#He has about 5 of each type of Follower I'd say

[era404-skib]

TCam 3.0 Concept*

(*with very quick and rushed art, my usual shit is better i promise,,,)

Abilities:

-Everything he previously had, plus the stuff he lost e.g. Blaster, hammer

-More shoulder blasters

-Return of the Ears :3

-Transmission receiver thing which allows him to receive broadcasted footage from ANY POV Cam, regardless of distance

-Wings, allowing him to fly more gracefully and still do a bullshit tough ram

-Followers:

So basically my HC is that the Cameramens main power is strength in numbers, so why not give TCam some followers to signify that?

Upgraded Orbital Camera Satelite

-Hide above clouds, only come down to shoot when TCam distress signals

-Glitch toilet movement

-Absolutely BONKERS lazer power

Orbital Engineer Camera Satelite

-Always surrounding TCam to protect him

-Equipped with two huge chainsaws

-Glitch Toilet Movement

-Lower down to the ground and uproot roads and other infrastructure in seconds with the chainsaws, killing small toilets in the process

-Ram into large toilets repeatedly to completely tear them apart

[serasfanfiction]

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3| Part 4 | Part 5| Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12

CW: For Valentino being Valentino. He doesn't do anything, but he does say some things.

oOo

The closer they came to V Tower, the more loud everything became.

Paper posters gave way to bulletin boards. Every street was lit with flashing signs and arrows, pointing the way to different businesses down the main strip. Advertisements were nearly plastered on every single available surface, competing with each other in a cacophony of bright colors and promises to make all of one's troubles go away, if only one bought the product.

Sinners wandered the streets, some glued to their phones as they typed out a text message, watched a video, or shouted at someone on the other end of a phone call. Some sinners loitered around various shops selling televisions, each screen showing an advertisement for the latest gadget VoxTek was selling.

The Vees made it ridiculously easy to learn their faces, as none of the trio were shy about plastering their likeness all over their wares. Vox was clearly unafraid to throw his reputation behind anything he supported, one advertisement proclaiming, "I'd buy it." Valentino left nothing to the imagination - figurative or literally - on what he was selling, with various larger than life posters that featured the moth scantily clad and in suggestive poses. Velvette was significantly more reserved, in comparison, with only a billboard advertising her perfume, named, Love Potion.

Quite frankly speaking, it was all a bit overstimulating.

Walking nonchalantly at his side, Alastor barely gave any of bombastic sights around him a second glance. He had made little commentary since they had set out from the hotel earlier in the day, falling silent as they had entered the Vees territory. Where all of this technology was practically invented yesterday, as far as Lucifer was concerned, Alastor had lived on Earth when most of the technology around them was still in its infancy stages. Advertising, likewise, was hardly new. Humans had been shouting at each other to buy this or to buy that since they'd first come up with the idea of selling a product. They may not have had flashing lights in the 1920s or 30s, but there had been posters, billboards, and radio ads.

Modern technology just made everything more... flashy.

Lucifer watched a group of sinners standing before an electronic shop, TVs stacked up in the window. Each TV was showing the same thing: an advertisement for the latest cell phone. He was a little surprised he still cared enough to be sickened as Vox straight up hypnotized the viewers into buying the phone. He shook his head in disgust a they passed group turned mob making a mad dash into the store. "Quite the salesman, Vox is," Lucifer commented, not trying to hide his judgmental tone.

Alastor snorted. He glanced at the group scampering out with their new cell phones as he drawled, "Vox has always had a... persuasive sales pitch."

It was Lucifer's turn to snort as they passed another poster of Vox, this time just the overlord and his VoxTech logo. His ever present slogan, Trust Us, curved around the logo. "You mean he hypnotizes people into doing what he wants." It was good to know in advance. No one had ever tried to hypnotize the Devil himself before and he wasn't keen to find out if it was possible.

"Hm," Alastor hummed in agreement. "Just so."

V Tower was easy to spot, even with all the noise going on in the background. The number of surveillance cameras also began to increase the closer they got to the trio's headquarters. Lucifer eyed one as it followed their trek down the street. "So much for keeping our arrival a surprise."

The redhead smirked, obviously pleased about something. Sing song, he assured, "I wouldn't be too sure about that."

The blonde sighed. He was walking right into it, he knew he was. He was going to do it anyway, because damn his curiosity. "Oh?"

Alastor twirled his staff around his fingers like a baton. "All the cameras we've passed so far have been laughably easy to take out." With a practiced hand, he caught the staff, it's tip pointing at the offending camera. As they passed it, the little button on the side of it blinked from green to red. "Vox isn't paying attention to his little toys. Dear me, he must be away from his surveillance room."

Lucifer squinted at the camera dubiously. "You can tell we're not being watched, by, what? The camera not coming back on?"

Alastor laughed, short and cutting. "Oh, it's more than lack of interaction." He leaned in close, as if he were parting with a juicy secret. "I can tell when Vox is watching." His smile was sharp and cruel and said everything about how pathetic he found the overlord in question. "His attention has a certain... desperation to it."

Lucifer wasn't certain which part of all of that to focus on first: the fact that apparently Vox had flat out stalked Alastor to the point Alastor knew when he was being watched or the fact that Alastor clearly found the whole thing hilarious.

Father, these sinner could be fucked up sometimes.

Lucifer grinned, unable to pass up the opportunity he'd just been handed to needle the deer demon. "Didn't do much about the camera that recorded the fight."

Alastor's expression soured around the edges. His ears flattened as he resumed his previous position, snide as he pointed out, "Yes, well, I was a bit distracted by doing all the work. You should try joining in next time."

Alastor hadn't let him get involved in any of the attacks, insistent that he had everything covered, and they both knew it. Lucifer had let him because he always half hoped someone would kill the asshole.

Lucifer let the conversation drop with little more than a roll of his eyes, his mind drifting as he processed this new information. If Alastor could indeed tell when Vox was watching (which, creepy) and had been surprised by one of the attacks being filmed, one could infer that Vox was keeping the hotel under a certain level of constant surveillance.

After returning from their day out, he had hauled himself up in his room as he scoured the news for mention of any attacks. Had tracked down the news reports Rosie had mentioned. There had only been a number written reports and many more reposted written reports, with a single video dedicated to the subject. The video itself contained footage from the first attack, despite the news articles having all been posted fairly recently. Judging from the general comments under the articles and the video, few people were interested in the hotel itself beyond wanting to know if it still stood or not.

They had been lucky the fight had forced the drone to retreat or risk being destroyed. Distance had rendered the video quality poor enough his bleeding hand wasn't visible for all of Hell to see. Everyone already knew angels could be harmed, killed even. It wouldn't do for anyone to get it into their pretty little heads that angel weapons might work on him or Charlie, however.

(Lucifer tried not to think about the main image he had seen, again and again, in those news articles. Tried not to think about how reverent Alastor had looked like as he reached his hand out to the Devil, as if he were the only God the sinner would ever be able to touch. The framing of the image had made it appear like it was something so different than it had really been.)

Light pressure on his shoulder drew him out of his thoughts. Out of the corner of his view, he caught Alastor withdrawing the hand he'd used to get his attention. It was a good thing he had, as it took a second for the sensor above the door to register their presence and trigger the door to open. He could only imagine what the media would have thought if a camera had caught Lucifer running right into the front doors of V Tower while lost in thought.

They stepped through the doors into a lobby themed in oranges and reds with purple accents. Hearts were definitely a motif, accenting arches and their support columns. Purple lanterns dotted every other column, more decoration than function. Lucifer took in the additional advertisements, some on the walls, some on a-frames. A large, flat screen tv displayed the VoxTek logo, but there was nothing currently playing on it.

There were a number of employees dotted around the lobby. A sheep sinner carrying a precarious stack of tablets raced off in one direction, while a horned rabbit sinner ran in another direction with an armful of clothing. A trio of sinners loitered off to the side, whispering back in forth in a frantic, hushed argument about what sounded like bottom lines and stocks. Near the back of the lobby, a blue and yellow sinner shouted about "messy actors" and "shitty wardrobes" as he frantically slammed his finger into the up button of the elevator.

At the center of the lobby, themed similar to the surrounding columns, was a welcome desk, currently being run by a white haired, fuchsia skinned sinner. Her tiny bat wings fluttered and drooped as she fielded calls. Distracted as she was, she failed to notice anyone had entered the lobby until Alastor and Lucifer had already reached the desk.

"One moment, please," she said to them, showing that she had at least noticed they were there. "Now where did Velvette say she wanted her calls sent to today...?" She bit her lip, finger hovering over one of a quite frankly insane number of optional extensions. Her eyes darted back and forth between two of them, before she shrugged and for all intents and purposes flat out guessed which one to send the line to. "Thank you for waiting," she said in a practiced, albeit polite monotone. "How may I... help..." She trailed off as she finally laid eyes on who had walked into the lobby, eyes going wide. She gaped as she recognized Lucifer but went completely blank as she took in Alastor's presence. The blonde was fairly certain that if he could read minds there wouldn't have been a single thought going through her head at that moment.

Lucifer fixed an equally practiced polite smile on his face. "Excuse me, miss," he began, only to pause when she failed to regain her senses, apparently still too flabbergasted by his companion. Brow twitching, he rapped his knuckles sharply upon the marble surface of the desk.

The noise seemed to do the trick, the sinner snapping out of her trance to jerk her head around. "Yes! Um." She swallowed, casting one last nervous glance at the Radio Demon. Between looking at Alastor and looking back at Lucifer, he could see her clawing her professional mask back on with the kind of experience that came from needing to remain calm when one's life was on the line. "How may I help you, sirs?" Her voice didn't even shake a little.

Noting the reaction and shelving the topic for later, Lucifer said, "Please let Vox know we are here to speak with him."

The sinner blinked, disbelief clear as day on her face despite her best efforts not to show it. "You..." Lucifer had the distinct impression the 'you' here was Alastor, even if she wasn't looking directly at him. "Wish to speak with... Vox?" Her tone suggested that had she not been speaking with Lucifer Morningstar, the literal king of Hell, she might have asked him if he was smoking something.

The noise, or lack there of, reached his ears. The general hustle and bustle of when they had entered had completely died down to be replaced by whispers and murmurs. Even without turning, he could feel all eyes on them. Lucifer glanced at Alastor, whose Cheshire Cat grin suggested he was internally laughing at all the fuss his being here was causing. His ears flicked to and fro as he followed different conversations.

Smile fixed in place, he affirmed, "Yup!" He waggled his fingers in the direction of her phone. "Now, please."

The receptionist stared off into the middle distance, the same blank look in her eyes he'd seen on soldier's who'd died at war. In the fatalistic tone of someone who didn't expect to have a job (or possibly be alive) in the morning, she said, "Whelp, this job sucked anyway."

Someone, a little too loudly, stage whispered, "Oh, I would not want to be in her shoes, right now."

Without turning, the receptionist flipped the person off with one hand while picking up the phone with the other. She pressed a seemingly random button as she put the receiver to her ear, a down right manic smile crossed her face.

Lucifer (and likely everyone in the lobby, as well) could tell the instant the phone was answered on the other end. A voice that matched the one's he'd heard in the advertisements bellowed, "WHAT DID I TELL YOU ABOUT INTERUPTING MY MEETINGS?"

Taking advantage of the fact that it sounded like Vox was a sinner who needed to breathe on occasion, the woman said, voice picture perfect cheerful, "The King of Hell and the Radio Demon are here to see you, sir."

A very long, audible pause, both on the phone and from the lobby around them. Then, "WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU MEAN ALASTOR'S HERE??"

Lucifer raised an eyebrow at the redhead, incredulous. Seriously? What kind of history did these two have that Alastor showing up at V Tower was causing this kind of fuss? It was almost enough to make him forget he had been totally overlooked in that last statement.

Around them, every camera in the lobby suddenly came to life, zeroing in on them. Lucifer could tell by their synchronous motion, someone was likely watching them. Alastor's whole posture changed as he turned on one of the cameras, head tilted just so and smile lazy as he waved at it.

As one, those very same cameras began to sizzle and pop as they were all taken out.

Lucifer noted the redhead looked far too pleased with himself for that to have been anything other than deliberate. He knew Alastor hated being recorded, but that was just petty. Turning his attention to the receptionist, it was only because of his heightened sense of hearing that he was able to hear Vox, voice considerably more in control and at a much more reasonable volume, telling her to send them down.

"At once, sir." She set the phone down at leisure, as if she hadn't just had her eardrums tested by her boss shouting in them. Still looking at something only she could see, she said, "Vox will see you now." She pointed behind her to a set of elevators. "Please use the elevator on the right, as this is the only elevator with access to Vox's personal office." Placing her hands on the desk in a deceptively casual way, she finished, "Please have a hellish rest of your day."

"You, too," Lucifer said on reflex. He watched her as they made their way around the desk, throwing glances over his shoulder after they'd passed it. Under his breath, he asked of Alastor, "Think the hotel needs a receptionist?"

They had a front desk, didn't they? And a land line? Maybe? There was no mail service in Hell and Alastor had to get communications somehow, seeing as he refused to touch anything more modern than a radio. He'd check on it when he got back.

"Ha!" Alastor side eyed him. "Come now, your Majesty, you don't want poor Husker to be out of a job, do you?"

Lucifer belatedly remembered that apparently Husk doubled as not just their bartender, but also as their receptionist. He guffawed. One the one hand, Husk was indeed an great bartender, even willing to be a patient ear for one's troubles, if he tolerated them. He was certainly an exceptional judge of someone's character. On the other, was he a good receptionist? No offense meant to the avian feline in question, but, not in the slightest.

Lucifer added the mental note to check in on the receptionist later to his growing list of things to do.

The elevator opened without them pressing any buttons, suggesting that Vox, the creep, had other ways of keeping tabs on them. Lucifer and Alastor stepped in, the former not thrilled with how tiny the elevator was. There was just enough room for the both of them to stand side by side with little to spare. Insult to injury, the most obnoxious elevator music he had ever had the displeasure to have inflicted on him played over head. There were no buttons to chose from, but there seemed to be none needed as the elevator began its decent on it's own.

Lucifer reiterated: what a creep.

More to fill the silence and distract himself from the growing need to destroy the speaker putting out that horrible noise, he asked, "You ever been here before?"

