#I should probably force him to play Splatoon with me

[kennytakoika]

Exposing a friend, he was so confused LMAO I DON’T BLAME HIM (not revealing his name but we had this convo at 12-1 am so we were both kinda braindead ngl)

[simp999]

A New Home Ch. 3

Splatoon Manga Various x Skilled! Isekai'd Reader

Wc: 1k

Back to the start! Previous Next

You slowly open your eyes and wipe the drool off your face. You wince when you look around, realizing how bright it is. You must have crashed pretty hard last night. You stretch your arms, feeling a nice stretch in your back. But the bliss doesn’t last long when the pain comes right back. Sleeping on a bench isn’t very comfortable. 

Hey, wait, you fell asleep on a bench? Your eyes finally adjust to the scenery and yup, you’re still in Inkopolis Plaza. Well, it seems that you still have everything in your bag and your weapon is untouched, so it seems like a good time to go perform some very unfair gameplay. 

The results of these games are no different than your past ones, with you only learning more about how people battle. It’s about noon when you decide to take a break and get some inkling-friendly water offered for players at Inkopolis Tower. Thank cod for that. 

You wonder if the next events from the Splatoon manga take place the day after Goggles loses that battle with the team Rider explicitly told him not to lose, or a couple of days after. You don’t have much time to think before situating yourself in a more discrete spot after noticing the one and only idiotic blue team. You pretend to play on your phone and you attempt to discern what part of the manga you’re at so far. Rider comes into frame and that’s when Goggles’ screaming starts. 

‘Oh, Rider just found out that team Blue lost the second round. Ouch. Guess that means Army’s up next then, I should go get good seats.' You make your way over to Inkopolis Tower. 'What stage was he on again? Oh yeah, Flounder Heights.’ 

You weren’t the first to make it to Army’s match, noticing some die-hard fans already on the sidelines. You spotted somebody wearing a special forces beret. 

‘Huh, guess even the weakest of the S4 is quite strong. Of course they all have a bunch of fans. Much deserved, being some of the strongest there is.’

You take your seat and put your backpack between your legs and your weapon on the seat beside you while taking out your off-brand manual. You’ve even named it that, right there on the front with big bold letters, even though it’s basically just a sketchbook.

Just a couple more minutes before the battle begins and Rider walks into the stands. 

‘Alright, not a big deal, I’m just some rando. He doesn’t know me. Nope.’

He sits beside you, opposite side from your weapon. Suppose it was sort of unfortunate that the best seat left was the one right beside you because the other good ones were all taken.

‘Should I move? Nah, that would be kinda weird. He might think he’s smelly or something. Should I say hi? Only if he says something first.’

You try your best to calm yourself down because once again, you’re in the Splatoon manga and that’s pretty damn cool. With your pencil in hand, the Squid Sisters announce the players and the stage. You quickly notice that Team Orange is much better as well as more efficient when it comes to inking. They swiftly make their way to the center while skillfully inking every pathway there.

‘The manga doesn’t quite capture how well they move as a singular unit. Not to mention how well they work together, knowing exactly which battle plan to use for each scenario without saying a word to each other.’

‘Pure skill alone might not be able to take care of even the weakest of the S4. If they can manage to have the advantage over every scenario, they’re virtually unstoppable unless you can manage to outrange them or something. Goggles completely had the right idea when it came to bringing in a completely unrelated variable. How could I possibly beat Army if paired against him?’

Not that you actually planned on battling him at any point in time, but it wouldn’t be too far-fetched to come across one of those die-hard Army fans who battle just like him. Though, it would probably be much easier to just out-skill them. But it’s better to be at least semi-prepared for any scenario. 

‘Man, I’m kinda starting to act like Army now, huh? How ironic.’

You continue to write information down on Army and his team, flipping to the next page because one wasn’t enough.

‘It’s much easier to analyze your opponent’s playstyle and moves rather than adapt your own to be unpredictable. It’s just about impossible to be completely unpredictable. Everybody has little things that they absentmindedly do during battle. Whether it be the way they may like to jump and flick their charger before taking a shot, or maybe they prefer dodge-rolling to their right side instead of their left.’

‘Maybe the best way to go about battling him is to out-skill him? If my team and I can manage to make solid plays before Army can discern them and decide on the best way to fight back, then we should be fine, right?’

Though, you are disappointed with the way the Splatoon manga introduced the S4’s skill. They really are much stronger up close. You can tell how much time and effort really went into Team Orange’s training. You also found it interesting how even before Goggles had attacked Army with his Inkzooka, He sensed Goggles’ presence behind him. He knew he was about to get flanked from behind. That’s something you can only get from years of experience. Either from getting pinpoint accuracy by hearing the sound of footsteps or clothes rustling, or just having some sort of sixth sense.

'Maybe I could train to be quieter? Yeah, that sounds good.'

You didn’t want to wait to leave the stands, so you walked out of inkopolis tower, phone in hand before the battle ended. The app you downloaded back in the real world seems to work here too. It shows your rank, the stages, and most of your stats. The level isn’t included, but that’s alright. 

Next part

Apr.6.23

[blazehedgehog]

Let's say a Sonic Adventure remake does happen. What would you chamge in a nutshell?

I’d actually started writing out a list of things for this post until I realized it was probably pitched more from the perspective of a new game and not a remake. So I erased it and started over.

Gosh, where to even start.

I think Adventure Fields should feel a little more open world. I don’t necessarily think Station Square needs to be this big sprawling metropolis, but everything Sonic Adventure did with breaking things up in to these tiny little loading zones could definitely be reworked, which could change the structure of the city in general.

Because, like, consider how many different ways Station Square is portrayed in Sonic Adventure. You have the Adventure Fields, where the train station is part of the Emerald Coast resort, right off the beach. That whole area feels really small to me.

Then you have Speed Highway, which is also part of Station Square, and its this huge skyscraper area that doesn’t feel like its part of the same environment at all. And then you see Station Square in FMVs, and it feels like another completely different environment, much more like a downtown zone in New York or something. All of that is supposed to be the same place, but none of it feels connected.

So reworking that to feel more cohesive overall is very necessary. The Station Square we get to roam around in feels more like a series of back alleys compared to what it’s supposed to represent. I see something maybe a little closer to the hub area in Sonic & Mario Rio, or the plaza in Splatoon.

And yes, Adventure Fields need to stay. This is a remake, which means trying to recreate the same ideals of the original game – which, in this case, was blending RPG elements with a platformer to create a sort of Metroidvania-esque game. Keeping that in mind is important. We need a free roaming space to explore, and a town with NPCs to talk to. Its atmosphere! And that’s important! Obviously Action Stages would still be the the same way, it wouldn’t be a fully open world game.

Even before Sonic 06 tried it, I thought a day/night cycle would be interesting in a Sonic game. You kind of got that in those old Genesis games. If you pay attention to Sonic 1, it goes from Green Hill (Day), to Spring Yard (Evening), to Starlight (Night) to Scrap Brain (Dawn). I also liked how Chaotix implemented it, where every time you finished a stage, it’d advance to the next time of day state. I’d like to see some kind of time of day system implemented. That might mean you’d play a stage like Speed Highway during the day, but that could be cool, too. Though maybe there’d also be a pause menu option to just straight up advance time.

As previously discussed, I’d drop Big the Cat from the main playable roster of characters and turn him in to a minigame located in various places in the Adventure Field. So he’s still around, still involved in the plot, you can still go fishing, but you’re never forced to if you don’t want to.

I think you’d have to update Sonic’s abilities a little. The light dash from Sonic Adventure 2, maybe the bounce attack or the Sonic Unleashed stomp. No boost, though. I love boost, I want all future Sonic games to have boost, but if you’re remaking Sonic Adventure, you need to stick to a strictly no-boost formula. Homing attack crosshairs are a must, though.

Beyond that, I dunno. I haven’t thought super hard how to update characters besides Sonic. Maybe we could cut another character from the roster, but my picks would either be Tails or Amy and I feel like you’d catch hell if you did that in either case. It’d be tough, but maybe a Sonic Adventure remake mostly focuses on Sonic’s story, and then you sell the other characters as DLC. So you’d have a Knuckles + Gamma side story pack for $15, a Tails + Amy side story pack for $15, etc. But I’d definitely want to focus on pouring all the budget in to making Sonic’s story the best it could be first and foremost.

The question then would be how you handle a “Final Story,” because that’s definitely a culmination of everybody’s threads coming together at the end, but if you split those threads off to be sold separately after the game is out… it creates a big problem with how you relay the story.

[virmillion]

Ibytm - T minus 50 seconds

Masterpost - Previous Chapter - Next Chapter - ao3

Words: 1,638

Logan clutches the laser shooter close to his chest, walking as fast as his feet will allow without full-on running to the safety of a blind spot around the corner (running is against the rules). The red pipes of light beaming from his chest do nothing to calm his nerves, which are more frazzled now than they’ve ever been. Worse even than the time a rumor floated around the fifth floor that Mx. Oatmeal was auditioning candidates to be launched into space to check on the jellyfish. (And in case you were wondering, yes, their last name really is Oatmeal. Please hold your shock.) And if his heart leaps into his throat with enough force to knock him of his breath when his foot catches on a loose seam, well, that’s nobody’s business but his own, isn’t it?

He whips himself around the corner and holds his breath, watching the black reflective wall betray the positions of his pursuers. Their shining blue lights bounce with each of their impossibly quiet footfalls as they swing a hard right turn. One turn too early.

Logan exhales as softly as he can manage, pressing the barrel of his shooter to his ribcage to prevent an inhale too deep, too loud. He releases it, one inch at a time, as his heart rate reluctantly slows. Well, as much as it can slow, given the nerve shakedown he’s putting it through by playing laser tag. Why did he let Virgil talk him into this?

Because it was the soonest you’d be able to see each other again in person, his brain unhelpfully supplies. Logan shakes off the thought, daring another glance around the corner. So thorough is his relief at the empty space that he almost doesn’t notice the swarm of faint blue light advancing from the far end of his hall. His heart finds that familiar place around his tonsils once more.

Clutching the scope to his eye, Logan scurries down the corridor and keeps his eyes peeled for an inconspicuous hiding place, but to no avail. Only one way to go—the last fork at the end of the hall. For all the black lights bouncing around in his skull, he’s surprised he hasn’t been completely blinded yet.

He hesitates at the split, torn between retreading the same ground or making a break for the red base, smack dab in the heart of blue territory. Left or right? Familiarity or safety?

The sound of footsteps hammers to his left. Easily five people, maybe more. Not long behind their broadcasted presence is a herd of blue lights, rattling like so many rain clouds along the walls.

He banks a sharp right.

He ventures down the hall on the balls of his feet, uncertain which way to face. If I continue forward, he reasons, I’ll see anyone coming. If I face backward, he counters, I’ll know how much distance I’ve got on those other blues. But I already know they’re there, and I don’t know who’s in the direction I’m heading. If I face forward, though, the other blues might snipe me from behind. So might someone in front of me. Or the people behind me might drop off, and I’ll be evading for no reason, and maybe even putting myself more at risk.

This thought process continues for some time.

He finds himself settling on a weird half-pivot style, spinning back and forth to scope out all directions, rather than, y’know, picking a direction and sticking with it. By the time he reaches the end of the hall, he almost feels optimistic about his chances of not losing any points for his team. This unearned confidence comes mere moments before he rams into someone with the slopes of his shoulder blades.

Logan lets out a yelp, tossing his weapon in the air and scrambling to point it as he whips around to defend himself—or figure out whether he can escape. He hasn’t decided yet.

The gun just about leaps out of his hands again as he locks eyes with Virgil. Where Logan wields an awkwardly large rifle, clunky in his untrained hands, Virgil spins two mini shooters around his thumbs. He likened them to the Splatoon 2 dualies, but Logan wouldn’t know—he’s never played. Supposedly, Virgil’s next mission following this escapade is to be correcting that lifelong mistake.

Virgil, it might interest you to know, is not on the red team. That is, he’s on the blue team. Against Logan. Sorry, might’ve forgotten to mention that.

The correct thing for Logan to do in this situation would be to tag Virgil’s gear with his hand sensors, or just laser the guy point blank. Virgil is much better at thinking on his feet than Logan. Of course, Logan has the detriment of never having played laser tag before, while Virgil apparently has years of experience under his belt, but that’s beside the point.

Aiming his dualies square at Logan’s chest sensor, Virgil cocks his head to the side and levels a grin at him. Overconfident, certainly, but with good reason.

Logan laughs uncomfortably. “What a tangled web, am I right?” His voice cracks on the last word.

“Said the fly to the spider,” Virgil retorts. Luckily for him—or not, as the case may be—Logan is spared from having to come up with a clever remark by the sound of frantic feet. For the briefest of moments, he’s reminded of the ‘...Daddy?’ ‘Do I look like—’ vine, but he shakes it off when he sees the kid rushing up to greet him. His chest glows a proud red to match Logan’s as he barrels closer, evading what looks like a distant swarm of blue fireflies. The rest of Virgil’s team, no doubt.

The next few things happen in very rapid succession, much too fast for Logan to keep up with. It goes something like this: The kid trips over his (probably untied) shoes, crashes into Virgil’s back, and saves himself with a somersault before continuing past Logan, evidently unimpeded. To the best of your ability, do try to keep up, because that in itself was only one event, the fallout of which Logan would never have predicted. At least, not outside of a cheesy romance movie. Virgil pinwheels his arms from the kid’s collision, his eyes waffling between the duealies he doesn’t want to drop and the balance he doesn’t want to lose. At the former, he succeeds expertly. At the latter, he fails spectacularly. Logan, in an understandable display of his inexperience, tosses his gun to the side and thrusts his arms out—to steady Virgil, to save himself, he isn’t sure. His answer doesn’t delay long.

Virgil releases the faintest of yelps—almost like when you accidentally step on a puppy’s foot—as he falls forward. He spreads his arms out to avoid literally punching Logan in the face as his momentum knocks both of them to the ground. It doesn’t really register in Logan’s mind what, exactly, just happened, until his heart decides to start beating again. An ache is rapidly forming along the side of his spine, but he ignores it in favor of wondering just how compromising their position looks.

Each of Virgil’s hands—both of which are still holding their respective dualies—are planted on either side of Logan’s head, his bent elbows keeping their faces mere inches apart. Where Logan’s feet drew up to his thighs in an attempt to curl in on himself, their progress is blocked by Virgil’s legs—one knee pressed to the ground between Logan’s, and the side of his other shoe planted firmly against the outside of Logan’s leg. Logan forces himself to draw a real breath, pleading with his brain to depart from its currently wayward train. It sprints in circles like a child thrown from one of those playground merry-go-rounds, whipping in incomprehensible circles without a care for what Logan would rather be doing—which is literally anything else, mind you. The messiness of this metaphor should offer some inkling as to how hard Logan is working to keep up with his current situation.

Oh my god, is he going to kiss me, is that what this is, I’ve always seen it in movies but never expected it in real life, oh my god, he’s going to kiss me, oh my god, what do I do, oh my god, oh my god, oh my —

Well, you probably get the picture by now. Also some concerns about whether Virgil will take the opportunity to get a point for his team, whether Logan should try to do the same, all that fun stuff.

Logan’s eyes must widen, or maybe his lips part, or something else in his expression betrays the whirlwind of thoughts in his head, because Virgil’s cheeks suddenly turn bright pink, and Logan is pretty sure it isn’t the reflection of the lights on his vest. Well, maybe the lights are helping a little bit, but Virgil’s face certainly wasn’t that red when they first bumped into each other tonight. Logan swallows around a lump in his throat as Virgil freezes, which is at once both better and worse than when he was, you know, existing like a normal human bent over his friend on the opposing team of a laser tag game. What else would be the next most reasonable thing for Virgil to do but jump to his feet, knocking Logan’s gun farther away in the process?

Logan glances behind himself as he props his weight on an elbow, but the kid on his team is long gone. Beyond Virgil, the swarm of blue is still steadily advancing. Virgil spins his dualies around his fingers once more before running to join them.

After he levels a laser shot square at Logan’s chest, of course.

[hollow-of-falling-stars]

There’s Always Another Choice

Chapter Three

First | Previous | Next

I spent all night plus my second block at school fixing this chapter and adding more stuff, if there are any grammar/spelling/punctuation mistakes, it’s because I was sleep deprived while writing it.

The final scene was the horror route. According to the script, I would learn that Mark is actually a psychopath and the date would end in murder.

Deja vu much, eh? Now’s not the time...

You followed Mark dutifully to the theater, zoning out as Mark rambled on about art and theater.

At least he’s trying to follow the script... Yeah, and the sooner this is over the sooner I can finish this.

“OH, it’s starting!” Mark said, turning around quickly to watch the stage.

You snapped back to the present and turned to the stage. Nothing is happening, confused you turn back to Mark, but he’s gone.

I don’t remember this part in the script... Neither do I, something’s wrong. You look back at Alex, they looks just as confused as you do, but they waved their hand at you to signal that you should just keep going.

You look back to the stage and you hear a low rumble, your vision goes fuzzy and something flickered into your line of sight.

What is that...?

You’re faced with tunnel vision and your ears ring, not quite masking the screeching in the background.

You tremble and shake, clutching your head in your hands when suddenly-

“Did you miss me?”

A face so familiar to your past is suddenly very close to you, and he’s grinning like a man gone mad.

Your mouth is left agape as he continues to speak, his form radiating auras that hurt to look at, but his skin is a sickly gray that looks it was either taken from a black and white horror movie or a corpse.

Oh yeah, it was taken from a corpse. Your corpse.

His voice is deep and it echoes, but there’s no doubt in your mind that this is Damien, probably Celine too. It takes more than one soul to keep a corpse walking after all.

“I missed you.... Very much.” He says, grinning.

You honestly can’t tell if he’s trying to be reassuring or not, but he’s stepping back now, thankfully. Personal space is still a thing you enjoy.

“I’ve been waiting a long time to see you again.” Damien says, you assume it’s Damien. The body looks like his, but by the snapping you hear whenever he moves, you can tell that it’s actually still your broken body.

“I’ve been pushed aside... Replaced... Mocked.” Damien explained, Clearly he doesn’t recognize me, or maybe he assumes I’m still in the mirror... You think to yourself.

“And then, he had the gall to not invite me on his little adventure with you.”

Adventure? What’s that supposed to mean?

“No more,” He says, “Never again. It’s my turn now.”

I.... Damien just stop this please. I really want to kill you but you’re making this difficult.

Damien’s stance changed, his form flickering every color there is. He looked angry.

“I’ve been waiting patiently. HE PROMISED HE WOULD LET ME IN AGAIN.” Damien snarled.

It was getting hard to keep up with Damien’s movements, he kept moving behind you or beside you, forcing you to turn your head constantly so that you could keep an eye on him.

“I’m tired of giving people a choice.” He said, adjusting his suit as he tried to calm himself down.

He sighed, “But I suppose I could give you one last option. Take your pick, anything of four different choices. More than he could’ve given you, and let’s see how far down this rabbit hole really goes.”

Between you stood four doors, they all whispered something different when you got close to them.

“Don’t Blink”

“Don’t Move”

“Relax”

And finally, the only real option there was,

“FREEDOM”

“Well,” Damien said, grinning that awful smile of his, “Take. Your. Pick.”

You look up at him confidently, “I choose Freedom.” You say, because freedom is freedom, and you sure as hell aren’t leaving until you get what you came here for.

“Good choice,” Damien says, “But... why should we have to choose in life?”

Maybe because life is ours to choose? You taught me that Damien, you should know this.

“If dinner is what you want, then I can provide.” Damien said, sitting down at a table. There was no food, but there were two wine glasses and an unopened bottle of sparkling wine.

“And I can take you wherever you’d like to go, I can especially take you places you do̢n'҉t̛ ͠w̕a͢n̢t̶ ̡t̶o go.͏” He said, grinning darkly.

Crrreeeeepppyyyy!

