, his roles are somewhat overshadowed by Korb’s performance as Zagreus, (which I’m still blown away he still had time to do) but his performance as Lord Hades is still excellent. Supergiant also uses Cunningham in Hades to sort of satirize how often he narrates for them by casting him as the narrating Old Man, then allowing Zagreus to break the fourth wall and acknowledge him. It is as if the team at Supergiant knows how much they use the same stylistic team, then mocking that same choice.

To other studios: learn from Supergiant

I’m running out of things to say and my ball of yarn that connects all these newspapers and polaroids on my wall is running thin. I would talk more about Supergiant really knows how to end a game and frequently does so in similar ways, or that their library is a masterclass in character-driven stories, but this little essay is long enough.

Instead, I wanna talk about how Supergiant does something right which so many AAA developers and publishers don’t seem to understand. To contrast with the Supergiant library, consider Assassin’s Creed, another franchise I have spent an embarrassing amount of time playing. This franchise releases a game almost every year, and in my experience, when a company does this, you tend to get the same pig with a different paint. From the original Assassin’s Creed to their most recent release, Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, the differences seem to be night and day. Combat and free running are far more complex than they once were, rpg elements to story and gameplay have been introduced, composers, writers, voice actors, and cast members have changed with each release, and the sheer size of the game has become staggering. Yet, in the 13 years and 11 main releases in the game’s history, (plus spinoffs) any change has not only felt incremental over time, but fundamentally insignificant to the skeleton of the game. Assassin’s Creed 1 and 2 play and feel differently, but the differences are subtle. The bones are different, but every year they assemble to form a vaguely Assassin’s Creed shaped thing. People who play games tend to hate this and frequently berate companies for this practice; Bethesda and GameFreak receive the same criticism that their games are so formulaic that their new releases might as well be carbon copies of the ones before it.

Yet, Supergiant Games, with its four games over ten years, has used essentially the same team and building blocks to make games that can hardly be considered interchangeable. Whether its the passion of this humble little indie studio or the sheer talent of this team, Supergiant takes the same pile of bones and assembles them in a different shape each time with care and attention. They are proof that a formula doesn’t need to be tweaked or altered or given a different coat of paint in order to be accepted; instead the formula needs versatility, the means to produce a fresh result each time. It also works best when we adore the result every time.

#thank you for coming to my ted talk #got shit to say #bastion #transistor #pyre #hades #hades game #supergiant games #supergiant tag

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0poole · 4 years ago

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Humor in Writing

Most of the time I feel like dismissing what might seem like “faults” in writing because I haven’t actually made anything myself, and especially haven’t gotten any attention to what I make, but every once in a while something really ticks me off. Of course, I still try to take it with a grain of salt because of my lack of true experience in writing, but considering I’m hoping to actually become some degree of a writer I feel like it’s worth actually trying to explain what I think is a fault with things and why.

There always seems to be one specific thing that bothers me a lot when reading/watching stuff, and it’s the hard switching of tone from comedy to sincerity, or something similar to that, or vice versa.

Honestly, even though it sounds like the motive of a cartoon villain, I kinda think there’s too much humor in the world. It’s probably just entirely driven by opinion and preferences, but I feel like so many people are striving and looking for comedy that it hinders so many other things. I feel like, both in real life and in writing, having so much humor everywhere creates a pretty big gap between that tone and sincerity, which is pretty much always needed at some point. The big line between comedy and sincerity makes it so much harder, emotionally speaking, to feel good about the switch. I’ll try to explain…

First of all, this whole line of thought, even though I’ve been thinking it forever, was spawned by me watching Epithet Erased. Took me long enough, because I’ve seen some of the characters around and really loved their designs, but I finally watched it all, and I gotta say… It was interesting. Also, this is probably just going to be very ranty and opinionated but I will (hopefully) have something more valuable to say after. But, anyways, for one, it felt just barely too close to some of the premises for the stories I’ve thought of in various ways, but I guess that’s just bad luck on my part. Second, I feel like its humor really brought it down for me. Some episodes felt so long winded (although not necessarily “boring” I guess) because I felt like I got the joke they were trying to tell relatively quickly after they started it, but carried it so far. It didn’t help that, at least for a few of them, some of the characters felt like archetypes that I’ve seen a lot around the internet, or at least were simple enough that I understood what they were instantly, and when they are carried out through long character-focused moments it felt like nothing was happening. I feel like some of the characters are fine enough, even if I may not like them, but Giovanni and Indus were the two big ones that I thought had a little too much time given to them…

But more relevant to what I’m trying to say, sometimes the writing jumps way too far from the very comedic tone it’s trying to put out and into it trying to be sincere. The worst case of this was when Sylvie met Mera in the museum storage, and Sylvester tried to out Mera’s nightmares, only to see that her nightmare was the reality she was already in. With the scene change, and Indus becoming more serious with Molly, it felt like a good enough departure from the usual comedic tone to warrant the deeper motive of the character. But, then, of course, they had to trash the whole tone by adding the line about her also being afraid of ducks. There was absolutely no good reason to warrant that line and I will die on that hill. Not only was it just humor, but it was spontaneous “random” humor, and so on… I honestly hope people could just understand where I’m coming from there by how out of place it seems. I feel like the only defense they could use, apart from “just liking it,” would be that it’s comedic relief, but I genuinely feel like since practically the whole thing up until this point was comedy there was absolutely no need for comedic relief. The scene itself is like the opposite of comedic relief, like “Sit down and pay attention” or “Turn your brain back on” or whatever. The climactic point of the scenes before it were reached, meaning the sincere conflict there should be focused on, and apart from that one tiny little line it worked well enough. The fact that it was so tiny and insignificant is basically why I hated it so much. They literally could’ve just scratched it off of the script and only good things would have happened.

Something a bit similar happened before when Molly revealed her backstory to Giovanni. It wasn’t quite as bad, but when a scene goes from comedy to “my mom’s dead and my life sucks” you do feel the shift a little too quickly. I feel like it’s not as bad because it could just be Molly’s character, seeing the tragedy of her life as just sort of normal and not really that remarkable, meaning she’s more likely to just randomly bring it up.

But I definitely wouldn’t be going off this much about it if there wasn’t at least a little bit more. Zora was literally the reason I wanted to watch the show, because I saw a drawing of her a while back and thought she was just some random OC, but when I heard she was from this show I instantly wanted to watch it a lot more. I think the same thing happened with Molly, but I think I knew she was from the show to begin with. Anyway, Zora was the main character who I loved from the get-go and loved even more the more I learned about her. She’s such a perfect amount of diversion from being a generic cowboy in the little design details, while still being 100% cowboy material. Then, when I saw that her power was “Sundial,” or more generally just time powers, I loved it. The big thing that seems little conceptually is making her key term “sundial” instead of just “time” or whatever, because of how much it relates to her cowboy-ness, with it being associated with the “sun” people often associate with Death Valley and the Wild West and whatnot. Not to mention, it’s just a cool power.

But that’s kinda the thing, though. She’s so insanely strong. She could literally kill anyone on a whim. I don’t see how anyone could be cracking jokes in her presence. It’s kinda more general of a gripe, but when she aged up Howie it was borderline terrifying, and yet… right after, they’re cracking jokes again. It’s just so jarring. She could have literally reduced him to dust, and they’re so casual about it. I know Percy is supposed to be kinda blind to some obvious things, but I feel like even she could see the horror. That said, though, Percy is also one of my favorites. Her powers feel so natural yet interesting for what she is for some reason.

Frankly, the visual character designs alone for this show are all really good. Whether or not I’m into the writing, I can’t deny that the show kept me coming back just because it feels so good to just look at it, you know? The minimal animation, vocalized stage directions, and top-down scene view was really interesting to watch, since I’ve never seen it before, and seems like a perfect way to produce more content with less budget. It made everything feel super crisp and tidy, despite being animated so simply. Not to mention that the general lack of animation meant the few scenes where there was traditional-level animation felt really good. The voice acting was also amazing, (again not directly tied to the writing) especially when the voice actors carried their character and emotion from the scene into the stage directions, instead of just reading them out plainly. And, at the very least, the premise of the show is also really interesting (at least to me, mainly because I created 2 stories with a similar idea without even knowing anything about it. Simplified, specific superpowers are just perfect for character designing, you know?)