In the same way most people would say, 'I'd rather die, thanks,' Alastor scoffed. "Absolutely not! I'd never inflict such poor company on myself willingly." Still, it wasn't hard to notice the little ways Alastor was on high alert, very much aware of the fact that he had walked willingly into enemy territory. His ego didn't allow him to worry, but it still paid to be alert to potential surprises.

Thankfully, the elevator didn't take long before reaching its destination. This new room was vast, with a color scheme nothing like the lobby's. Where the lobby was warm shades of orange, red and purple, this room was all cool shades of blue, red, white. The room was dark, only illuminates by dozens upon dozens of screens, most glowing with white light, a handful with red light. Red light filtered up from what appeared to be a deep pit surrounding a bridge-like walkway. Attached at the end was a round platform and attached to the platform was a seat surrounded by even more monitors.

This wasn't an office. This was a surveillance room.

Walking down the walkway was none other than the founder of VoxTek, Vox himself, striding along with all the confidence of someone who was at the top of their industry and knew it. His smile was wide and Lucifer immediately pegged it as the fake kind he usually saw on car salesmen. "Your Highness! Welcome!" Vox greeted. When he was close enough, he offered his hand out for a handshake.

Lucifer eyed it, just long enough to make it look like he wasn't going to take it. He didn't expect anyone to actually bow to him in greeting, but something about this guy left him half tempted to push for it now. Taking the hand, he allowed Vox to shake it to be polite.

When it came time to greet Alastor, the TV demon merely gritted his teeth and said, voice dripping with venom, "Alastor."

Alastor didn't appear bothered in the least by the rude greeting. Matching vitriol with amusement, he merely said, "Vox."

Lucifer looked from Vox, to Alastor, and then back to Vox. Man, he was so sorry he hadn't asked for more details on these two before they'd gotten here. Predicting this could go on a while if they were left to their own devises, Lucifer pointedly cleared his throat.

Vox's smile smoothed out, salesman mask back on place. "Yes, of course. Now, your highness," the sinner held out his hand towards the bridge, indicating he'd like them to come into his "office" proper. Lucifer didn't fail to notice there was only one seat down that way and it was meant for Vox. "May I call you Lucifer? Lucifer--"

Oh, absolutely not. They were going to have to nip that in the bud. Even Alastor, who had somehow become his rival for his place in his daughter's life and literally lived down the hall from him, was smart enough not to call him by name.

"The word you're looking for is 'Majesty'."

Vox paused, body tensing. The fallen angel got the impression he wasn't used to being interrupted. "Excuse me?"

Lucifer effected a bored stance, one hand settled on his cane as he explained, deliberately just this side of hostile, "Your Highness is how you would address my daughter." He looked Vox dead in the eye, making it pointedly clear he was deadly serious and there was going to be none of this BS about who was calling the shots. "Your Majesty is how you address your king."

Vox interestingly grew more calm in the face of his king's ire. "Of course, your Majesty," he said, immediately correcting course. He offered they move the conversation to the platform again. This time, Lucifer nodded. He followed as Vox lead the way, noting how the TV demon never quite turned his back on them, seemingly uneasy having Alastor at his back, even this deep into what was his own territory.

Lucifer took the time spent crossing the bridge to exam the pit around them. While the red light obscured the bottom itself, he was able to make out what appeared to be a very large tank behind equally large glass walls. Swimming around without a care in the world were what appeared to be several glowing sharks. He followed one as it made its way from one side of the pit to the other, able to sense there was nothing natural in their design. These creatures may have appeared to be alive, but they were all circuits and wires, through and through.

When they reached the platform, Vox showed sense by not going for his chair. He did stop in the center of the circle, a subtle attempt to regain some control of the situation. "Now, your Majesty," he began, just sincere enough it was impossible to tell if it was fake or not. "Please, tell me how I and VoxTek can be of assistance today."

Lucifer watched him. Watched the way his face was turned to Lucifer, but his eyes kept ticking to Alastor. Noted the way his body was tilted ever so slightly in the redhead's direction, as if drawn by a magnet he couldn't resist. Vox may have been putting on a show of talking to Lucifer, but he very much only had eyes for Alastor.

Someone was obsessed.

Someone was obsessed really badly.

Something that felt suspiciously like possessiveness reared its head deep within his chest. Lucifer had no more of a claim on Alastor than Vox did, but Alastor had chosen to live under his roof and was his daughter's hotelier. Finicky to the last, with all the loyalty of a feral, stray cat, Alastor was theirs.

Smile all teeth, eyes gold on red, Lucifer raised his free hand until they were right under where Vox's nose would be if he had one. He snapped his fingers, once, twice, sharply.

Vox nearly went cross-eyed, as he zeroed in on the offending digits, leaning slightly back.

"I know Alastor is very eye catching," Lucifer drawled, voice deepening as he let his displeasure seep in. "But you are talking to me. Do you understand?"

The TV demon had the grace to raise his hands, not necessarily in surrender, but certainly in a pacifying manner. It was easy to see him cycling through possible responses, as he fished for the one that would deescalate the situation the fastest. "I apologize, you Majesty, for any offense," he settled on, tone so polite it reeked of falseness.

Lucifer let him have it because it seemed Vox was finally cottoning on to the fact that there was a larger predator in the room then either of the two sinners. The reluctant king withdrew a step, pleased when Vox's eyes followed him, with not a single glance at Alastor. Now that he had the CEO's full attention, he decided it was time to get this show on the road. "I have a message for everyone in the Pride Ring. I've noticed how many people have a TV or a cellphone. I've also noticed VoxTek's reach." Lucifer said this last part only because it was true. However they had managed it, VoxTek has even managed to make it's way into the other rings.

For the first time since they'd arrived, Vox's smile actually appeared real. It put into stark light how fake the one he had been wearing up until this moment had been. "We would be thrilled to feature you on one of our television shows, your Majesty." He was smart enough not to look at Alastor, although it was obvious the next part was directed towards him. "Our viewership ratings have been going through the roof over the last few years. Statistics show that almost every household in the Pentagram City has a TV these days."

It was a good sales pitch. It might even have been true. The hotel had even had a TV, although Lucifer had explicitly forbidden anyone from bringing one into the palace, the exception being the live-in servants' personal quarters. Regardless, Vox hadn't said that to try and sale anyone on anything, he'd said it to rub it in Alastor's face that Lucifer had chosen to pass his message along over Vox's medium, instead of Alastor's.

Although they hadn't discussed it ahead of time, Lucifer found himself saying, in all the casualness of it having been a given, "If Alastor wishes to broadcast the message simultaneously over radio for our viewers who prefer the medium, he's more than welcome to do so, but we're not here to discuss that." He was fairly certain, even without turning around, that Alastor hadn't given it away that this was news to him.

The idea was reinforced by the way that Vox's eye twitched before he could regain control over it. "Yes, of course we want it to reach all of the intended audiences." Hands coming to rest at the small of his back, the TV demon attempted to steer them back on course. "Now, about the content of the message."

Lucifer tilted his head to the side. "Does it matter what the content is? Unless you prefer I go somewhere else to do this." Something that was also true. Mammon may lack any talent of his own, but he knew a cash grab when he saw one. He jumped onto the bandwagon that was television sets, TV shows, and moving advertisements as soon as the technology had hit Hell. The only reason none of his products where seen in the Pride Ring was because Lucifer limited his exposure to sinners were ever he could. If he gave him the green light, Mammon would topple VoxTek within a matter of months, if not less.

Vox paused, sensing he was in troubled waters, but not quite sure from which direction. "No, no. We here at VoxTek simply prefer to make sure that all the content we put out is content we stand by--"

Lucifer leaned in. If his tail were out, it would have been thrashing. "Are you saying your king could say anything VoxTek wouldn't support?"

Vox's screen left eye widened ever so slightly, the sclera going from a solid red, to more hypnotic red and black. It was there and gone in the blink of his eyes. His voice sounded glitchy as he gritted out a, "No."

"May I suggest something, your Majesty?"

Lucifer broke off what was quickly becoming a staring match with Vox to turn his attention to Alastor. The redheaded sinner had been standing behind him, seemingly content to watch the drama unfold from the side as Lucifer took the lead. Considering their rivalry, Lucifer was a little hesitant to allow Alastor to enter the fray, lest he potentially make things worse. However, he did appreciate the fact that these two knew each other better than he knew either of them.

Giving away the floor, at least for now, Lucifer gave a single short nod, for him to proceed.

Alastor stepped up until they were side by side.

Unable to resist now that the redhead had center stage, Vox immediately shifted to face him, Lucifer all but forgotten. He frowned, almost all pretenses of being a businessman all but thrown out the window. "What are you doing here, Alastor?" He snipped at the redhead. "I know you'll take any opportunity to move up in Hell, but I didn't take you as a kiss ass."

Alastor smiled at him, as if he were a short sighted child. "We hadn't gotten to that part, have we?" He gave his staff a little spin, noting the way Vox's eyes narrowed as he took in it's repaired state. "His Majesty asked me to stand with him as he gave his address."

Vox snorted, doubtful. "You'd never agree to appearing on screen." He actually started to laugh at the idea, until he realized Alastor was completely serious. "Wait, you said yes?" Gaping, he turned on Lucifer, seeming in his shock to forget who he was talking to. "What the hell did you do to get him to agree to show up on TV?" He glared back and forth between then, baring his teeth as he asked, "What, are you two fucking or something?"

Lucifer narrowed his eyes, lip curling back. In one fell swoop, Vox had just reduced himself to less than scum on the bottom of his boots. The only reason they were continuing this conversation was because he didn't feel like dragging Valentino down to the Greed Ring. "Maybe you just don't know how to speak his language," he snipped back, mouth moving before he could think about what he was saying or how much it gave away.

Before Vox could think too deeply on it, the redhead cleared his throat. For all that he preferred to be an unseen voice on the radio, Alastor did how to play his audience in person. "Let me sweeten the deal," he said, his hand running down the pole of his staff, eyeing the TV demon as he did so. "If you agree to broadcast our King's message, I'll do that one little thing you wanted me to do when you asked me to join you." He pointed the microphone end at Vox, the tip perilously close to his screen. "From when you agree to the end of the broadcast."

Vox stared at the microphone. Slowly, he raised his eyes until he met Alastor's. Something that looked suspiciously like sadness peaked through his anger, although Lucifer was certain they weren't supposed to see it. "You'd really do that. For him?"

Alastor withdrew his staff, tucking it under his arm. With his free hand, he reached out until a single claw rested under Lucifer's chin. Encouraging him to look up at him, Lucifer let Alastor tilt his head up and around to meet that fond expression on the redhead's face. "As his Majesty said, he knows how to speak my language."

Vox's eyes widened, a dawning expression coming over him. Real horror followed shortly behind it. "Holy shit," he whispered, staggering back. Lucifer tore his gaze away from Alastor's just in time to see him drop into his chair as if his strings had been cut. Dragging a hand down his face, Vox said with absolute certainty, "You actually made a Faustian Bargain."

He said it like this was his worst nightmare came to life.

Beside him, Alastor practically radiated smug triumph. It was all the affirmation he needed to give.

All of the fight hadn't been been cut from Vox just yet. Unhappy as he was with this set back, Vox was already trying to figure out how spin this in his favor. An elbow resting on each arm of his chair, the knuckles of his joined hands pressed to his lips, he countered, "Alright, Alastor does his thing and I'll broadcast whatever you want." His grin took up most of his screen, all pretenses of friendliness dropped. "Give me an hour to prepare the studio for you."

Before Vox could run off, Lucifer placed one last little condition on him. "Vox. Make sure the other Vees are in attendance." At the TV demon's questioning tilt of his head, the blonde merely said, "I wouldn't want anyone to miss my message."

Whatever Vox thought of this was hidden behind his joined hands. Instead of bothering with any of the usual ways out of the room, Vox transformed into a bolt of electricity, disappearing into one of the monitors.

Silence descended over the room. Then, "You two have history."

Alastor snorted. "You know how to use your eyes, your Majesty. I'm impressed."

Lucifer ignored the sarcasm and the insult in favor of observing his companion. The redhead's brows were furrowed with concentration, eyes closed and the very air around him warped to a noticeable degree. To Lucifer, a creature who had existed before physical matter, picking up on the way Alastor was enhancing certain electromagnetic waves around him was child's play. Hoping to kill two birds with one stone - learning more about their shared history while figuring out what the sinner was doing - the little king gave into his curiosity and asked, "What did Vox want you to do?"

Alastor didn't answer for a moment, whatever he was doing taking quite a bit of his concentration. Lucifer patiently waited him out. Several minutes ticked by with nothing by the hum of the monitors and the swimming of the sharks to keep him occupied. Cracking open a single eye a slit, Alastor reached a point in whatever he was doing where he could split his attention. Lucifer noted the pupil of the visible eye was a dial.

"Do you know how the technology in that silly little device in your pocket works?" Alastor asked by way of response.

The only things Lucifer tended to carry on his person were his cane, which was in his hand, and his cellphone, in case Charlie tried to call him (rare that it was). His cellphone, which was indeed in his pocket. Fishing it out, he eyed it. He knew it worked. He knew how to work it. Did he really need to know more? Besides, it wasn't one of VoxTek's cellphones, which made him less wary of it. Confused as to where this was going, he said, "It works, isn't that all that matters?"

"Such a pedestrian response." Alastor hummed, his microphone coming over to point at the little device. "You device works because it's able to transmit data via radio waves." He used his staff to gesture to the room around them, his eye falling shut now that he no longer needed to see to engage in the conversation. "Vox's specialty is electricity. He can interact with anything that uses it."

Lucifer remembered the way the TV demon had disappeared into his monitor, a chill running down his spine as he imagined what all else he could likely interact with.

"Radio waves, on the other hand, are my specialty," Alastor continued. This fit with what Lucifer had observed both in the current moment and back at the radio tower. "Usually I simply use them to connect myself to any radio in Pentagram City, but I can also enhance them." His edges of his smile tightened. There was no strain in his posture, but Lucifer was suspicious they might see hints of it if this carried on too long. "When Vox wanted to introduce wireless technology to Hell, he suggested that we team up. He would create the technology and the demand, and I would enhance his reach." His expression sharpened into a sneer. "I had no interest in being a mere tool in elevating him to the top."