“It’s exciting, knowing that there are endless possibilities, waiting for you.” Now he’s leaning closer, you carefully shuffled your chair away from him. Why are his eyes twitching?

“I CAN GIVE YOU ANYTHING!” You stood up quickly as Damien started scratching desperately at his clothes, manically. The sound the chair made scraping across the floor barely covered the sharp gasp that came from behind you.

Alex was here as well. Hopefully they’d stay as low and as quiet as possible.

“I’ve been waiting a long time to get some personal time between us...” He said, smoothing his shirt down only to have another burst of insanity.

“THERE’S NOTHING YOU OR HE CAN DO TO STOP ME!”

You scrambled back into your chair, hoping Damien didn’t notice Alex’s muffled shrieks.

Damien remained oblivious, thankfully. And you couldn’t help but wonder what was causing these outbursts.

“So... Now that we’re here together, we should really  get to know each other.” Damien said, parts of him separating to show a man screaming in pain.

“You just need to let me in, it’s as simple as that.” Damien purred.

You snort and pushed away from the table, careful to keep Damien’s eyes focused on you, “Yeah, I’ve heard that one before, and I remember exactly what happened. You think I’m falling for this again? In your dreams, asshole.”

The background of what you assumed was the Upside Down faded away, you were standing outside the theater. Damien looked angry.

“You’re never, ever, going to escape me! Not now, not-” Damien grunted as he was tackled to the ground.

It’s Mark! Where's he been?

“What the hell? Where did you come from?!” Damien groaned as he fought to stay upright.

“Let’s see how you fight with a bag over your head!” Mark said, pulling a black bag from his pocket and throwing it over Damien’s head. “Two can play at that game, mister!” Damien retorted, pulling out his own.

“What the hell is going on?” You heard Alex whisper. Good to know that they got out too, one less thing to worry about.

“I have no idea, but you should probably leave.” You replied quietly, watching as the two fought.

You had never noticed it before, but Mark and Damien looked almost identical, it was really on the hair parting and mannerisms that set them apart. Weird how they aren’t even related.

One of them pulled out a gun, only for the other to throw it to the ground in front of you.

You pick it up quickly, and looked back at Alex. “Leave now, whatever is happening right now doesn’t concern you, Alex. Run while you still can.”

They shook their head, “No way in hell am I leaving you now, this is insane! I’m not leaving without you, (Y/N)!”

Damien and Mark are trying to get your attention, spouting nonsense about the other to try and make you shoot.

You wouldn’t shoot, not yet. Maybe you could clear up what happened back at the manor, with or without bloodshed, that didn’t matter.

You needed answers.

FINALLY FINISHED THE CHAPTER!!!  The next one is the one with the trigger warnings for sure, I honestly thought it’d be done sooner than this. Sorry y’all, but hey! 

Shit’s gonna get real in the next chapter.

@ego-protection-squad @sassy-in-glasses @greyumi @egoimagines @slim-jims @splatoon-jim @bitten1ce 

*Also, in the last chapter I had the placeholder name Drew for Alex as well as male pronouns because I wasn’t sure what I would be doing with that character, I may have missed changing them to Alex/they/them/their. If any of you noticed that in Chapter Two, would you mind letting me know? Thanks!

**Not sure if I was clear enough last chapter, not that anyone pointed it out, but the four oc’s take place of the titles Director, Camera Handler, and Makeup Artists. Tyler, Ethan, Pam, and Kathryn (I think Kathryn was on lights actually) played those roles. That’s what I meant by replacements!

[donut-secret-one]

Games: Of The Year

Hey, it’s me, your gamer friend “Parasite” Eve, here to talk about video games. I watched and played a few of those this year, so here’s some words about some of them, as a tumblr post, because I don’t know where else you can put a long writing thing.

GAMES ENJOYED BY WATCHING

Drakengard 3 and Ending E of Drakengard

I watched these in preparation for NieR: Automata, and it turns out I could have basically just read a summary and it would’ve been fine. I still think it’s impressive that I like the look of Drakengard 3 even though it seems like the gameplay sucks and I hate most of the characters.

Resident Evil 7: Biohazard 7: Resident Evil

I think it’s neat that each “level” of this game is like a different horror genre. Scary house with a murder man, different scary house fulla bugs, a Saw thing, a scary little girl, a Resident Evil game... it’s a cool way to make the different parts of the game seem like, different, parts of the game.

NieR (Gestalt)

This seems like a really good video game, although the playthrough I watched cut out a lot from the extra routes, so maybe those parts are boring, who knows. The big plot twists are rad and the characters are good and it’s a videogame that made me cry.

Yakuza 0

I love Majima. Remember when all those people were looking at the statue guy and he was doing his dance and they were ignoring him? Remember when he had his band play battle music? Remember when, at the end, he can’t say anything to Makoto and he just walks away and you get sad at video games again? yeah...

Kiryu’s very good too. I can’t think of as much stuff to say about him. sorry.

Yo! Noid II: Enter the Void (https://dustinbragg.itch.io/yo-noid-was-ahead-of-its-time)

I probably could have played this but I had already seen a stream of the whole thing so I didn’t. The music and the look are rad. I think I want a whole game that plays how this game looks like it does, probably.

Tekken 7

There’s a part in the story mode where everyone sees Kazuya turn into the devil and shoot a big laser beam, and then a few days later everyone forgets it happened because something else happens.

GAMES ENJOYED BY PLAYING

Fire Emblem: Heroes

I started out liking this kind of a lot but not so much anymore, and I think I pretty much just want some aspects of this to be in a “real” FE game. It lets me only use the characters I like without missing out on anything, I get to be a silent protagonist instead of a boring generic loser, and they added a vague, abstracted version of the support system that lets you be a whole lot gayer. I think in my game Camilla is married to both me and Lucina. But yeah, it turns out I just want all that in a game that’s not a Mobile Game-ass Mobile Game.

Maybe I should learn more about game dev and make that game myself.

Animal Crossing Pocket Camp doesn’t get its own section cause I basically have the same stuff to say about it. Just let me have a small house and let me make public spaces in a proper AC game. Actually I think they let you do that in Happy Home Designer. Maybe I should just play that.

Zelda: Breath of the Wild

Needs more cooking in it. Also, one time I saw a guardian shoot its laser at the ruins of an old wooden shack I was hiding behind, and it just stayed standing, and that seemed kinda weird.

For reasons this game is good, read anybody else’s GOTY list.

Team Kirby Clash Deluxe

I don’t have screenshots for all of these, okay?

So this game has free-to-play mechanics that force you to choose between “paying money” and “grinding, but only getting a certain amount of fights per day”. Apart from that though, It’s fun to try and speedrun Kirby bosses with that good kirby music.

NieR: Automata

I only finished Route A, oops.

Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow randomiser (https://github.com/abyssonym/aos_rando)

I played this about as much as any other game on this list & remembering it now makes me wanna play it more. I became good at skips in this game, and had a gun fight with Julius.

Splatoon 2

The game was pretty good I guess, but the music was even better than Splat1n. Everything by Marina and Pearl, the final boss songs, and the weird Salmon Run themes rule. I’m also real into the art of the fictional bands they make for this. Hey, nintendo, when are you makin a full rhythm game in the Splatooniverse?

Miitopia

This is a weird Mii RPG they put on 3DS. The gameplay is pretty, because it’s mostly just like, generating weird events and encounters based on the miis you’re using and the personalities you’ve assigned them? It’s pretty neat for a single playthrough but that’s about it. I kinda wanna see more games that do this kinda gimmick though. They probably exist and I’ve never heard of them.

Also I got to wear cute outfits and the relationship has that same vagueness that makes it seem gay as I talked about for FE:Heroes.

Sonic Mania

Sonic Mania is so good, it even has the bad parts of 2D Sonic. You still get crushed by dumb platforms and some of the bosses are awful. The middle section of Metal Sonic is garbage until you find out how you’re “supposed” to do it. Also why can’t Tails fight the true final boss.

After you get used to all that though, it’s a good video game. you can even go fast.

Metroid: Samus Returns

Hey, they (officially) made a new Metroid game, and it’s good. It sticks a little too closely to the original Metroid 2 in certain ways that kinda make the exploration part not as good, but they do a lotta cool combat stuff. The fights are tough but they give you checkpoints right before them so I’m fine with it at least, and even though the new final boss was a big obvious fanservicey thing, I was still way into it.

Dragonball Xenoverse 2 for Nintendo Switch

This game’s fine I guess.

Anyway I watched a bunch of Dragon Ball this year, mostly DBZ Kai. I’m just at the start of the Future Trunks arc of Super. Hey, did everyone know, Dragon Ball fuckin rules??

Super Mario Odyssey

i like when the mario does a jump.

Sonic Forces

Honestly, it’s just a sorta-worse-than-normal 3D Sonic, and that makes it a pretty fun video game. Sure, the 2D sections are bad, I wish the 3D ones played a little more like Generations, and I wish the plot was a little more entertaining, but, I got to dress up my cat and fist bump sonic and the song called “fist bump” played. It’s cool. I’d prefer the good version of this to the perfected version of Sonic Mania. probably.

Dragon Ball Fusions

Okay but -this- Dragon Ball game was actually really good. It’s a 3DS RPG where you collect Dragon Ball characters like pokemon, including like a hundred OCs made for this game that I sometimes like better than the real characters, and you fuse them together. The battles system, though, is one of the best parts. I haven’t seen much else like it. The basic idea is like a Chrono- Trigger-style thing where the attacks have an area of effect based on the position of the character using it and the target, but on top of that, attacks do knockback, and you can knock enemies into allies to do a combo attack, knock them into other enemies to bounce them off each other, or knock them out of bounds to delay them a few turns... and they can do that stuff to you as well? And so every fight is also kind of a pool game?? And it rules???

On top of that, there’s stuff around which direction you’re attacking in vs. which direction the target is blocking, using your ki blast moves to counter other people’s ki blast moves so you’re pushing back Frieza’s death ball with a galick gun, and using super moves to recruit enemy fighters... there’s all this stuff going on in the fights, and despite being a turn-based sort of tactical RPG, the fights still kinda feel like DBZ fights? I’m writing a lot about this one I think mostly because it’s the one I’ve been playing recently but also nobody talked about it whenever it came out. It’s a good RPG -and- you get to do Dragon Ball stuff. You can fuse Yamcha with Vegeta. You can fight Great Ape Broly. For some reason they replaced all the swords with sticks but people still talk about Hell and Frieza’s still all about killing children. That’s a weird one but I wanted to write a third thing that was in the game and that was the first thing I thought of.

Anyway yeah... my top games are probably Dragon Ball Fusions, Breath of the Wild, and, I dunno, Samus Returns? Sure, let’s go with that.

ANIME OF THE YEAR

Kemono Friends. I didn’t watch a lot of other anime this year... but I didn’t need to.

2018 STUFF

There’s a new Kirby game so that’ll probably be at least in my top 5 I guess. Dragon Ball Fighterz looks good but I don’t own anything that’ll be able to play it. what the hell else is coming out in 2018

“THE END OF THIS POST” OF THE YEAR

In conclusion, the games were pretty good. I think we should keep making them.

Have a nice next year!

-Eve “Good at Video Games”. No second name.

<3

[shes-my-colllar]

the whole byf masterpost

sorry this isnt on my main blog, i wanted to keep this separate from the posts on my main blog lmao

ABOUT ME

hello. i’m Kodi. you can also call me Minty. either one works, but i prefer Kodi.

here’s what i look like. in case that was a concern you had.

i’m 14, nonbinary (they/them or he/him preferred, but anything works tbh), a freshman in high school, and live in Colorado. no, I won’t sell you pot. thanks for asking.

im asexual and panromantic. if you look like lars im probably already attracted to you.

i’m incredibly vulgar, in case you already couldn’t tell. c:

also in case you couldn’t tell, i mostly reblog mcr and frank iero n stuff. i’ll also reblog memes and shitposts and whatever. but it is mostly mcr and fiatp and stuff like that. anything that’s not mcr is most likely tagged.

speaking of stuff i usually post, things will get bloody on here. i will fairly often reblog pictures of blood. 99% of the time i tag it, tho. if you want to follow me but have a blood trigger, blacklist the ‘blood tw /’ tag.

i have depression, ADHD (professionally diagnosed), anxiety disorder, and DPDR (self-diagnosed)

i do art things sometimes. and music things, but theyre not public. maybe when i work up enough courage i’ll post something related to my music stuff.

i’m a Satanist, a member of the Satanic Temple. (i have a membership card man dont fuck with me)

i’m an anarchist, too.

i’m fluent in sarcasm and talking shit. partially fluent in spanish.

i play bass, ukulele, melodica, and violin (and a little piano too but i’m not good at it)

if you see me reblog something that contains a trigger of yours, please do not hesitate to send me an ask and tell me!! you can send it on anon and tell me to tag it. (tho i prefer off anon, so i can answer you privately [and take you seriously. remember that one anon that asked me to tag bob? i thought it was just someone who actually liked bob asking me to start a tag for him, so i responded really sarcastically and told them i wouldnt. it turned out to be someone who was genuinely triggered by bob, and i felt like shit for responding the way i did lmao]) 

this is completely unimportant, but i want to share it anyway. my main drink order at Starbucks is a mocha. iced, hot, frappuccino, white chocolate, peppermint, dont care, as long as its a mocha. unless the psl is in season. then i get a psl.

thanks for paying a visit to my blog. stay fresh, stay classy, and stay alive.

i support - LGBTQ+ rights (this blog is a safe space, and will not tolerate any form of aphobia) - women’s rights/gender equality (this blog will not tolerate any sexism, towards men OR women, or any other gender identity) - racial equality (this blog will not tolerate any racism) - anarchism (fuck the government! its built on old white men with standards that were good for a country 200+ years ago! they’re racist! they’re homophobic! they’re sexist! get them the fuck out of there! replace the government! respect existence or expect resistance!)

i do not support - conservative republicans - Donald Trump specifically - feminazis/radical feminists - pedophilia/ddlg and any ships involving it - incest and any ships involving it - pro-ana/thinspo - exclusionists (those who think asexuals aren’t LGBTQ+ and don’t belong in LGBTQ+ spaces) - TERFs/SWERFs - forcing sexualities onto people (we all think Dan and Phil look cute together, ok? i like the idea of them being together too. just stop going out of your way to find every little detail that may suggest they’re together, and just,,, saying they’re boyfriends, leave them alone lmao)

bonus unlocked: music I listen to, shows/youtubers i watch, things you’ll see me reblog at times, etc - Twenty One Pilots - Panic! At The Disco - Gorillaz - Leathermouth - Pencey Prep - Death Spells - My Chemical Romance - Frank Iero andthe Patience - Fall Out Boy - I Don’t Know How But They Found Me - Falling In Reverse - Misfits - Nirvana - Vinyl Theatre - the Cancer Crew (Filthy Frank, iDubbbz, Maxmoefoe) - Pyrocynical - Dan and Phil - Splatoon - Night in the Woods - Overwatch - Bojack Horseman - Rick and Morty - Stranger Things - Steven Universe - The End Of The F***ing World

just warning you now; every time something new comes out for something im into (new episode of a TV show, new music video for a band, new video from a youtuber, etc), i’ll be reblogging things related to that thing for awhile. so, you may come across spoilers for some things. apologies. i’ll try to remember to tag it if it has major spoilers.

LINKS

band member tags (they all should be mobile friendly now!! fixed them all)

gerard - x ( tagged #!!.gee ) frank - x ( tagged #!!.frank ) ray - x ( tagged #!!.ray ) mikey - x ( tagged #!!.mikey ) (eat shit bob) bonus: frerard - x bonus: rikey - x

era tags (i did my best to make sure these are all mobile friendly)

bullets - x ( tagged #bullets ) revenge - x ( tagged #tcfsr ) black parade - x ( tagged #bp ) danger days - x ( tagged #dd ) hesitant alien - x ( tagged #aliens ) andthe patience - x ( tagged #patience )

lyrics tag

social media (this list is frequently updated, but if any of the links don’t work please let me know)

deviantart - KoditheInkling instagram - xokodi_ snapchat - koditheinkling (most active) youtube - MintyBlueNobody ifunny - JoeKeery (inactive) wattpad - fantastlc-bastards twitter - xokodi_  spotify - koditheinkling

gaming shit (no actual links here, just where you can find me)

switch FC -  SW-5080-0652-7342 switch IGN - SR • xokodi_ pocket camp ID - 0578 1253 280 pocket camp IGN - my dude discord - emo in 2018#1677

support me!!

buy me a coffee shop my redbubble

not an mcr fan? its chill, i got tags for other stuff too c:

gorillaz twenty one pilots i dont know how but they found me panic! at the disco black panther  love, simon rick and morty dan and phil

(more coming soon!!)

[squidbrothers]

Annie groaned, finding herself in the boiler room of the ship. She tried to move her arms, but they were restricted by ropes. She tried to turn into her squid form, but a shock bracelet on her arm prevented her from transforming. “Ugh!”

“So, the Squidbeak Splatoon? Tell me all about it, now that you’re awake.” The Inkling smirked, looking at her badge. “You don’t have somewhere to be, do you? Didn’t think so.”

--

Maurice paced to Calvin and ripped him from the bar. “Yowch!! What’s that for, Maur?!”

“We got a huge problem.” he played the message back to Calvin. “Annie?!”

“You don’t need to cause a scene! Gather the other two, I’m checking the area she was in. Hopefully, she wasn’t thrown into the ocean, like her communicator was. You got it, Cal?” Calvin nodded his head, and ran to the main deck.

“Cod, four, you got yourself in a real jam this time...”

--

“Ahhh-oowwwww!!” Chelsea was ripped from her relaxing spa treatment by Calvin. “Annie’s in danger! Come on!” Chelsea’s eyes widened as big as saucers. “Okay!” she recollected herself and ran with him.

--

Just as Damin was about to score the winning shot, Chelsea pulled him out of the court. “NOOO! Chels!!” 

“No time, Annie’s gone! We gotta find her.” Damian gasped and nodded, running with Calvin to regroup with Maurice. 

--

“Four? Four?!” his search became a panic. “ANNIE!!” he knocked on each cabin door and asked if they’ve seen her, giving a clear description. An elderly jellyfish was shocked at his question and told him what went down, having witnessed the events. Maurice nodded along. “Okay, Okay. Where did you see him take her?? Okay, got it. Thank you so much!!”

--

“Never! I’ll never tell anything. If I do, it will be over my dead body!!” Annie shouted. 

The Inkling scoffed. “Such heroism is so useless. Let me tell you something, pretty girl.” he approached slowly, and grabbed her chin to force her to look at him. “’Heroes’ never came to my aid, or anyone else’s. Whoever made you who you are filled your head with lies. ‘Agents’ haven’t done anything for us, you know that?! You’re no hero. You’re just a young inkling, as naive as those tweens. You’ll never be anything greater than what you were born with!”

A charger was set off, causing the Inkling to jolt and look behind him. 

“Maurice!” Annie cried. 

“You’re wrong.” he boomed. “While you and your friends were creating havoc, we were silently picking up the messes you made. The Great Zapfish and Squid Brother Calvin didn’t just come back coincidentally. We had to make it happen.” he aimed his charger at him. “The Squidbeak Splatoon is a league of anonymous heroes who have dedicated themselves to bringing justice to the defenseless, and without an award from the public. We don’t need validation to be heroes. We just do what’s right. That’s not hard. And unfortunately for you, that’s the last thing you’ll know.” he released the shot, splatting the Inkling immediately. 

“M.....” Annie muttered. 

Maurice dropped his charger and ran to Annie. “It’s alright, I’m here now.” he removed the shock bracelet, allowing Annie to return to squid form and get out of the ropes. 

“M-M-Maurice!!” she sobbed. Maurice embraced her. “Don't worry, it’s okay.....” he gave occasional pats on the back and reassured her everything would be alright.

“Maurice?! You in here?!” Calvin exclaimed. He sighed in relief. “Oh good, you’re safe Annie!” 