But I am kinda acting like the writing was bad, but it really wasn’t all things considered… I’m just not really into comedy, and when the comedy I don’t like is paired with writing and practically everything else I do like it doesn’t sit right with me. Considering this idea and some of the story beats were adopted from a DnD(-esque?) campaign, I feel like it’s much more fine. Frankly, I’m surprised I didn’t realize it sooner. Once I read about that, everything just fell into place. I’m not really into DnD either, though…

So, I feel like there are things to gain from thinking about this. While Epithet Erased is still on the mind, I feel like I’ve realized something about the juxtaposition of comedy and sincerity, that being that comedic characters can exist in sincere surroundings, and vice versa. Zora specifically could be one of these characters, because she’s so powerful that she probably sees everything around her as trivial, while the other characters have more sincere reactions to her obscene power. She could easily crack a sick joke that no one laughs at because she’s the only one who can find humor in whatever’s going on. By contrast, the thing about Mera’s fear of ducks was a product of the scene and not of the character, so it just ruined things. Nothing about it was made to be funny to the characters, it was made to be funny to the audience, even though the audience should be in sincere mode then.

Another character that I think works like this is Charlie from Hazbin Hotel, who is the sincere personality in a world of complete and total insincerity. She’s basically a more unique kind of straight man (despite being neither straight nor a man), who are always the grounding in comedic casts, like Squidward in Spongebob. I guess in sincere stories there are comedic relief characters, and in comedies there are straight men. You know, these are probably all things other people have figured out already… at least I can feel good knowing I sort of reached them on my own…

I think a good solution for stuff that’s primarily meant to be a comedy is to make it almost entirely comedic, at least with the inclusion of a straight man if needed. The big name that comes to mind is good ol Monty Python, the backbone of 14 year old boys’ humor style. At some point I realized why I like the humor of The Holy Grail, at least above other comedic movies, is that they don’t hold back at all. At no point whatsoever do they pull back the veil and put in a sincere moment. And, of course, since I can basically recite the entire movie from memory I think it did wonders. I think when it comes to comedies like this, trying to be too sincere at certain points makes it feel even less sincere than if it didn’t have the sincere moment at all. This might be a product of the 00s American family-rated live action comedies who all feel like they fall into that same boat, where the entire movie is hijinks, but then at the very end they pull that all back and have something really impactful happen, with the idea being having some shoehorned message about “family” or whatever. I can group so many movies into that category that it feels almost corporate how many there are like that, and because it’s both overdone and geared towards too generalized of an audience, trying to capture the comedy-lovers and sincere-lovers, it really just fails in both ways. Or, maybe people love them because they’re just barely bad enough to enjoy it in a so-bad-it’s-good sort of way. I dunno. If I wasn’t a little nostalgic for the time those types of movies might be my all-time least favorite.

But I’m a stick in the mud who hates comedy so I’m not really equipped to tell anyone how to do it right. Instead, I feel like there’s some seriously untapped potential in other forms of “feel-good” tones, like casual lightheartedness and just plain fun. I feel like those two things really work towards creating sincere stories that are still enjoyable, and not just one shot of sadness after another, while still having a dash of impactful emotion in them.

I feel like this is where Pixar really shines. People say “It’s not a true Pixar movie if you don’t cry at the end” because I think Pixar movies are great at making the audience lower their guard, and when the moment is right, hitting you right in your heart to make you feel the right emotions. For example, what I’d call my favorite movie of all time (for intents and purposes, if not for real), Inside Out, is all about emotional sincerity, where it’s trying to get across how it’s okay to feel sad, even though the world around you tends to say happiness is always what you want. For most of the movie, it’s a pretty casual romp around the inner workings of Riley’s mind, with some jokes thrown in (because it doesn’t have to be completely without jokes). I’m not really sure how to explain it, but the various jokes in Inside out feel like they’re sort of blended with the interesting workings of this fantasy mind-world, like the fact that earworms are just the little blobby workers in our minds sending the memory of the song back up to the control panel for the hell of it, or that our dreams are a product of a Hollywood-like place in our minds. These things definitely are there for humor, but something about them feels much more fun than just any kind of generic comedy.

Then, I feel like the most important thing about fun and lightheartedness is that they feel like they blend so much better with the sincere moments. Obviously if it’s too quick it’ll still be bad, but I think it’ll be much less bad than with comedy. Maybe you could think of it like a spectrum with pure comedy at one end and pure tragedy at the other, with fun and lightheartedness just barely crossing the midpoint towards the comedy side. Since there’s less of a gap between it and tragedy compared to pure comedy, it feels less jarring. Plus, it just feels more reasonable logically speaking, since comedy sort of puts up this insincere barrier to sort of suspend the disbelief that the events in question are supposed to be taken seriously, which makes breaking that barrier harder once it’s established. With fun and lightheartedness, there may be an expectation of it sort of maintaining itself but there isn’t as much to say there isn’t something hiding in the background. In Inside Out at least, throughout Joy and Sadness’ journey they are pretty determined to get back to the control panel to save Riley, but they’re for the most part confident they can do it (or, you know, just Joy’s confident), so they sort of interpret the world around them in a more casual light, but with that lower-level need still there. But when Joy falls into the abyss of forgotten memories and the hopelessness sets in, you feel it much more, because it was sort of already there to begin with, and it was just made perfectly clear at that moment. I think Bing Bong’s emotions during the scene also make it pretty emotional, since he’s being casual about his death while also being sincere about his sacrifice for Riley’s sake. Not to mention his inner sadness was outed while talking with Sadness.

I feel like if I were trying to write an actual essay I could probably phrase all this a lot better. I just think there’s a ton of value to lightheartedness in stories, as opposed to comedy, for the sake of “feeling good.” Pretty much all of my favorite things have that tone to them to some degree, like Wander Over Yonder, my for sure favorite TV show. It definitely feels fun in a way that can elicit laughs, but it’s not a lot like “This is a joke and you should laugh” most of the time (Disregarding the Evil Sandwich, my least favorite character in the show). I also think Steven Universe succeeds very well with that tone, creating an extremely comfy atmosphere when it comes to the less climactic episodes.

I also vastly prefer the lighthearted resolutions to the conflicts in lighthearted stories. Frankly, I am infinitely more likely to cry to a comfy and happy resolution than I am to the actual sad parts. I’m not really sure what it is about them, but I guess the characters finally being happy again after emotional turmoil warrants a happy-cry. I swear, if I think too hard about the scene where Riley finally admits her sadness to her parents and just sits in their warm embrace, I tear up. It feels so much better than hijinks-danger-hijink resolution.

But yeah, the stories I want to write the most will all inevitably have that sort of lighthearted flair to them, unless of course I choose to go more inherently serious with a story. There’s nothing wrong with that either.

With regard to the really big claim I made before about there being too much humor in the world, the themes of Inside Out, and what I said about comedy’s insincere barrier, I really think the world as a whole would benefit from valuing humor a little less. It feels like there are so many situations where people sort of want to maintain their good feelings with humor instead of more directly dealing with issues in a sincere mindset. For example, if people say something disagreeable (but not insane), It feels like too many people resort to making jokes at that person’s expense and not dealing with the issues directly. Obviously if someones saying some insane bullshit it’s fine, but when the more reasonable takes that are just barely put under the same umbrella as the insane shit are made fun of, it really deepens the trench between the people of different opinions. Of course, humor isn’t the only thing deepening that trench, but it really feels like one of them a lot of the time.

Apart from that, I feel like using humor as a way to distract from general negativity and negative emotions like what Inside Out sort of warns against can be pretty detrimental too. Obviously happiness can still be around, but putting up that kind of barrier between you and the necessary sincerity for emotion with comedy just makes the unpleasantness of the unpleasant stuff that much more unpleasant. I’m saying this one at least out of personal experience, since I have sort of developed to be too subconsciously against super sad and sincere real world scenarios. I haven’t personally felt too many of them myself, but I definitely feel myself blocking off some of my own emotional vulnerability, especially around other people. I can consciously talk against it, like I’m doing now, but I feel like it’s going to take a long time for that barrier to really break. Is humor to blame for that sort of thing? Maybe, with a dash of toxic masculinity and other buzzwords people often avoid for reasons I mentioned in the last paragraph.

Even though this one is much more unreasonably generalizable than the last two things, I feel like the popularity of self-deprecating humor across the internet also (probably?) takes a toll on some people. Obviously some people might just use it to their genuine benefit, but since it seems so common surely some people are putting on a self-deprecating face to get along, and eventually maybe even believing what they used to joke about themselves. Either way, it might be a product of an extreme departure from any kind of narcissism, making being self-confident and self-loving just that little bit harder for people.

But, while I’m not the most equipped to judge writing, I’m even less equipped to actually debate for the existence of all those things, so just know I’m kinda speaking with my heart and not my brain here. People obviously want and need different things, and I’m probably just projecting. Hell, maybe that’s me self-deprecating to not make me seem weird to everyone else. I dunno.

No matter what, all this reliance on humor really just shows who is and isn’t funny. Sometimes, people really need to get a grip. Frankly, I don’t think I’m that funny either, which is why I’ve kind of had the humor beaten out of me by one too many awkward silences after a weird joke in my elementary/middle school days. I guess that’s my cartoon villain origin story.