Judging from the short interaction he'd observed, Lucifer was suspicious Vox had wanted much more than just to use Alastor as a tool. Vox had done little to hide the depth of his anger and hatred, and no one reached that level of emotion without having swung in the opposite direction first. Lucifer wondered if Alastor had really turned Vox down because of his own lust for power or if Alastor had seen the way Vox had looked at him and hadn't been interested.

Since that question was more likely to shut down the conversation then receive an answer, resigned himself to never knowing. Either way, he supposed he should be happy that Alastor had turned Vox down. Lucifer didn't want to think about what they could have accomplished if they had somehow found a way to work together.

Instead, he went with, "So, you can interact with anything that receives radio waves, then. Not just radios?"

In response, his cell phone dinged. The screen lit up to the lock screen, showing he had a new text message. Though it should be improbable, there was nothing in the place of a sender's name. Lucifer silently frowned at it, suspicious of who was the sender, but unwilling to open anything he didn't know who it came from.

As if sensing his distrust, Alastor crooned, "Go on. I promise it's not spam."

Lucifer was still wary, but he unlocked his phone. If this was malicious ware, Alastor was getting him a new phone.

The text message was indeed not spam. When he opened it up, there were simply two words:

You suck!

Lucifer glared at the message. "So, what? How would this help Vox?"

Alastor wagged a finger at him. "I'm currently high jacking every TV and cellphone with it's WIFI turned on. 666 News has never been more popular than it is right now." He paused, as if searching for something. "I excluded most of the phones in the hotel, but I do have Angel's."

Lucifer whistled, giving credit where it was due. That was honestly incredible. Terrifying in it's reach, holy shit, but incredible. A thought crossed his mind, an unholy grin slowly spreading across his face as he wondered, "Wait, if I reply to this, will the message go straight to you?"

"Ha!" Alastor shook his head, using his microphone to bop the top of Lucifer's hat. An impressive feat, considering his eyes were still closed. "Sorry, but I'm merely a transmitter and an amplifier. My abilities don't work that way."

Lucifer straightened his hat, half tempted to try anyway, just to see if it were true. Perhaps he would another time.

He was interrupted from any further questions by one of the monitors coming to life over Vox's chair. A moment later, the sinner himself reentered the same way he had left. Vox settled back in his chair, legs crossed and significantly more calm than when he left. "The studio will be ready for you in half an hour." He glanced once at Alastor, who had opened his eyes upon the TV demon's return, before returning back to Lucifer. "Let's relocate there now, shall we?"

Lucifer nodded. Instead of leading them towards the elevator they'd come down in, Vox merely joined them in the center of the platform. It became apparent why when the very middle suddenly began to rise, revealing there was yet more ways in and out of the surveillance room. Once they were back in the lobby, he led them over to elevator on the left, only sticking with them long enough to press the button of the floor with the studio, before pulling back out of it. "I'll meet you up there."

The door closed, once again leaving just the two of them and that horrible elevator music.

Lucifer glanced at Alastor. He still looked fine, but he was definitely putting out a lot of power. Feeling concerned (Alastor had agreed to do this for him) and wary of insulting him, he asked, checking in, "You doing okay, still?"

Alastor's ear twitched, the widening of smile showing he wasn't insulted, but rather amused. "Oh, don't worry your little head, I'll be just fine, your Majesty." Eyes aglow with more than just the power it took to carry out his promise, he added, "But I expect a reward when we return to the Hotel."

Lucifer felt a jolt run up his spine. The chain around his neck didn't manifest, but he could feel it tightening ever so. Alastor was invoking their deal, officially giving him his 12 hour notice. He supposed he shouldn't be surprised, as Alastor had yet to actually invoke the deal since making it with him. Tilting his head so his hat hid his expression from both Alastor and the camera's gaze, Lucifer grumbled, "Should have known you'd do nothing for free."

The doors to the elevator opened, illuminating the redhead's sinister grin. A few sinners had paused to catch a glimpse of them as the doors opened, only to pale at the expression on Alastor's face. They quickly scurried off to carry out their tasks. Lucifer stepped through the doors, taking in the chaos in front of him. Numerous demons were running around, similar to the frantic energy he'd seen in the lobby, everyone getting the studio ready. A stack of papers and angry shouting from a blonde woman in a red dress (what was her name? It started with a K) suggested that something else had been planned for this hour, but had been cancelled due to Lucifer's abrupt interruption.

Lucifer might have felt bad, if it weren't for the fact that he knew without a shadow of a doubt this particular reporter was likely going to find some way to verbally eviscerate him later. He may not have remembered her name, but he did remember her particular brand of cutthroat journalism and the outright nasty things she had said about his daughter in the past. And her casual abuse of her co-reporter.

As if sensing she was being watched, the reporter turned her head a full 180 degrees, her smile down right unhinged and full of promises.

Not for the first time since landing in Hell, Lucifer almost wished he was still capable of creating Holy Water. There were some situations one just needed a spray bottle full of the hard core stuff for.

"Your Majesty," Vox pipped up, appearing from seemingly nowhere. The only reason Lucifer didn't jump was because he was still caught in a glaring match with a literal reporter from Hell. "This way, please."

Lucifer carried on glaring at her, right up until he physically couldn't. "I don't care who you've got sitting with me, I don't want her anywhere near me."

Vox followed his gaze, snorting when he saw who he'd been making a stink eye at. "Oh, no worries." He turned his own glare on Alastor. "I'll be copiloting right along with you."

Lucifer took in the two chairs. If he was sitting in one and Vox in the other, Alastor was going to be left standing. Judging from the gleam in the TV demon's eye, this was on purpose. Vox pulled out the seat on the right, the malicious reporter's coworker's usual seat, a smile so fake one would have to be blind to think it sincere spread across his screen. "Just a few more finishing touches, and then we'll be ready to begin." He turned on his heel and disappeared back into the bowels of the studio.

Lucifer blinked down at the seat. He could already feel the sheer number of eyes from the people in the studio, watching and waiting to see what he was going to do next. This was the first time almost every single one of them had ever seen him in person. He already hated everything about this. It was more than enough to make him want to retreat back to his room at the hotel and not come out for the rest of the month.

A gentle brush, an almost tickle, against the back of his neck, the feeling almost shockingly intimate, startled him. He inhaled sharply, not having noticed that he had stopped breathing. Instinctively, he turned his back on the growing crowd, his hand coming up to half way, before he aborted the motion. Turning to face him, Lucifer noted that Alastor appeared to have not done anything, standing in that default pose he favored. The only reason Lucifer could tell it had been him that touched him was from the way the redhead was watching him.

"Smile, your Majesty," Alastor murmured, voice pitched low and soothing. "The hardest part is almost over. I'll be with you the whole time."

How out of sorts had he been that even the Radio Demon was taking pity on him? That the reassurance was a comfort?

Lucifer breathed in slowly through his nose, breathing out even slower through his mouth. His racing heart began to calm, as he reminded himself that he had taken on far more terrifying beings than a room full of nosey sinners. This was all for Charlie and the safety of her dream, and for that, he could handle anything.

He dropped into the offered chair, the anticipation of a battle falling over his shoulders like a weathered cape.

A door opened off to the side, one that he hadn't seen anyone coming and going through. Stepping through were none other than Valentino and Velvette themselves. Velvette was typing away on her phone, muttering about an interruption to her photo shoot.

Valentino paused as he caught sight of Lucifer and Alastor. "Oh! If it isn't papito, himself!" The grin spreading across his face and choice of wording caused the blonde's skin to crawl. Sauntering over, Valentino nearly draped himself over desk, bringing his and Lucifer's faces far too close together. "You wouldn't want to hang around after this little show for some one on one time, now would you, mi pequeño rey?"

Lucifer had barely managed to do more than lean back in his chair, trying to escape the heavy stench of smoke and hard drugs that hung around the Overlord like a second skin, when a weigh settled heavily on his shoulder. He glanced up, finding that Alastor had stepped up beside him, hand placed in such a way that it wrapped possessively around shoulder and was beginning to snake around the back of his neck.

"Valentino." Alastor's filter was grating, a warning despite his pleasant smile.

Valentino lazily blew out a thin pink, heart shaped mouth of smoke. It hit Alastor in the face. His smile was filthy as he gave the deer demon a once over. "Don't be jealous, venado, my offer is still open to you, too."

The static glitch of a record screeching. It wasn't hard to pick out Alastor's distaste with everything from the offer to the Overlord himself. "Pass," he quipped back, shotting down the offer with extreme prejudice.

The pimp shrugged, viewing it as his loss. He turned his attention back to his original target. "What do you say, papito? We could--."

"Val." Vox's voice was barely recognizable through whatever filter he was using, the noise causing Lucifer to flinch as it grated at his ears.

Valentino pouted, somehow making it look aggressive. "Vox, querido, what have I said about using that tone with me?" He twisted around in a way that accented his figure. "Don't be upset because the Radio Demon's already turned you down."

"The show is about to start, Val," Vox pointed out evenly and sternly, despite the dig. Lucifer was beginning to pick up that when it was anyone other than Alastor, the TV demon might actually be able to keep a cool head. "How do you think it will look if we don't start on time?"

Valentino's pout to edge in the direction of a normal pout. "Spoil sport." He leaned back until he was facing Lucifer. He reached out, running a single finger along the underside of the blonde's chin. "Call me if you change your mind." Offer made, he thankfully, finally got off the desk and made his way back over to Velvette.

Lucifer was going to take a long, hot shower when he got back to the hotel. With acid. Regrow some nice, new skin that Valentino had never touched.

Alastor pulled him from his thoughts, giving the back of his neck a squeeze. Lucifer was almost sad for the loss of contact when he pulled his hand away so he could resume his prior position.

From where he stood, Vox watched the two of them, his expression unreadable. Several minutely later, the blue and black themed sinner dropped into his own seat, calling out to the cameraman as he did so. "How's the camera holding up?"

The cameraman peaked at Alastor, indicating this question was because of the redhead's tendency to take out anything with a camera around him. The sinner studied his monitor and then gave a thumbs up.

Vox clicked his tongue. "So," he gripped, irritation heavy in his voice. "You can be recorded without destroying my electronics."

Lucifer couldn't see Alastor from where he was standing almost directly behind him, could only hear the tapping on his fingers on his microphone. His taunt was malicious as he came back with, "We both know I can be photographed ...when I want to be."

The TV demon grimaced, the hit landing where it obviously hurt. He had little time to recover, as the cameraman began his countdown. As he hit zero, Vox's smile was back in place, just a lot less real.

"Top of the hour, folks!" Vox's voice was loud and boisterous, the rhythm and pace almost break neck. "Breaking news: in a rare interview, we're joined by none other than the King of Hell and the Devil himself, Lucifer Morningstar!" Vox leaned over, holding a hand out to indicate the fallen angel sitting beside him. "Please, give your people a little wave, your Majesty."

Lucifer resisted the urge to flip him off. Gave the camera a little wave with little enthusiasm.

Vox carried on, unphased, "Equally rare and unlikely to never happen again, fellow sinners, we also have radio talk show host, the Radio Demon himself, Alastor!"

Alastor didn't wave. He grinned straight into the camera, as if staring into the very souls of the views, eyes and teeth alight as reality itself threatened to warp around him.

The camera gave an alarming whine. The cameraman gave an alarmed cry as it threatened to give out.

Point made, Alastor seemed to remember he was supposed to be behaving. The camera stopped whining as reality returned to normal.

Vox's eye twitched. Smile strained along with his chipper tone, he said, "Your Majesty, I assume your being here is because of the attacks on the hotel your daughter is running?"

Lucifer gave him his own chipper smile. "You mean the attacks you only know about because of your voyeuristic habits?"

Vox laughed, a touch nervously. "You've clearly never dealt with the paparazzi, sire. One has to cross a few boundaries if they want to get the exclusive first."

Was that what he was going with?

Either blind to it or ignoring it, Vox glossed over Lucifer's offense, moving on to, "Please, tell us, do you have any idea who's behind the attacks? We're dying to know."

Lucifer highly doubted that. Or at least, doubted Vox cared. It was more likely he wanted the hotel to fail or get taken out, judging from his poorly concealed eagerness. He leaned his elbow onto the table, chin resting on his palm. "I'm not here to waste my time nor the listeners' with an interview." He took delight in watching Vox falter for the first time since the interrogation began. Over his shoulder, he called sweetly, "Alastor?"

Alastor's voice was just sweet and still more bloodthirsty. "Yes, sire?"

It was a show of how in tune Vox was with Alastor's moods that the TV demon was already beginning to sweat. He was doing a good job of hiding it, Lucifer would give him that. It was a pity he was sitting beside someone who could see right through him, when he chose to make the effort. Lucifer rose from his chair, the blue and black sinner nearly taking a screen full of wings as they manifested. "Be a doll and make certain Vox doesn't get any ideas. Like interfering."

"With pleasure." Alastor's words were nearly lost to his filter. The air around them crackled, the shadows in the corners of the room growing unnaturally dark. Vox dropped all pretenses of pretending he wasn't unnerved, leaning back as much to avoid the wings as to distance himself from the redheaded sinner.

Red and white wings fluttered, giving Lucifer the lift to make stepping up onto the desk look effortless. Papers flew everywhere and a few people made startled noises as they were hit with a few errant pages. His wings fanned out, allowing him to gracefully fall into a seated potion on the other side of the desk. He leaned to the side, placing his weight on the hand braced on the desk, head rolling until he was facing the other two Vees. "Velvette, if you value your life just sit there and look pretty for a bit."

Velvette narrowed her eyes to slits at him. "What the hell?"

Valentino waited to see what advice he had for him. When he received none, the pimp blew out a lung full of pink smoke. His expression turned sultry. "Nothing for me, pequeño rey?"

Lucifer didn't respond, not wanting to give the game away too soon. Relaxing his control over his form, he allowed the full extent of his corrupted, angelic form to appear on full display for all of the viewers to see. Far too many eyes focused in on not just the camera, but the cameraman and the sinners directly around him. Each of them instinctively shied away, hindbrains warning them they were out in the open and too exposed. Vox attempted to push his chair back, the area around the desk suddenly a little too hot, only to be stopped by the end of Alastor's strategically placed staff locking the chair in place.