Annie sniffled and held back her tears. “It was so scary....but that guy’s gone now!! I will find the rest of them!! I swear!” 

“No, you’re not. Annie, I’m releasing you from this mission.”

“W....What?” 

Maurice took off his shades. “We’ll finish this mission. I’m not going to jeopardize you again. I should’ve known better than to split us all up with your lack of experience-”

“L-Lack of experience? You don’t think I’m capable of fighting?” Annie’s face scrunched up. “Because I am!! I can fight Maurice, I’m strong enough-”

“Then why did you let yourself get squidnapped?!” he snapped. “You obviously can’t keep your guard up!”

“I-I can! But he grabbed me so unexpectedly.....it was all too fast!”

Maurice tightened his fists. “What did he do to you?” 

“Nothing! Well, he threw me onto the ground, and then punched me in the face.....but isn’t that kind of thing normal in this line of work?”

Maurice shook his head. “No. It’s not. It doesn’t happen to us.” he walked past her. “You are to remain in your cabin until the cruise makes a stop, then you are to go home. That’s an order.”

“N-No! I’m not just abandoning you guys-”

“I SAID THAT’S AN ORDER!!” Maurice shouted. He sighed. “Calvin.”

“Okay....come on, four.”

--

Annie hung her head low as Calvin escorted her to her cabin. “Sorry that happened. It was unexpected.” Annie just nodded. When they reached her room, Calvin gave a friendly punch to her arm. “Hey, cheer up! We’ll be done before you know it and you can hop on the next mission! Right?” Annie just looked away. Calvin pulled her closer and pecked her cheek. 

“Don’t fret, I’ll make sure Maur doesn’t go commander on you again, kay?” He brushed her tentacles aside. “You should probably catch a few z’s. I’ll bring some food to your room later.” Annie walked in the cabin and shut the door, and watched Calvin walk away. Annie curls on her bed and closes her eyes for a rest.

[aurimeanswind]

Friends and High Places—Sunday Chats (7-9-17)

I’m in the sky. Yes, I can fly and write at the same time. No, but really, I am currently on my flight back home from Austin because apparently Sunday Chats don’t stop for NOTHING. Not since I missed a couple weeks in a row, because apparently people miss this when it’s gone. So let’s chat.

Friends from Far Long and Far Away Places

This weekend was incredibly special for me. Though I’ve definitely mentioned her on Sunday Chats before, today she gets a big dedication. It’s story time.

A little over three years ago my would-be friend Jazz started following me on Twitter because of a mutual love of Game Grumps. Some DMs later we’d be chatting back in forth together ever since August of 2014. It’s not often for me to have someone kind of ethereal, who you can hold a conversation with for almost three years without ever meeting them, but Jazz was that person for me.

It’s been a long time, and I often referred to her in my head as my “pen pal”. Sometimes you can meet people by total happenstance, and it all started with her DMing me about what I went to school for. From there, I found one of the best friends I’d have in my life, and like I said, a near-continuous conversation with the same person for almost three years.

I’m very privileged in this life. For a number of reasons, but one such is that I always try to avoid taking for granted are the folks I have befriended on my journey through writing and gaming. Jazz is a friend I made almost entirely separate from that, separate from any specific community or event. Separate from any one moment and almost entirely through luck and serendipity. It was just a lucky mutual follow.

This weekend I took a trip to Austin so I could finally meet her in person. It’s a trip I had been playing around with for a long while and decided to book on the same weekend as RTX so that I’d be able to see some other friends while I was in town.

I’m lucky that Jazz was totally okay with me selfishly wanting to take up her time and spend plenty of one-on-one time together. What did we do? Well, we talked of course. But more so, I listened. I got to sit and listen to her stories, to her life, about her friends, her opinions, her experiences, and just like that, the continuous conversation that’s already been going on was championed through this weekend. We even sat and watched her favorite movie of all time, Clue, which I had never seen before, and is really pretty great.

Listening to her, I can’t begin to convey to you all, you wonderful Sunday Chats readers, how incredible a person she is. She is fierce. She is strong. To me, she is power embodied. She is inspiring. She takes no bullshit, she is protective, and she is a total and complete badass. To list all the things I admire in her would be to carry on for far too long, and considering she is probably reading this, I’m sure she’d be suuuuper embarrassed if I did, but I’ll try and keep it succinct.

She’s an award winning journalist. She’s incredibly witty, smart, and balanced. She is an excellent conversationalist. She is maybe the funniest person I have ever met. She is gorgeous and has a fire that burns on the inside and out. She’s one of my best friends. She was even kind enough to listen to me rant on about my life, my troubles, and things I’ve never told anyone else in my life, because I can’t help but say too much around her.

I’d count her amongst three that I depend and rely on truly and completely. Through this last month and a half, where my depression has been incredibly troubling and I’ve been in one of the worst places of my life since 2012, she has been an endless resource of support and comfort, even though she herself is has been through the ringer. She inspires me, makes me smile, and reminds me of how lucky I am to be here.

There are truly only three people in this world I can speak so highly of. She is one of them. I know it’s incredibly sappy, I know it’s a weird thing to splooge about in a massive public post, but I feel like I’ve brushed this friendship to the side like it’s some big secret, this distant friend from the internet. If she will proudly brag about me to her friends in the anticipation of my visit, then guess what? I’m gonna do it to my wonderful readers on my way out of Austin.

Thank you Jazz, for your support, for letting me be a part of your life, and for being an inspiring, fierce, and unendingly kind and caring badass.

Love you lots, J.

What I’ve Been Working On

My workflow is still pretty stilted. I think there is definitely something I’m held up on, and while I’m writing every day with insistence, I don’t know if it’s a help or a hindrance at this point. I’m playing around with getting to the 1000 day mark, which should fall sometime in this coming December, and then stop writing for a little while. We’ll see where things go and if any projects lift off the ground between now and then, but tentatively, I want to throw that out there.

I’m restarting a piece I was working on a long time ago on Overwatch, and I’m retouching up my first Case Study. I’m going to reshoot the first episode of Case Study, and now that ExtraLife is out of the way and I have a super nice new computer, I’ll be able to edit video ago. I’m definitely very concerned for the process, since I’m more than a little rusty, but I’m excited to see how it turns out. I need to reconfigure a few things about how I shoot the show, but I think it’ll look pretty good and sound great.

I also wrote a few one-off blog posts this week, which you can read HERE. One was on the Fourth of July, and the other was after watching the first episode of Netflix’s Castlevania series.

What’s on Tap

Overwatch

Yo I’m still playing Overwatch

I think i am generally winning a bit more now

That new character Doomfist looks pretty goddamn awesome doesn’t he?

I really like Overewatch still. It’s now pretty much all I play until I get into Nier Automata and Splatoon 2.

Castlevania Netflix Show

I have now watched all four episodes of the first season of this show. And it is, in my humble opinion, fantastic.

It definitely has a bit of a Game of Thrones vibe, in that it feels like a lived in world that has an established history, but it doesn’t boggle itself down too much in character names and family houses.

It just jumps into a world and it’s first episode, which is all about setting up Dracula as a villain, is just absolutely fantastic.

The rest of the series is about Trevor Belmont, the protagonist, who ends up being just as interesting as Dracula, but has a much longer arc, and seeing him slowly evolve as a character is really great.

The show is definitely gory and brutal, which I expected, and I think with the artstyle and the animation it does it super well. I was definitely a bit triggered by the graphic scene of *spoilers* someone being eaten. But y’all know that’s my weird specific phobia, whatcha gonna do?

The way it ends leaves me begging for more, and it’s already apparently been renewed for a second season. I cannot wait for more of this show, and I am totally hooked. I really recommend it, because it is a very good interpretation of the Casltevania universe and the way its tropes and ideas, like the whip, are conveyed into visuals, is fucking awesome.

Tomba 1 & 2

So I finished Tomba 1! Yay! I’ve been replaying that after finishing Alundra

Tomba is a great game! I think for the first time I ddi every last one of the quests in the run, all 130, which was a ton of fun.

I started Tomba 2, which was in the big switch from 2D to 3D, and it actually still looks pretty great.

For a 3D game from that era, it’s definitely super chunky and blocky, but the characters are very distinguishable, and it is 100% fully voice acted. The voice acting isn’t amazing, but for the time period it’s actually relatively stellar!

Tomba 2 is just such an amazing Metroidvania/RPG/Adventure game. I cannot recommend it enough.

Zelda Breath of the Wild

Oh look at this one cropping back up. I decided to get the DLC before shipping off to Austin this weekend, and it was a great idea.

Though I haven’t really dipped me toes in any of the new content, using the new map feature, I’ve been able to explore the areas I missed before. In my initial 110-ish hours I was uh… surprisingly thorough, let’s say. But goddamn.

I still have a few shrines left, 17 now, I believe, and I really want to find all of them. I have yet to consult a guide.

Questions

As always you can get your question in Sunday Chats by replying to my tweet on Sunday afternoons with the hashtag #SundayChats in it!

Hrm. I really like them as they are, I’ll be honest. I don’t think they’re necessarily perfect. I think, and I had a recent conversation about this with Jazz actually, that the effort to make Snape a redeemable character all at the last minute felt a little forced. It worked for me, but I think if you wanted to make it really believably, for everyone, folks like Jazz who really hates him, you could have layered it out a lot more. We get a little bit of it in book 5 and the rest in book 7. Now I think the opposite works super well for Dumbledore, where you kind of learn about his troubled past in book 7, and it works so well because you can clearly tell he is aspiring and working toward redemption so much throughout the rest of his life. The kind of breaking down of his character in the final entry of the series hits so hard because we get to see that so well reflected through Harry.

I think there are plenty of characters that could have been fleshed out. I honestly would have loved to just spend more time in that world, more time in the classes, more time learning the history, but I don’t think that is a thing that would have worked in this story, Harry’s story, specifically.

I also haven’t read Cursed Child yet, still. And I’m still maybe a little concerned it’ll ruin a bit of the magic for me. I really enjoyed Fantastic Beasts though, in spite of its issues.

I mentioned it a little bit above, but yeah, I thought it was fantastic. Just the character work specifically worked so well for me. There was a lot of attention given to make Dracula such a sympathetic villain. Even though it’s essentially a trope we’ve seen before, I think it’s used really well, because beyond the incidents that set up his villainy in the series, we get this nice little glimpse at his past distaste for humanity. It leaves you with questions about history, ones that don’t need to be answered, but you want to be, which are always the best questions because consulting them in your mind engrosses you even more in the world.

And good god is everything about the last episode just fucking perfect.

This is a really hard one. If that’s something you’re going through, I’m sorry. It isn’t easy. I am someone who has never been broken up with, I am the break up-er. Not that that’s something to brag about, which I’m not, I just want folks to know the position I’ve been in.

I’ll say this, and please hear me out on this. Assuming things didn’t end with cheating or murder or physical/emotional abuse, assuming it was a thing where it was distance, fighting, anger or animosity, or just things not working out, remember this: empathy. Whether you’re the break up-er or the break up-ee, I think it’s really important to remember that the other person is a human being, and what’s more, they’re going to handle this in their own way. Intimate companionship is really hard to manage and it’s not a one way street. If both folks aren’t on the same page, it’s just not going to work out. This doesn’t mean you need to pocket blame, or hate the other person, or look for reasons why things aren’t working or didn’t work out. In my history, the moment you’re really questioning whether things are worth continuing means you at the very least need to have that conversation with your partner.

They’re human and you need to respect that. I don’t think either person should lob insults or take enjoyment out of a breakup. Again, we’re excluding the worst case scenarios here.

I think you should take a deep hard look at yourself, at your feelings, and genuinely ask yourself: do I still want to be friends with this person? I know for me the answer has always been no. I need that distance because being close to them would either fill me with guilt or pain, or just a general concern that the other is in pain any time they’re around me. That’s what’s worked for me, but if you or the other make that decision, I really believe you need to respect it.

To kind of top it off here, I think a lot of distance can do a lot of good. Stop checking their social media, unfollow/unfriend/or even block them if you need to. Get them out of your view and focus one what you need to do to get yourself in a stable and happy place again. You both need to do this, you both need to figure out how to make yourselves happy without the other again, and that’s not easy, but that’s the best advice I can give.

I know that’s pretty contrary to a lot of modern advice of be friends, be cool, be amicable, but I just don’t think that shit happens really. I’ve seen it, I’ve seen it myself, but it’s very hard, and it’s very rare, so don’t be afraid of opting for the easier choice. Do what’s best for you. Take care of yourself.

Haha, well this is hopefully my last trip for a hot minute. I don’t know. I don’t want to make any promises. This most recent trip to see a friend was special because I had never actually seen them before, so it was really important for me to meet them and spend time there. The next one? I really don’t know. I think I need to spend some time figuring some of my own shit out now. I have a lot on my mind lately and a lot of things I want to start and get done.

Oh, and very little money.

Ahh this is a really hard question.

I like the standards and the fast food burgers. I could go for any. But the best burger, that’s tough.

I’ll say this, I take my burger a very specific way. One, it always has to be a cheeseburger. If it’s not a cheeseburger you can just leave thank you. I always take my burger with Lettuce, Mayonnaise, and Ketchup. I know, it’s a weird combo, but it’s the best. I got it from my older brother Brady, though his included a tomato, which I just don’t fuck with, so that is my perfect burger wherever I go. I sometimes throw grilled onions on there if it’s an option too.

I don’t know if it’s my all time favorite, but there is this eastern chain near me called Cheeburger Cheeburger, and their 1/3 pound burger with my chosen toppings on it was really good. Their bread was always super flakey, and they were real-ass thick burgers too.

As a general style of burger that I love, you can’t go wrong with a good patty melt. My go-to usually if I’m at a new diner.

So my friend told me to listen to this song and now that I have, I see why. I know a bit of the story behind it and it is very... powerful. I mean, it’s hard to imagine the girl that did Tik-Tok is doing this song years later, but I think it really is reflective of her and her soul and her pain.

I thought it was really beautiful. I thought it was very poignant.

This is a tricky one. I’ll say I have two. I really love the triggers nowadays. Obviously the Switch does not have analogue triggers, which is unfortunate, but I get it what with it being a handheld console as well. But man do those Xbox one and PS4 triggers feel reeeeeal good. If i had to pick a specific one, it’d be the right trigger, because it usually does the shooty-bang-bang in the video games.

Outside of that, you can’t go wrong with the bottom face button. Usually jump, or hit, or fuck-up, as I like to call it. That’s A, or B, or X, depending on which controller you have, and it’s a rad button. Don’t futz with it.

Having been in Austin all weekend I have not gotten the chance to see Spider-Man Homecoming, but after hearing the words on it, it has skyrocketed up my must-see list. I may even go to see it tomorrow morning before I go to work. Goddamn do I want to see it. I did see Clue this weekend though! That’s a great movie!

But really, Peter Parker is like, my legit hero. I loved him as a kid. He is for sure my favorite Marvel hero, and probably my second or third favorite superhero in general, behind Superman and Batman, depending on the day. I wanted to be a photographer when I was younger, before I wanted to be a doctor and then enthusiast press, so when I found out that Peter Parker was a photographer too, I thought it was even more rad.

Did you know that the Polar Bear is the largest land carnivore? Or land predator, one of the two. When they stand on their hind legs, Polar bears can measure over 12 feet tall.

Polar Bears are fucking. Awesome.

The vacation was incredibly helpful. Being around someone who has been helping me get through such a troubling time in my life and also just sleeping in and relaxing was so, so helpful.

Of the Clue characters, it’s so goddamn hard to choose. I almost want to say Mrs White because of her absurd monologue in the last ending alone. I don’t know if I’ve laughed that hard like… ever. Good fucking god. Like holy shit.

I also just love Mr. Green because of every absurd physical thing he does in that movie, and Tim Curry is incredible. Just incredible. They’re all great, but those are the three standouts for me, I’d say, with maybe Mrs. White taking it.

Trevor is the villain in Clue. Though I see him as more of a Mr. Body character, who is playing everyone behind the scenes. He is the villain because he loves his power too much.

Jesus Christ Roger. I can only wonder what the people who don’t know you but only see your tweets in Sunday Chats must think you’re like.

I have never seen Grown Ups 2, nor do I think I ever want to. It’s an infamously bad movie, from what I understand. I mean, there is a podcast about watching it every week for an entire year that is literally called “The Worst Idea of All Time”. Also I take great offense to being compared to David Spade and I’m not 100% sure why.

I can’t speak to Star Ocean 3, but I loooove replaying old favorites. You can see from what i have on tap this week that I’m going and playing Tomba 1 and 2 as is. Those are two very old games, and while a little rough around the edges and certainly not perfect, they hold up for me quite a bit.

I think there is definitely a level of nostalgia that can get you through certain things. Like, when I went back and played Tales of Symphonia again within the last few years, it’s a lot less dynamic and fun than I remember it being. The voice acting is also a whole lot worse than I remember it being too, but I still really love that game. I still finished it and played it through to the end. I am someone who regularly goes back and replays games, and just like gaining something from a movie on a second viewing or reading a book through again, you’re almost guaranteed to get something new out of it. If you’re open to the idea of something maybe not holding up as well as you remember it doing, than I say go for it. Just don’t let that be all your time like it has been for me recently.

I think it totally is. Especially if you have an emissary of that nostalgia to boot. For example, I think Tim Gettys really reps the Crash games as far as nostalgia and looking-back-love is concerned.

I think knowing where you’re at with something is also super big though. Like, are you into 3D/2D platformers, or more importantly, platformers from that PS1 era? Because Crash Bandicoot sure as shit is one of those. I went back and played the first Crash again recently and I know it’s not a super great game. I just know that in my heart of hearts. But I also remember really liking Crash 2 and 3, especially 3, and I want to go back and see those two very much. I have yet to get back into the N-Sane trilogy, but I’m excited to, and I think I’ll get a good amount out of those later two games. Just set yourself up with the right expectation and know that if you’re trying to specifically “buy into someone else’s nostalgia” that you need to see those games through the same scope that they did.

This is a mean question. I mean honestly, if I could hangout with you every week you know I would.

Okay real answer time. It’s probably that fucking Mrs. White monologue. You hyped it up to me while we were watching it but good fucking lord. I cannot overemphasize this: it was solid gold.

Also, I want it to be known that Jazz was fucking saying the words along with the movie as we watched it, and multiple times I had to stare at her until she stopped and then apologized. She has seen that movie waaaaay too many times.

Spelunky and Overwatch. Both are incredibly well made and I’ve been revisiting both time and time again, with months of distance between play sessions, and they have not let me down.

Okay, well I’m not about to sit here and make some declarative statement like that. I think for me, yes, it is my favorite Zelda game. It even beats out A Link to the Past, and if you want to know specifically where I’m at with it, you can read my review here: http://irrationalpassions.com/review/the-legend-of-zelda-breath-of-the-wild/

I think to deny the ingenuity, courage, and grace by which Breath of the Wild is executed would be incredibly inept of any video game player out there. I understand that a lot more folks than I have issues with it, many of them being hosts on my very own podcast. I get it. I get that the story isn’t 100% there for them. It really was for me. I get that the gemaplay doesn’t seem as new and original to them. It was for me. I think Zelda refines and executes on ideas barely even approached in other video games, and it does it with grace, style, and little to no issue. Especially in a post-performance-patch world, it is something incredible.

I think there is an argument there. I don’t know if I am even the one to make it though.

At least... not yet.