#rant #rambling #opinions #writing #humor #comedy #epithet erased #poole #etc

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fuwafuwamedb · 5 years ago

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Summoning An Ancient Jackass (Gilgamesh, Hakuno)

There was a lot of chanting.

Hakuno stared at the room, watching the man in the center of the circle chanting and shouting towards a large, very poor adaption of the great king of Uruk… or rather- what seemed to be a pop culture icon with a smolder on his face and a lion on his lap.

Truly?

They thought that was Gilgamesh?

She’d switched four departments before settling on this damn language and culture and that was what they were going to do with the kind of information that she delve up from the depths of Iraq? Why didn’t they just make Raikou a large chested “ara ara” kind of person? Why not just make Nero Claudius some ‘waifu’ material for horny young people to jack off to or imagine as a wife?

Heck, why not make change up some relationships? Who says Brynhild needed to have only a one night stand with a disguised Sigurd? Let’s have them fall in love and cancel out his wife. He doesn’t need the woman anyway?

I can’t even remember that woman’s name that he married, Hakuno thought bitterly.

Tomorrow would be a study day.

“COME GILGAMESH!” The man in the center of the circle chanted. “COME TO ME!”

She scoffed. “The man wouldn’t come to you even if you were naked and pumping your dick, dumbass.”

Oh.

The group paused from their work, glancing up to the alcove she was sitting in.

“YOU! HEATHEN!”

They sounded like the damn conferences, but she could hardly appreciate that. There were a handful rushing for the stairs. She could see them storming to get her, grabbing just as she finished gathering her sketchbook and preparing to head home.

“You’ve invaded the wrong church,” one of the men murmured.

“I am a tourist,” Hakuno tried.

The hooded men barely reacted, opting to haul her down to where their summoning circle was. The one in the center of the circle- their precious leader- was already pacing, cursing and spitting at those around. She didn’t need to see their bodies or their faces to sense the levels of tension in the room. Why they would be frustrated by their own games and play occults, she would never know.

“You. Girl.”

“I prefer my name,” she told him, earning a growl.

“We do not know your name, do we?”

This was true.

“What is wrong with my summoning?”

Finally, someone bothered to ask what was wrong. Rather than blindly going about their work and continuing to become more and more frustrated as they reached incorrect solutions and assumptions, someone had finally bothered to look at alternatives. Someone had finally decided to think that perhaps they were wrong.

She could work with that.

“First problem that you have is that your circle here is grossly incorrect on Sumerian,” she told him. “You tried to write this in modern letters too. And why is there German here?”

Was this the Thule Society?

“Second problem,” Hakuno pointed out, “Your circle takes after a great number of symbols that come from Christian and stereotypical occult symbology. You’re trying to summon someone from ancient Sumer with the entirely incorrect culture. This is like giving Eastern robes on an American as part of their culture.”

The hooded group murmured to one another, bringing forth scrub brushes and beginning to wipe up the circle quickly.

“You have a statue here that was clearly made by a horny teenager with a cat love,” Hakuno pointed out. “You’re doing this in a church, but considering the fact that you probably can get this place to yourself at night, we’ll leave that for now. Your chants are partially in German as well. What is it with you people and German? Not all cults have to use German, you know.”

“You try this out then,” the man growled, moving to grab something from the nearby altar and shove it into her hands.

She took one look and snorted.

“What is it now?”

“This is a fake tablet.”

“It is not. It is the tablet that Gilgamesh wrote, declaring a need for valuables to build a crown from for his friend, Enkidu.”

“Why would he use a younger version of Sumerian that isn’t developed until at least a century after his death?”

The man stared at her.

She could almost sense the dismay.

“…Create your circle, since you are so smart,” he demanded.

Well, she could try.

It might be fun to mess around and attempt to summon a great king of heroes. Taking the blood colored marker from the men, she hummed for a moment.

The Sumerian flower would be a good symbol for the center of her summoning circle. She drew one quickly before humming again.

The next part of their circle had been writings. They’d been bad at writing and opted for German, which was no doubt one of the occultist’s primary language. For her circle, she would use the script of the great king’s talk with Humbaba. It was witty. It was a negotiation for gaining something that the king wanted. It also was just entertaining to write.

She swapped the offering of a mouse with an offering of an idiot.

Ah, this was actually becoming fun.

The inverted symbol of Ishtar was fun to draw in one of the flower petals. She drew a mapping of ancient Euphrates and Tigris in another petal. A lion head in another. A great bird in another.

Anzu birds were part of the Sumerian myths around the king’s time. His father had gotten speed from them in exchange for his actions.

“Alright.” Hakuno handed the marker back. “This should do.”

The hooded leader looked at her handiwork and shook their head. “…This looks like an indie band’s album cover.”

“Thanks, your opinion has reminded me that I have better things to do.”

Ah, but her witt shoved her right back into the center of the circle, the group barring her from leaving. Their chanting began again, leaving her to groan at their insistence to try to do this summoning.

A light came from beneath her feet, making her mind draw short.

Was this?

The chanting grew louder around her. Sparks began to fly, expanding as Hakuno laughed. She could feel her hand burning a bit, her eyes going to the leader only to hear him shouting over the others.

“You must say it too, woman.”

This was interesting.

She didn’t even worry about the how of it all. They’d humored her. She could humor them in turn. It beat arguing over the phone with Rin or Shinji. She listened to their small chant a moment before she began to chant.

The chant was said once before everything went black.

“…Well… That was anti-climactic.”

A laugh came from behind her.

Suddenly, the world was back in rights, the hooded ones passed out around her as someone stood behind her person. She could feel their breath on the back of her neck. She could almost sense them leaning in.

“What is this?”

Hakuno turned, noting the man looking at her drawn circle with interest. The armor on his person was out of sorts, showing Sumerian influence right down to the grand writing upon his pelvic plate declaring him a grand warrior.

She stared, rereading that for good measure.

Grand warrior…

Shouldn’t that be on a chest plate of his back?

Was this a reference to him being some kind of sexual deviant in bed? Was it intentional or was it a last minute piece? Was-

“Woman.”

The man snapped his fingers, making her glance up at him.

“Who are you?”

“You’re neither cute nor amusing, master… if you are even worthy of such a title, mongrel.”

She really wasn’t trying to be cute now. The annoyance and the bitter humor at finding these occultists trying to pass off inaccurate nonsense about myths as accurate had been grating at her nerves a bit. And then this guy…

Her eyes shifted to the statue nearby.

“…Are you a patron for this church?”

It would explain why he had a statue here.

“I am Gilgamesh, King of Uruk, the conqueror of Humbaba and-”

“Gilgamesh was a co-conqueror, not a conqueror alone,” Hakuno pointed out. “He had his friend at his side and went there originally with a moment of faltering in the Cedar Forest. If it wasn’t for his friend, he wouldn’t have bothered and he’d have returned home, without discovering the reality of mortality.”

The man stared at her.

“Tell me I’m wrong.”

“…You are not.” He didn’t sound pleased about that.

“He was a great king.”

The man nodded.

“And he’s very dead, so please. Who are you?”

“I am Gilgamesh.”

“A Gilgamesh? Did your parents wish to name you something unusual?” She’d heard of some oddball parents out there in the world. Sometimes parents wanted to feel like they had a unique and unheard of name for their child.

“My mother is Ninsun. My father is Lugalbanda.”

“If you are Gilgamesh, then tell me this: how was sex with Ishtar?”

His expression was priceless. The brows furrowed almost to limits they dared not go. His eyes, already so serious, narrowed, glaring at her with an unerring focus. His lips thinned.

“Well?”

“I have no need to sully my person with someone so useless. The woman is the splinter in the hand of a farmer. She’s a cut upon the heart of-“

“Tell me something only the real Gilgamesh could say.”

The man glared at her a moment longer before beginning what had to be the most profound and detailed rant in Sumerian that she’d ever heard. Minutes passed, filled with the sounds of his shouting. Perfect pronunciation, without a second of hesitation or search for words; he was truly a speaker of Sumerian.

Hell, that was even archaic insults!

“Come with me.”

Hakuno grabbed his hand immediately, hauling him towards the exit.

“The grail, woman.”

“I have some cups at home,” Hakuno promised. “I brewed some ancient Sumerian beer recently too. I’ll pour you a glass when we get to my house. I have questions for you.”

And demands, but he could hear her demands for answers about his Epic later.

He could explain why he looked very different from his real statues then too.

#drabble #drabbles

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kinglarrykoopadx · 4 years ago

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My top 10 all time favorite characters

10. Captain Basilisx (SMBZ)

One of the few redeeming factors of SMBZ, Captain Basilisx is one of Bowser’s more threatening forces. An incredible badass who’s better than Shadow the Hedgefart (fight me) that has Medusa’s gaze and is the only one out of Bowser’s army who canonically kills Mario in the og series (the Reboot does not count, it does not exist to me). And his theme song, like god damn, that remix of Show No Tears from DMC3 is a banger. The only reason he’s this low is cause Basilisx is a one time character. His debut episode, The Great Doomship Offensive, was his final episode because Carl Marx Haynes refused to put him in the reboot, so thanks a lot, Alvinlaskan Bullworm.