Lucifer rolled his head back around, until he could easily stare into the camera. "Now, to clear up a few things: I could care less about sinner politics." He grinned in that way he knew looked off, even for a creature of Hell, leaning into the fact that he wasn't human and had never been human. "How you decide to throw away the one good thing you stupid, stupid little humans have going for you is up to you." His pupils were lost in a red glow as his temper spiked, the flame of hellfire blazing between his horns. " What I do take issue with is someone sending hitman to threaten my daughter over something as silly as potential lost contracts."

He slid off the desk, the sinners in front of him all collectively taking a step back. Only the cameraman stayed in place, too frozen to move. "Perhaps it's my fault, I've been away a while." He held out a hand, fingers searching until he found the particular contract he was looking for. "Perhaps it's yours for never reading the fine print." His hand closed around his desired target, a chain made of pink, translucent smoke, deceptively fragile, coming into being. One end led out the doors. The other end led off to the side, leading over to a certain Overlord.

Valentino's and Angel's contract.

The pimp held up his wrist, confusion evident on his face. "The fuck?"

Lucifer's grin was all teeth. He wrapped his hand around and around the chain until he had a nice, solid grip on it. Without warning, he viciously yanked on the chain.

Valentino was pulled so hard, his shoulder nearly popped out of its socket. The pimp yowled like a cat dropped into pool as he was sent crashing to the floor. Lucifer didn't give him the chance to recover, reeling him in like a particularly resistant fish, the Overlord shouting and cursing as he was dragged across the floor. The Devil gave no quarter, even when he had him where he wanted him, pressing his heel into Valentino's back and twisting moth's arm until it was just short breaking.

"You see," Lucifer carried on, tone bored and voice raised over the slew of insults being thrown his way, "There's this little clause in your contracts that say I have the final say in every single one of them."

"You little shit!" Valentino hissed, twisting in a way that should be impossible for someone who purportedly had a spine. "We had nothing to do with the attacks on that shithole your hija is running."

Lucifer pulled on the chain until he could hear the shoulder pop. The sinner's claws dug into the ground beneath him, glare baleful. "Maybe," Lucifer said, almost nonchalant. "But you're the lowest kind of sinner: the kind that profits on selling human flesh and locks people into contracts so they can never escape."

The moth demon snarled, composure gone. "Every one of those whores came to me willingly. I made them stars. They would be nothing without me."

The Devil peered down at him, unmerciful. All of Valentino's sins where on display for him to see and judge and he found him wanting. "Nothing gives you the right to abuse another human being."

Lucifer returned his attention to the camera. He wrapped his free hand around another section of the chain, pulling the links tight between his two fists. "Let everyone remember that your little deals mean nothing if I say so."

Without further ado, he pulled almost effortlessly on the chain, Valentino's strength that of a kittens next to his. A link, just off center, gave, pulling apart until it shattered. Each one of the links similarly followed suit, falling from his hand like crystalline shards. They vanished like the smoke they had originally appeared as before they could hit the ground.

Valentino's arm, free of the chain, fell to the floor with a heavy thud.

Lucifer stepped off his back, releasing him. Stepping around the desk this time, he held his hand out to Alastor. The Radio Demon blinked back at him, something delighted behind his gaze.

It looked a little like victory.

He took Lucifer's hand.

"The Hazbin Hotel and every one of its residents are under my protection," Lucifer declared into the stunned silence, voice projected loud and unearthly, raising the hair on ever sinner's head, save the one in front of him. He looked upon each of the sinners in the room, gaze coming to rest on the camera lens. "I will not have mercy upon anyone looking to cause my daughter anymore trouble."

To his right, a portal appeared. Without another word, he stepped through it, pulling Alastor along with him.

As everyone continued to stare, the portal vanished and they were gone.

tbc

Translations:

-Papito: Little daddy

-Mi pequeño rey: My little king

-Venado: Deer or venison. I chose this word as a way for Valentino to make a dig at the fact that Alastor's demon form is a type of food source.

-Querido: Darling, used if you love or like someone. Chosen as a shoutout to the affair they're clearly having.

[mirai-e-jump]

Animage October 2023 Issue ft. Aoto Watanabe Interview (translation below)

Publication: September 8, 2023 (between episodes 27-28)

"I'm on Top!"

Born and raised in the slums, Yanma Gast ascended to the throne with just his computer. He's the "President," who's earned the respect of the nation, or rather of his friends, for his passionate way of life. N'Kosopa has had a history of being forced to work as Shugoddam's supplier. Standing at the top is Yanma, who isn't afraid of any opponent.

"I won't flatter or bow down to you. Regardless of who my opponent is, I'll beat them down with guts and brains!"

It's his core belief

Charging down the path he believes in, Yanma claims to be a king of knowledge, and is by no means an bad person. He has the insight to see through both Gira's role as an "evil king" and Racules's true intentions. He's compassionate, someone who at times will subtly care for his friends, at other times, he'll show off a mature attitude. He's an exceptional engineer who's developed weapons such as the Ohger Calibur, and the mechanical lifeforms know as Shugod's. His many strengths are his main appeal.

The battle against the new enemy, Uchu King, is bound to be fiercer than ever. Yanma's engineering abilities, superior brains, and his belief to not give into anyone or anything will be a great source of strength for the royal Sentai.

-The cool things about Yanma, who can respect others-

"It's now been about half a year since the the start of the broadcast, how do you feel?"

Watanabe: Each day was long, but looking back, it felt like it went by in an instant, it's a strange feeling. I suddenly realized that we're halfway through filming, and every 5 episodes feel like the climax of the show, so now I'm thinking, "What's going to happen in the next 20 episodes?" (laughs).

"Since filming began, has your impression of Yanma changed at all?"

Watanabe: I felt that he was more friendly towards other people than I originally thought. As I'd said in one of my lines, I think that Yanma's stance is that he does what he wants to do, and only follows those who want to follow him. In the end, they all unite, and while I thought he didn't like helping others out, in episode 7, he talks about how friends should be, saying, "It doesn't matter if you're in the middle of a fight, you lend a hand when things get tough, and when it's done, you get back to fighting." Recently, there have been more scenes in which he offers alittle more help to the other kings, and I see him as someone who's opened up and discovered new sides to himself. For example, in the film, he tells Rita what he thinks, but when Rita says that they don't think the same way, Yanma backs off. Don't force your opinions onto others, and maintain a certain distance. I like the respect he has for the others. I also like the fact that Yanma isn't stubborn, and is able to accept other people's ideas, being flexible even if he thinks differently. Even though he has his own path, in order to follow it, he needs to think about things with an open mind, and see things from different perspectives. That's why he was able to come this far from nothing, and I feel that he's the type of person who'll grow the most in this world.

"In terms of his relationship with the other kings, he told Kaguragi in episode 17, "You'd never go along with anyone. In fact, that makes you more trustworthy"

Watanabe: In a way, that exchange with Kaguragi was cool, because it conveyed some good things about him.

"Furthermore, your relationship with Gira, Hymeno and Jeramie seems to be mutual ones.

Watanabe: That's right. Kaguragi and Rita are the type to put boundaries between themselves and others, so there's a sense of keeping a distance from them, on the other side, Gira and Hymeno are more direct. When it comes to Jeramie, I want to continue to be on equal terms with him. Jeramie comes off as rather cute, so I think we can have a relationship where Yanma pulls him along. But, what Jeramie has gone through is something we can't even imagine. So, I want to have a relationship with Jeramie where I can fight along side him in a normal way, to become alittle annoyed with him if he says something wrong, and to have a strong sense of respect for him. This is shown when we fistbump in episode 19, which is one of my favorite scenes.

"Is there anything you're conscious of in presenting the relationship between Shiokara and the others members of N'Kosopa?"

Watanabe: Honestly, I rarely discussed things like acting with them. Especially with Akka, Usuba, and Mayuta, I try not to get too close since those 3 have a relationship that is to follow Yanma's lead. Shiokara, played by (Yuhei) Chiwata-san, plays a more central role, and I'll see him thinking up his performance, but, he never bothers to tell me what he's going to do, and he doesn;t ask what we're going to do. Everyone just tries doing what they like when it comes to the performance.

"What was the most memorable interaction with Hirotsugu Mori-san, TomboOhger's suit actor?"

Watanabe: It didn't happen on set, but the first time we went out for drinks together was very memorable. Mori-san is a very sociable person, so we became good friends right away. We went out for drinks and both talked about how we got into King-Ohger, and what we wanted to do as Yanma, we talked so much that before we knew it, 5 hours had gone by (laughs). I'm not the best at socializing with other people, so I was really surprised by the fact that we had endless conversations during our first drinks together, and was impressed that we actually talked for 5 hours.

"It seems exactly like having a like minded partner."

Watanabe: Yeah. I felt like Mori-san created that kind of atmosphere.

"How is it doing the dub for TomboOhger?"

Watanabe: I think it's very difficult to perform using only my voice. In the beginning, when I would hear my own voice in the broadcast, I would sometimes think it lacked abit of energy or that it just didn't sound like Yanma. Now, I'm more conscious of performing while moving my body, throwing in more hand gestures than normal, and speaking in a lower tone.

-Interactions with children who reaffirmed his starting point-

"Do you have any memorable events, such as the stage greeting for the film?"

Watanabe: I was happy to be able to feel the enthusiasm of the audience. I usually spend time filming on site, so I only had a chance to see people's reaction by looking at their feedback online. When I actually saw the audience in person, it really felt like, "These people are happy to see us." In general, children don't get to post their feedback online, do they? Of course, I was happy to see the reactions of adults, but I was most excited for the children due to the fact that I myself watched Sentai as a child. When we were doing highfives, some children would come running up to me with their eyes sparkling, while others would be too nervous to look me in the eyes. When I was a kid, I was also the shy type, so I felt like I was looking at my younger self. I recognized that, "I'm acting for the sake of these kids," and it gave me more motivation for future filming.

"We're sure there'll be more opportunities to appear at events in the future, and we hope you'll be able to make more wonderful memories. Please tell us about your favorite episode so far, or what episode you have fond memories of."

Watanabe: It changes every time (laughs). If I had to pick, the scenes where everyone assembles are most memorable. The scene in episode 5 where the five of us finally stood side by side was very exciting, as we'd been playing our roles since the audition. There's the scene in episode 10 where we call for Legend King-Ohger, and I also liked the scene in episode 19 where all of us transform together. Things started out with just Gira and me, but then Hymeno, Kaguragi, Rita, and finally Jeramie, we grew one by one, and the process of seeing our group formation up close was probably why it's so memorable.

"Other than your role as Yanma, if you could name your favorite character, who would it be?"

Watanabe: For me, I'm a fan of Hymeno. I feel that the charisma Hymeno possesses is similar to that of Yanma's. Yanma gains allies by just doing whatever he wants, while Hymeno gets people to follow her through being selfish. I myself admire such people, and think it's cool that she's a loner, or rather, that she's selfish and doesn't follow others. I've always been more attracted to strong female characters who are willing to go ahead, rather than stand behind and offer support.

"Speaking of which, at the press conference to announce the film, you mentioned that your first love was Jasmine (DekaYellow) from "Tokusou Sentai Dekaranger."

Watanabe: That's right. Possibly due to the influences of Sentai, she gives off the image of the ideal woman (laughs).

"By the way, who's your favorite female character from anime and films?"

Watanabe: For anime, I really like Hancock from "One Piece." Films include Elizabeth from "Pirates of the Caribbean" and Padme from "Star Wars"…..The 3 people I mentioned are all either princesses who fight or high class ladies (laughs).

"You're consistent in the type of women you prefer (laughs)."

Watanabe: Yeah, I noticed that too. (laughs).

"As mentioned earlier in your conversations with Mori-san, is there anything you'd like to do as Yanma in the future?"

Watanabe: I want to do a scene where I'm in the rain, and Mori-san said he wants to do a 1 on 100 fight. So, we talked about wanting to do 1 on 100 fight in the rain (laughs). I was told we couldn't do that because I used to spray dye my hair blue, and the color would fade if it got wet. But, starting with the new chapter, I now have blonde hair, so I'm secretly hoping that we can finally do it. I have alot of things I want to do with my mentor, Gin-san (Ken Yoshizawa-san), and I can't wait to tell you all about it when it finally become a reality.

"We're looking forward to the day when Watanabe-san's visions are realized! Finally, please give us some highlights of future events."

Watanabe: The new chapter will not only bring in new enemies from outer space, but it will also explore the heart of the show's universe. I have a feeling that we'll be diving into the story of the world from 2,000 years ago and explore the roots of the Yanma and others. I'm very excited about it, and I'm sure that you'll enjoy the new developments as well!

[tacoma-narrows]

Twenty (Three!) Years of Humanistic!

Abandoned Pools' first album, Humanistic was released 23 years ago today, on September 25th, 2001! For anyone who doesn't know, Abandoned Pools is my all time favorite band! I found them through Clone High in September of 2020 and immediately connected with a LOT of their songs, and in that time, Humanistic became my all time favorite album! A spot that it still retains to this day hehe.

So when I found out that the following year, almost a year to the day from when I started listening to Abandoned Pools, was Humanistic's 20th anniversary, I knew I wanted to make something big for that occasion! I ended up making a drawing based on each song in the album! This is similar to what I did for Owl City's album Cinematic later on, which I posted last year.

This is also sort of a look at proto Let's Get Back! in a way! I made this when LGB! was still just a duo act with PB and Shep, since Rye and Pumpernickel didn't join the lineup until I was about halfway through the project, and the band wasn't officially named Let's Get Back! until February of 2022 lol. The cover image here is based on the actual album cover for Humanistic, and I edited later to say "Covers by Let's Get Back!" to make it consistent with the rest of my LGB! art :3

Each piece in the series is below the cut along with the song they're connected to and some explanation about each one. Again, these pieces are three years old at this point, so some of the art is a bit wonky looking and some of these piece I'd do differently if I were to do them today, but most of them still hold up pretty well I think! :D

1: The Remedy

I based this one on the line “save your breath, your soul is hollow” and wanted to do something simplistic but still interesting! According to my friend who also likes the song, this is “exactly how that song feels” lol. It was fun working with silhouettes here, which is something I've done here and there in the time since.