The Checklist

It’s all about MBMBaM for me this week. If you’re not familiar, My Brother, My Brother and Me is one of my all time favorite podcasts. In fact, it’s my favorite non-video game podcast. I love and adore it, and I think you should go listen to it. When I’ve been depressed recently, I’ve just been re listening to old episodes of MBMBaM and it’s made me very goddamn happy.

https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/my-brother-my-brother-and-me/id367330921?mt=2

I also started watching Polygon’s Monster Factory this week, and hoooooly shit is it funny. In this series, McElroy brothers and Polygon staff Justin and Griffin McElroy make horrific creatures in video game create-a-characters and go ham with them. I’ll provide my favorite episode so far (not that far into the series), which is probably the disaster that Fallout 3 became pretty much immediately.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LHBzVTCO3nM

I sat and listened to Nick Scarpino do a couple of great one-on-one GameOverGreggy Shows this weekend in my downtime, and I can’t pick between the two, so I am just linking both.

Overcoming Anxiety - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=taPC2fOx5BY

Brian Altano - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QD8W-kpK3ew

Okay. I’m done. I’m writing this at home, finishing everything up, formatting, and then posting. I know it’s posting super late, and I’m sorry about that.

I have a melancholy weight with me now. It’s time to start looking ahead and I really don’t know what’s ahead for now. Both exciting, but right now, I find myself more anxious than excited. It’s a somber note to end Sunday Chats with, but it’s an honest one.

But hey, thanks for reading, and do me a favor, eh?

Keep it real.

[rhapsody-crossing]

S2: IYHO Tournament - A Reflection [Part 3]

PART 1 is here. PART 2 is here. This written series now has a tag #iyho series

7) Unexpected Champion of the Loser Bracket

If Ink Your Heart Out event is a anime, I would dedicate an episode or two to SST (Sotong Serba Tahu). Their captain, Riderman, used to be an active player but stopped due to university and life. Dinie is one of the rare badass female gamer who shows her skills with action instead of bragging. Jazmi was a skilled A ranker brush user (probably an S now). Three of them, along with a few others from the OC, were part of MAWS-- a team created for a SEA Tournament held on April. Malaysia did not do well on that tournament, but their bonds held strong and true. As such, Riderman’s return is equivalent of seeing a retired yet respectable general picking up his blade again and called his companions to arms for this upcoming war. They took in a newbie name Heraan as their fourth member.

SST lost to littleSOTONGS in the winners’ bracket, most likely due to the lack of coverage or connection issues. They tore through the loser bracket by defeating EPDS and INKvaders with a brilliant display of skill and team synergy that was almost touching to watch. It was unfortunate that they encountered an obstacle in the form of member disconnection, which led them to forego the match against Avengers...

On the other hand, Harapan’s experience was the opposite of SST. They encountered disconnect issues when battling Avengers in the normal bracket, which landed them on the loser’s bracket. Nevertheless, they powered through their opponents, beating Team 7, Gugu Team, Avengers and littleSOTONGS with a clean 2-0. It is also well noted that the teams they defeated contain at least one OC member, so my OC group chat was filled with awe and surprise of their skills and victory.

From surface, Harapan seemed ordinary: only their captain najmuddin and Afif were level 50s. syamin is in his late level 20s but is amazingly good at slaying. Rais was the last and latest addition, and he’s only ONE week into the game. We would later learn that captain najmuddin is actually part of the police force in real life. What happens when a police officer coins strategies in Splatoon 2? Apparently, it results lots of victory in a form of team synergy.

Harapan was like the black horse, the unexpected final boss. True to their namesake, waiting for them to start was akin to waiting for Malaysia’s GE14 votes to be tallied (their matches were delayed for an hour due to prayers, and was again further delayed due to connection issues). And yet, true to their namesake, they defeated almost everyone in the loser brackets much to everyone’s surprise.

If Avengers had won, we would expect a tough fight with some confidence that we could win. But Harapan threw every prediction out of the window, so the only way to find out who won was through the battle itself.

8) Finals - First Set

When the time came, Low was suffering from disconnect issues. As such, slap, louhai, Furi and I proceeded ahead.

It was terrible. I felt as if I was locked by their range. They were never alone, and the missiles kept coming. The whole match resulted in our first tournament loss:

Our team went on a state of panic. Everyone demanded for Low to come, poor connection be damned. Furi and Low were the pillars of slaying, so if both of them were on, everything should be okay, right?

What resulted was a close match but a loss: 

Harapan won.

9) Finals - Second Set

What almost everyone had forgotten is that this tournament runs on Double Elimination format, meaning everyone gets a second chance, also meaning Tofu team had one more attempt. NCY and I had to stop everyone from dispersing in order to proceed to the Final match.

However, Tofu took a hit in the morale: to louhai, Furi and Low were invincible, and he felt like the weakest link. He wanted to be subbed out so that slap could play and turf, but the four of us rejected that idiotic and paranoid notion (”because bby”, I wanted to tell him, “one does not turf with Dynamo”). For the past week, we have seen louhai worked hard, and we trusted louhai with our backs. If we were to compare to ink brush’s sneakiness and Dynamo’s AoE, we needed the former more. Even slap could see that.

(At that moment, I took an internal hit in my weapon choice and skills as well. I chose NZap to better support my teammates in turfing as well as to give louhai and slap the freedom (hah, pun unintended) and pressure to kill, but this comes with an exchange on my ability to aim and kill more efficiently. If I had stuck Tri-Slosher, would things have changed? If I had more practice on aiming, would we not have suffered those loss? If I had took ranked more seriously, could we have won...? 

Unbeknownst to my teammates, I was really conflicted, but louhai was freaking out, and that itself gave me the strength to be strong.) 

Except, we were unfortunate to have gotten Walleye Warehouse as our next map. Walleye Warehouse is a narrow place with tons of alleys and tight spots, and very little place to run. In short, it was a terrific place for Tenta Missiles and long range users. I tried to sneak, but my poor judgment and aim got myself killed. louhai managed to snuck past last minute, but it was too late:

The second match would be the decider. If Harapan won, they would be champion. If Tofu won, then we may have chance to win the overall tournament.

“S’ok let’s do our best.” was what I imparted. 

As if they took it literally, Low changed back to his main weapon Dapple Dualies Nouveau. Furi and louhai returned to their Octobrush Noveau and Inkbrush Nouveau roots respectively. If Nouveau is a real brand, they ought to sponsor us as their spokesperson. 

Moray Tower is one of the oldest maps, appearing in both Splatoon 1 and 2. It is an interesting map with two tall buildings with narrow paths and a rather tight middle. It is by no means as constricted as Walleye Warehouse, but it allows for a lot of ambushes and backdoor attacks, and with harder-to-aim Tentas. 

In a sense, the map was advantageous to us: Low charged forward as if he owned the territory, louhai followed behind and did what he does best-- sneaking and ambushing unsuspecting peeps, Furi was a mixture of defensive and aggressive play (while assisting me with Tenta), and I did what I usually do best a.k.a support (except with much more confidence as Moray Tower is a familiar territory). It also helped that one of my favourite songs, Riptide Rupture was playing, so I was especially pumped.

The middle was controlled well, with Low and louhai invading their tower and slaying most them. Harapan was thrown into a disarray as they were not able to charge their specials fast enough. All in all, we secured a victory in this one:

At long last, the final match. If everyone was sleepy beforehand, they were definitely awake after this match. Whoever wins this would be crowned champion. 

When Manta Maria was chosen, I was relief. The ship is spacious with plenty of place to climb. It will be hard to aim Tenta Missles in this one, but it will also be easier to charge them. it also allows a few opportunities for backdoor attacks, which Low and louhai could use.

With well wishes from the OC, and an encouragement threw to the team... we proceeded towards the final battle. 

Unlike other teams, Tofu Team did not do voice chat during matches. This was due to a majority of us using hotspots, and we wanted the connection to be fully utilised in our matches.

And yet, during the penultimate and final battle, it was as if there was an unspoken agreement between us. That Low and louhai would charge forward, that Furi would maintain a defensive position in the middle, that I would be entrusted in the turfing of our base.  

The final battle that felt as if all gears have connected, a continuous dance between us where everyone watched each other’s back. It was our unspoken synergy against their trained synergy. 

We pincered our enemies and got pincered in return. I aimed my Tentas at them, and was aimed in returned. We killed our teammates’ slayer and got slain in return; an endless cycle of reacting, splatting and turfing...  

Three minutes flew, we got our results:

West Mountain Tofu is the champion of Ink Your Heart Out Tournament!

P.S. Full recording of the both Final Sets can be seen here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/268577433

9) Overall Results

10) Aftermath

I woke up the next day with a huge migraine from the lack of sleep. I was also greeted by tons of positivity and congratulatory messages by others.

Yes, Tofu team received much congratulations, mostly thanks to the goodwill that louhai garnered with the community as well as my subtle connection with the OC.

Speaking of louhai, he made a HUGE heartfelt thank you Facebook post to the OCs and quickly befriended every other players on Switch. This man has continued to form connections and hone his skills in hopes to become a role model for the players of his state. He has big dreams for Johor community, so I doubt he would stay as a Tofu... Or perhaps he would make a Tofu Team version 2? Regardless of his choice, I wish him best of luck, as it may be a little hard to get us “past champions” together.

For one, slap is not a dedicated player. He has moved on to Detroit: Become Human as soon as the tournament ended.

Secondly, it would be difficult for Low to join due to some complications.

With Low gone, and the fact that the OC actually needed more assistance, I would like to focus more on assisting in the development of Splatoon 2 Community and its events.

On the other hand, Furi was in for a long haul. louhai’s heartfelt post made her admitted that she had been a solo bird in Splatoon 2, that she was so close to quitting yet decided to give the tournament a try. She was tremendously glad to have found us, and we were tremendously glad to have adopted her. It was without a doubt that Tofu team was happy to have her, that I was happy to have gained a friend in her! The fact that her workplace is 10 minutes away from my house means meeting up with her is relatively easy, heck, we actually met up for dinner that Sunday evening to celebrate our victory.

The group chat for Western Mountain Tofu remains for a more Spla2n-centric discussion, group-play invitations and Salmon Run hostings. 

On a final note, I made a plea on the rewards towards the OC-- as all five of us had done battle, everyone in the team deserved a prize, so could the OC kindly request an additional eshop card from the sponsor...?

The request was approved by the sponsors, and our Splatoon 2 life continued oh-so-peacefully.

END

[elliotthezubat]

DEATH CITY DAYS CHAPTER 12

as our hero’s make vacation plans, unknown forces begin to move. and two sisters reunite with lost family..