9. Rosalina (Mario series)

Is anyone surprised she made it to this list somehow? Rosalina first appeared in the masterpiece of a game, Mario Galaxy. She watches the Comet Observatory and was accompanied by thousands, scratch it, millions of Lumas. They did her dirty in Mario Galaxy 2 by reducing her appearance to a cameo in the base game, and 3D World made her a straight up playable character to wash off the disrespect. She’s pretty much the only Mario princess that I adore. Pauline’s not my type, I despise the hell outta Peach, and Daisy is too sassy for my liking. Why she is at number 9 is that I don’t like her as much as I used to. Don’t get me wrong, I still liked her, I just don’t like her as much. Still a decent Mario character though.

8. King K. Rool (DK series)

Another case of Basilisx, he’s basically if Goofy from Disney tried to be Bowser. He’s many things. A boxer, a king, a scientist, hell even a pirate captain. His goal varies throughout his appearances. In the first DKC game, he wants to hoard all the Kongs’ bananas. In the 2nd and 3rd, he plotted revenge against the Kongs. In 64 is where he’s most serious, cause he wants to BLOW UP DK ISLAND with his Blast-O-Matic. he’s a wacky one, but that’s what we all adore from him. The reason he’s this low is that he’s another case of Basilisx. He’s underused as hell, he and the Kongs haven’t batted eyes in years. And truth to be told, I really wish he’d stick around. The villains we got in the recent DKC games are just generic as hell. Tiki Tong is Knucklotec but before Odyssey happened, and of course the Walrus is the main villain of Tropical Freeze. How anti climactic.

7. Blaze (Sonic series)

While I stated before that my faith on Sonic sinks as deep as the Mariana Trench, she’s one of the better Sonic characters. She’s the anti Sonic where while Sonic is social, caring and all about action, Blaze is an introvert, has no friends, and plans ahead. Kinda like everyone in 2020 when you put it in perspective. She has incredible fire powers and is the guardian of the Sol Emeralds, the Sol Dimension’s Chaos Emeralds, which looked like the Royal Rubies/Savvy Sapphires/Equable Emeralds from Dragon Quest. At first, she was hostile towards everyone except Cream, but in the end of Sonic Rush, she had character development and grew fond of everyone. She’s one of the best Sonic characters, and Sega did her dirty by pulling a Basilisx. Seriously, Generations was her last appearance, not counting spinoffs.

6. Metal Sonic (Sonic series)

In the Sonic series, Metal Sonic was the chad to Sonic’s virgin. He was first introduced in Sonic CD, as Sonic’s faker, who strived to be better than Sonic. And can I just say that Metal Sonic is 99.9% better than regular Sonic, despite Sonic kicking his ass multiple times? Safe to say that the scrap brain has acheived his life’s purpose (hohoho-) . He has speed that outmatches Sonic, can overheat his circuitry to catch up with Sonic when he’s far behind, but the biggest highlight was when he turned to flying metal godzilla. And his theme songs never cease to disappoint. Stardust Speedway is a banger and What I’m Made Of. Dear god, WHAT. I’M. MADE. OF. If you never smiled hearing this, don’t even speak a single word, cause you’re an alien and I’m calling the FBI. The only problem with him is he’s another Blaze/Basilisx. His last official appearance was in Generations, not counting Forces cause he was a hallucination at the time, and Mania was made by Whitehead and not Sega so it doesn’t count. The only reason he’s higher than Blaze is because I prefer him over her.

5. Vivian (TTYD)

In this tumblr, I normally trash talk TTYD, but now, let’s talk a positive from the game. Someone get me the bucket, cause after this section, I’m gonna barf. Anyways, Vivian from TTYD is by far the most developed out of the TTYD roster. We get glimpses of her being abused by Beldam and eventually in Chapter 4, she has a change of heart and joins your party, practically defying her purpose in life. She also has a wide array of useful attacks. Shadow Fist being her neutral special, Veil which is basically Bow’s Outta Sight, Fiery Jinx which inflicts Burn, and Infatuate which confuses enemies with a kiss (might as well call this The Thousand Kisses Door). The reason she’s this low is cause she’s not exactly my favorite female character in paper Mario, she’s rather the 2nd best.

4. Koopalings (Mario series)

Maybe I watched too much Bowser’s Koopalings for this one, but shut up, this is my list.

3. Bowser Jr (Mario series)

Bowser’s spoiled son here takes the 3rd place for multiple reasons. One, look at him. He’s adorable. How could you hate him you soulless pricks. Two, he’s smart as hell. I mean it’s evident since his debut, he literally framed Mario and got away with it. And mind you, framing someone for a felony is not easy. Takes years of planning, lawyers, hiding of evidence, and did I mention lawyers? And it doesn’t stop there. Unlike Bowser who normally uses brute force, Jr here uses all sorts of tech to keep Mario at bay. Megahammer, Mecha Jr, Boomsday Machine, you get the idea. Third, his father son relationship with Bowser is adorable as hell, seriously, HOW DO YOU HATE THIS GUY.

2. Olivia/Bobby (Origami King)

It was hard ranking these two individually but then I decided to put them both in the same tier. First up, my favorite Paper Mario character, Olivia. She’s basically a precious sunshine baby and if you dare lay a single scratch on her, I WILL BE FORCED TO TRAVEL THE WORLD AND BACK TO FIND YOU AND WHEN I DO, THEY HAVE TO MAKE ANOTHER COFFIN FOR YOUR FUNERAL. Yeah, her hints usually don’t help and I can see why there are people who hate her, but that’s what kids do, and I don’t even wanna see how an Olivia hater parents his kids. I just assume they donate them to an orphanage or something. I was kinda sad to see her go honestly, she was the only one travel companion out of the modern trilogy that I feel actually matters. And now, we have Bobby. He’s basically a Bob Omb who was a passenger of the Princess Peach (the narcissism, I know) until Olly took over and he eventually lost his fuse and memory. He doesn’t do much in battle, but his story arc is his spotlight. Eventually, he got his memories and the fuse he kept as a memory for his fallen bestie, which means it’s time to say goodbye. I know some TTYD fanbitch is gonna question his death because “aLl bOb oMbS sUrvIvE aN explOsiOn” but listen. Bobby isn’t a special case like say, Bombette or Bobbery. He’s just a regular factory made Bob Omb, which means he’s gonna die should he explode. And not gonna lie, that was one of the saddest videogame moments I experienced in my life. I almost cried, true story, and it takes a lot to make me cry. Olivia’s despair doesn’t help either. He was a valiant hero, a chad, and most importantly, he was a FRIEND. The reason they’re not on the top is because there’s one surpassing the two of them, and all who know me know who he freaking is.

1. Bowser (Mario series)

I mean, c’mon, who else would it be? He’s basically the supreme chad to Mario’s virgin. He’s one of gaming’s most iconic villains and he deserves that fucking role. He’s incredibly badass, like look at Giga Bowser and Fury Bowser and tell me he’s not the icon of awesome. If he’s not, don’t speak to me. Hell, even Pyrrhon from Kid Icarus Uprising acknowledges his badassery, if you’ve seen Hades’ Misguidance Season 2. He’s also crazy powerful, being able to conquer entire galaxies and punch out castles, TWICE. He even punched an entity of darkness to oblivion once. And did I mention he’s an incredible parent? He’s one of the most complex Mario characters, and that’s why we love him, is it not? For me, this is rather the case of rooting the villain more than the hero. And if I get judged for it, then so be it. I wish one day for a standalone Bowser game (Inside Story does not count) where Bowser beats the shit outta Mario. I salute you, King Koopa, you don’t need a crown to be my ruler, my throne’s already yours.

#mario #sonic the hedgehog #donkey kong #paper mario #olivia paper mario #bobby paper mario #paper mario ttyd #vivian #koopalings #bowser #bowser jr #smbz #king k rool #basilisx #blaze #bowser's koopalings #metal sonic

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fractionallystruckout · 4 years ago

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Second String (Part 2)

(Part 1 - Part 2)

Inspired by @rainbowjunko's great drawing of Jun and Tetsu playing guitar and bass, respectively.

AU: rock band!AU

Also on AO3.

Jun's band practices every day except Monday and Thursday. Yuuki shows up on Monday.

—

Jun stood with the door open, staring at Yuuki on his front step.

"What are you doing here?" he asked. "It's Monday."

He was pretty sure. He hoped it was or the date he'd written on every receipt at the bookstore was wrong.

"I know," Yuuki said, easing some of Jun's concerns. He shifted the bag on his shoulder. "I was wondering if I could practice here."