2: Mercy Kiss

I decided to not actually draw them kissing bc the song says “I don’t need your mercy kiss” haha. Wanted to capture sort of a defiant attitude for this one. Posing is a little off here, and I've tweaked some minor things abt their design but overall one that I'm still pretty happy with :]

3: Start Over

I was SUPER happy with the posing on this one, I love the sense of motion it has. Basically, I wanted to express being stuck in a cycle and just wanting to go back to the way things were, which was something I was REALLY feeling at the time, but is still sort of applicable today.

4: Monster

Another one I REALLY like, with this one, I wanted to show that I can be a force to be reckoned with when standing up for myself. Or at least that’s how the song makes me feel. It’s a good rampage song too. This is another case where I really like how the pose came out. As you can also see, this is the only piece without PB since I wasn't sure how to incorporate him into this idea, but I’m sure he’s still involved somehow lol. Also this is the best song called Monster, I do not take criticism at this time.

5: Blood

Blood always feels like a sort of gloomy, spiral-y type song, so that’s what I went for. The line “we watch it burn, and we never learn, this can’t be what you’re waiting for” was really the focus for this one. A neat vibe with this one overall I think that I'm pretty happy with.

6: Suburban Muse

Suburban Muse makes me think of like, a fake sitcom town where things look normal, but things aren’t as great as they seem if you look a little closer. It even says “cue the canned applause” at one point. Also, those sort of, weird reality dreamscape neighborhood liminal space images like this where you can see where it's coming from but they just feel, off y'know

7: Sunny Day

This one is kinda weird because Sunny Day is kinda weird (though in like the best possible way, I love it). I couldn’t quite come up with a solid idea for both my OCs here, so I based them on two separate lines: “my head is inside a cloud” for PB, and “get off the bathroom floor” for Shep. In hindsight, I don't think the two separate lines approach really worked here since it feels more disjointed and not really representative of the full song, but I still like it well enough.

8: L.V.B.D.

This one was hard to come up with something for. I’ve never been super crazy abt L.V.B.D. since it feels, Very Hetero™ and I’m not about that. But it’s still sounds great and I’m definitely super glad it’s part of the album. Went for drawing Shep and PB here as little stuffed dolls, which is related to the acronym in the song’s title (which stands for Little Virgin Baby Doll) and I couldn’t think of anything better aha. I should draw plushies more often though

9: Ruin Your Life

Important: Shep and PB are only upset with upset with each other for the sake of this drawing, as I refuse to let anything bad happen between them for real. Anyways, the expressions were really fun in this one, and oh boy does this song feel very relatable over the last year or so.

10: Never

This one is very similar to Ruin Your Life for me, where it’s a sort of comforting during a dark time kind of way. Just crossing the days off hoping that things will get better soon, that’s what I went for here. The calendar is listed as 10/12 since this is the 10th song out of the 12 on the album, and the image is a reference to a previous drawing I had done of PB and Shep together :3

11: Seed

Personally, Seed is my least favorite song from the album as a whole, for similar reasons to L.V.B.D. but in a, more gross kinda way that conflicts with my ace side. The song still sounds great musically for sure. Even tho I’m not super crazy abt the song, I actually really like how this drawing came out, in fact it might be my favorite out of the whole batch, ironically enough lol. The boys are looking down into a hole from the line “there’s no more grace to fall from, there’s nowhere left to go but down” and I'm really happy with how the perspective turned out!

12: Fluorescein

Finally, Fluorescein is my favorite song of the entire album, and my favorite song in general! It’s so aggressive and loud, I love it. I decided to draw PB confronting a giant Shep bc the song makes me feel like I can take on a huge adversary and win >:] Although I do like what I chose to do here, I kinda wish I had come up with something better to represent my all time favorite song lol

So in conclusion, like I said, Humanistic is my all time favorite album and it means so much to me. Really all of AP’s work really means a lot to me, but Humanistic in particular. I found the band through watching Clone High and I am all the better for it. So thank you to Abandoned Pools for making something that I’ve gotten so much out of and I absolutely cannot wait for the sixth album coming at the end of next year!! :D

So I hope you guys liked this little trip down memory lane with me, and if you're also an enjoyer of Abandoned Pools, please let me know what you think of these and what your favorite AP songs are! I'd love to know! And if you don't listen to Abandoned Pools, I highly recommend their music if you can't tell lol. If you enjoy early 2000s alt rock sort of stuff, there's a solid chance you'll enjoy Abandoned Pools :3

[quixtrix]

could the niji 6 theoretically function as a kpop group?

i found out last night that apparently the niji 6 is a group that while, yes they do commit war crimes and murder, they also are a performing group. the art book states that their moves are choreographed to at least some extent! now that begs the question;

could they rise to the top of the charts and become korea's eden's top group of the century?

let's find out! let's begin with each member and how they're presented: - the captain, red. bombastic and arrogant - the tank, blue. silent and a tank - the sass, violet. snarky and quick-witted - the go-getter, black. excited and a bit too prepared - the smarts, yellow. knows bullshit and keeps the team on track - the green one. has a gun we have a lot to work with, obviously! now before we start, im going to say that we're going to ignore their canonical piles of bodies and child soldier endorsements they have under their belt! anyways, the main things for a kpop group to thrive, regardless of vocal talent, are coordination, visuals, and personality. starting off with coordination, we clearly see that bodily there is a lot of coordination! they get into perfect poses for their team intro stances AND they move as a perfect unit. it's honestly admirable. they even make a satisfying idle position. it shows off their personalities well!

you can tell there is personality to each of them! from the imposing stature of blue, to the spotlight hungry red, to black ready to fire, it's clear this was practiced to exemplify their greatest personality traits! so for coordination, i WOULD give them 5 stars, however, clearly red's own desires override the entire group's objectives as whole, throwing off the whole balance that the niji 6 would have. so for red, 3 stars. he got them blown up for fucks sake talking about personality, unfortunately red really takes up all the space for it. we get snippets of it with the dialogue that they all (as in four of them) exchange with each other, with red being the most memorable. we do see a few bits within black, yellow, and violet though. black is clearly all too excited to fight against gay people, pink is teasing with the 'i was just asking myself, can i get the arm?' and yellow with the clear callout to his leader's ego. in fact, violet's personality seems to clash with red a lot, as when red is being cocky about taking care of the vr facility, violet is the one to say "thats fucking bullshit, you could barely handle rayman." the two of them were in fact about to get into an argument before yellow, clearly the voice of reason within the group, calls attention to dolph. so there is some entertainment value within the group dynamics, and there is thankfully a mediator of sorts. i would say they could possibly be a good group, but would have plenty of drama. if they can find a good balance between drama and friendship, they'd thrive. as they are now, i'd say 3.8 stars. lastly, visuals. i'll begin with the men, as they (of course) have the greatest visual variation. we get something for everyone here! to take from the ouran host club, blue is the silent intimidating broad body type, yellow is the cool and collected slightly skinnier type, and red has a big ass. no im so fr he has a big ass. why does his ass matter? let me tell you about monsta x. it's a group that is sadly disbanded but one of their most popular members, wonho, is known for a lot of things. his vocals, his charm, his big fucking muscles

like holy fucking shit??? genuinely we dont get kpop stars like this he's on the uncommon side. thats why he's renowned. it's insane. women and gay men alike adore him. also idk if hes really that renowned im a casual kpop fan but TRUST. that man has millions of followers on instagram and i guarantee not all of them were monsta x or kpop stans. ik im not a monsta x fan but i still follow him now if we take in the fact that the ENTIRE niji 6 is built, then we could reasonably come to the conclusion that visuals? banger. the women are also definitely muscular as well. like wlw are the strongest soldiers the kpop industry have. they'd buy the shit out of every bit of niji 6 merch. so i'd say a tentative 4 stars, because what if they face reveal and the general population finds them ugly??? the allure is a major factor, but it goes away when the mask is gone. now, i would say that yes, absolutely, the niji 6 would thrive at the top as a kpop group. however, the bigoted nature of red would have them cancelled by the first promotion. so unfortunately, since red can't shut the fuck up, the niji 6 would be eaten alive by the kpop stans. at least their fan chant goes hard

[deke-rivers-1957]

Elvis Puzzler Magazine

I'll be editing this post with my thoughts on each puzzle as I go through it. Thanks @vintagepresley for posting about in the first place.

Pre-Hollywood Puzzles (Despite some of these involving elements both during and after his Hollywood career, they all come before the official movies so they'll all go here).

Ultimate/2 min Trivia: Incredible how obvious my interest in the niche of Elvis movies is that I actually struggled with some of the questions. Funny thing but one of them was whether or not his real hair color was blond. I know he had blond hair as a child but he clearly has brown hair as an adult. Does that still count as him being blond? I know I probably thought about the semantics too much, but it's a true/false question. You wouldn't say Elvis was a blond as an adult but he did have blond hair as a child. I would've reworded it by asking if his real hair color was black.

Mix & Match: I'd say this was pretty easy as long as you know some of the bigger hits. Elvis song titles are simple in that if you only need to find one word, you can use the rest of the title to figure it out.

TV Guide Spot the Difference: 2 of the three had an obvious difference that either involve his name or the heading. The second one was a bit of a challenge since the difference was pretty small.

Word Searches: I appreciate that they each follow the theme well and include specific words from the song/album. The difficulty of them are all about the same.

Missing Letters: I like this one since you really need to keep track of the individual letters for each word. Since there's no space between words, it adds to the difficulty since you need to know how many letters make up each word as well.

Ed Sullivan Show: 5 letters scramble is just not my best type of puzzle. I'm not good at it, but for once the word sudoku didn't give me as much issue. I got the mystery word right away. The criss cross was fun because I learned about so many acts that appeared on the show. You don't realize retrospectively how big the show was until you see how many big names were on there.

Elvis' Christmas Album Spot The Difference: This was really easy. There's so many big presents on the cover that you can tell when something was missing.

Elvis' Golden Records Album Trivia: Some of the stats I have no idea how they verified. For instance, how can you possibly figure out if he sold 1 billion records? Some of the metrics like the Billboard 100 didn't even exist yet so a lot of his early records weren't included in some counts or had to be retroactively estimated. I would've used a more easily calculable stat instead.

Aloha from Hawaii Spot The Difference: One difference I wasn't so sure about was the blue circle on the earth. I had to look really close to make sure they were different shades. I know it's rare but I wonder what someone who's color blind would see. Would they even know there was a difference in colors?

Crossword: I thought the clues involving lyrics from Elvis songs were cool. Some of them though made no sense to me like 46 down being "hon" when the clue was cupcake. How does that fit and what does "hon" even mean outside of a variation of honey? I know you need the h from 44 across and the n from 51 across but you could've just used hen or hun.

Movie Puzzles

Love Me Tender: The word scramble was easy since his songs had very simple titles. The word sudoku was a bit challenging since I'm not used to doing those, but the criss cross was very fun. I love how in the summary they talked about how Clint was exempt from service since I mention that in my review. The main takeaway I got was that I surprisingly didn't know a lot of behind the scenes names for this movie. For instance I never knew Ken Darby was the actual writer of the song "Love Me Tender". When I wrote my review, I didn't go into the same detailing of behind the scenes personnel so it was great to learn more about it.

Loving You: Boy was this quite a jump in difficulty. I made a lot of mistakes throughout all of the puzzles. The 5 letters puzzle was a lot harder than it should've been to me since I didn't associate the same words to what the clues were saying. The word sudoku was a nightmare to the point where I had to use the answer key to finish. I knew the mystery word was Lizabeth because the summary already included her name. The criss cross was a little easier but I still made a couple mistakes on it. Overall, I'm just glad Loving You finally got some representation since it's the least talked about of his 50s movies.

Jailhouse Rock: This a bit easier. The Scramble was very easy but again the word sudoku gave me trouble. At this point I know that puzzle will take me a lot of time. The criss cross I only had one mistake because I miscounted the number of letters.

King Creole: This one took longer to do as I had other stuff going on. Once again the 5 letters and word sudoku were difficult to finish. Only one mistake on the criss cross because I was looking at the wrong section. I'm amazed they mentioned the riots in Mexico that occurred because a lot of teens wanted to see the movie without paying.

G.I. Blues: This one was really easy. The tank one was unfamiliar but once I got one word, the rest was easy to finish. Criss cross as usual was easy as well. What I didn't know was that this movie's soundtrack was nominated for 2 Grammys (one for Best Soundtrack and one for Best Male's Vocal Performance) since I didn't mention that in my review.

Flaming Star: The last letter trivia spiral is only hard if you're not that knowledgable of Yellowstone or Dirty Harry's basic production credit details. We do get a change of pace by having a word search about Western tv shows and a find the different image puzzle. I'd say those two are easy, you just need to pay real close attention to what you want to find.

Wild In The Country: I admit that I'm not that knowledgable in country music either. There was a clue about the leading man from A Star Is Born for the scramble and I have no idea how to spell his last name. Same with a country music legend who grew up with 11 siblings. I got both of their first names but no clue on their last names lol. There was another word search that I had a better time with. Now what was a weird choice was an add 'em up puzzle. The final number doesn't have any significance to the movie so I have no idea why it was included for this movie. I would've changed the given numbers so that the top of the pyramid added up to 1961 (the year the movie was released).

Blue Hawaii: Interestingly there's only 2 puzzles that take up the double page spread: Fill in the Blanks and a word search. The word search I think makes up for having one less puzzle because you're finding a lot more words compared to previous movies that had one.

Follow That Dream: Also only has 2 puzzles that are Fill in the Blanks and a word search. This time though, the word search wasn't that hard. About a third of the page was just a full body shot of Toby which is absolutely necessary. The only thing I wonder though is what exactly is the ceremony from the word search? I wouldn't call the governor seeing part of the highway a ceremony. The court scene at the end definitely isn't one either. If anyone had just seen the movie, let me know if I'm missing something.

Girls! Girls! Girls!: We completely skip Kid Galahad which stinks since I would've loved to see boxing themed puzzles. Only 2 puzzles but this time it's missing letters and a maze. Mazes to me can be tricky since you almost need to start off on both ends and try to meet in the middle. I'd say it makes up for not have 3 puzzles.