Kid: (holds her hand) "Thank you for listening. I think it is very important that we are careful, and I...Stocking, I would love nothing more than to have a child with you. But I want to be ready." stocking: i do too. Kid: "..." (hugs her) "I love you." stocking: i love you too, kid. Kid: (pulls back, strokes her face) "Well, onto other topics: you have done great work on your new bedroom." stocking: thanks. i made it a mix of my room back at my dad's and my old apartment. Kid: (smiles at photographs in her room) "Perhaps we should have your father over for dinner." stocking: maybe, but he's busy right now. Kid: "Oh?" stocking: but we could spend some time in here for now. KId: (smiles, holds her hand) -in her room is a desk, a bookcase with a reading area, a walk in closet, her bed, a dresser, a vanity, and a TV with a dvd/bluray player as well as a wiiu- Kid: "Quite a variety of items. What would you like to do? Read together? Watch TV? Play a game? Talk?" stocking: well, i did just get some new games as a roomwarming gift. Kid: (smiles) "Can I be your Player 2?" stocking: hehe~ Kid: (takes a controller) "Which game would you like to play?" -they ended up playing splatoon- Kid: o_o "Must...make...every...floor...symmetrical..." stocking: hehe~ --Then an opponent inks his floor-- Kid: "...Ffffffffff..." (blasts the enemy away, then throws down an ink bomb to fix his patch of land) stocking: *smirks* Kid: "Must...cover it all...with ink!" (smils) "There. This spot is finished. How much more do I have?" (stares at his map) o_o "Oh boy..." stocking: hehe~ Kid: "How do people play this game? My weapon is so erratic at painting all of the floor..." stocking: here, like this. *she shows him* Kid: "...Oh, okay..." (fires his gun as she demonstrates) "Hey! That is easier!" stocking: great job! Kid: (blushes a little, smiles) "Th-Thanks...Well, care to team up against some people online?' stocking: sure. -elsewhere- Black Star: (serves ramen and drink to Tsubaki) "Enjoy!" tsubaki: why thanks. *she smiles* <thanks for the meal> Black Star: "Right back at ya!" (sits down to his own bowl--which he scarfs down very fast) "I hope you like the meal..." -later- Black Star: "...Tsubaki? What did you think of that lesson today?" tsubaki: ./////////. -her ponytail turns into a blade- Black Star: (cringes, backs away a little) "J-Just curious!" (holds up his hands) "I-I learned a lot today! That's all! Just wondering whether you did!" (backs up more) tsubaki: y-yeah... *her hair changes back* Black Star: "G-Good..." (rubs back of his neck) "Nygus had given me the sex talk...repeatedly. Having to act like a nurse all the time..." tsubaki: yeah. Black Star: "Tch. It's like she thinks I'm going at it like a rabbit or something. Some trust..." -elsewhere- Hiro: (sitting on the stage in the DWMA auditorium, reading some lines) "Jeez...Marlow just is not as good as Shakespeare." eternal feather: um.... h-hi hiro. Hiro: "Oh! Um, hey, Eternal Feather. H-How are you?" eternal feather: alright. i thought you went home already. Hiro: (nervous laugh) "I wanted to practice some lines for the next play. It's hard sometimes at home, so I try to practice where I actually am going to perform. Kind of silly, huh?" eternal feather: i dont think its silly. it makes sense, as to familiarize yourself with your surroundings. Hiro: (smiles) "How about you? Why are you still here after school?" eternal feather: i just finished as the secretary for the therapy sessions. Hiro: "Oh, really? How's that work?" eternal feather: it works pretty well. i think it helps the other students too. Hiro: "I think it would. You thinking about going into therapy?" eternal feather: i...i'm not really sure yet. Hiro: "I think you'd be good at it. You're helpful talking with people." eternal feather: m-maybe.. .////. Hiro: (stretches) "I'm about done practicing tonight, and I told Mom and Dad I was going to get dinner on my own tonight. Have you eaten yet?" eternal feather: i did save a bento for later... Hiro: "Oh, okay..." (stomach rumbles) "Heh. I guess I better go get dinner..." -elsewhere- Meme: "Mio, would you like some tea?" mio: sure.... Meme: "Goody! I've been having trouble sleeping again--not sleep-walking, just tossing and turning. So I thought sleepytime tea would help." mio: ah. Meme: "Do you have trouble sleeping? Any nightmares?" mio: usually just insomnia. Meme: "Aw, that's no good." (deposits the teabags into the hot water) "I hope this tea helps you sleep tonight. Maybe you'll get some good dreams!" mio: maybe... Meme: "Or maybe you need something else: you ever sleep with a stuffed animal?" mio: no, that's for little kids. Meme: (giggles) "Well, I'm older than you, and I would love to have a try sleeping with a stuffed animal--if it helps me sleep, all the better! Or would you rather just hug a pillow to help you sleep?" mio: maybe... Meme: "When I was younger, I used to sleep in my mother's bed, and she would wrap her arms around me, and I felt safe there..." (smiles sadly) "I miss that." mio:................ Meme: (sighs, rubs her eyes) "Well, here's hoping we both get some sleep tonight." (holds up her teacup to toast to her and Mio) -the next morning, elsewhere- Patty: (exits the shower, smiling happily) "All done, Sis!" liz: alright. Patty: (goes to her room to get dressed, and passes Kid and Stocking) "Morning!" Kid: *yawn* "Morning..." ("That video game tired me...") stocking: zzzzz.... Patty: (blinks) "She's still asleep?" Kid: (pushes her shoulder a little) "Stocking?" stocking: *yawn* mhmmm.. Kid: (smiles) "Wake up, Sleeping Beauty..." (kisses her cheek) stocking: *her eyes flutter open* Kid: "Hi..." stocking: *she snuggles his arm closer* Kid: "Sleep well?" Patty: (shrugs, exits to her bedroom) stocking: yeah. Kid: (rubs her back a bit) "Thanks for a great game last night." stocking: no problem... what day is it? Kid: "Wednesday, I think." stocking: ah. Kid: (stretches) "Hope it's a good day." (looks around the room) "Have you liked it? Is there a bathroom with your room?" stocking: yeah, its really nice. Kid: (smiles) "I'm glad. Want to wash up?" -elsewhere- Giriko: (staring at himself in the mirror) arachne: fixed up your body, i see. Giriko: (smiles) "Had to. Was lucky I could move..." arachne: *chuckles* it was just beer gut. Giriko: (pats his stomach) "I probably still drink as much...just work out a lot more." -he still looks more or less the same- Giriko: "Think I should shave?" arachne: *she kisses his cheek* as long as you're fine with it. -elsewhere- soul: *he wakes up screaming* Black Star: "Soul?!" soul: *panting* f...fuck..... Black Star: "I could hear you screaming from outside. Almost ripped the door off before I realized I had your spare key." soul: oh.....................damn.... it was another nightmare again.... Black Star: "...Maybe you should see someone..." soul: the dream......remember the london incident with free?.... i saw maka die in front of me there...... but she had this weird orange crystal impaling her..... Black Star: "Man, I'm sorry...Wait, isn't an orange crystal already 'weird'? Was there something else about it?" soul: when she fell to the ground..... i saw that weird girl....kohaku.... with her hand out with this shit eating grin on her face... Black Star: "That's weird...I think it would help to talk with someone about this..." soul:.......... Black Star: "...Well, get dressed. I'll make you some breakfast...and we can talk more, if you want." soul:......yeah....... -where to look around- [] kitchen [] bathroom [] living room [x] maka's room Black Star: (glances at Maka's door...sighes...) "I wonder how it looks now...since she's been gone." soul: ................... [the room looks frozen in time, with maka's jacket folded neatly on the bed.] Black Star: "..." (pats Soul's back) soul:..... *gets a text* fuck...this fuckin..... *ignore* Black Star: "Work?" soul: no. the other meister i had temporarily. she's such a pain. Black Star: "Oh. I don't know much about her. Why is she contacting you?" soul: just to annoy me as always. *chuckles* remember those times when me and maka had those fights, like on the bridge? well, she's like that....24/7. Black Star: ("Hmm...Maybe Soul needs to be fighting more: at least if he was just arguing with this girl, he wouldn't be only pounding his fist into Arthur's face...") "Well, what does she say to annoy you? Why not just block her number?" soul: i've tried to, but she keeps making new accounts. i should get a restraining order on her or something. Black Star: (looks at the phone, reading...) [text from 'hell bitch'; YOU HAVENT EVEN CALLED ONCE! WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING YOU IDIOT? WE HAD MISSIONS MONTHS AGO!] Black Star: "...Dude, have you told her that you're not doing missions with her anymore? She acts like you two are still meister and weapon officially...Wait, have you even told the DWMA that you two aren’t partners anymore?" soul: yeah, but she's delusional. Black Star: "Hmm...Get that restraining order. I don't want to stop by your apartment and find out she's got you tied to the wall or something." (returns the phone) "What you want for breakfast?" soul: you know what....fuck it.... *he gets out some black coffee* i need this. Black Star: (nods) "Better add some protein and carbs to your meal--give you some more energy. Maybe you can take a nap when classes are over today." soul: yeah... Black Star: (cooks some eggs, bacon, and serves it with some orange juice and an apple) "Eat up, dude." soul:....thanks. Black Star: "..." (smiles) -at school- Harvar: (looking over bulletin board) kim: hey harv, how's it going? Harvar: (shrug) "Bored. Thought I'd look at missions in case there was something interesting." (solemn) "How are you?" kim: doing alright for the most part. Harvar: "Good. ... Ox keeps wondering if you are okay." kim: *sigh* of course. i'm doing fine. Harvar: "I will give him a detailed report as to that effect." (taps on the bulletin board) "You see this mission?" kim: *she examines the board* Harvar: "Some queen over in Europe needs help containing a werewolf. Offering a lot of money, too." kim: well, i think i can help on that~ looks like.... Harvar: "Small area near Germany. But a werewolf? Why would they be causing problems?" kim: who knows. Harvar: "So, you taking that mission?" kim: looks like. -and so- Black Star: "Yahoo! I get to fight another werewolf!" Jacqueline: -_- "No one asked you to come..." eruka: how are we getting dragged into this? Free: " 'Cause I'm a werewolf. And if you didn't come, I'd probably get lost--given my sense of direction." eruka: ..... (thinking: what are you, the werewolf ambassador?) -///-; Free: (sniffs) "Woof! And this werewolf has _not_ bathed! I think they went that way!" (points to the left path of a forest) -after a while, they arrive at some ruins of a building- Free: "The scent ends here..." Black Star: (looking around) "I don't hear anything..." kim: ........ Jacqueline: (points) "Um, anyone else notice the giant pile of bones? With flesh still on them?" eruka: *gulps and sweats* ox: *hurk* --Scratching heard-- Harvar: (turns to the sound) "That's not ominous in the least..." kilik: ok, get ready... *HOWL!* Free: "Oh, rude!" kim: ok.... take it nice and easy now. --A bone is thrown at Kim's head-- kim: OW! oh what the fuck?! --Slobber falls upon Eruka from above-- eruka: *SCREAMING* WHY?! --Eruka is seized by the wrist, by a metal claw-- eruka: h-hey!! kim: !!!! --Alone pulls her upward, sniffs...but he has metal shoved in his nose-- Alone: "Tell me...do you smell good?" eruka: Q_______Q;;;;;; Free: "Hey, bro! Let her go! She's all stringy anyway!" eruka: D : < Alone: (sneers) "Then she'll be an appetizer..." (opens his jaw over Eruka's head) eruka: !!!!! kim: *flies up and kicks alone in the jaw* Alone: "Grrowr!" (tooth knocked out) "What the hell?!" eruka: d-dieh- kim: dont mention it, pay back later. Black Star: (wielding Tsubaki) "Sorry, Fido, but we have to put you down." Free: -_- "Dude, I'm right here. That's just hurtful." Alone: (dashes at Kilik) kilik: *jumps+dodge* Alone: "Grr?" ox: hyah! *slashes with harvar* Alone: (he is almost furless--so he has some of his hair cut off) "Damn it!" (clutches Ox by the throat) "Baldy!" ox: gack! Harvar: (zaps electricity at Alone, causing him to release Ox) "You okay?!" ox: *cough cough* im ok. Alone: "The hell are you doing with these humans, Brother?" Free: "Passes the time..." (transforms and tries to bear hug Alone) "A little help here, Eruka!" eruka: right! *gives free a srength buff* Free: (chuckles) "Handsome." (slams his fist into Alone's snout) Alone: "Ouchie!" (slaps Free in the face) "That hurt! I was just going to eat you all!" (points at Kim) "Can I eat her?" kim: *she flips him off* Alone: o_O (growls, barking as he rushes at Kim) Free: "Hey!" (tries to hold Alone down, but he slips loose, coming at KIm) kim: uhh sit boy! Alone: (leaps up to come down on Kim...) kim: *jumps away* i said sit! Alone: (slashes at her) "Stand still, prey! I'm gonna gobble you up!" -kim's jacket gets slashed- kim: THAT WAS A NEW JACKET YOU PRICK! Alone: (spits out the fabric) "Tastes cheap." kim: *aims jackie and sends a fireball at him* Alone: "Crap!" (flame to the face, as he clutches his face) "My face!" kilik: yeesh. Alone: (uncovers his face--the metal has melted) "Witch!" kim: *rolls eyes* Alone: "My face! I'm already bald, scrawny, and now you took away my looks!" (slams his foot to the floor) "Fine! Then it's time I release _them_!" eruka: i have a reeeeally bad feeling about this. --The ruins shake, as something crawls from under the floor--biting at Ox's legs-- ox: OW FRICK! --Giant ants. Giant freaking ants-- Harvar: o_O "Oh, fuck no!" kim: WHAT THE SHIT?! Harvar: (starts firing electricity at random while shrieking) "GET AWAY! BURN THEM! AH! AHHHHH!!!" Free: "...Huh. Don't see that everyday." Alone: "Ha ha ha! Enjoy the buggies!" (tries to escape...) kilik: *punches alone in the spine* nah. Alone: (Scooby voice) "Ruh-roh..." (collapses) Free: (laughing, petting an ant) "Aw, what a cutie! Eruka, look! Aren't they adorable?!" (the ant is biting his hand...hard...) eruka: O_______O;;;; Jacqueline: "Free, keep one as a sample to take back with us! Kim, incinerate the rest!" Free: (hugs his ant) "No one is hurting Free Junior!" Free Junior: (bites Free's ear...) kilik: ..... *sweatdrop* (thinking: i fear for their future children.) Harvar: (sobbing, blasting indiscriminatingly at ants...) "I. HATE. BUGS!" kim: so you and jackie have something in common then. Jacqueline: (frowns) "At least I'm not pissing my pants over it..." (incinerates another ant) "But these things are creepy...Let's get this over with, drag the werewolf to the Queen, and collect the money." Free: "Hey!" Jacqueline: "The _other_ werewolf." Free: "...Oh." -and so- Harvar: .\\\\. kilik: dont worry, we wont tell anyone. kim: at least _they_ wont Harvar: (frowns) "How much is this going to cost me?" kim: weeeeellll~ Harvar: -_-; Jacqueline: (eyeroll) -in the shadows- ????: this is quite a development... what should we do? ???: "He's going to want to know about this. You know how obsessive he gets with every little detail." ???: yeah. ???: "And she'll want to know, too. Let's get back..." -later on, back at the academy- Kid: o_o "What happened to you?!" kim: tl;dr. ants. big ones. Patty: "What, no uncles?" liz:.................................................... Patty: "...Too corny? I'm not trying to..._bug_ you!" -ba dum tish- liz: PATTI! Patty: "No need to be so _antsy_!" liz: patti stop. Patty: "Now, now, there's no need to make a mountain out of an anthill!" Kid: (tying a handkerchief together, as he approaching Patty...) liz: why are you doing this? Patty: "Just can't let these jokes..._fly_ by! Ha ha ha--" liz: no! --Kid puts the handkerchief around Patty's mouth, tying it, then tying her hands together with another one-- Kid: "No. More. Puns." Patty: (muffled screaming) liz: thank you. stocking: well seems your sister wasnt _ant_icipating that! Kid: ._. liz: stocking why would you betray me like this? Patty: o_o tsugumi: *chuckling* Anya: "...Philistines." Kid: (pats a hand on Stocking's shoulder, whispers) "I would bound your hands together and cover your mouth...but doing so here would be inappropriate..." stocking: *griiins* -that night she would be on the receiving end of a whip- Kid: (chuckles, whispers) "Later..." (to everyone else) "Let's get back to studying, please?" (picks up Patty over his shoulder, taking her to class) Patty: (mumbling angrily, trying to kick herself loose) -later on- Patty: (glaring at Liz) "Vengeance. Will. Be. Mine." liz: sure sis. Patty: "You won't know when. You won't know where. You won't know how. But I assure you, it will be glorious." -after a while, elsewhere- Yumi: (relaxing in a bathtub) "Ah..." maid: do you need anything? Yumi: "Would you mind turning on some music? Something relaxing?" -she turns on some classical music- Yumi: (smiles, as she massages her belly) "Good music, yes, Little One?" -the baby seems pleased- Yumi: "Wait until you are here with your father and me. There is so much music waiting for you." (tearing up a bit) "And so much love for you..." -elsewhere- Giriko: (looking out the window) kirika: whats up with you? Giriko: "Nothing. Just thinking about...the future." kirika: with arach-errrr 'charlotte' here? Giriko: (eye twitch) "Y-Yeah..." kirika: !! s-sorry. 7-7;; Giriko: -_- "Just...one day at a time...So, Squirt, what's been going on in your neck of the woods?" kirika: same as usual. folks decked out the nursery. my loser brother's girlfriend moved in with us, so thats a thing. Giriko: (chuckles) "Hilarious. You do anything to mess with him and his lady?" kirika: soon. -she loosened the screws on kid's bed- Giriko: (smirks) "Let me know how that goes..." (pats her back) "Come on. I feel like sparring a bit." kirika: alrighty then *cracks knuckles* bring it. -elsewhere- Kid: (puts the last dishes into the kitchen cupboard) stocking: that was delicious~ Kid: (smiles) "Father is quite good at cooking. He doesn't do it enough..." stocking: unlike my dad, haha. Kid: (kisses her cheek) "He tries." stocking: yeah. Kid: "Well, that takes care of my chores, and I have the evening free. How about you?" stocking: looks like~ Kid: (holds her hand) "Any plans for you, my busy lady?" stocking: maybe some snuggling~? Kid: (kisses her other cheek) "I'd love that." -they enter his room- Kid: (shuts the door, locks it...and stands there, placing a soft kiss on her lips) stocking: mmmm~ Kid: (pulls back, strokes her cheek...) stocking: why dont i give you a show~? Kid: (smiles) "Oh? What kind of show?" stocking: sit down and you'll see~ Kid: (strokes her cheek, down to the tip of her chin, then tickles a bit) "Very well..." -when he sat down, a small creak was heard- Kid: "???" stocking: *she starts to undress down to her underwear- Kid: (smiling, as he feels himself getting hard...) stocking: *she crawls on top of him* Kid: (leans forward to kiss her lips...) -CRASH- -the bed falls apart- Kid: "Ah!" (the back of his head falls against the mattress) stocking: ahh! *she lands on top of him, her chest squishing his face* Kid: o\\\o (flails his arms..."I don't want to die like this!...But..." closes his eyes and sighs with a smile..."There are worse ways to die...") o\\\\\\\\\\\o (flails again) stocking: *she gets up off him and looks around.... she tears up* Kid: (blinks) "St-Stocking?" stocking: *cries* i'm such a fatass! Kid: o\\\\o "No you aren't! Why would you ever think such a thing?!" stocking: i broke the bed! Kid: (frowning, looking around, while still feeling really turned on at seeing Stocking...) "That doesn't make sense in the least! I know we ordered the sturdiest bed possible! You could put three elephants in it and it wouldn't break!" (slaps a hand over his mouth, as he realizes what he just said) stocking: Q~Q *PUNCH* -later, after stocking calmed down- stocking: *knocks the bathroom door* kid. are you ok? Kid: (sitting on the edge of the bathtub, holding a cloth to his forehead to stop the bleeding) "...I'm fine." stocking: *sigh* i'm sorry for punching you and getting mad at you... turns out the screws were loosened. Kid: (lifts his head up) "What?" (rushes to the door, throws it open) "Loosened?" stocking: *KNOCKED OUT BY DOOR* ow..... and yes. Kid: D: "I'm sorry! Sorry sorry sorry!" (picks her up--and hugs her) "You beautiful goddess--you are not fat. I told you so." stocking: kid.... *she pats his head* Kid: (kisses her forehead) "I want you to be happy in your own mind, body, and soul. Whatever you want, I want--because it makes you happy. I love you." stocking: *she smiles a bit* t-thanks... Kid: (smiles at her...then sees the bed) "So, I have three guesses who messed with the bed..." stocking: patti and kirika being on the list. Kid: (nod) "Third candidate? Doesn't seem like Liz?" stocking: no, black*Star isnt here...maybe that weird kid, gordo? Kid: (shakes his head) "How would he get in? Like Kirika would ever invite him in..." Kid: "Maybe it was only one of those two...unless we can think of another suspect." -later- Patty: T_T "Why would you think I would do that?!" -elsewhere- Harvar: (looking at items at the grocery store, when he sees...) "Oh, Soul." soul: sup dude. heard you had a mission recently. Harvar: "...Yes. Do you know where the bug spray is?" soul: yeah, in the gardening isle. Harvar: "Thank you. Um...How are you?" soul: alright.... !!! ah shit its her. -a girl with pink hair and skull earrings enters- Harvar: " 'Her'?" soul: excuse me. psst, akabane keep her distracted, will you? Karma: "Tch. Fine. You owe me, though." soul: fair enough. girl: *taps her foot* Karma: (stares at the girl, putting on a sincere-looking smile and assuming a pleasant voice) "Pardon me, ma'am? Do you require any assistance?" girl: yeah hi, is soul evans here? Karma: "Sorry, he's not available today. I could pass along a message the next time I see him." girl: oh really? well i'm sure i saw him in the window. Karma: (smiles) "Must be your eyes. Tell me, ma'am, have you had your eyes checked recently? We have a wonderful optometrist here who does free eye exams--and we have a sale today on glasses: buy one pair of frames, get the lenses for free!" girl: exCUSE me? is this some kind of joke? WHERE. IS. HE? Karma: (keeping the pleasant smile) "He's