"Why here?"

"I live in a 1K and the walls are thin."

Jun wanted to say no.

It was Monday, that much was confirmed. Monday was Jun's day to catch up on everything that had fallen by the wayside during the previous week like grocery shopping and laundry. It was why he was standing in front of an unexpected guest wearing a threadbare shirt and a pair of old sweatpants. Yuuki's neatly pressed office attire, including an expensive looking coat, made Jun feel underdressed in his own home which was ridiculous and annoying.

He wanted to say no.

His stupid, stupid dream said otherwise.

You'll only be better if he gets better.

"Fine," he said, stepping back in reluctant invitation. "Come in."

Yuuki nodded and stepped inside, setting his case down so he could take off his shoes. Jun watched him put shined dress shoes down next to his own scuffed boots. Yuuki picked up his case and moved towards the stairs, pausing for a moment to glance at the hallway leading to Jun's kitchen.

"You know the way," Jun said, pushing Yuuki on the shoulder.

They went downstairs, the short trip lit only by ambient light falling down from the entryway until Jun reached out to turn the lights on. Everything was still set up from their practice yesterday, for their practice tomorrow. Yuuki stepped over the cords strayed across the floor as he took up his usual spot, stage left of Miyauchi's drums.

Jun leaned against the wall.

"There's a metronome in that box somewhere," he said, pointing to a box in the far corner behind Miyauchi's seat. It was a mess of cords and tape and anything else that didn't have a proper place. "If it's dead, there's a pack of batteries in the closet."

Yuuki looked up from unpacking his bass. "You're not staying?"

"No," Jun said, shaking his head. "It's Monday."

The day Jun caught up on everything he hadn't had time for during the previous week.

The newest issue of his favorite shoujo manga was calling his name.

Not that Yuuki needed to know that.

"Have at it," he said, starting back up the stairs. "Give a shout if you need anything."

Yuuki nodded. Jun heard him searching through the box as he left.

He walked past his kitchen, letting out a heavy breath as he sat down at the small table next to his bed. In terms of space and rent, Jun technically lived in a 1DK but he'd given up the bedroom to use as a practice space, shrinking his actual living space down to a single studio room. It was fine on most days. He didn't spend a lot of time at home not practicing or sleeping.

More importantly, it was what he could afford.

Jun pushed away the meager remains of his dinner - day old fried rice from the convenience store Ryousuke worked at - and picked up his manga.

He heard the metronome start up below him, sharp electronic beeps measuring out a quick beat. He shook his head at Yuuki's insistence on always playing at full tempo. He chose to ignore it in favor of finally finding out which of the suitors Mariko, the manga's heroine, would pick. The climactic decision was coming and he was only pages away.

Yuuki started to play, pulling Jun's eyes down to the floor.

He could hear the low notes of Yuuki's bass. He could hear the rhythm and the constant beep of the metronome.

He could hear Yuuki being wrong.

Jun lasted ten minutes and two pages before he threw the manga onto his bed and marched downstairs.

"They're upbeats!" he shouted, taking the stairs two at a time. Yuuki looked up at him as Jun stalked over to where he stood, pointing at the rhythm in the music. "Upbeats," he stressed.

Yuuki frowned. "I know."

Jun bit his tongue.

He knew Yuuki knew. They played a surprisingly good set only two days ago. That didn't make waiting for the rhythm to sink in any less tortuous.

He picked up the metronome and turned it off before tossing it carelessly at the box. The beeping was starting to hurt his head and he could only tolerate one persistent annoyance at a time. He grabbed his guitar, keeping his back to Yuuki as he plugged into an amp.

Jun eventually met the subtle question in Yuuki's gaze.

"Next time, bring food," he said, pointing a pick at him.

Yuuki nodded easily.

"Okay," Jun said. "From the top."

—

Jun remembered to put on better clothes before answering the door the following Monday.

There wasn't a lot to choose from. He still hadn't done laundry but the jeans he wore all day and a relatively clean shirt made him feel better when faced with Yuuki's neat, pressed professionalism.

Yuuki stood on his front step, holding his case and a plastic bag in either hand. He held the bag out to Jun.

"Ryousuke said you like oyakudon," he said.

Jun laughed which made Yuuki frown, his hand dropping a little.

"Do you not?" he asked.

"I do," Jun said, holding his hand out to accept Yuuki's offering. He stepped back to let Yuuki in, peeking into the bag as Yuuki took off his shoes. There were two bowls and two sets of chopsticks. "I'm just surprised Ryousuke told you the truth. Saying I like goya or something just to mess with me is more his style."

Yuuki picked up his case. He frowned hard like he was struggling with a rhythm.

"Do you not like goya?"

Jun scrunched up his face. "I hate it."

"I see," he said.

Jun shut the door, suddenly feeling uncomfortable being the topic of conversation. He glanced down at the bag in his hand, the floor, and then the hallway to his kitchen.

"Do you want something to drink?" he asked, changing the subject. "I have water and... water."

"I'll take water," Yuuki said, without a hint of judgment. "Thank you."

"Sure," Jun said. "Go ahead. I'll be right down."

Yuuki nodded and headed downstairs.

Jun went to his kitchen and set the bag of food down on the counter. He searched through his limited collection of dishware, selecting two cups that were the most presentable, meaning clean and not cracked. He filled them with ice and water before grabbing the bag and going down to the practice space.

Yuuki had cleared a stack of books and magazines off a neglected end table and placed it between the couch and a chair. Jun set the cups down on the table and began unpacking the food. He handed Yuuki a bowl and chopsticks before taking the other for himself and dropping into the chair.

Jun was three bites in when he had to stop.

"This is really good," he said.

Yuuki set down his water. "It's from a shop in the train station by my office," he said, as if he was considering it for the first time. "It's very popular."

"I can see why," Jun said. Yuuki smiled as Jun ate vigorously, too caught up in the satisfaction of good food to be bothered with polite pacing. He paused about halfway through and sat back in his chair. "Thanks for dinner."

"Thanks for letting me practice here."

Jun shrugged. His letting Yuuki practice wasn't exactly altruistic. If Yuuki got better, the band would be better. It was all in service of Jun's dream.

He set his bowl down and looked at Yuuki.

"So, what else do you do?" he asked. "When you're not butchering our music?"

Yuuki frowned.

Jun laughed.

—

Yuuki liked routine.

He was consistent and predictable. Jun could set his watch by him, if he wore a watch.

It was something Jun learned, gleaned, picked up over time and shared meals eaten in their practice space. He also learned that Yuuki had a degree in management and had been at his job since he graduated from college. He liked it well enough, it paid the bills. He learned Yuuki had a younger brother who was still in college. They talked regularly, on Thursdays, coincidentally, which was probably the only reason Yuuki didn't show up asking to practice on those days too.

But most of all, Yuuki liked routine.

It was that preference towards routine that brought him back to Jun's front step, week after week, Monday after Monday, always with food in hand. After oyakudon it had been curry, paitan ramen, yakitori, and shio salmon.

Today it was okonomiyaki.

And beer.

"Don't make that face!" Jun said, pointing at Yuuki.

In Yuuki's defense, the range of his expressions was small but Jun could tell. He had the advantage, the high ground, standing while Yuuki sat on the couch. He also had years of experience with people's opinions on shoujo manga.

He could tell.

"What face?" Yuuki asked.

"That face," Jun said, stepping up to the end table that separated them, pointing at the amused tilt to Yuuki's mouth. "That 'shoujo is for girls' face."

"But it is? It's in the name."

Jun groaned, his body drooping in disappointment.

"A target demographic doesn't define the entire audience!" he said, gesturing a bit too widely given the beer in his hand. "They're still good stories, they just focus more on people than action. It's like a kids movie," he argued, approaching the table again. "Are you never going to see another kids movie just because you're not the target audience?"

Yuuki blinked, the amusement subtly falling off his face.

"No," he said slowly.

"Exactly," Jun grinned. He took a long, victorious drink from his beer. "It's the same thing."

Yuuki stayed quiet as Jun returned to his seat. He had no rebuttal for Jun's bulletproof argument.

Jun dropped into the chair as he surveyed the remains of the food. He turned at an angle, throwing his leg over the side arm, giving him leverage to reach across the table and pick a neglected piece of pork off Yuuki's plate. He righted himself as he put it into his mouth.

Yuuki didn't seem to notice the theft.

"Do you have a favorite?" he asked.

"I can't pick just one," Jun said, between chewing.

"Which would you recommend?"

"It depends on what you're looking for."

Yuuki frowned, which was a weird response.

It made Jun want to press his finger to Yuuki's brow to see if the crease would go away.

"What's your favorite manga?" he asked instead.

"Lone Wolf and Cub."

Jun laughed.