It Happened At The World's Fair: After taking a break in the middle of a word search I think that really helped my concentration. It was a decent sized word search since you had to find really long words like paddleboat rides. We also got a new puzzle with code words. I love this puzzle. You got the trivia aspect where you have to find cities that hosted a world's fair and the puzzle aspect where you need to figure out what the other letters are. Definitely makes up for only having 2 puzzles.

Viva Las Vegas: We skip a couple movies and only get 2 puzzles. A Cluefinder puzzle that's only 3x3 for each category is a bit too easy. Since you also only have a word search I think this was a bit underwhelming. I would've added another puzzle like a word scramble that included trivia about Ann Margret.

Girl Happy: We skip Roustabout and only get 2 puzzles. The word search is standard but it was interesting to see the names of some famous pin up girls that I've never heard of. The code puzzle is good in that you're using the alphabet's number positions to spell out the names of songs used in the movie.

Harum Scarum: We skip Tickle Me and still have 2 puzzles. Word builder is fun since you have to remember how to spell certain words. The one word word search shouldn't even be part of this since you're only finding Elvis. It's a general Elvis puzzle when this is supposed to be about the movie. It would make more sense if you're finding his character's name Johnny.

Change of Habit: This is the last movie and even in an Elvis magazine all of his movies past 1965 except for this one was skipped. It's not even a big send off to his movie career. Only one puzzle and it's a measly word search. I feel like they could've done a better job. I understand that this was made by the editors of TV Guide and it won't be a complete package, but the ending of this section is so underwhelming. I might make my own puzzles for the movies that weren't included some day.

Post-Hollywood Puzzles (I know some of them were made during his movie career but that's how it's set up in the magazine).

'68 Comeback Special: Trivia Cross was pretty easy, but Both Directions and Sudoku were hard for me. Only having 3 small puzzles make sense because of the difficulty.

Elvis: TTWII: Only having two puzzles is fair because you have the word search with 18 different Vegas performers throughout history and Hidden Alphabet. That second puzzle can be difficult if you don't know what exact word you're looking for.

From the Archives: Both of these are crosswords and I had to give up by using the answer key. Some of these clues I had no idea what the answer was and made mistakes. What doesn't help is that these were from time periods where I simply wasn't alive to know American culture. I'm not going to know who Mr. Television was or every single movie that came out in 1950s/90s.

Elvis' Giant Xword: For a puzzle this big, I did fairly well. I did have to look up his discography and names to get the spelling right. I'd say for a catch all puzzle involving Elvis, this was pretty good.

Spot The Differences: All fairly easy but I love how we got to see Elvis through his adult life starting with his Army years. I did think some of the differences were a bit too obvious such as having Priscilla's entire shirt be a different color.

Elvis Hit Song Rebus: I thought it was pretty easy for an "end credits" puzzle since it comes after the answer key. As long as you know what his hit singles were, the pictures are pretty easy to put together.

Back Cover Fill in the Blank: As long as you know the quote word for word this should be easy. I admit I wasn't expecting to have a puzzle be on the back cover, so it made for a nice little surprise.

Final Thoughts

I thought this was a great magazine even if there were some missteps. I don't get TV Guide so if these puzzles came directly from issues over the decades, I can't really complain as much. If these were made from scratch, I wish we had at least every movie represented since I was bummed that some movies I enjoyed were missing when others I didn't like as much made it in.

If you haven't gotten one, I high recommend buying one while you still can.

[themonotonysyndrome]

hello, again, lovely lady! 🙃 AND HELL YEAH, I LOVE THE CRACK DEN, WHOOP WHOOOOP! 🗣️

if you would choose to indulge me, i was wondering if i could ask a few questions about deirdre & dain? (i love those names btw!)

1. are the twins close?

2. what are their personalities like?

3. talents/flaws?

4. we already know that you chose for them to look like castin, but what does that entail?

5. how are they around people? (i always thought that deirdre was more sociable and extroverted, while dain was opposite)

6. and last, do they have any hidden desires?

as always, have the best day/evening!

🤍💖

Hey, awesome addie~ Make yourself at home!

I enjoy answering your asks; they're fun! I'd never pass up the opportunity to gush about any of my OCs!

Yes, Dain and Deirdre are close! They have that typical twin bond, where they understand each other's body language and are in tune with each other's emotions. If you ask one where the other is, 90% of the time, the other twin will be where they recommend.

You got no.5 correct, Addie! Dain is the quiet type. Observant and enjoys gossiping with his twin. He's also petty as hell, just like his mother. Meanwhile, Deirdre is loud, passionate and quick to anger but also quick to forgive you. That's a bit of Castin in her. She enjoys helping her twin pull pranks on people that piss him off.

Under Castin's training, the twins are excellent warriors. Dain favours the dagger while Deirdre the sword. Both weapons are commissioned by Celica and gifted to them during their debut. These two make for a devasting team in battle. Flaws? Well, both can be impatient in and out of the battle and when that happens, you can get the jump on them.

Appearance-wise, they take more after Castin, and this isn't really anything bad because Celica took after her father, too. So it's like... a family thing for children to inherit their fathers' look in the Anesidora Household.

The twins have this system when around people: Deirdre will break the ice, make them reveal themselves, and Dain will react accordingly. To which afterwards, Deirdre would follow his lead. It's how they adapt to high society. Celica is very proud of them.

Hidden desires, eh? Hmm... I'd say this, neither of the twins wants to be Celica's heirs, but they know that one of them has to take the fall eventually, or it would break their mother's heart and potentially ruin their family. That's a conversation that neither is ready to discuss and they can only delay the inevitable for so long before Celica calls them to her office.

I hope this answers your questions! You have a good day/evening too!

[lineli225]

A little essay about the TogaChako vs IzoCha situation

Ship wars happening 'cuz of TogaChako is so crazy and wild to me because:

-Toga is canonically Bi/Pan and in love with Izuku and Ochako.

-Ochako is canonically in love with Izuku but been thinking of Toga more and more to the point of promising to give her blood to Toga forever.

- Ochako is canonically bottling her feelings of Izuku down, yet she admired Toga for not giving up on her feelings.

- Izuku is canonically oblivious to both of them and denied Toga's confession.

- Toga and Ochako are canonically in love with Izuku and just been implied that Ochako loves Toga back, meaning they love each other despite Izuku not reciprocating. In summary:

Easy to understand version:

Looking at this graphic, what way seems easier to go? I'd say Toga x Ochako So it can only go two ways:

Either Uraraka gives up Izuku to date the one who actually loves her back so TogaChako canon.

Or Izuku accepts both of them so TogaIzoCha canon.

Cuz i doubt Toga will give up her feelings for them at all.

"oh but toga said she doesn't love them anymore-" bro no one loses their feelings that quickly in a switch, she is just processing her grief for twice and the rejection, i'm sure that with Uraraka's confession her love will surface again.

Could it go to the IzoCha route?

Where izuku suddenly realizes he was in love with Uraraka despite never showing it, Uraraka suddenly stops thinking about Toga and Toga suddenly stops being in love with them both after almost 40 volumes of things being this way?

Yeah, it can happen but:

1- Horikoshi never half asses things like this, he is too tender and spot on with details in his story, so it would be odd.

2- Just because it is a Shounen it doesn't mean Hori will follow it in the end, MHA is top sale so it wouldn't affect him when he make TogaChako canon on the last chapter, because after 9 years it will be over anyways, and MHA has a huge LGBT+ public.

3- Horikoshi already went all the way making Toga canonically bi/pan and in love with another girl, so why drop the ball now?

4- An end where Izuku dates them both is super possible, since it's normal in anime for Male MCs to have multiple girls.

5- Despite unofficial promo art, there is little to no Izuku and Uraraka moments from Izuku's part, he never showed to reciprocate, and once again, Hori isn't the type to fumble like this, specially since he reads tons of romance and loves the genre.

I genuinely believe TogaChako has a chance, and I genuinely can see TogaIzuCha being canon as well, but to see all of Toga's feelings suddenly disappearing and Izuku suddenly seeing Uraraka as a love interest just for IzoCha to be canon due to pure Shonen pressure is... unlikely, it would be very disappointing knowing the amazing writer Hori is.

IzoCha currently feels a lot like the first case of HeteroBait ever tbh, because if TogaChako is QueerBait then- wow, Hori REALLY wanted to bait us huh?

Anyways Poly win

Izuku, Uraraka and Toga all have two hands

End of discussion, what is canon is canon.

[sniperct]

with xena being from the 90s is there anything specificically dubious or of the time that people should know of ahead of time before going in? ie the similar vein to warning people of tng test of honor and other drek in 90s trek?

hope you dont mind the ask, youre just one of the few people I see around still chatting about xena

some of it is YMMV. the entire show plays fast and loose with all kinds of mythology and magic from not just Greece/Rome but as far away as brittania, norway, china and egypt. (all the gods of each culture seem to exist simultaneously and occasionally interact/chat with each other.) But generally plotlines are one of the following:

Xena's evil past has consequences

Warlord/God acting up and needs to be defeated

A god is being mischievous and needs to be outwitted (aphrodite, cupid, some others are common here)

something silly/over the top/campy

Gabrielle is trying to figure out her life's direction

Xena's Personal Beef with Rome and Caesar in Particular

sometimes multiple or all of the above (see Fish Femmes and Gems)

Up to season 5 on my current rewatch, I'd say The Way is still probably the most culturally insensitive (they actually had to record a PSA on hinduism over it). The two leading up to that didn't seem to get any backlash that I could tell when reading about it. (its a three part story that's super important to the plotline and character development of the show and hammers home the soulmate angle, especially the second one). But I'm no gonna speak for that culture or anything, just what I read on the wiki. But the third part I know enough to feel uncomfortable with it). Ripped from the wiki:

The episode was pulled from syndication after protests from Hindu groups. It was finally allowed to be reshown with the addition of a public service announcement at the very end by Lucy, Renée, as well as a spokesman for the Hindu community explaining that the producers took liberties with the Hindu religion.

In general, jokes and silliness overall tend to land well, especially if you enjoy camp.

While it can be clumsy in some respects overall it handles gender and race pretty well, there's a variety of women of various roles. They had someone in drag at a fashion show episode who (who late IRL came out as trans) that was handled really well. The Amazons are very much sexy but also deep and spiritual.

Casting generally appears to be race blind with regard to heroic roles, evil roles and the more complicated grey area 'seeking redemption' roles and mostly seems to try to cast appropriately on a cultural basis. Like warlord casting seemed to be like 'are you a big guy? you're hired!'

Nothing ever seemed to approach test of honor's level of bad IMO, except maybe The Way.

(I'd argue there's even some meta commentary with regard to centaurs and centaur culture and how its treated)

Its got some of your standard 'guy likes girl, does stupid shit for girl' type stuff but he gets character growth and ultimately he's family. He's the little brother, 'only we can bully him but god help you if you bully him' type of dynamic. Someone hurts our proto-himbo joxer and xena and gabrielle go for the throat. Then ten minutes later are roasting him.

The only episode I really skip is the gross one involving lice and a skin rash(but at least they let the lady heroes be gross, quite frequently in fact). Maybe also skipping the married ...with children parody episode too. The Way could maybe get by with a summary but I wanted to watch it again specifically to see where it fell on the character part. Pretty important to jumpstarting Gabrielle's peace arc.

[babiebom]

yeah me too! my friends and I actually do have some plans of streaming together, so that should be fun... if we ever stop procrastinating 😆

a whole week?? wow that's some top notch commitment 👏

props to you guys lmaoo

I hope to see the fnaf movie soon, but the 5 of us can't settle on a date so it's tricky :/

hopefully soon we can actually watch it tho lol

unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be a romance mod for Mr. qi yet 😕 😞

im half tempted to attempt making my own, but I dropped coding agess ago lmao.. don't know where I'd start 😅

altho I think if i were to make one, he'd not move in w the farmer. idk he just doesn't seem the type. he's got the vibes of rich hubby on vacation who sends you stuff.. that might just be me tho lol

speaking of, may I request nsfw mr. qi headcanons with an ftm! reader?

tysm :]

-🔮

A/N:omfg? Idk how I didn’t see this until now I’m no sorry! I hope you’ve gotten to see the movie by now especially with how many spoilers are on EVERY app. If you ever do make the mod let me know! I wanted to get back into coding but then remembered that I actually hated it so unfortunately I can’t. I do wanna try to make a game in itch.io(is that the website for the games?) that is the choose your own adventure fic that I’m writing but I don’t know how i would even do it. Also agree with the rich hubby thing. I don’t think he would ever actually settle down ANYWHERE. like he’d be home like 2 days out of the week at most.

Tw:Sexual content! Cursing

ALSO idk if this should go under warnings, but I would also like to say that I am not trans myself, so if I write something that’s inaccurate or offensive make sure to let me know, I’m trying my best to write from that pov I just wanted to….warn? Let you know? Like I do not mind writing this at all(no transphobes allowed) I just want to make sure that I’m writing/understanding well!!

Wc: 30 bullet points

Sdv Masterlist

Also fucking and making love are two DIFFERENT things

I 100 percent believe that gender identity doesn’t matter to Mr.Qi at ALL.

I also think he doesn’t care about bottom/top surgery at ALL

Like he is a fan of mystery, of the unknown that’s what he likes, and he likes people that also have those interests, or people that make him interested in a similar way.

(I think he would be pansexual? Demisexual?)

So in his mind he knows that you have nothing to worry about. He also knows that emotions don’t follow logic half of the time and that your nerves can’t be dispelled just by him saying that you have nothing to worry about.

So he shows you.

Depending on if you’re a romantic/sentimental person or not he does different things

Like would set up and entire display with roses and everything, music playing and snacks to make you feel loved and comfortable

but if you’re not the type of person to like that sort of thing he would probably do something more chaotic like a scavenger hunt for you throughout the day(which arguably could be seen as more romantic) that leads you on a wild goose chase and allows him to set something up at home(your home but like whatever)

Making love to him is very sweet. He tries to keep the teasing to a minimum

By minimum I mean he only teases in the beginning, and not how he usually would. Would probably edge you for a little just to make your first orgasm mind blowing then would get on with it.

He does slow his pace down for love making because it’s more…spiritual(?) like it’s an exchange of love and it’s not only for pleasure y’know. It’s literally to express how you feel for each other.