not available. May I take a message?" girl: *she grabs his collar* tell him to answer my calls and emails and to stop ignoring me! soul: *cringes* Karma: (keeping the pleasant smile...but his voice chills) "You let go of my collar, or your next ride is in the back of an ambulance." girl: !!! how dare you! do you even know who i am asshole? i'm motherfucking Veronica Willson, DWMA student and heiress to the Willson company! Karma: (wraps his fingers around her wrist, tightening his grip) "I am Karma. And I do not care how much money you have, rich girl..." (the smile turns into a sneer, his eyes narrow) "...let go of me, or that ambulance will be a hearse." girl: !!! manager: ok, time out, whats going on here? Karma: (resumes his pleasant smile, letting go of Veronica's wrist) "Sorry, sir. I was rather excited to tell our customer about our sale on eyeglasses this week." manager: *he saw everything* really? well great work on that. *smiles* veronica: actually i was about to call you, where the hell is soul? manager: soul? white hair, sharp teeth? if so, i hear he's on a mission in russia. Karma: ("Sigh...I should have lied--but I didn't want Soul to pop up and undermine my cover...") veronica: *ugh* excuse me, i have a plane to catch. oh, the service here sucks anyway! *she slams the door and leaves* manager: *sighs* wow that was scary. Karma: "You just covered for Soul, sir. That is surprising." soul: um...t-thanks sir, for doing that. manager: no problem, i know what its like having an ex girlfriend like that... long story short, she messed me up preeetty bad. soul: thats not how it is! Karma: (" 'Ex-girlfriend'?") -in the back room- soul: yeah, so thats the situation. Karma: "Hmmm...Maybe you should call the cops on her." soul: i might have to get an investigation on it... i had to get my phone worked on because of her. Karma: " 'Worked on'? Did you tap it?" soul: took it to a geek squad, she apperantly bugged it. Karma: "She's insane. I should have just dragged her out of the store." soul: i'll send a report tonight. -elsewhere- Yumi: "Death, have you seen Kid?" lord death: he's in the study, why? Yumi: "He and Stocking still seem troubled." lord death: hmm... well, kirika did fix the bed so.... -study- stocking: *she's comforting kid* we should sleep in my room for a while. Kid: (nods) "Keep the door locked...maybe even add or change the locks." stocking: *she nods* Kid: "..." (hugs her) "I'm sorry." stocking: i forgive you kid. Kid: (holds her) "Thank you." -after some time, and veronica is transfered to another branch- Black Star: "Bet you're feeling relieved, Soul." soul: yeah.... looks like i'm not going to russia anytime soon. Black Star: "Hope not. If you ended up there, she'd probably tie you to a wall and make a shrine to you out of your hair." soul: ......................dude what the fuck. Black Star: "What? You saying she wouldn't? If I was a crazy stalker, that's what I'd do." soul: dude, tmi. tsubaki: O_O;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;; Black Star: "Stop looking at me like that! I said it's what I _would_ do! I'm not a crazy stalker!" soul: >_>;;;;; -elsewhere- Patty: "Hey, Sis? Guess what I've been doing?" liz: what? Patty: >:3 (shoves her hands on Liz's abdomen--and her hands are freezing cold) liz: *SCREAMS* Patty: "Ha ha ha!" (tickles with the cold fingers) liz: PATTI NO! STOOOP! Patty: "I shoved them into the freezer just for this purpose! I'm not letting go for a bit!" (shoves hands along Liz's neck) liz: IYAAAA! TT~TT Patty: (lets go, laughing) "Revenge is a dish best served cold!" liz: Q~Q Patty: "Now we are even!" (holds out her hand to shake Liz's) liz: you're gonna buzz me, arent you. Patty: (frowns, removes the joy buzzer from the palm of her hand) "Kill-joy." -elsewhere- Anya: "Oh, Tamaki, there you are." tamaki: nyah? oh sup, whats new? Anya: (hands over a Tupperware container) "Here. I made some cookies in the dorm, and we had so many extras, that I am giving some to a few people. These are for you and your squadron." tamaki: oh. thank you. Anya: (holding another container...with a fancy bow on it) "You're welcome." tamaki: *she nods and exits* Anya: (blushing...) "Okay...I can do this...Just giving it as a friend, that's all..." --Anya spots her target...and he's talking with Shinra-- shinra: dude, there's no way that's going to work! Arthur: "Come on, I can't go to a museum exhibit by myself--I'll look like a loser." shinra: oh, as if you dont already? Arthur: -_- "First, rude. Second, are you telling me you are not interested in the history of medieval swords?" Anya: (overhearing...she peeks at her cookies...which are in the shapes of dragons and swords...) shinra: i have other stuff to do, i promised to help the commander check stock on supplies. Arthur: (grumbles) "Fine. I guess I'm on my own." Anya: (blushing as she walks up behind Arthur) shinra: ??? *watching* Anya: "A-A-Arthur?" Arthur: "??? Oh, Anya. Hey." Anya: o\\\\o "THESE ARE FOR YOU!" (shoves the Tupperware at him) Arthur: "...What are they--?" shinra:.... *JAWDROP* Anya: "COOKIES!" Anya: o\\\\o "..." Arthur: ._. (opens...blushes) "Oh...dragon-shaped cookies..." Anya: "G-Ginger..." shinra: .................................................................................................. wat. Arthur: .\\\\\. "I-I like ginger. Th-Thanks." Anya: "...WELL, GOOD-BYE!" (runs--and slams into someone) shinra:.......ow......... Anya: (backs up) "S-Sorry!" (bumps into someone else) "S-Sorr--" (blushes) Arthur: (catches her) "You okay?" Anya: o\\\\\o "MUSEUM! EXHIBIT!" Arthur: "Uh..." shinra: oh my god...anya are you dying? Anya: "I AM NOT!" (tries to push Shinra away--and ends up punching him in the face) D: Arthur: .___. "This is either awesome or frightening." shinra: ow why! Anya: "SORRY!" (takes his hand) "I'll take you to the nurse now! Goodbye, Arthur!" (drags Shinra, goes around a corner--but he is too slow, and ends up slamming face first into the wall) Anya: D: ("Tsugumi did not say it would be this hard!") -elsewhere- --Two Ant-Persons enter an abandoned church...-- grimoire: and what do you have to report? Ant-Person #1 ("Anthony"): "Alone was apprehended by the DWMA." grimoire: *sigh* unbelievable, and typical for that fleabag. Anthony: "And...the DWMA took one of your ants." grimoire: *glares* what? Anthony: "...A werewolf adopted it. As a pet." grimoire: oh? Anthony: "Yes...to research the ant's properties, powers...who knows what else." grimoire: *grumbles* well, encountering the DWMA was inevitable... looks like war is on the horizon. Anthony: "We have alerted the soldiers, sir. Merely give the orders..." grimoire: once i report to her highness, i shall do so. *he goes underground* Ponera: (smiles) "Hi, Grimoire! What news do you have to report?" -he explains the situation- Ponera: (clutches her ant plushie) "...They took...one of our ants?" grimoire: seems so. Ponera: "...I am tired of hiding in the shadows. I want our dominion back. I want our world back. And I want my ant back!" grimoire: i understand. *he holds her hand* and we will. Ponera: (blushes a bit) "Good. Send orders to the troops." grimoire: *to the troops* send a battalion to the germany branch. Anthony: "As you command." grimoire: send one to the france, spain, and Italy branches for good measure. Ponera: (sneers) "Just wait, Death: we're coming." -later- Stein: (staring at the ant in his lab) "Eruka...Do you notice anything about this creature?" eruka: well, besides the fact is a giant ant thing? free jr: *ant noises* Stein: "Yes. Aside from having a far sturdier exoskeleton, much more than the ratio to its size, I cannot determine its other properties. What magic does this creature have?" eruka: that's what i've been trying to find out. Stein: "You don't recognize it?" Stein: "You don't know what kind of magic it has?" eruka: hmmm.... ........... hmmmm.. Stein: "Sigh...Great. Some magic we can't even figure out...must be a pretty old magic." eruka: hmmm... maybe i should see if i can get an expert from the witch world... Stein: "That may help. Who were you thinking?" eruka: hmmm.... i-i'll find someone. Stein: "...Okay." (guides Free Jr back into their pen) eruka: ...... Stein: "Let me know when the expert arrives. I'll get to work on other projects." eruka: alright..... (thinking: free's busy, mizune has her job, and i dont want to go alone!) Stein: (opens books, begins reading...including one on "toddler care") -and so- Akane: (staring at Alone in his jail cell) "What was this werewolf trying to do, Nygus?" nygus: we've been interrogating him, but he's only attempted to bite at us.....he bit off sid's arm. Sid: -_- "I'm waiting for it to be reattached." Akane: "Perhaps he needs to be convinced otherwise...We can try interrogation...or...'charms.'" kinuta: HAH sorry, i dont date pooches. Sid: "That's surprising, since you are already a bitch." kinuta: D : < clay: OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHH!!!!!!!!! *slamming his hand on the table* Akane: "Perhaps if that witch assisted us, her conditions in her cell would be less grim. Maybe a change of clothes? New shampoo? Better food?" kinuta: a proper dicking? nygus: no. Sid: "I'm sure there has to be something that would improve your time here. You know you aren't getting out. You know on the outside that no witch is going to help you, not after your actions. So, what would make life better in your cell?" kinuta:....a working shower and some decent clothes. Sid: "Nygus, can that be arranged?" nygus:....very well. Sid: "Okay, witch: get ready to work your magic on that werewolf." -after she is locked, with both chained to the other side of the table- kinuta: so, what were you doing in a decrepit building? Alone: "Man, you are really pretty..." kinuta: yeah i know. so, are you gonna answer the question or not? Alone: "Hmph. I was in that decrepit building because no one would go there. Duh. Hey, your voice is really pretty, too." kinuta: fitting for your name. now, about those little ants... what were those doing there, huh~? *winks* Alone: *blushes* "Um...Well, I can't do the work on my own. And they are good at building tunnels..." kinuta: tunnels for what? Alone: (frowns) "I tell you, I might as well be dead." kinuta: oh~? Alone: (blushes again) "These are powerful people...a powerful witch." kinuta: really~ do tell~<3 *wink* Alone: (red face) "An ant witch...who needs the tunnels to get in undetected, traveling through the underground." nygus: ant witch? Alone: "Yeah...Ponera." nygus: ponera? *she looks at sid* kinuta: ponera huh? i think i heard the name from my mother, but didnt she get wiped out? Alone: (smirks) "Guess you'll find out." kinuta: cant you tell lil ol me~? *she presses her chest together, flashing her cleavage* Alone: "..." (wolf howl) "Sh-She's alive! Really alive! Still up and kicking with a ton of ants and an axe to grind against humans--and the DWMA!" nygus: !!!!!! Alone: (cackling) "You'll all fall! How are you going to fight back when you can't even stand on the very ground beneath our feet falling away from you?! You're all going down!" nygus: alright. -they both went back to their cells- kinuta: did it work? Sid: "It worked. The shower installation will finish tomorrow morning, and your new clothes will arrive then, too. Good work, witch." kinuta: i have a name you know. eruka: hi, um.... is kid on the campus? Sid: "Oh, hello, Eruka. Yes, Kid should be in the Death Room." (thumbs at Kinuta) "You can tell him that _Kinuta_ just got us a lead on this werewolf and his ant." eruka: awesome! so who is it? Sid: "Some ant witch named Ponera." eruka: sounds familiar. i'll go now.... *glances at alone* ...... ._.; Alone: (cackles, licking his chops at Eruka) eruka: O-O;;;;;; Alone: "Come back, Little Red Riding Hood! Let's get closer!" eruka: no thank you! Alone: "That charm witch got closer. If that wimpy werewolf isn't doing it for you, come on back my way!" eruka: *cringes and exits* (thinking: so says the very malnourished wolf.... i'm not even _wearing_ a red hood!) Alone: *chuckles* "Hey, Zombie Guy! What reward do I get for that information?" Sid: "You're still alive, aren't you?" (shuts the other cell door, keeping Alone completely...alone.) Alone: (frowns) "Jerk." -in the death room- Kid: "Father, any news on that odd ant Kim and her teammates recovered in Germany?" lord death: actually yes...... -he explains what sid told him over the phone/mirror- Kid: "Ponera?" lord death: yes. Kid: "Hmmm...'underground tunnels'...Father, have you checked the tunnels of Death City?" lord death: we're doing an extensive search as we speak. Kid: (nods) "And I would advise the same in Germany." lord death: i just sent the message out. Kid: "Thank you...Now I guess we have to wait for more information. I'll see what I can read about this 'Ponera.'" -later- -DWMA SHANGHAI BRANCH- DWMA Agent: (studying her nails) agent: Cho? what'cha lookin at? Cho: "Oh! Sorry. I've been distracted by this new nailpolish...the color seems off." agent: 'hihana violet', must be a bootleg of hibana's new nail polish out. Cho: "W-What?! I thought this was authentic!" agent: where did you get this from? Cho: "This very nice vendor at the local bazaar. She said it went great with my eyes." agent: hmmm.... *looks at their pager* ah, looks like the boss wants to speak with me. Cho: (still studying her nails) "Yeah, okay..." -in the boss' office- agent: you called for me? Cho: *still studying her nails* boss: there have been reports of people in the slums behaving oddly and attacking people. Cho: *starts to sweat a bit...* "Is the A/C even on in here?" another agent: yeah, its on... kinda chilly.... boss: the odd thing is, when we apprehended some, their nails- Cho: *takes off her jacket* "Huh..." (shakes a bit) "I'm sweating, and got the chills..." (shaking a bit...as something forms along her eyeball...) other agent: m-miss cho? are you ok? Cho: (convulsing...panting...) "I-I-I..." (slams her fist on her desk) boss: ??? <cho? what's gotten into you?> Cho: "Get back!" (shoves the boss away) boss: ?! agent: cho? whats wrong? Cho: (panting, panicking, and then...transforms her arm into a blade) agent: c-cho?! Cho: "H-Help m-m-me..." (screams, slices at the Agent) agent: *changes arm into a spear blade and block the attack* ?!?! Cho: "P-Please!" (she feels her body getting warmer...and so is her blade...) -elsewhere- Traitor: "Lady Shaula, we have turned another one." shaula: an excellent job. hmmm.... looks like a DWMA brat... this will prove useful~ Hibana: (opens her fan, starts fanning herself) "Delightful...I was hoping we would possess one." shaula: *writing down notes* side effects include...chills....and sweating... Hibana: (chuckles) "An odd mix of symptoms. Do the victims also run temperatures?" shaula: that depends, but the first batch seems to be working smoothly. the first 'bootleg' batch anyway~ Hibana: (pouts) "I was hoping that their strength would increase, and that their abilities would manifest. After all, in this batch, we had included some material from my specimens..." shaula: lets just keep watching for now. -elsewhere- Meme: "And then I heard Anya tripped Shinra as she escorted him to the nurse's office!" tsugumi: ouch. Meme: "But get this--she asked Arthur to go out with her to the museum!" tsugumi: ehhh?! ao: oh? Meme: "Maybe she lost a bet." mio: she'd have to. Meme: "What do you think, Tsugumi? Would Anya and Arthur be cute together?" tsugumi: hmmmm.... i'd give it about 60% probability. Meme: "At least we know now why she was baking those sword and dragon cookies." (smiles) "So cute!" -elsewhere- Giriko: "Ha ha ha! And the whole bed just fell?!" kirika: yep, and kid got punched in the face.... she did forgive him though. Giriko: (laughs louder) "That's hilarious! You know how much I'd have to pay to get my bed broken and get punched in the face?!" kirika: O_O .................................. Giriko: "So, how much punishment did you get from your new mommy and daddy?" kirika: they made me fix the bed. Giriko: "That's it? Man, if you were my kid and pulled that, I'd laugh--then make you do hard labor in the front yard for a month." kirika: well albs is cleaning toilets for bangin kim's mom. Giriko: "...He's being punished for _getting_ laid? What the fuck?" kirika: she did kinda try to kill a bunch of people so... Giriko: "Not like he helped her--not on purpose." kirika: keep in mind, this is albs we're talking about..... he's not the most smart person. Giriko: "True." (sips on a glass of water) "Man...I could go for a beer right now." arachne: *she enters with some liquor* kirika: hey charls! Giriko: o_o "Is that booze?!" arachne: *she nods* Giriko: (stands up--and hugs her) "I love you so much!" arachne: !! *blush* Giriko: "It's not every woman who'll bring booze to a guy!" arachne: ^^; Giriko: "Well, let's drink up! Here, Kirika, let me pour you a glass..." -elsewhere- Patty: "Hey, Stocking--what's that in your locker?" stocking: hmm? *she looks* ?? --It's an envelope addressed to her, in Kid's handwriting-- stocking: *she chuckles and opens it* --Inside is an RSVP ticket for "A Relaxing, Invigorating Evening (with Dessert)." Location: Your bedroom. Time: (left blank to be filled in and returned) )) stocking: *she chuckles* kid you dork. Patty: "What does it say?" stocking: oh nothing~ Patty: "...Well, okay..." (pouts) "I don't get any envelopes in my locker..." -later- --In Class-- Kid: (seated at his desk) "Ah, Stocking! How are you?" stocking: great~ *she slides him the letter.* Kid: (smiles, blushing a little) "You received it? Did you complete it?" stocking: maaaybe~ -time; whenever you're ready~<3- Kid: (smiles) "Tonight? After dinner?" stocking: sure. Kid: "Then it's a date." (lets his hand rest over hers) -later- Patty: "Sis, have you picked your classes for the fall?" liz: yeah, yours and kid's too. Patty: (smiles) "You're so organized! What did you pick?" -liz picked history, child care, and fashion design as her courses- --Patty decided to add drawing as one of her courses— liz: so what are you picking, kiddo? Kid: "I'm going to take advanced drawing and a poetry class." liz: ah. -stocking would take advanced culinary/baking and sword fighting classes- Kid: "I'm happy with the class schedule. I'm surprised I was able to fit so many classes without conflicts." liz: wow. Kid: (smiles) "I will miss sharing so many classes with you and Patty." liz: well we cant coddle you _all_ the time. stocking: seems we have a lot of classes together kid. Kid: "I'm glad for that. Which ones?" -poetry, history, literature, cooking, tactics, etc- Kid: (Charlie Brown squiggle smile of happiness about being in poetry with Stocking) liz: hehe. Patty: (sees the hearts fluttering around Kid's head) "Uh..." -later- Kid: (finishing the dishes) stocking: alright, now you said you had something planned~? Kid: (smiles) "I'll just need an hour to set things up in your room...But in the meantime, I have something for you..." stocking: oh? Kid: (hands her a giftwrapped box...) "Enjoy..." stocking: ?? *she opens it* --Inside is a new 3DS-- stocking: awesome! *shiny eyes* Kid: "I hope it keeps you occupied for an hour. Now then, may I have an hour in your bedroom to get everything set up?" stocking: you may~ Kid: (kisses her lips lightly) "I will see you in an hour..." -later- Kid: (waits for Stocking to knock...) stocking: *knock knock* Kid: (calls out) "Come in." -she enters- --The room has low lighting with candles around the room (but positioned so not to fall and cause a fire). The bathroom door is open, with more candles obviously in there. The room smells sweet. The bed has rose petals along it. There is a cart with a robe, slippers, towels, and bottles of lotion. And Kid stands, in just black boxers and a black bowtie.-- stocking:......... *stoic face+nosebleed* Kid: (shuts the door, locks it, holds tissue to her face) stocking: so~ how shall we start~? Kid: (smiles, gestures to the cart) "Care for a massage? You can change out of your clothes and into the bathrobe." stocking: i would love that... though the robe wont be needed~<3 Kid: (puts a finger to her lips) "It builds the anticipation..." (winks) "Go into the bathroom and change out of your clothes and into the bathrobe...and into something else I left for you in the bathroom.~" stocking: ok~ *she goes in* --Stocking takes the bathrobe with her into the bathroom...and in there is a pair of see-through black silky panties and bra. With it is a card...-- stocking: .///. *she opens the card* --The card: "You are so beautiful in whatever you wear--and these panties may be the death of me. Maybe this will give you some ideas..." Along with the card is a gift card to a lingerie store-- stocking: oho~ --Kid waits for Stocking to change...-- stocking: well~? what do you think~? Kid: (looks at her in the bathrobe) "As I said..." (traces his finger along her neck) "No matter what you wear, you are beautiful..." (kisses her cheek) stocking: hehe~ Kid: (tracks a finger along her robe, which hugs along her hips) "Shall we begin your massage, madam?" stocking: *she nods* Kid: (guides her to the bed, turns her around, tugs a bit on the robe's collar, and kisses her neck...and reaches down to untie the belt around her waist...) stocking: mmm~ Kid: (gently, slowly, pulls down the robe off her shoulders...letting it fall to the floor...he's stares at her beauty) "My God..." stocking: impressed~? Kid: "Yes..." (traces a finger along her bra strap, as he stares at the sheer, translucent, silk panties...) "Do you like the underwear?" stocking: yes, its really nice~ Kid: "They complement you well...Please, lie on your stomach..." stocking: ok *she does so* Kid: (lays a towel over her panty-clad backside, keeps her bra on...and slowly drips lotion on her lower back...) stocking: ooh~ Kid: (smirks) "This lotion is designed to luxuriate the skin...pull out the tension..." (begins to massage it along her lower back, as he whispers into her right ear) "...and it is great for other purposes..." stocking: *she licks her lips* Kid: (puts a bit of lotion along his hands, rubs them together, and massages her legs) stocking: *sighs blissfully* Kid: (continues massaging for a few minutes, easing the tension out of her...his fingers approach her bra) "This is in the way..." stocking: *blush* Kid: (unfastens the bra...easing down the straps but leaving it on her, as he now massages her shoulders and upper back) "Tell me, have you felt a lot of tension in your shoulders?" stocking: yeah, especially when i study. Kid: (massages along her shoulders) "I wish I could carry that weight on my shoulders for you..." (rolling out a knot in her back) "Anything I could do to help with your studying?" stocking: maybe studying together? Kid: (moves to her lower back) "Yes, let's do so..." (removes the towel, revealing her backside...and puts lotion onto her thighs to begin massaging) stocking: ooh~ Kid: (continues massaging her thighs...) "Your legs are wonderful..." -elsewhere- Black Star: (sips on his milkshake) "So, Soul, feel relieved that Psycho Ex-Meister is off in Russia?" soul: yeah. hopefully she becomes a bitch-cicle! tsubaki: yeah... she was not the most pleasant. (thinking: HELL YEAH GOOD RIDDANCE!!) Black Star: "...So...Any meisters you thinking about pairing up with?" soul: actually, i dont want to. Black Star: "...Oh. Um...So, you'll be a one-man weapon wrecking machine?" soul: guess so, i mean, if justin can do it without any hassle, then so can i, right? Black Star: (smiles) "Right." tsubaki: ^^ Black Star: (stretches) "Well, that was a good meal. See you at school tomorrow, Bro?" soul: sure thing. Black Star: "Cool--night!" -the next morning- --Stocking's bedroom: clothes everywhere, candles extinguished, an empty tray where a delicious cake Kid made has been consumed-- --Kid also installed a fridge for Stocking for desserts~-- stocking: zzzzz..... Kid: (sleeping, wraps his arms around Stocking's waist) liz: *she looks in*.....