"Of course it is," he said, not noticing when his laughter floated almost into giggle territory. He tried to take another drink, peering into the bottle when it came up empty. He put it down on the table with the others. "You seem like the type that likes sword fights that go on for a hundred pages."

"It's a story about sacrifice and determination-" Yuuki started.

"It's people fighting with swords," Jun moaned, dragging the words out.

Yuuki smiled, which was a weird response.

Jun narrowed his eyes at him.

"If shoujo is more than just a genre for girls," Yuuki said calmly, "then Lone Wolf and Cub can be more than just people fighting with swords."

Jun stared at Yuuki as he considered his argument.

The stark professionalism that gave Yuuki an untouchable air was gone, shed slowly, piece by piece, over the passing weeks. His tie was gone, the top two buttons of his shirt were undone, and his long sleeves were folded up to his elbows. Jun could see his watch, the calluses on his fingers, the flex of his forearms as he turned his beer in his hands. He could see the flush of alcohol that warmed Yuuki's face, the color running down his neck to where lines were still drawn.

It made Jun wonder if Yuuki felt as warm to the touch as he looked.

"I guess you're right," he said, turning his attention away. Having nothing to do with his hands, Jun crossed his arms over his chest. "Maybe we can swap later. You can read some shoujo and I can find out what's so good about sword fights."

Yuuki laughed, brief and soft.

"I'd like that."

"Me too."

Jun glanced at him, feeling his face warm when Yuuki smiled.

He blamed the alcohol.

"Although I expect you to take good care of my books, Yuuki," he said, forcing the usual edge to his tone. "Some of them are out of print."

"I will," Yuuki said with a nod, unquestionable as always. He looked at Jun for a moment before adding, "And Tetsu's fine."

Jun fought the smile trying to overtake his face.

"Jun's fine too."

#fanfic #TetsuJun #AU #rock band!AU #Second String #Fitz fic #Personal opinion: Jun is wrong about bitter melon (goya)#I just needed a food for him to hate and had a lot of trouble coming up with one #And I know a lot of people who don't like bitter melon #Also Jun shouting about upbeats is so funny to me #I can't explain it

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theheightofdishonor · 4 years ago

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Top 10 Battles in the Metal Saga (in no particular order)

Kyoya-Ryuga

There aren’t many battles that are just about raw power the way this one is. The whole thing is just so extra, from ruining the stadium before the battle even begins to ending with Ryuga’s possession and Kyoya passing out with a dragon’s tail going through his chest. The power-play between these two is riveting. And on top of that, it’s the closest anyone but Gingka and Nemesis ever gets to beating Ryuga. However, it does annoy me that Kyoya is the only one of Ryuga’s opponents in Battle Bladers who comes out unaffected in the long-term. After their respective battles, Hikaru retires from Beyblade, Tsubasa suffers with possession, and both experience a healthy dose of PTSD but apparently, Kyoya gets away with no signs of it? I call bullshit.

2.Da Xian - Julian

If you didn’t love Da Xiang before, you had to after this battle. It did a brilliant job of highlighting how good Dashan is at manipulating people, and doing so “coolly, and brilliantly”. Dashan sees the scene as the opportunity it is and coaxes Julian from a disheartened shell of his former self to someone who’s willing to try again without the man even knowing. Oh, and he gets Julian to appreciate the value of his friends too. And beats him in battle easily. And delivers, “You think you and I are alike? That’s an insult, ” decimating Julian’s remaining pride. Talk about being cool. (Chao Xin should definitely take pointers)

3. Gingka vs 100 (supposedly) Face Hunters

I had a hard time choosing between this and the battle earlier in the episode where Gingka first saves Kenta from Face Hunters, but I think this holds more impact and the one Kenta thinks is more notable. As a fight itself, it’s short compared to some of the other more epic battles on this list, and its placement is more about the consequences of it than the contents of the actual battle itself. It’s the moment where Kenta’s admiration for Gingka really cements, and the moment that Kyoya takes a serious interest in him, shaping his relationship with two people who will be monumental in his life. Also, Gingka looks super cool and baby Kenta is adorable.

4. Excalibur-Gan Gan Galaxy

This battle has one of my favourite scenes of ALL TIME- Masamune single-handedly cutting through Sophie and Wales’s joint special move. Let me just take a second to gush about how powerful he is and how much I love him and how he deserves so much more love and did I mention he stopped the twins in their track with ONE MOVE. Your fave could never but if I don’t stop now, i’ll be talking about Masamune all day.

The visual of Pegasus and Striker moving as one force, with the music crescendoing only for Destroyer to cut them down at the climax, is breathtaking. Seriously, I’ve watched that one scene on repeat and my breath catches.

I love to see Masamune and Gingka work together as a team, especially because it’s not their preferred dynamic and it doesn’t always come easily to them. But when they try, they’re magic together, partially because they’re so alike. This is the only battle where we get the full force of the Y-Masamune-Gingka dynamic, a god-tier trio who can only possess one brain cell when they’re together because otherwise, they’d be way too strong. Let’s be real. If these morons actually combined their intelligence, they would have crushed Excalibur to dust. We need more scenes with them tbh

As a side note, it was not at all ok for these guys to crash the festival or for Yu to ruin a culturally important arena. It’s played off way to lightheartedly for my tastes. It’s not even the only time they’re insensitive- in Fury, Yu and Kyoya damage ancient ruins and Gingka’s group explicitly disobeys orders to not step on a sacred volcano. The whole thing is kinda gross and the Metal Saga should address its serious disregard for other cultures. Sophie losing her shit on a literal 12 year old was funny though.

5. The Legendary Bladers-Nemesis part 2

This is a pretty long battle, I linked it to where the battle begins but it doesn’t end until the end of the next episode. There’s a lot about this battle that drives me crazy- like why are you people just letting Kenta destroy himself, why are the strongest bladers in the world who were specifically chosen for this battle unable to withstand for more than two hits, etc BUT- this is when Ryuga hands over the Star Fragment which is cool and emotional enough to let everything else slide. It’s a pretty satisfying conclusion to the Kenta-Ryuga arc and rings parallel to Metal Fusion down to Ryuga pulling a Storm Pegasus and disappearing into thin air.Which talking about, I will forever be mad Storm Pegasus doesn’t ever come into play after Metal Fusion. Shogun Steel would have been such a perfect time to bring Storm Pegasus back to play and assure in a new era- such wasted potential, but I digress.

Oh, and friendly reminder that Yu’s Inferno Blast breaks through Rago’s barrier while 8 Legendary Bladers combined couldn’t leave a dent on Nemesis.

6. Kenta-Reiji

Talking about emotional, if you didn’t cry during this battle, you’re a liar- it’s painful to watch. The entire thing with Kenta using Libra’s performance tip and his insistence that he has to win for Yu- it breaks your heart. Reiji is such a great villain because he does exactly what he’s meant to do- make the audience be invested in him. He’s so unnecessarily cruel, so irredeamable, and this episode drills that into your skull. Even the spectators of the match can’t look on as Reiji tortured Kenta well after Sagittario has stopped spinning.

7. Easter Island

It would take too long to name everyone involved in this, so i’m not going to. But boy is it a ride You’ve got King starting it off with Chris for insulting/defeating/humiliating Masamune- a noble cause if there ever was one. His impassioned defense of his boyfriend is one of the best speeches/declarations in the Saga and is also 80% of the reason this battle is on the list. The guy has his priorities straight, ok. Gingka says it’s either Masamune’s feelings or the world and King chooses Masamune, no questions, no hesitations. Can’t say I blame him. Especially after seeing the heartbreak on Masamune’s face when Chris insults him. But of course, the world is actually more important so

Gingka jumps in to stop King which as Benkai mentions, you can’t stop him from battling by actually battling him, so I don’t know what Gingka was thinking. Johannes’s lackies, including Aguma and the Beylin Fist, joins the battle, prompting Zeo, Toby, etc to also join. Then Ryuga appears and starts draining Chris’s power before Kenta stops him (thus publically revealing their affiliation to the world) and the two disappear. Literally everyone is involved, Johannes tells Chris to “man up” when he dares to show pain that Ryuga is literally stealing his power away but then vanishes because he doesn’t want to face Gingka head on yet. Can you say hypocrite? And while this was all happening, Johannes somehow managed to buy Chris’s loyalties.

It’s insane and so much fun.

8.Tsubasa-Jack

I didn’t expect to put this on the list but I watched it recently and had a newfound appreciation for it so here it is. While the team battle with Excalibur was the climax of Tsubasa’s arc, this was the resolution. It is arguably Tsubasa’s best battle of the series. He made his recovery with Excalibur, had a practice run with the Garcias, and by this battle, Tsubasa is better than ever. There’s a satisfaction in watching Tsubasa beat Jack with ease. After struggling the entire season, it's very cathartic. There’s this one bit where Jack is complaining about battling Ryuga and how Tsubasa can’t possibly know the disappointment he felt and Tsubasa snaps, because how fucking dare he, who the fuck did Jack think he is. Again, very cathartic.