NOW FUCKING IS A WHOLE DIFFERENT THING

I do think he would be on the more dominant side, preferring to tease and take control, coaxing out things you didn’t know you had within you

Will let you take control though

He is a man of curiosity

Wonders how you will behave when given a dominant position

Doesn’t refuse anything you want to do, but is mischievous the entire time. Has a stupid smirk on his face that makes you think that you have absolutely no control.

Idk if it’s magic or what but always does SOMETHING to make everything more sensitive.

Is VERY into blindfolding

Wants genuine reactions without self consciousness getting in the way.

Good/smart/naughty boy are a part of his vernacular and he will use it only when you’re too fucked out to react to him saying it in any other way than incoherent whining.

Probably into shibari and likes to be tied up and tying you up.

Blindfolds + shibari is a normal night ngl.

The glasses stay on during sex idc

He makes sure by the end of it that both of you are sweaty and out of breath

Likes having sex in different locations with a tiny bit of risk. Like he doesn’t want the two of you to get caught

But he wonders what would happen if you did…

The sexual experience with him is always a good one somehow even when he wants to try out weird kinks.

[dearinglovebot]

oml hi! what are your headcanons for claire and owen when they were at school? here are some of mine:

claire would defnitely be on good tersm with everyone, i feel like she'd be popular in the way that she knew everyone

but she's classify everyone as aquaintences though and call it 'networking'

would be super annoyed by everyone in her class constantly talking abt marriage and kids like thats the only option for her (alas i wish she was in my class i'd have someone to survive those trenches with 😔)

straight A+ student ofc

owen wouldn't really care for school i think

he'd get like alright grades

he'd be like 55% class clown if that makes sense?

super good at PE tho like he'd be the Pe Kid (TM)

i think he had a pet dog or cat (or both?) but they died

i kinda hc that his parents were pretty shitty. idk why but i do. (shhh let me project)

constantly getting into fights with vic hoskins but everyone agrees vic is annoying as HELL so eh he gets a pass socially-speaking

also:

in dodgeball the teachers always put claire and owen on the same team bc the two of them against each other means the match lasts FOREVER and if it does end it's a tie followed by an argument of who won that lasts for two weeks. like claire vs owen in dodgeball would be legendary. and like +340% hype bc everyone's 10 and dodgeball matches are IT when ur ten (can u tell i miss primary school dodgeball 😔)

hello anonnie! brace yourself cause this is a level 5 yapnado

I don’t agree with EoC a lot (...most things) but it hits my high school headcanons very well. that is to say, she is weird and off-putting to the general public. particularly sheltered midwestern kids who absolutely will be raised on the housewife/breadwinner-husband cool-aid in the 90s. they’re all obsessed with settling down with kids in the same town they were raised in while she’s trying to escape to a big city and get a master's degree. they’re doing the 90s equivalent of calling her woke blue hair liberal with pronouns. not outright bullying her but like... side-eyeing her. she's not really being invited to parties. which is fine! (it is not fine. she is lonely).

she has sooooo many autistic traits that i do just consider it part of my personal canon and that will NOT help her. her hyperfixation is going to college and she stims by doing homework (exaggerating. but only partially). i love my queen dearly but she does not have cool autism that makes you do cool art installations. she has collecting alaskan postage stamps from the 1800s type autism. she is a loser that few will truly appreciate <33 like fine wine

claire being from no-where wisconsin in the 80s-90s is sooo vital to understanding why she is #likethat. small town midwest is basically the deep south politically except in the south people will straight up say "women belong in the kitchen" and in the north they'll go "oh. you want a degree? how quaint [condescending tone]". she's used to everything being a backhanded compliment and proving that she deserves what she has. it makes her super defensive and lean towards interpreting things as malicious even when they're not. which is why, on the island, people don't really like her. she's the mean boss lady who won't even do small talk with her peasants

she absolutely is a straight A student. that is PRESIDENT of the debate club to you. she's a teacher's pet who Will do the extra credit work every time and has perfectly chosen her extra curriculars based on what will look best on her college application.

i also think she'd start working about as soon as she legally could. not only is that the smart financial move (start saving as soon as possible) but it looks amazing on college applications too. she is absolutely maximizing what she is able to accomplish in a day

overall, it really isn't an experience she thinks of fondly. she spends most of her teenhood devoted to trying to escape the poor, rural lifestyle she was born into. it's another stepping stone in her 10 stage plan to conquer a small nation. and she wouldn't regret any of it until her life inevitably comes crashing down (indominus incident) because only then does she realize she's been chasing material wealth instead of internal happiness for her entire life

owen has none of the crazy ambition claire does bc he's normal. he would take it one day at a time with vague goals of where he wants to end up. as long as he does the bare minimum of passing the class then he's doing pretty good. best subject science, worst subject literature

owen is from the 80-90s deep south which also heavily influences how i view his characterization. as a funny guy who enjoys very traditionally masculine things like construction and sports, he's going to be very well liked. everyone likes someone who makes you laugh. but overall it's pretty surface level. nobody asks about his day. he's gonna be like "damn is this really all i am to them??". but it's not like he can say that cause then he's being weird and emotional (toxic masculinity culture). so whatever. he keeps balling. (represses vulnerability and compensates by going even harder into funny sport guy routine)

so really he's the guy everyone "knows" but they're gonna lose contact the moment he leaves town. which is whatever. he has his wholeeeee life ahead of him to make some #real friends (his only long term friends include barry, the raptors, and sometimes claire)

he has proven time and time again he has no problem speaking his mind so yeah he's punching every hoskins that comes along and getting a few days suspension over it. he would not gaf tho bc his internal sense of justice is stronger than any school related punishment

he's the kind of kid who mows the lawn for your mom for pocket change and volunteers at the animal shelter

not the worst but yeah he's not that interested in reliving that

not including much about their individual family dynamics because thats an entirely different yap session

also:

in a hypothetical au where they're in the same high school, i believe it would go like this: claire is brilliant and smart in every class they share meaning he's enamored with her big words, she thinks all sports guys are meathead jocks and actively avoids them, she tutors for extra cash after school and he's on the verge of failing lit, she takes him on as a client and he's like wowza the whole time, she's like can you focus on the themes of shakespeare already and stop looking into my eyes longingly every few minutes i'm starting to think you aren't even interested in the deeper meanings of the rivalry between the veronas and capulets (she isn't picking up on a single hint), and now he is actively pretending like he doesn't understand any of the assignments to "get her guidance" on them (she still doesn't get the hint and is wondering if he got a concussion at some point)

[feuqueerfire]

4 Minutes Ep 1 - 6 Rewatch + Ep 7 Live Blogging

I've watched just a handful of series while they're airing and I don't tend to rewatch stuff while waiting for the next episode. However, I watched a whole bunch of this show on my iPad in a different country (Ep 1) or on my phone while outside and barely able to see the dark scenes (Ep 5, 6), so I thought I'd do a rewatch to actually watch the show.

Also, ep 6 gave us more info and the story is a little more coherent now, so I think it'd be cool to watch the earlier episodes with the knowledge of ep 6 and then watch ep 7 with the refreshed knowledge.

Probably not going to write down much for the rewatch because I've already written my thoughts as I go in the live blogging for those episodes.

Ep 1 (Sep 1)

didn't even notice the guy pointing the gun at Tyme the first time

The dead cat appearing to Tonkla

I wonder what these Korn at work or the Tonkla scenes actually are. Is it just us being shown the original timeline like I was thinking at first? But we saw in ep 6 that some scenes don't happen the same way in the OG timeline right? But it's like Great's mind isn't coming up with this because he doesn't know about all this, so either it's original timeline and the stuff involving Great is the "redo" timeline based on his thoughts or there are at least two actual timelines where the Korn-Tonkla stuff from ep 1 - 5 is the modified timeline and not the real one. idk?? Because like okay Korn is so hesitant at his job in ep 1 - 5 but Great also doesn't actually know about it, right? Whereas in ep 6 we see he's more ruthless. So the ep 1-5 is an actual timeline? Where Korn is a different type or guy? Or is it actually just Great's imagination still even though Great doesn't fully know the Korn work and Korn/Tonkla stuff? We still don't know what's real and what's not ig

Ep 2 (Sep 1)

I'd kind of forgotten just how apathetic/disengaged Tyme was with his patients. Like in Ep 6 we know that OG timeline Tyme is an asshole what with the revenge porn and such but he wasn't a kind person in the redo tl either

ah, the flashbacks that Great was seeing of having sex with Tyme show up in the ep 6 ONS

I really like Bible's acting/demeanor when asking Tyme about whether he has patients who see the future + the line after that. idk why but his delivery struck me the first time when watching too

Ep 3 (Sep 1)

Tyme really is so much nicer to Great in the redo timeline lol. Like how he was trying to get Great's Line last ep + this whole entire Thai Tea on campus exchange (but where's the flashes of the apology from?)

I loveeee the "oh really?" (ow, laww? - I can't find what word it is in Thai rip) Den says so much at 14:33. Rewatched it a bunch of times the first time and now too

Ep 4 (Sep 2)

oh yeah, I forgot that Win was being followed. Wonder if that'll come up again

Tonkla's "Take off" to Win's pants lol. I think it's fun to see how Korn's so much more submissive with Fasai while Tonkla is bossy with Win, a flip for Korn and Tonkla's dynamics with each other

wonder if the cat/the cat's killer will come up again. is it his dad? did his dad die already and so we won't get more of him?

I did not watch the full Korn/Tonkla first time, so I didn't know that Tonkla didn't even know how to kiss!

oh, Korn also said I love you to Tonkla. I'd missed that my first time, so I thought only Tonkla had said it.

I want more info about Lukwa and how she and Great were in that same white room

the difference between the redo timeline Great and Tyme having sex vs in the original timeline truly is stark

Ep 5 (Sep 2)

this is the episode I watched on iQiyi and it only had non-sultry at the time but like... they cut out regular scenes because they didn't have sex scenes to cut in this ep

Mon's death is so fucked up

who's the guy in a disguise following Tyme? It's not Win is it?

it's still striking how differently the parents/the dad treat Korn vs Great

Fasai is so attractive

I do wonder if Korn is bi and just likes both of them. If he's gay and only likes Tonkla. If he's bi and just using Tonkla, especially because he feels powerful/desired/important there whereas he's under Fasai or his parents' thumbs otherwise.

If his mother doesn't die in the original timeline, how does Great have visions of the man pulling a gun on his mother + her lying on the floor with blood splattered across her

Wonder what the running sequence with Tyme is about. and is it the same outfit as when Tyme is shot and walking around in ep 1 intro? Looks like it...

Things pointing to a third timeline: The Thai Tea that Tyme gave when Great saw the visions even though it wasn't in the original timeline + Great seeing his mother being shot even though in the original timeline she was not shot.

Ep 6 (Sep 2)

Differences with Great: Den telling him about research, Nutcha breakup (happened the day Great killed the woman, not earlier)

this car dashcam of them getting rid of Dome...

In this original timeline, Tyme doesn't know that Great killed the woman, right?

I didn't fully watch the Great and Tyme sex scene outside last time but watched it almost fully this time

so curious about Tyme's parents apparently starting the gambling thing + Great's dad claiming he didn't kill them. What's the truth?

I loveee Great's loud "we can choose your favourite spot" to pressure Tyme

Great is really just so... a not as nefarious/dangerous Vegas in the conversation with Tyme. like idk he's def far from Vegas but the demeanour/manner of speaking somehow... like thus far, Great has been quite distinct from Vegas despite being played by Bible (because he's talented as hell omg) but this specific convo... It reminds me a bit of Vegas messing with Pete

the way he leans forward to ask "Wanna hook up?" is so funny

In the redo timeline, Korn is more hesitant about hurting Nan and he + Great have a better relationship (ep 1 talking after the dinner with parents where Great tells him about his visions + in ep 4 or 5 when they get drunk enough that Great can steal his phone, etc.). Here, Great and Korn don't really talk + Great follows a car, doesn't get Nan's address from Korn's phone.

So in this tl, Tyme himself releases the info that Nan releases in the redo tl I guess?

Now that I've binged these episodes, I'm even more excited about episode 7 actually. Like it wasn't super hard for me to wait a week between these episodes but I think the wait it is a little bit harder now because after seeing everything in the span of two days (+ on my laptop mostly), I need to know what the next episode will do. hmm maybe I should have done the rewatch on Thursday - Friday so that I don't have to wait 3-4 more days until ep 7 lol.

Ep 7 (Sep 6)

This was the hardest few days of waiting for this so far actually. Rewatching really did a number on my brain, I'm so much more into this show now than being like "yeah, sure, this is cool" when 1 ep a week.

Busy at work but not busy enough to pass watching this. I’ve been looking forward to it for the past few days.

Ohhh the day Tonkla’s cat died

okayyyy Title not Tonkla’s first murder. The jingling and the music as the body lay there reminded me of Bulbbul.

ah, the dashcam footage of Title and Great was found but fell into the hands of the corrupt cop and so was destroyed

Now Win knows that Title killed Dome. Is this before or after he knows that Tonkla killed Title?

Also Title is the chief’s son, no wonder Title was all confident about his father’s power

Oh, it’s literally before Title’s death. I know people were wondering how tf Tonkla knew who to kill and if it was just a (correct) guess lol but Win did tell him

The kid who found the dashcam footage had backed it up on his phone while fuckass Inspector Win did not

Oh true Tonkla finds Title’s IG -> Great’s IG (accomplice) -> Korn’s IG and realizes they’re brothers or maybe remembers. idk if he already knew before or not

In the original timely, the parents flee first and ask Korn to find Great to follow them

not Den literally dropping his cookie and hearing white noise at learning that Lukwa has a faen lmfaooo I was shipping her and Den too

okay lol she’s broken up now, lukwa/den still a go!

rip grandma

it seems like Great was a beloved child so why the sob story man

I can’t remember right now but I’d found out this week that Great and Tyme knew each other as kids. Was it a spoiler from Bible?

those wafers… want

oh yeah, did I find out in relation to Tyme knowing about Great’s fear of dogs?

So I guess it’s like Great’s parents and Tyme’s parents are both pretty bad with the illegal gambling rings and stuff but they’re making Warit the main villain?

okayyyyy Tyme’s tymeline with 4 minutes power. People were posting about it last week and guess it was indeed true.