*sigh* Patty: (looks in, whispers) "Yikes...Did a hurricane blow through here?" stocking: ???? o///////o h-HEY! GET OUT OF HERE! Kid: (sits up--sees Liz and Patty) "Ah!" (cups Stocking's breasts to cover her up) stocking: o////////////o liz: .......................... Patty: .\\\\\. Kid: o______o "I am scared...Do I let go, or not?" -BWAM- liz: U///U# Kid: (upside against the wall, nose bleeding, no boxers on...) stocking: *puts a compress on his head* Kid: "I had that coming..." (too concerned to bother covering himself up...) -after this nonsense- Patty: (makes bacon and eggs in smiley faces for Kid and Stocking) "Sorry about earlier." liz:.................................................... >>;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;; Kid: (large bandage in the center of his forehead) "Thank you, Patty. I forgive you." (glances at Stocking...) -meanwhile, iris walked in on shinra as he is getting into the shower....he was only in his boxers- stocking: .////. Kid: "...I'm sorry to you as well, Stocking." stocking: i-its fine. Kid: "...I just wanted last night to go well..." Patty: :( stocking: and it did. *she smooches his forehead* Kid: (smiles--then winces at the bandage on his forehead) "Owie!" stocking: hehe~ Kid: (smiles meekly) "Well, I guess we had best get to school..." -at school- Anya: o\\\\o Arthur: .\\\\\. shinra: .////////////////. iris: .////////////////////////.;;;;; tamaki:........ well say something dammit! Anya: "I DIDN'T MEAN TO KNOCK OVER THAT SUIT OF ARMOR!" Arthur: "I WASN'T TRYING TO HOLD YOUR HAND! WHY WERE YOU FREAKING OUT SO MUCH?! AND WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU, SHINRA?!" shinra:............n-nothing.... iris: i didnt see anything.... i didnt see anything.... i didnt see anything... Arthur: "...What was this 'nothing' that you didn't see, Iris?" iris: oh dear! i left the phone on i have to go fix that! *exits* Anya: "...What did she do, walk in on you in the shower?" shinra: *nervous smile+sweats* Anya: o\\\o "I just remembered--I have to go to class. Bye, Arthur!" (runs) Arthur: "...So Iris thought what you had was 'nothing.'" (smirks) shinra: shut up mr 'right handed' Arthur: (frowns) "It was just the one time..." -later- Yumi: (looks into Stocking's room) "Death, do you think our children have major problems?" lord death: define 'major'. Yumi: "Kid's imprint is still lodged in the wall where Stocking threw him out of her bed." lord death: actually that was liz who threw him. Yumi: "Hmm...Maybe they should go to more counseling." (looks at her stomach) lord death: perhaps... Yumi: "...I heard about the report out of Shanghai." lord death:..... this is very troubling. Yumi: "Agreed...I feel useless. I should be back at the East Asian Branch..." lord death: shhh... we'll send spirit to check it out after he finishes cleaning toilets. Yumi: "...I think we need to assign someone else to the East Asian and Oceania Branches. I cannot be there when I am here so often now." Yumi: "A new Death Scythe..." lord death: *he nods* Yumi: (hugs Death) lord death: *he hugs back* Yumi: "..." (rubs his back) -elsewhere- Jacqueline: (sparring with Kim) "You sure you're okay?" kim *pants* y-yeah. Jacqueline: (blocks an attack) "You just seem a little stressed. You're just swinging your arms wildly." kim: *she sighs and sits down* sorry....i'm just a bit on edge right now... what with her being here and all... Jacqueline: (sits as well, hands her a water bottle) "She is contained, and she can't get to you...Except here..." (taps Kim's head) "...and here." (taps her heart) kim:.....say.... how many souls have we gathered? Jacqueline: (sips on her water) "79." kim: ah... Jacqueline: "...You think I'll ever be a Death Scythe?" kim: maybe.... Jacqueline: (finishes her water) "Where would I go? Which branch would be best for me?" kim: who knows... but i'll go with you if it helps. Jacqueline: (smiles) "Thank you." kim: no problem. Jacqueline: (fans herself) "Good workout...You ready for the showers?" kim: yep. -elsewhere- Spirit: T_T "I hate this punishment..." marie: aww. Spirit: (smiles at Christa) "At least this makes my day..." christa: peewee! hehe~! Spirit: p_p "Don't remind me, Christa..." christa: speewee! marie: i think she's trying to say your name! Spirit: "Awww..." christa: speewee speewee! Spirit: (crying and smiling) -later- Meme: (stares at Mio) Meme: "Mio, have you done something with your hair?" mio: its like this every morning.... Meme: "Oh...I guess I haven't paid enough attention...I like it." mio: ..... 7///7; Meme: "I was thinking of getting mine cut...Hey! Why don't you come with me?" mio: uhhh. o-ok. Meme: "Great! Meet me after school." -later- Meme: "Ready, Mio? The salon is just a few blocks from school." mio: *following* Meme: "How were your classes?" mio: alright i guess. Meme: "So many of our classmates are going to college--it's kind of weird how far along they are now, huh?" mio: yeah... Meme: "You think about going into college here at the DWMA?" mio: maybe, but i could never get in... Meme: "Why not?" mio: i'm not the smartest person. Meme: (pouts) "Maybe you just need tutoring..." mio: hmm... Meme: "I could help--I could share my study guides..." mio: well...i guess.... Meme: (smiles) "Good!" (takes her hand) "Here we are! Let's also get our nails done!" mio: uhhh.. Meme: (approaches cashier) "I'll have a haircut, and we'll both be having our nails done." (smiles at Mio) "My treat." mio: .///. Meme: (takes a seat as the hairdresser shampoos and cuts her hair) -later, mio got orange, meme got pink- Meme: "So cute! Here, let's take a pic!" mio: 7///7 Meme: (holds up phone, puts an arm around Mio--SNAP) mio: o////o Meme: "And...Send! Oh, Tsugumi wrote a comment already!" [SpringBird12: so cute! ^v^] [ForgetMeNot: Thx!] -elsewhere- Giriko: (drinking another glass of water) "So, the drinking got so bad at the wedding that I may have done something untoward to Gopher--he's Kirika's boy-toy or something--and ended up getting my ass kicked by, of all people, that guy Eibon." kirika: poor lil bastard still hides behind me. arachne: eibon, hmm? so he's still alive? Giriko: (pours another glass of water for himself) "Yeah, weird, right?" arachne: perhaps....nevermind. -elsewhere- Hiro: "Tamaki! Wait up!" tamaki: nyeh? whats up? Hiro: "Hey. Have you noticed anything weird about Arthur?" tamaki: weird? you're gonna have to be specific. Hiro: "...Good point. Well, he's been really quiet and nervous." tamaki: oh? Hiro: "Yeah. He looks all red and sweating, but he won't tell me what's up. How about you--you have any idea what's going on with him?" tamaki: must of been that failed date with annie. Hiro: "Wait, seriously? I thought everyone was joking they went on a date. What, did Anya lose a bet?" tamaki:..... *shrugs* Hiro: "...So...how do you feel about Arthur dating someone else?" tamaki: nyeh?! w-what do i care? i mean, i have my own problems! its not that i like him or something like that! Hiro: "...So, you're saying you like him." tamaki: o///o s-shut it, nya! Hiro: (holds up his hands) "Okay, okay! Sorry! J-Just...If you see Arthur in trouble, could you let me know? Please?" tamaki: w-whatever! i have to go do stuff. Hiro: -_- "Right. Sorry. Well, good luck..." -later- Patty: "We still on for that road trip to Las Vegas or Salt Lake City?" liz: yep. Patty: "Sweet! When do we leave? Do we have hotel rooms booked? You got any singles?" liz: this weekend, i got reservations for a nice hotel.... wait wha? Patty: "Well, when in Vegas, what else am I going to do? Don't you want to check at least one male stripclub?" Kid: o\\\\o liz: oh my GOD PATTI! >///<;; Patty: (smirks) "You telling me you don't want to see a musclebound stud gyrating his hips in your direction? Stocking, back me up on this!" stocking: eh, i prefer to have someone more...slender. *wraggles eyebrows at kid* Kid: o\\\\\\\\o Patty: "...Eh, whatever floats your boat. What else do you want to do in Vegas, Stocking?" stocking: i guess playing games and attending concerts and shows? Kid: "Oh? Such as a magic show?" stocking: yeah. Kid: "Something like this?" (holds open a hand, then flicks it--and instantly a bouquet of flowers appear, which he hands to her) stocking: woah! haha! kid is this another of your reaper powers? Kid: (blushes) "No, this is just a practical magic trick, just sleight of hand...I used to do a few with Father when I was little." stocking: aww. *she chuckles* Patty: "...You just carry magic tricks in your suit for random occasions? Sis, do you think Kid, like, keeps a rabbit in his pants or something?" liz: patti no. we dont need a repeat of the snake pants incident. Kid: "..." (ﺧ益ﺨ) Patty: "Oh, so you're saying the snake in Kid's pants already ate the rabbit." -later, elsewhere- Harvar: "Hello, Ox. How was your visit?" ox: it went well. i brought some new flowers for her room, i think she likes them Harvar: "That's good. How are the nurses and doctors tending to her?" ox: they're doing pretty well too. Harvar: (nods) "Okay...I made some dinner. Just need to heat it up. Also, I think Kim seems...bothered." ox: yeah...... maybe we should do something for them? Harvar: (nods) "Aside from money, what does Kim like?" ox: hmmm... i think she likes playing games at the arcade. Harvar: "Maybe give her tokens? Or do they have gift cards?" ox: we'll have to see. Harvar: "Too bad you can't afford to buy an arcade machine for her. But knowing Kim, she'd never leave her home..." ox: *sweatdrop* Harvar: "Hmm...I suppose you could put an arcade machine in our apartment--then you'd have an excuse to invite Kim over." ox: hmmmmm *glasses shine* Harvar: o_o; "Um, Ox...?" -elsewhere- Jacqueline: (shudders) kim: hmm? you ok jackie? Jacqueline: "Y-Yeah...I just sensed something...foreboding." kim: oook? Jacqueline: (shakes her head) "Anyway...Have you picked your college classes yet?" kim: still looking through them. Jacqueline: "Best hurry, or else those classes will fill up and you will be stuck in a useless or frustrating class." kim: alright alright, haha. -later- Kana: "Mail, Tsugumi." tsugumi: ah! my package arrived! Kana: "Oh? From whom?" tsugumi: i ordered something online. Kana: "Hmm..." (pulls out a letter for herself--and her eyes widen) "Uh..." tsugumi: hmm? what is it? Kana: "L-Letter from family..." tsugumi: oh? (thinking: i thought her parents died....?) Kana: "Th-That makes no sense. Why would someone do this?" (tosses the letter) "This is some sick joke." tsugumi: ...... *she examines it*..... (thinking: perhaps i should bring this to sid...) Kana: (sniffs loudly, rubbing the back of her hand over her eyes) "What kind of a person does that?" tsugumi: ..... *she hugs kana...* Kana: (cries for a bit before calming down...) -that night, miss misery would spend the rest of the evening with her- -elsewhere- Black Star: (groans, covered in sweat) "Okay, I'm done with my pre-dinner workout. Hey, Tsubaki, you need the bathroom? I'm going to take a bath." tsubaki: go on ahead. Black Star: "Thanks!" (takes off his shirt as he leaves for the bathroom) "Oh, what's for dinner?" tsubaki: we're having some paella tonight. Black Star: "Cool!" (enters the bathroom, closes the door behind him, and bathes) tsubaki: *humming* Black Star: (finishes pre-bathing, goes into the hot water...) "Aaaaaah..." (muscles relax) -knock knock- tsubaki: who is it? Patty: "It's us!" liz: hey~ tsubaki: oh, hey girls! i'm getting dinner ready, we're having paella tonight. Patty: (looks at Liz) "Can we?! Can we stay over for dinner?!" liz: well.... *sigh* alright, let me just call kid and let him know you're staying over. Patty: "Squee!" Black Star: (hearing voices outside the bathroom) "Wonder who's visiting..." -later- Black Star and Patty: (asleep on the floor with big, stuffed bellies) liz: i should bring her home now. thanks for having us over. tsubaki: no problem. -at the mansion- Kid: (sighs) stocking: zzzzzz..... Kid: ("She fell asleep on the couch..." Smiles. Picks her up and carries her to her room.) stocking: zzzzz.... Kid: (lays Stocking in her bed, puts the sheets over her, and enters the bathroom to prep for sleep himself) stocking: .....zzzzzz.... Kid: (finishes brushing his teeth, exits the bathroom, opens Stocking's dresser where she keeps some of his pajamas...) -what does he find?- Kid: (pulls out his pajama pants--and finds underneath...) o\\\\o ("...That is the largest vibrator I have ever seen...") stocking: *sleeping* Kid: (He also finds an unmarked box, but he thinks better of opening it... "I'll just change..." Takes off his clothes and slips into his pajamas) -the next morning- Kid: "Zzzz..." stocking: *she yawns and looks at kid.*...... (thinking: so cute.) *she kisses his eyelids* Kid: (smiles...) "Stocking..." stocking: wakey wakey, handsome~<3 Kid: (yawns, opens his eyes) "Hello, beautiful." stocking: i got something for you~ *she goes to the drawer* Kid: o\\\\o; "O-Oh?" stocking: *she takes out the box* here you go~ -it was a new shirt to replace the one kirika ripped- Kid: (twinkling eyes) "Th-Thank you!" stocking: no problem~ Kid: (kisses her lips) "I love you." stocking: i love you too, kiddo~ Kid: "I can't wait to put this on!" -later- Kid: (in his new shirt, smiling widely as he walks to class) soul: mornin' Kid: "Good morning, Soul. How are you?" soul: doing pretty good. excited for the trip. you? Kid: "Same. It'll be an excellent way to cap off the last summer before college. How is work?" soul: doing good. gonna have to let the boss know about the trip. Kid: (nods) "How are you packing? I was planning to have some casual clothes, some more formal attire for a date, a pair of swim trunks for the pools..." soul: some casual clothes, pajamas, swim trunks, other stuff. Kid: "Oh, right, pajamas..." (thinks what he would do without pajamas--eyes widen, blushes) "And, um, I better make sure to leave extra space in my luggage for any souvenirs." soul: yeah, same here. Kid: "What's the first class today, anyway?" soul: looks like math. Kid: (glances at Stocking...) "Math?" stocking: *grumble* -at lunch- Kid: (pats her back) "You survived." (holds up a spoonful of ice cream to her) stocking: *nom+pouts* QnQ Kid: (smiles..."So cute...") "Tasty?" stocking: *nods* Kid: "Care for another spoonful?" stocking: QxQ yes please. Kid: (smirks) "Say 'Ah...'" stocking: aaaah~ Kid: (passes the spoon into her mouth, letting the ice cream fall onto her tongue) stocking: mmm... mmmmmm~! <3 Kid: (laughs a bit, has a spoonful for himself) "What is the next class?" stocking: music i think. Kid: (smiles) "Excellent." -later- Kid: (reviews his sheet music) stocking: hmm. a duet piece, huh? Kid: "Hmm...Interesting...I wonder how it will sound." soul: .................. Patty: "Soul? Um...Is your brother the teacher for music class now? Or is someone else?" -after school- Kid: "Stocking, you were amazing!" stocking: aw thanks. Kid: "Have you considered performing with the Academy's music club?" stocking: do you mean the light music club, band or the orchestra? Kid: "Maybe light music or the orchestra." stocking: i dunno, i usually do music as a small hobby. Kid: (holds her hand) "If you ever need an audience, I'm there..." stocking: ^///^ Kid: (smiles) "Any plans for after school?" stocking: today or...?? Kid: "Today. I was hoping to finish packing for our road trip." stocking: sounds good. Kid: "Anything we don't have at home that we need for the trip? Anything to shop for?" -elsewhere- Spirit: (collapsed on the floor, conscious but demoralized) "Am I done? Have I finished my punishment yet, Lord Death?" lord death: seems so. now that the punishment is done, you have a mission. Spirit: "My mission?" ("I think the toilet fumes got to me--I can't remember...") lord death: why dont i get you some coffee? Spirit: (nods, sits up) "That would help." -one coffee later- lord death: now, you have a mission in shanghai. our branch there has run into some trouble, and we need you to investigate since yumi is incapacitated at present. Spirit: "...Shanghai? That's...pretty far, sir." lord death: take all the time you need.. Spirit: (nods) "Understood. I guess I'll have someone house-sit for my apartment...I, um...I have something I want to do first. Well, two things." lord death: oh? Spirit: "...Say goodbye to some people..." lord death: ah. well, keep in mind this isnt a permanent transfer, just a quick check up for about a week or two. Spirit: "I know...but in this line of work, you never know when your last goodbye will be...I will be updating my will as well." lord death: ...... Spirit: "Well, I better get to the first of these meetings...I will see you when I return, sir." lord death: of course. Spirit: (nods, turns, departs... "First stop..." Spots someone. "There she is...") "Kim." kim: hmm? oh. hey mr a. Spirit: "Hey...Um, how're you?" kim: alright, you? Spirit: "...I'm going away for a while. A mission." kim: ah. Spirit: "...I just wanted to let you know...and I hope you are hanging in there." kim: i've been managing. Spirit: (nods) "...Have you...tried speaking with her?" kim:............... Spirit: "...That's a no, then. I don't think that's the wrong decision. Take it from...a bad parent, I know when a child has to cut ties with someone like her..." kim: ................ *she hugs him* ............... Spirit: o_o "Um..." (pats her back) "It's okay, Kim." kim: you....you're not as bad as you think you are.... sorry, was that too sentimental? 7_7;;; Spirit: (smiles) "Yeah, that was schmaltzy..." (pats her head) "I appreciate hearing that...If you need anything, call me. I can't answer all the time, but...I'm going to try." kim: t-thanks....d-... n-nevermind.... .