Irrelevant, but this episode has some of the best quotes including gems like

“What is this? A bunch of creepy pictures”;

“Oh dear Tsubasa” queue Jack asking for a battle;

“You’re really lacking in the culture department” - Jack to Madoka, “

The rest of Gan-Gan Galaxy are common, unrefined types”.

The list never ends. Do yourself a favour and watch the episode.

9. Zoe-Toby-Masamune

This is the only season where there’s no one Final Battle but instead two separate climactic moments- Ryuga and Gingka working together to stop Hades City from melting down(?) and Toby and Zeo fighting to bring Toby back to normal.

Unlike the Finales in Fusion and Fury, this one’s private, personal. Not only were Ryuga-Gingka battle and the Battle against Nemesis attended by a lot of people, they were also widely broadcasted across the world. In comparison, Toby, Zeo and Masamune (and Ziggurat at one point) are the only ones to witness the Finale in Masters. It’s a very intimate moment. Their friendship is fractured-Toby's brainwashed, Zeo was manipulated, and there’s still tension because Masamune left them in a time of need. The two of them are finally confronting just how much their friendship has strained: Masamune never imagined Zeo would resent him when he only ever wanted to fulfill Toby’s wish; he’s almost offended Zeo would think so badly of him. On the other hand, Zeo wrestles between accepting Ziggurat manipulated him but also his very valid resentment towards Masamune. They both hurt each other but get past it and forgive each other for the sake of their best friend. Bey battles are when bladers communicate through each other and in this one, these three use it to find their way back to each other.

10.

Gingka-Kyoya

Of course, the list wouldn’t be complete without a Gingka-Kyoya battle. Despite Kyoya being Gingka’s second biggest rival, they only have 3 complete battles with a clear winner. (Kyoya is disqualified in Survival Battle, and neither won in the Championships Team battle or the one in Fury). Despite there being so few options, it was still hard for me to choose because they’re all brilliant and my opinion changes every other day.

Honestly, I didn’t remember why I chose this battle, so I went back in and re-watched it- SO many thoughts. For one thing, Kyoya sounds like a cheesy bat man villain. Seriously though, the battle feels so off to me because in this episode, Kyoya is more or less just another evil villain; a pale foreshadow of what Ryuga will become in the Final Battle. I’m not even kidding. This hits almost the exact beats that the Gingka-Ryuga battle will. I didn’t like this battle when I re-watched it for this post. Gingka and Kyoya’s battles are important because of the history and bond they share and in this battle, neither of those are solidified and it’s just not as satisfying.

I will admit though that this battle was important for them, mostly Kyoya who was headed towards unhinged-Ryuga territory before Gingka saved him. It kickstarts Kyoya into being the lovable grump we know he’s capable of being and creates a debt towards Gingka which in turn develops into an actual friendship. It’s an important step of their journey and I can’t begrudge it too much ig. If you really want to watch a Gingka-Kyoya battle for non-thematic reasons, though, I recommend the World Championships or the one in Metal Fury Ep 1

#metal saga #beyblade metal saga #gingka hagane #beyblade #metal fusion #metal masters #metal fury #beyblade metal fight #metal fight #kyoya tategami #kenta yumiya #ryuga

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sugar-petals · 6 years ago

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Sub!Yoongi A-Z

warnings ⚠️: smut, bdsm, dom/sub

a/n: entries for jk and jimin linked in mlist.

a = aftercare (what they’re like after sex)

Could not be clingier. Definitely the type to like some music in the background for it. If possible: Loves to be picked up and carried, or just guided to a prepared ‘surprise cozy place’ that promises cushions, calm & plenty of joint napping.

b = body part (their favourite body part of theirs and also their partner’s)

Tough one. Definitely not the hands, I can tell you that.

c = cum (anything to do with cum basically… i’m a disgusting person)

Jizz and saliva make Yoongi morph into his final form. A giant slutty mess. He always swallows what he can get and blows bubbles. Needs that stuff running from of his nose. Sucks out every creampie, laps everything squeaky clean. Disgust is not in his dictionary. Cum is his skincare routine.

d = dirty secret (pretty self-explanatory, a dirty secret of theirs)

Yoongi wishes he’d cry every time you have sex. It turns him on.

e = experience (how experienced are they? do they know what they’re doing?)

You’ll never be able to tell because he will come across as really competent either way. The type to search up all kinds of kinks on Naver, incognito mode. What you think might give him away but will stay anyways is how fidgety he gets beforehand. He doesn’t want to fail pleasing you. It’s one of your main obstacles to make Yoongi embrace the lax enjoyment and lack of pressure when you fuck. Because the more he stresses himself out, the less he’ll focus on pleasure in the first place. Experience is not a huge issue, but rather, developing ease. Once Yoongi can let go, his intuitive skills unfold the best.

f = favourite position (this goes without saying.)

While spooning. Both ways with him penetrating you, or you using a strap on him. He loves it because it resembles his favorite resting position aka fetal. Also excellent to whisper hot things into his ear.

g = goofy (are they more serious in the moment, or are they humorous, etc)

Super silly. Makes funny noises you’ve never even heard of. Adrenaline makes Yoongi go all out. Might laugh a lot during sex. Enjoys your reactions.

h = hair (how well groomed are they, does the carpet match the drapes, etc.)

All natural. Practicality. Yoongi leaves the little fuzz there is and it’s cute on him. Especially the happy trail. Face, of course: He had a laser treatment, you won’t kiss stubble.

i = intimacy (how are they during the moment, romantic aspect…)

Oh my god, Yoongi is so sloppy and eager. Romance he’s 50-50 on, it’s more about how much you can mark him down and get out every little scream there is.

j = jack off (masturbation headcanon)

The studio password protects him from his obsession becoming known, this guy can beat the meat like there’s no tomorrow. Boy can do this all day. Usually between long intervals.

k = kink (one or more of their kinks)

Asphyxiation. Yoongi loves to gasp and gag himself through sex and can’t help it.

Fancy Clothes. He is fascinated; has something to play with his fingers. Kitten.

Degradation. Calling him names might become your second nature.

Chastity. Twice as loud when he’s locked up.

l = location (favourite places to do the do)

Sofa, his eternal buddy. Needs to be a surface that’s easy to wipe down given how messy as fuckity fucking fuck he is.

m = motivation (what turns them on, gets them going)

Loss of control, the sheer power exchange. Yoongi likes to be helpless and at the mercy of your teasing. Prone to seek total surrender. Not for every domme, but this guy makes for a perfect starfish. All that it actually means is: Calling for bondage.

n = no (something they wouldn’t do, turn offs)

Hard limit feces. Also Yoongi Kryptonite: A partner’s constant self-doubt. He will always reassure, but at one point, the feeling transfers & drags him down, too. Strong lead needed.

o = oral (preference in giving or receiving, skill, etc)

Beware. Get tissues ready. Lives for sucking and licking the living hell out of his partner. Will perform a Cypher on your goddamn nipples and clit, that’s how intricate it goes.

p = pace (are they fast and rough? slow and sensual? etc.)

A lover of everything rapid and punishing. Likes to have his brains pulverized nonexistent by a good pounding. Wants to feel alive, being shaken, and thrown onto the bed. Would risk some major rug burn at any time, too.

q = quickie (their opinions on quickies rather than proper sex, how often, etc.)

Knows that it takes 20 minutes to properly warm up with a woman, quickies are only reserved for backstage fuckery. Dislikes it because he wants to be painstaking with prep, contraception, cleaning, the whole shebang. Safety first.

r = risk (are they game to experiment, do they take risks, etc.)

Provokes you to do some audacious things on him with his trademark smirk or some sarcasm, knows he can get away with anything even if BTS hears the two of you.

s = stamina (how many rounds can they go for, how long do they last…)

Likes a literally climactic approach so it’s one time, one hard time, and then mutual collapse. Aims for a typical 30 minutes time frame, and yes, he always checks his Rolex. Probably leaves that thing on while you fuck. PS: Also counts when you choke him, guy’s aiming for a new record every time.

t = toy (do they own toys? do they use them? on a partner or themselves?)

Toy enthusiast, the more torturous, the better. Probably some electro shit to use on his nipples. As for your toy collection: Oh well, he can make that magic wand go out of business.

u = unfair (how much they like to tease)

Outrageous amounts, shit. Indulges in physical teasing all the time trying to guide attention to his attraction points. Arms, ass, legs, neck. Movements: Just like a cat. Verbally, he will dare you to one-up either him or yourself last time you fucked with his tiny font comments. “Can you...?”

v = volume (how loud they are, what sounds they make)

Desperate and pained moaning. Yes, noisy. And deep, respectively, that voice drops hard.

w = wild card (get a random headcanon for the character of your choice)

Yoongi couldn’t enjoy butt plugs more, spends time on his laptop wearing one. He also wants to try sounding and medical play.

x = x-ray (let’s see what’s going on in those pants, picture or words)

Floral imagery here we come. Now that’s a pretty snowdrop. Good small dick lovin’.

y = yearning (how high is their sex drive?)