I watched like 15 minutes of this at work and the rest on the way home on the bus + I watched the censored version I think (2 mins less than the sultry version?). So I'll do a rewatch next week closer to the ep 8 date.

I wonder how they’ll wrap everything up next episode omg. Gotta be a 2 hour episode or what. I don’t really foresee a happy ending and I don’t want one either but I don’t necessarily want one where it’s all bleak, everybody dies, either. They said ep 8 is more like a recap episode that explains everything, so we'll see - esp since it'll be from Tyme's POV I guess?

I'm a bit sad that it'll end next week because it was pretty fun the past month to have something to watch on Fridays but I'm also excited to see how it ends.

[itsmicqua]

Turning Slow Living Into Reality

It’s been 4 years since I last put something up on here- that’s crazy. You’d think after setting up a tumblr account for every single one of my 164291 emails I’d finally give up. But this is the story of my life: try, falter, and try again. I’d like to think that’s better than giving up. 

All this time I've been trying to figure out why I struggle to sit alone with my thoughts and put them into words. As far as I know, and as much as I know myself, I think.. it’s because I write what I think, because I’m too afraid to say it. Afraid because I think no one would listen and care. As I sit and type away on my laptop, I realize how that’s both terrifying and empowering. To, at least, be able to put my thoughts and feelings in a little corner on the internet and not have it ruin or affect anybody but also have it existing, as proof of my emotions and experiences.

I wonder why this is important to me. I wonder why it’s important to remember. Is it because I don’t want to forget? Or is it because everything is changing and I can’t keep up? 

This is my attempt to remember- that this year, 2024 in August I truly lived by what makes me happy. Without worrying about societal norms of success, conventional notions of happiness and just being in the moment and following my joy.

So, what has transpired since the last time I wrote? Well, it’s officially been 7 months since I broke up with my then-boyfriend. Yes, after 5 years of not seeing each other and meeting for the first time in real life in September of 2023, I called it off in March. This was 6 months after our time together in Europe, which, don’t get me wrong, was really good.  3 weeks in Europe was unforgettable and unreal. But I couldn’t see myself in a passive relationship where it was up to me to make things happen. 

How detailed should I go into this, I wonder. I'll chalk it up to... If they wanted to, they would. And maybe, if I had the means, resources and opportunities to have made it work and move there and be the one to do the traveling, to uproot my life but even then still, it would have continued to ruin me and eat at me- constantly thinking I was never going to be worth flying halfway across the world for. It felt one-sided, as if I was the only one that would go through all the hoops, flights, visa applications and re-arranging my life. You know what? Maybe I was, but I gave it a real shot. I'd like to think I deserve to want to be desired to be with enough to make them see where I'm from and be with me here. And if they weren't able to do that, then what's the point? So, actually, the breakup was inevitable given that he just couldn't bring himself to make plans to see me within the next year. I tried waiting but it just felt like begging at one point and that was my lowest low. Begging for someone's time- because you shouldn't have to, if they loved you. Or maybe that's just me and my love language is quality time. So, I decided not to make that my reality and called it off. It wasn't easy, still isn't- but I am 100% better for it and I feel changed altogether.

I remember coming across a quote before that says, something is only real when it is shared. Is this why I have an urge to express my thoughts and feelings? Because they are only real when I transform them into a tangible thing- in this case my writing. Do I write about my life and experiences because I want them to be real and exist as more than just a mere memory in my head? Maybe that’s why I’ve avoided writing about the end of my relationship for the longest time. My journal hasn't even had my pen inscribe every trivial detail of the final moments of my last relationship. But now, it's really over.

My reality now is filled with the comforting feeling of warm sunlight on my skin, quiet afternoons without worry, cuddles with Ponpon at night, laying on the beach while reading a sad book, blasting good music at the hostel and completely being myself enjoying every day as best I can.

Now, I live on my favorite island- Siquijor. Volunteering at a hostel while working online. After 5 years of back and forth traveling to and from Manila, I was scared I'd be tired of this island but constantly meeting new people from all over the world has kept giving me different experiences. And, each time I come back, it's different. Maybe it's because I also keep changing. I often meet people that end up being good friends. On the odd times, I meet people that inspire me and make me want to give writing another shot.

I used to obsess over living the 'right way' or find purpose or meaning and something bigger for my life- maybe I'll find it or figure it out. But I have come to know and accept that living day by day and knowing yourself and being present is good enough. Maybe releasing these words into the wild will somehow make it true or real (I hope it does).

This is me trying, at least.

[contentgreenearth]

PSYCHOSOPHY/ATTITUDINAL PSYCHE POST #1: BEST PRACTICES FOR TYPING IN PSYCHOSOPHY AND ATTITUDINAL PSYCHE

Usually, I start each new section with an intro post, but not this time. I'm going after the best practices right away.

These 2 systems are similar enough to each other, I will write about them as one in these posts. Along with the Enneagram, I believe these 2 typing systems can pass the accuracy, reliability, and validity test if we follow these following best practices when we type people/ourselves in PY and AP.

1. Start by figuring out the person's AP type. It's easy to figure out if an AP type is also a Psychotype, so I recommend figuring out the AP type first.

2. Type the person by positions over everything else. Figure out which aspects a person is self positive/self negative, others positive/others negative, and process/result. Then put the aspects in the positions that match your findings. *Then* and only then, do I recommend the use of clubs, sextas, blocks, and the like-to check your positions, and see if they make sense with the person in question. If they do, the person is correctly typed. If not, go back to the positions, and investigate further.

3. Do not *start* with clubs, sextas, blocks, etc. Why? A lot of people can be described outwardly in the same way but still have quite different positions for the aspects. That's why I'm always positions first.

4. If you are having a hard time typing someone, it's because they're a clear extrovert/introvert with an ambivreted type, an ambivert with a clearly extroverted/introverted type, or they're not the PY archetype. In those particular instances, I look for other possible clues to the positions that aren't presenting themselves as typical manifestations of the type . For example, I had a non-archtypical dream person LVFE who didn't like to talk, so I had to determine most of his positions by his actions rather than what he said. Another dream person was a non-archtypical FELV, in that he was not counter culture to his family, and he didn't just blow where the wind took him. Instead, he got along well with his family and simply didn't prioritize volition. Position-wise, even with all those differences from the archetype, he was still 1F, 2E, 3L, and 4V.

5. Psychosophy and Attitudinal Psyche do not correlate at all to the MBTI or Socionics. Attitudinal Psyche does not correlate at all to the Enneagram. Please do not listen to the people on Personality Database who say that they do. There is only a *secondary* correlation between dominant instinctual variant and Psychosophy, and that is the *only* Enneagram correlation at all to either system.

6. Interestingly, there *is* a *direct* correlation between the conscious/unconscious dichotomy in Classic Jungian and the self positive/self negative dichotomy in AP and PY. They both represent the same thing. But I do not recommend using this to aid in your typings unless you are excellent at typing people in Classic Jungian or SOJT. If you are not great at typing people in those systems, I'd just start with the positions and then check your work using blocks, etc, as I mentioned before. (Funny how no one on Personality Database knows this.)

7. Don't trust that Rob Zeke always has the right answer. Some of his typings make no sense at all (like Taylor Swift as FELV-she's *1V* ,not 4V-don't know how you could mix those up), and he second guesses and changes a lot of typings that were correct the first time (like when he changed Eminem's typing from EFLV to ELFV-honestly I think EFLV was a better fit). If a typing on his website or Facebook group doesn't seem right, just go and retype the person on your own. Interestingly , both the examples I used here (Taylor Swift and Eminem) will be typed correctly in upcoming bonus typings in practice.

I hope that these pointers will help you to improve your typing accuracy, reliability and validity in PY and AP, and get you typing people/yourself at a passing rate of 60% or better . See you in the next post

[chaeinedup]

First encounter

"Can the day go any slower?"

You couldn't agree more with Innie, sure working at the diner is not as bad as it could be. You get to dress up a little, be in character for a few hours and since the rest of the employees is your friend group, it's almost the perfect scenario. Until you want to rip out Beomgyu's hair when he jokes around a little too much, but that comes in the contract you sign when you choose to be friends with a guy like him.

"We just have an hour left until our shift is over and then we can finally rott in bed for the rest of the day."

Lily always tries to make everyone see the bright side in everything but poor girl is stuck with two sarcastic bastards (You and Jeongin) and a very impacient pisces man. She's the perfect balancing factor, she tries her very best to bring the excitment out of each and every person in the room, works for 5 minutes and then she joins the misery bandwagon.

The bell above the main door made all of you perk up and fix your posture, this sound means business.

"Okay, I'll take their table", those are words you never expected to hear from Beomgyu's mouth on a toasty Tuesday at 6pm. But everyone just assumed he was trying to impress god knows who, or he just couldn't stay still anymore.

...

"Here, so three cheeseburgers menus with two vanilla milkshakes and one chocolate. I'm gonna go to the kitchen to help Jeongin, you and Lily take care of the drinks."

"Sir yes sir" you jokingly roll your eyes at him.

Your favorite part of this job was making the milkshakes, number one because you can make them really pretty and number two there's a recorrent "joke" you have going on with your coworkers.

For each costumer that orders a milkshake, they will get an extra cherry on theirs if any of you think said person is cute, crush material cute. This has led to many discussions on who has questionable taste, who pulls absolutely no bitches and who's always thirsty. Safe to say you don't belong to any of these categories, thankfully you have not only a type but standards as well, something Beomgyu couldn't brag about.

Once Lily was finished with the vanilla ones she approached you while widening her eyes.

"TWO CHERRIES!!", she whisper-yelled, "Do you even know which one of them ordered the chocolate???"

"No, but I have a feeling I'm gonna get it right, one of them is sitting alone while the other two are sitting on the same side, I bet you a month of kitchen duty that he's the one who ordered this one."

"I'LL BET ON IT", Innie shamelessly yelled from the kitchen window.

You threw a glare his way that made him giggle in amusement. Beomgyu quickly grabbed the plates to serve and you followed right behind him with the biggest question known to mankind. !Is the cute guy you have an eye on, the one that actually ordered the chocolate milkshake!

Once you said "Chocolate?" and he let out a "for me, thank you." you cheered knowing Jeongin had yet again lost another bet and will be heading to his third consecutive month in the kitchen. Victory feels good.

You went back to the counter, doing some cleaning, when Beomgyu approached Lily.

"Wait tell me my eyes are decieving me, but... not one... but two cherries?"

"Hey don't look at me, it was y/n."

Beomgyu was frozen in place, he actually thinks he just witnessed a serious crime.

"Hey and proudly, I'd do it again, I mean have you seen him? It was worth whatever you're about to say."

"YEAH I HAAAAVE SEEN HIM BECAUSE HE'S ONE OF MY BEST FRIENDS!!"

His words didn't seem to be real, there's just no way that you just gave one of Beomgyu's best friends... two cherries....

Your world was falling apart mainly because your actions will definetely have consequences, but also because Beomgyu couldn't seem to be able to hide his resentment.

You had to just smile and say everything was okay so the costumers wouldn't just run out the door, as they probably should.

While coming out of the kitchen doors Jeongin cheerfully announces "I'm the one that lost the bet but it seems like you're the real loser" and you might just have to agree with him.... again....

previous// //next

[radiant-reid]

2 fics in 2 days? you’re spoiling us cate !!! what’s next?! 😊😊

omg i know i haven't written that much in so long. honestly i was looking at my 117 drafts and i was like 'girl, you gotta finish some of these' so i did

as for what is next, here are my most current wips, some of these are 1% started but i feel like i'm on the right creative wavelength to write them and if y'all have an opinion on what i should finish first, i'd love to hear it

angst about the aftermath of the Jeid confession

smut where they finally have sex after spencer's knee injury

my personal fav 🌟 an angst fic based on the vibe/plot of a recently released song and i don't want to give too much away but it's very new england

fluff (most likely) fic based on the song Mastermind, but not in a stalker type of way

heavy, heavy angst fic about a parallel between Spencer kissing Lila in s1 and Cat in s15

angst fic where reader gets amnesia (i know some people hate this trope but i freaking love it) and she doesn't remember spencer is her husband who she's close to divorcing

smuttttt but it's a foursome, sort based on that scene at the start of ahs: hotel before anyone gets murdered

college!spencer who's really in love with the most popular girl who actually likes him back

one night stand... but she gets pregnant trope (lots of people hate this, too, but i do not) and of course they end up in love

the second Cat Adams situation (where she says she's having his baby) but Spencer has a wife... who is pregnant

part 2 to the spencer x reader x hotch threesome but it's a little more intense

reader visiting spencer in jail (i'm not really sure where this will go

just some more smut but it's giggly because they're drunk

reader meeting each member of the team

just this whole bunch of dad!spence fluff where it's one fic comprised of little blurbs about him being a cute dad

a wedding fic !! but it's enemies to lovers... and they're the maid of honor and best man

this kinda random angsty fic where spencer feels himself becoming his dad to his own kids

reader fake-dating derek 😈 to make spencer jealous

angst sort of based on the Maeve situation but the stalker takes reader who spencer is actually in love with

so friends with benefits, but reader moves away just when spencer's ready to tell her he loves her

strip poker smut

reunion trope sort of, where spencer sees reader again and they were romantically involved in the summer before she went to college

(this is going back all the way till feb) a fic about the typical chaos of the Reid house with their kids and they're sort of trying to get it on but they have like 95 children so it's difficult

also this list is not even going through my asks ahaha

my series ideas

forbidden love, i guess, but basically reader is Cat Adams' lawyer...

actually finishing love/hate island (i need someone to hold a gun to my head until i do)

a series following on from this and this part 2

Aaron Hotchner wips

fic about him talking about his childhood issues

frat boy!aaron but it's fake dating trope

another frat boy!aaron fic but reader sort of hates him

just this lil winter fluff fic

smut where reader is jack's friend from college (disclaimer, she's 21 and didn't know aaron as a minor)

fluff fic where reader's goddaughter and Jack are on the same soccer team

this series where he's actually wealthy wealthy

and i do have another 5 wips but all I've written is the first paragraph/line and i have no idea what the plot was going to be !!! how annoying is that