In overdrive particularly when you’re in his studio, adapts fast. Still goes all ham because of how easy it is to turn him on at the sway of a hip, which comes to his demise when you go for PDA. Yoongi lusts hard for your body, he pictures and enjoys it so much, feels boundless adoration. A lot of his drive goes into worship. You’ll see it in his gaze. That guy is nuts, nuts, nuts for your sheer presence, and always grateful that you spend time with him.

z = zzz (… how quickly they fall asleep afterwards)

Still apologizes for it. Dozing comes early, he’s really fucked out each time. Will be fast asleep for several hours with no dream in sight, nor tossing and turning either, because sex with you has the uncanny ability to put him at complete rest.

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happymetalgirl · 5 years ago

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Opeth - In Cauda Venenum

Opeth's fan base still seems to be reeling from Åkerfeldt and company's stylistic departure from the very progressive death metal they helped pioneer and build a huge reputation on and to the growl-less retro-prog they pivoted so sharply to on 2011's Heritage and onward. I mean, Damnation and the softer gothic acoustic folk rock ballads sprinkled throughout their catalog should have at least cushioned some of shock to Opeth fans, but it still caused one of metal’s more prominent uproars of this decade and there seemed to be hopes for Åkerfeldt's growls and the death metal elements to return in some degree on the two albums that followed, and it seems to me at least that Opeth's fan base has only now come to accept that this cleaner prog rock retrocelebration is the band's solidified direction in this later stage of their career.

While I, like many other Opeth fans, revere and prefer the band's brilliant balance of death metal and prog rock on their pre-Heritage work, the band have certainly more than earned their opportunity (if you’re of the mindset that a band has to earn it), and fans' patience, to try out something new for them. Like most fans though, I have felt that this new direction has only halfway played to Opeth's strengths, and often come off as indulgent 70's prog worship rather than a fresh Opeth-unique take on it, which was most evident on the band’s most recent “observation” before this one. While it started off really well with its title track and "The Wilde Flowers", the band's 2016 effort, Sorceress, was a painfully unignorable exhibition of this lapse in songwriting to prop up this old-soul prog aesthetic and probably my least favorite Opeth album to date. I mentioned Opeth earning our patience earlier though, and this album is why.

While it was a trilogy, Pale Communion was my favorite of Opeth's prog-rock-era albums, but In Cauda Venenum has finally found them putting a more expressive and intriguing spin on this growl-free progressive rock sound they've been cultivating and is definitely the best album they've released in this style. While the past three albums, even in their better moments, have been rather laid-back and content to mimic prog legends, Opeth finally get back some of that grandiose instrumental ambition that lit up momentous and often conceptual albums like Blackwater Park, Still Life, Ghost Reveries, and My Arms, Your Hearse. The dual release of the album in Swedish and English editions makes the band’s larger artistic investment quite apparent just on the surface, as Opeth’s contextual gesturing often tends to be, but the band do follow through in the meat of the project too.

Once again, In Cauda Venenum plays with the growls and death metal on the bench (not fully retired for this analogy since they still stay true to their older songs’ original style at live shows) and with Åkerfeldt’s smooth clean singing and Joakim Svalberg’s synth playing taking more of the spotlight in their place, as the drumming avoids excessive double-bass and blast beats and the guitars rely not on on/off distortion to drive the loud/soft dynamic of the band’s more tempered prog rock sound. Opeth's quieter songs and their prog rock albums have highlighted their gothic flair, but this album takes it to a more exuberant level that I am glad to hear getting the spotlight again. The opening song, “Livets trädgård” (“Garden of Earthly Delights”), dims the lights for the album’s show through a smooth build of synth-orchestral ambiance before the pre-released single, “Svekets prins” (“Dignity”), breaks through the silence with bombastic, Devin Townsend-esque choral gusto and into a dynamic and deliciously riffed gothic prog ballad. The little touches like the chimes and the synth strings in the back do a lot for the song's various sections soft and loud, and the sludgy drums help give the harder sections this monolithic feel, while Åkerfeldt's hums give the softer sections their extra haunting edge. The album's lead single, “Hjärtat vet vad handen gör” (“Heart in Hand”), follows along a more traditionally heavy progressive rock/metal pattern, but with similar instrumental grandeur; the chugging riff underlying Åkerfeldt's soaring vocals and the faster, flashier guitar playing across the rather consistently turned-up, yet still adventurous, instrumental work (until the honey-sweet acoustic outro) show how even in this style, Opeth are not just reliant on loud/soft dynamics to drive their prog.

The song “De närmast sörjande” (“Next of Kin”) sways through a roller coaster of smooth rock fusion and explosive synth symphonics and guitar dazzling that give the song such a cinematic feeling to it, like it belongs in the climax of a Tim Burton movie. The somber piano balladry during the verses of “Minnets yta” (“Lovelorn Crime”) really turns up the drama in a way that Opeth don't often go for, and, while I wish it carried over to the more instrumentally enhanced sections, I'm loving it here. The strings that come in later to boost the heartfelt sorrow of the song and Mikael Åkerfeldt's harmonized vocals are absolutely gorgeous here. I kind of wish the band put the prog on hold just for this song and stuck to the somber gothic balladry they were playing with so beautifully, but the song still is a highlight for the album as it is.

The song “Charlatan”, for me, is another particular highlight because it captures a mesmerizing Meshuggah-esque groove in its prog-rock, something even djent-focused imitators can't seem to capture the essence of very often, if at all, even with 8-strings. Yet Opeth have done it here with your regular bass guitar and a little distortion. But aside from that, the dissonant synth work is a cool bit of flair for the track, and the band do well again to play excitingly with relatively heavy instrumentation all throughout the song's main portion before its hymnal outro.

“Ingen sanning är allas” (“Universal Truth”) finds the band kind of back in old habits with the acoustic prog worship again, though the swelling strings shine again through the relatively meager composition the band comes through with this time around. Despite showing off some high range, Åkerfeldt's mostly monotonous vocal melody feels more at home with Sorceress than the lush orchestration that carries this song. The creepily slinking bass-range piano melody of “Banemannen” (“The Garroter”) brings the album a sense of welcome darkness and tension akin to being followed through the woods. The woodwinds and the fluttering guitar embellishments sprinkled atop the lighter strings help give the song a sense of enveloping atmosphere, but it's the constantly shifting keys that give the song its attention-holding uneasiness as it shifts back and forth from paranoia to self-assuredness.

The 12-string acoustics and the prominent woodwind melody of “Kontinuerlig drift” (“Continuum”) are probably the only real differentiating elements on the track as the band find themselves slipping back into Sorceress mode again for a bit. I do like the more bombastic solo section in the song's middle, but Åkerfeldt sounds pretty tuned out by this point unfortunately, and the song could have used a bit more of the fantastical imagination that the previous tracks are so strengthened by. The closing song, “Allting tar slut” (“All Things Shall Pass”), fortunately ends the album on a theatrical and conceptual note with huge bursts of orchestral instrumentation and cymbal crashes backing thematic calls back to "Minnets yta" ("Lovelorn Crime") as Åkerfeldt's passionate vocal delivery guides the climactic and lush arrangement toward a fulfilling conclusion.

If they needed to, Opeth have certainly justified their shift away from death metal and into more bona fide progressive rock for the past eight years with this record, and it's because they finally stopped focusing so much on emulating their prog idols and trusted their own prog rock instincts and chemistry to bring out a unique and vibrant form of progressive rock. They've always been about going big and putting a lot into their music, and the massive orchestral instrumentation here helps fill the void the growls and blast beats left behind. And in a way, it feels very much like an old-school Opeth album just without any death metal involved. It's a heady, super-moody prog-fest with all sorts of twists and turns that feels like they have purpose and build toward a wonderfully fulfilling experience. Only time will tell, but I hope that this album serves as a breakthrough for the band, an artistic oasis after years of wandering through the desert of 70's prog imitation. I hope this guides them going forward as a blueprint for success in the absence of death metal. I hesitate to say they should have been doing this for the past three albums, but I don't know if they necessarily had to go through Heritage and Sorceress to get here, as this album builds on much of the signature dynamic from their classic albums with a sonic pallet far more expansive than anything explored on the past three albums. Regardless, I sure hope this is the album they chart their course with, as it is undoubtedly the more advanced form of their prog rock evolution.

Heritage's deliverence/10

#Opeth #In Cauda Venenum #progressive rock #progressive metal #new music #metal #new album #heavy metal #album review

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