///.;;; Spirit: (smiles...) "I don't have to get going yet. I'm going to get lunch...You hungry?" kim: sure. Spirit: "Okay...So, what do you like to eat for lunch here?" -after lunch- kim: thanks for the food. Spirit: (checks his wallet..."Man, she is expensive. T_T ") "No problem! Well, I guess you got to go back to class...Um, I'll see you when I get back, okay?" kim: ok... b-be careful, ok? Spirit: (cocky smile, goofy dad grin, thumbs up) "Definitely!" (bishi starburst) kim: *rolls eyes* see ya. (thinking: same ol' mr a.) --Later-- Spirit: (knocks on Blair's door) blair: coming~ *she opens up* oh, hey spirit. Spirit: (waves) "Hey...You mind if I come in?" blair: come on in. *she smiles* Spirit: "Thanks...How are you?" blair: doing well. nagisa's sleeping right now. Spirit: "Oh..." (sits on the couch) "That's too bad...I'm...going away on a mission." blair: ah... Spirit: "I wanted to actually see a few people in person before leaving..." blair: *she nods* Spirit: "...I'm going to miss being around here. It's been awhile since I've had a mission this far out of the country." blair: yeah....be careful, alright? Spirit: "I will...I have one more stop I want to make..." -and so- Spirit: "..." (leans down to Maka's tombstone) "Hello, Maka." Spirit: (puts a hand on her tombstone, sits there for about an hour...) -silence- Spirit: "...I'm going to be a better person, Maka. Just be patient with me." (rests his hand on the tombstone again) "I miss you. I love you. And I will be back..." -no response- Spirit: (chokes up) "Goodbye..." (turns and walks away) -later, elsewhere- Patty: (folding her clothes into her luggage) liz: ok, that should be everything. Patty: "Yep! Oh, Sis, I want you to take this..." (hands Liz $400) liz: ....thanks sis. (thinking: i'm afraid to ask where she got this.) Patty: "I'm just worried I'm going to bet all our money in Vegas, so I figured you should hold onto my cash for me...You know what, take these, too--" (hands her three ATM cards and eight credit cards) liz: ok. Patty: "Just...don't ask why the ATM cards aren't in my name...and don't tell Stocking I stole her dad's ATM card..." stocking: SHE WHAT?! Patty: o_o "Well, I must be going." (tries to run away) -grab- mephisto: i think you have something of mine. *calm smile+dark aura* stocking: o_o;; Patty: ._____. (holds up a plushie) "You mean this? I won it for you at auction." -later, after the ATM card is returned- Kid: "...Your father did _what_ to Patty?" stocking: she was only in there for about 5 minutes....she'll be fine.... mostly. Patty: (rocking back and forth, wide-eyed) "I saw things that no mortal should see...and they didn't even give me a t-shirt..." -later- --Patty is asleep in bed-- Kid: (passes a hand along her hair) "Get some sleep..." -elsewhere- Anya: "...I'll be going to bed, now." tsugumi: night. ..... (thinking: i wonder if sid found who sent the letter yet..?) Anya: "...Night..." (gets into bed, turns away...a small sob heard) tsugumi: ..... ?? Anya: "I'm an idiot." tsugumi: anya? Anya: "Why did I bother asking Arthur to go with me to the museum?" tsugumi: i dont know what all happened, but i guess maybe you wanted to try knowing him better? the important thing is you tried your best, and i'm proud of you for that, ok? Anya: *sniff* "Th-Thank you...I think I'm going to go downstairs and make some tea." tsugumi: ok. *she follows* --In the kitchen-- Anya: "Here..." (hands her a saucer and teacup) tsugumi: *she smiles* thanks. Anya: (sips...) "So, any news from your friends back home?" tsugumi: they're doing well. Anya: (nods) "Did any mail come for me?" tsugumi: doesnt look like it, unless you ordered anything...? Anya: (shakes her head) "Just curious..." (finishes her tea) "...I guess I'll try to sleep again." -the next morning, elsewhere- Spirit: (holding his airplane ticket, standing in line to board) kami: *reading a magazine* Spirit: "..." (looks back--and cringes) "K-Kami?" kami: !!! *she tries to look away* (thinking: oh god DAMMIT! can i never get away from this idiot?!) Spirit: (approaches) "Um...Hi?" kami: *hides her face in her magazine* what? Spirit: "I didn't know you were flying...Hadn't you left Death City after...that?" kami: well, i was heading elsewhere, but alas, this plane made a stop here... Spirit: "...Oh. Um, where are you heading?" kami: does it matter? Spirit: "...I'm going to Shanghai..." kami: running away again? Spirit: (frowns) "No. Lord Death assigned me to a mission there, as Yumi cannot go." kami: ah.... how is she doing? Spirit: "She's doing pretty well, actually. She seems really ready for having a kid." kami: good for her... Spirit: "..." ("This is going to go badly...") "Um, you aren't going to Shanghai, are you?" kami: no. europe. aka. far far away from you. Spirit: ("Just breathe...Don't get upset...Not in an airport...") "I hope the trip is enjoyable, and I hope to see you in Death City soon." kami: doubt it. Spirit: "...Okay. Well, I better wait at my terminal. It was good to see you..." kami:.......... -elsewhere- Kid: "Zzz..." stocking: morning kiddo~ Kid: (opens his eyes slowly...) *Yawn* (smiles) "Morning, Stocking." (kisses her cheek) stocking: so cute~ Kid: *Yawn* "We have anywhere to be?" stocking: classes, then we leave for the road trip on saturday... Kid: (pouts, small groan, hugs her) "I wish I could stay in bed a bit longer." stocking: hehe~ Kid: (smirks) "Shower?" -at school- Black Star: "Anything we need to pick up after school, Tsubaki?" tsubaki: just some toilet paper. Black Star: (nods) "Nothing else you wanted for the trip?" tsubaki: maybe a disposable camera or two. Black Star: "I think I'll get a few more snacks. How about you, Soul?" soul: sure. might take something to read. Black Star: (nods) "Hey, in Vegas, you up for a magic show?" soul: eh, why not. Black Star: "Sweet! There's this one act, someone claiming to be a witch--but no one really thinks she is, that it's just stagecraft." soul: oh? Black Star: "Yeah. Totally large number of conspiracy theories online, trying to prove whether she is a witch or not. She doesn't release her Soul Protect, but can still somehow perform magic, so no one is sure. Weird, huh?" soul: maybe? i dunno. Black Star: "And maybe check out the pools, too. Impress some ladies..." (eyebrow wiggle) tsubaki: *bonks his head* behave. Black Star: T_T "Just jealous of my awesome flirting skills..." soul: *chuckles* Kid: (overhears) "Best not to antagonize your weapon, Black Star." (to Tsubaki) "What time should we pick you up for the road trip?" tsubaki: we'll come over around 10-11-ish. Kid: (nods) "Stocking said her father's vehicle will be there at 9. I'm hoping to have my suitcase on the vehicle by then." tsubaki: ah. Kid: "Well, I guess we should finish our reading for this class...Hmm...I wonder what our next class is." -later- Patty: "What will there be in Salt Lake City, Sis?" liz: *she checks the travel guide* Patty: "Maybe shops? Or theaters?" liz: they have some mining tours. Patty: o_o "We could find diamonds! Gold! Or maybe it's a mine full of rock candy!" liz: maybe *chuckles* Patty: "Man, if we tricked Stocking into thinking one mine was full of rock candy, imagine what would happen..." liz: oh boy. Patty: (takes out paper, starts drawing a map) "This is my most brilliant prank ever..." (stops) "Um...Do you think Kid will kill me for this prank?" liz:....... Kid: (slowly emerges from behind the couch...) "And why would I do that, Patricia...?" Patty: o_________o liz: O_______________O Kid: > : ( "Have you two finished your packing?" liz: just about. Patty: (nods vigorously, hides behind Liz) Kid: "Good..." (opens travel brochure) "Oh, it looks like there will be fireworks while we're in Salt Lake." liz: ooh. Patty: (emerges from behind Liz) "C-Cool..." Kid: "Vegas should be interesting as well...Liz, can I trust you and your sister will behave yourselves?" liz: yes sir! Patty: (pouts) "What's the worst that we can do in Vegas?" (whispers to Liz) "No, seriously, what can we get away with in Vegas?" liz: patti no. Patty: (pouts more) "What, you saying I can't go skinny dipping in a hotel fountain?" -elsewhere- Yumi: (lying in bed, sleeping) "Zzz..." lord death: *also asleep, holding yumi close* zzzzzzzzz Yumi: (begins to toss and turn...) "Death?" lord death: *yawn* yeaah yumi? Yumi: "I'm hungry. Could you get me some cookies and milk?" lord death: coming...*YAAAAWN* right up.... *he gets up, stretches, and goes to get it, still in his boxers* Yumi: (smirks) "Lovely view..." -once he brings the cookies and milk- Yumi: (munching quickly) "Hmmm...Um, sorry to make you go back downstairs, but could you also bring up some anchovies?" lord death:....ok? -1 delivery of anchovies later- Yumi: (puts anchovies on some cookies, and dips them in the milk) -elsewhere- Kid: *yawn* stocking: still tired kiddo? Kid: (nods) "Not sure why..." stocking: *she picks him up bridal style* come on, time to get you to bed. Kid: o\\\o "Th-Thank you..." Kid: (holds onto her) stocking: *smiles* Kid: "You are so strong..." stocking: almost there kiddo. Kid: (smiles, yawns again..."My strong angel...") stocking: ok, we're here. Kid: (smiles) "Thank you, Love." stocking: any time. stocking: *she lays him down* Kid: *yawn* "Hmmm..." (smiles) "This bed is so comfortable..." stocking: it is...*she lays next to him* and it doesnt break~ Kid: o\\\o "O-Oh..." stocking: hehe~ Kid: "..." (leans forward, puts his arms around her, kisses her lips gently) stocking: mmmm~ Kid: (rubs her back gently as he continues to kiss...) stocking: ah~ Kid: (slips his tongue past her lips) -meanwhile, elsewhere- Hibana: (taps at a scorpion in a container) scorpion: > : ( Hibana: "Tiny, yet dangerous..." shaula: dont mind him. paul gets cranky when he doesnt get fed. Hibana: "...'Paul'?" Hibana: "Hmm...In any case, I would have thought your venom would have stronger control over people already...The side effects are disappointing." shaula: oh? how so? Hibana: "Through my company, I have donated considerable amounts of money to advanced medical companies and hospitals--and I have used those connections to garner results from many of the nail polish customers...Symptoms include a high temperature..." (looks at Shaula) "I think my addition to your venom has an unfortunate effect..." shaula: did they go up in flames or something? Hibana: "No, but I would not be surprised that such is the next symptom." (points at Shaula) "You have to contain it." shaula: alrighty. lets see here... -elsewhere, in the ruins of an ancient and lost city- medusa: *panting* Noah: "Enough?" medusa: aww, getting cold feet already~? Noah: "No, just bored...I feel like I'm always the dominant one..." (smirks) "Don't you desire to have some power?" medusa: *smirks and vector arrows him to the floor* if you insist, honey~ Noah: (cackling) "Yes...Let's see what you can do now...see whether my lessons have paid off." medusa: *she sits down and rubs the tip of her foot against the shaft* Noah: (sighs) "Yes...Tell me, why are you always barefoot?" medusa: snakes dont have feet. Noah: "Not a desire to get closer to the ground?" (smirks) "Or to someone else?" medusa: ............ *steps firmly on the shaft* Noah: o___o "Ah!" medusa: heh~ Noah: (grins in annoyance) "Haven't you considered a more delicate touch to get the results you want?" medusa: with you? Noah: "Heh...How are you going to get off just slamming on my dick?" medusa: like this~ *she changes her clothes into snakes that wrap around her, one of them turning into a phallus that slides into her* ahhh~<3 Noah: (growing harder) "You don't like someone else pleasuring you?" medusa: jealous~? *fondling her own breasts* Noah: (licks his lips) "I am greedy..." medusa: *continues fondling herself with tentacle snakes* ahhhh~ Noah: (licking his lips) "You bitch...Hogging all of that to yourself..." medusa: maybe if you broke free from your restraints... but i doubt that~ Noah: (starts panting, huffing, as he tries to pull loose from the straps..."Good, she is getting stronger...and more cocky. Everything is falling into place...BUT GODDAMN IT, I AM HORNY!") "Come on--stop teasing me!" medusa: too bad~ *she fingers herself* ahhh fuck that feels good~ and so wet too~ Noah: "Fuck you!" (writhing in the restraints) "I could make you wetter!" medusa: oh yeah? just try me~ Noah: "Arg!" (beginning to tear at the arrows...) medusa: ahhhh~ *she squirts, licking some of her juices* Noah: "NO!" (rips out of the arrows) medusa: !!!! Noah: (stands still, erect) "I want some..." medusa: nah. *starts to walk away* Noah: "..." (grunts, turns his back to her, begins to stroke himself) "You fucking bitch..." medusa: *she just stands there, whistling* Noah: "...You want to watch?" medusa: *not answering, still naked* Noah: (turns, facing her, as he continues stroking...gazing at her) medusa: what? Noah: "I remember you begging me to go deeper inside you..." (keeps stroking) medusa: dont recall~ Noah: "..." (strokes more vigorously) "God, you look amazing..." medusa: you just gonna stand there? Noah: "...I want you on me. I'm waiting for you to make the move, Medusa...I want you." medusa: *she lays down on her back before rolling over, shaking her rear* ...... satisfied? Noah: (walks over, lies down alongside...and rubs her backside) "You tell me...I'm following your directions this time..." medusa: heh. if you really think you can make me scream, then prove it~ Noah: "Do you want this...?" (spanks her) medusa: *wince* ah! w-what am i, a 4 year old? Noah: "Not with what comes out of your mouth..." (spanks harder) medusa: ..... hmm... tell you what.... if you can catch me, then you can have your way with me. sound good? Noah: (smirks) " 'Catch you'?" medusa: *she takes off* Noah: "...Damn." (runs towards her) -after about 15 minutes- medusa *she turns a corner* Noah: (whispers in her ear) "Found you..." medusa: !!!! Noah: (his hands wrap around her--and pull her in a hug) medusa: ?!?! .///.; Noah: "What? No arrow through my gut?" medusa: *she elbows him* Noah: (grunts, smiles) "That's more like it..." (tries to grab her again) medusa: *she dodges, punches, kicks until she loses her balance* shit! Noah: (catches her at her lower back...holding her, as he strokes a hand along her face) medusa: .////.# *she tries to bite him* Noah: (brings his lips to hers...) medusa: !!!! Noah: (pulls back his lips) "Surprised?" medusa: s-shut up. Noah: "A deal is a deal..." (he rests his hand along her hip, as he kisses along her neck) medusa: 7///7 Noah: "How shall I pleasure you?" (massages along her lower back, as he kisses the crook of her neck) medusa: bet you cant~ Noah: (places a hand along her right breast, massaging it) "I've fucked you sensless so many times...I know every bit of your body..." medusa: *blush* Noah: (pinches her nipple) "You are beautiful, my serpent..." medusa: mmm! *she bites her lip* Noah: "I've thought so for so long..." (kisses her shoulder, as his other hand slides down her stomach...) medusa: *blush* i know. Noah: (brings his lips to hers again, a bit harder, as his fingers continue to work her nipple and his other hand now reaches for her folds...) medusa: mm-mmmmm.... Noah: (slips his tongue past her lips, and three of his fingers inside) -elsewhere- arachne: *sleeping* Giriko: (snoring) -elsewere- eibon: *working on something*..... *looks around and sighs* seems he's gone to play with his friend again... *small smile* -elsewhere- Spirit: "Zzzzz..." (eyemask over his face, as he lies back in airplane seat) -back at the mansion- kirika: *asleep as mocha sleeps in a kitty bed next to her* Kid: (purrs happily...) -something is sneaking into the mansion- kirika: zzzzzzzzzz........ Gopher: (slowly rises over the edge of the bed, looking at Kirika...) kirika: zzzzzzzzzzzz....... Gopher: (what he is thinking: "Oh, my darling. You are still under the sway of Morpheus, far away from me and yet so near...I hope your dreams are pleasant, and worry not: I will guard you at all times against the shadows of this world. I shall be your angel of light.") (And what he looks like: a blushing, sweaty, nervous boy) kirika: ............. (dreaming about stuff) zzzz stahp hoggin all...t-the crescent rolls....then there ...wont be any for everyone else...y-ya assholeeee... zzzzzzzzzz *drooling* Gopher: (gulps..."At least I know what I could buy her for a gift...") --Gopher stares at her for a long time, still keeping his distance...he backs up a bit, towards Mocha's kitty bed...-- kirika: zzzrt.... thirsty. *she gets up and sleepwalks to the fridge* Gopher: (freezes in place, struggling not to move...) -she returns with a mini-carton of milk, which she proceeds to drink* ahh that was good. *throws the empty carton into the garbage can* Gopher: (hiding behind the bed, trying not to make a sound...and the empty carton hits his head on its way into the garbage can) kirika: back to bed... *she crashes out onto the bed, snoring* Gopher: (sighs with relief, smiles, stands to get up--and trips on Mocha's bed) mocha: *le scratch* Gopher: "Owie!!!" kirika: *still asleep* Gopher: "..." ("For real?! I just screamed and--and--And I must be incredibly lucky..." Then he sees Mocha glaring at him...slowly backs away--then feels his back hit something) -the edge of her bed- Gopher: "Wow!" (the back of his knee hits the bed, causing him to fall backwards...) -right in the bed, his back on her side, making an X shape- Gopher: 8< ("Oh God Oh God Oh God Oh God...I don't want to die!" Tries to slowly ease out of the bed, as he delicately places his arms down to give himself support to push himself out of bed) kirika: zzzzzzzzzzz *drooling* Gopher: ("How is she still asleep?!" Notices the drool...) : < ("I had best wipe that drool..." Removes a tissue.) kirika: zzzzzz..... Gopher: (gingerly wipes away her drool...His ^ frown curls up into a w-smile..."So beautiful...") kirika: zzzzzzzzz *she opens her eye at him* .................. Gopher: OwO;;;;; (sweats, frozen...) kirika:...................... *she gets up and calmly choke-holds him, taking the clock on the night stand* you can read a digital clock, right? Gopher: (suffocating, struggling to nod) kirika: what does it say, then? Gopher: "I can't tell--I think I'm going blind..." kirika: ..... *she lets go* god you're such a wuss... Gopher: (gasps for breath, falls forward--onto Kirika) kirika:............... *PUNCH* Giriko: "Ooooow FUCK!" arachne: ?? Giriko: "S-Sorry. Felt like someone I know just got punched hard in the face..." --Elsewhere-- Gopher: "Ooooww...Why do you bruise me so?" kirika: .......... U,U# Gopher: "Is my nose broken? Am I going to die?" kirika: of the love of- you're fine dumbass. you survived worse. Gopher: "...Oh. O-Okay...M-May I leave now?" -later- eibon: *gives him some tea* Gopher: "Thank you, sir." eibon: do try to be more careful, alright? Gopher: "S-Sir? I-I should not be going into her bedroom...I think I should be punished." eibon: if you insist.... *tiny chop* bad. Gopher: T_T "Thank you, sir. May I have another?" eibon:.... *tinier chop* Gopher: .w. "Thank you!" (tears of happiness) eibon:......m-my child? Gopher: "I never had a good disciplinary figure in my life who cared!" (sobbing) eibon: ..... *he hugs him* Gopher: "T-Thank you...I have appreciated your guidance and mentorship..." eibon: *he nods* you still have much to learn. but for now, i think you need to rest. -the next morning- kirika: ............. .n. Kid: "What's wrong with you?" kirika: nuthin.... Kid: "earlier this morning did not sound like 'nothing': Stocking and I could hear noise from your room." kirika: THATS NOT HOW IT IS! >///////< Kid: o_o "I-I wasn't implying that! ..." (smirks) "So, you feel affection for Gopher?" kirika: DO YOU WANNA DIE?!?! lord death: ok, settle down, settle down. Yumi: -_- "Could everyone please stop yelling..." -at school- kirika: ........ --Gopher is hiding behind a trash can-- marcy: *staaaaaaaare* *hiding behind the trashcan as well* Gopher: :< "Hey, get your own trashcan!" marcy: shhh! *covers his mouth and stares at soul, who is getting a pepsi from the vending machine* Gopher: (grunting, struggling to get released...) soul: ......??? Gopher: (makes more noise, trying to get loose) -later, during class- Black Star: "Man, I can't wait for classes to be over--I want to be on the road NOW!" liz: we should be out by tomorrow morning. Black Star: "But this class is so boring already!" -at lunch- Black Star: (frowning, chalk dust stuck in his hair) "All I said was class was boring--Sid didn't have to throw an eraser at my head." stocking: hehe~ Kid: "You can wash it out of your hair after gym." -at gym class- Kid: "What's up for today? Basketball? Swim laps? Track?" liz: looks like we're doing a marathon run around the city. Patty: "Man, that's going to be exhausting...Don't suppose we can cheat?" -and so- Kid: (sweating, panting) "Quite a long distance...How are you holding up, Stocking?" stocking: doing good. Kid: (smiles) "Good. And you, Liz?" liz: *panting* good. Kid: (looks concerned) "Please take it easy...Wait, where is Patty?" liz: *she points ahead* Patty: (lying back in a rickshaw pulled by Meme) "Faster! You want to take off those last few pounds, right?!" Meme: "Right!" (pulls faster) Kid: o_o "She is so going to get a failing grade in gym..." kim: wow. hmmmmmm.... Jacqueline: "Kim..." -later- Patty: "I don't see why Sid had to punish me." (changes out of gym clothes) "I wasn't the one who was pulling the rickshaw..." liz: at least he was nice enough to delay it till after our road trip. Patty: (grabs her towel, heads to the shower) "Yeah, but a college student in detention? That's just embarrassing." liz: detention served running laps. Patty: (frowns, turns on the hot water for her--and then turns the cold water onto Liz) -later- Kid: "Here are my last books to return to the library before our trip." librarian: ah. you enjoy your vacation sir. Kid: "Thank you..." (passes by a shelf and spots...) "Tamaki?" tamaki: ?! *she looks away* Kid: "??? Are you looking for something?" tamaki: no. *she's reading a book on arthurian legend* Kid: o_o "Please tell me you aren't seeking the Holy Sword." tamaki: the holy sword? Kid: "...He who shall not be named... (ﺧ益ﺨ) EXCALIBUR." tamaki: oh, you mean arthur's stupid beam sword? Kid: "No! That annoying sword that Hiro had! The one that transforms into that albino penguin looking creature!" tamaki: *laughs* what?! Kid: (grabs her by the shoulder, shouting in the library) "He is real! Really annoying! If you see him, run! Run from that abomination!" tamaki: sure... librarian: SHH! Kid: (sweats, whispers...) "Sorry!" (back to Tamaki) "Why, then, look up Arthurian legends?" (pauses) "Why was your first thought Arthur Boyle?" tamaki: *cat tail* sh-shut up! Kid: o____o "O-kay...Well, have a good break..." tamaki: 7-7;; Kid: "Are you doing anything during your vacation?" tamaki: maybe. Kid: "...Ever been interested in visiting Las Vegas?" tamaki: maybe, but if your inviting me, no. i have other plans. Kid: "Understood. Well, good luck with...reading." tamaki: .............. -later- Black Star: (cleaning his locker...and pulls out a brown paper bag that is soggy and growing mushrooms) soul: o__o Black Star: "...You think this is safe to eat?" soul: fuck no. Black Star: (frowns, tosses it into the trash) "Let me see what else is in here..." (pulls out a photograph frame...and looks sad: it's him, Tsubaki, Soul...and Maka) soul:........... Black Star: "..." (finishes cleaning, then sets the frame in his locker so that it is now visible, front and center) "...Remember that day?" soul: yeah... Black Star: "You and Maka were whining at each other all afternoon...then you just were laughing and all smiles." soul: yeah, maka actually threw up from the roller coaster, and i ended up laughing. then she made me ride that spinning wheel... i thought i was gonna die! Black Star: (laughs) "Yeah, you were struggling to stand upright! Almost knocked down Maka!" soul: yeah. it was a good day. Black Star: (smiles, pats Soul's back) soul:..... Black Star: "...I think you should see her before our trip." soul: yeah... Black Star: (packs his bag) "I'm done with my locker. How about you?" soul: getting to it. Black Star: "Need help? I'm really good at keeping things clean!" (the brown paper bag has somehow crawled out of the trash can, slithering along the floor...) -later, after soul cleans his locker- Black Star: "So, anything in Salt Lake City you plan to check out?" soul: not sure yet. Black Star: "There's a cool planetarium there--maybe big enough for a star like me!" -elsewhere- Yumi: (sitting in a rocking chair in the baby's new room) lord death: how are you holding up? Yumi: (smiles) "Okay...Just sore..." (yawns) "And tired." lord death: aww... *he rubs her stomach* Yumi: (blushes a bit) "What do you think she'll look like?" lord death: who knows... Yumi: "Oh, come on--can't you imagine her with golden eyes?" lord death: oh i can see that. i hope she looks like you. *he smiles* Yumi: (sad smile) "I wonder if I will see my family's features in her..." lord death: .... *he hugs her* Yumi: (quiet for a bit) "It's going to be quiet here, with the children going on this trip...Do you worry?" lord death: of course i do. especially given kids... *ahem* condition. Yumi: "...Would you feel more comfortable if they had a chaperone? I know they are too old for that sort of thing...but maybe they don't _have_ to know someone is following them?" lord death: hmmmm.... Yumi: "Someone who can be good with children...who knows enough about Las Vegas..." -later- soul: hey maka... its me again.... --Silence-- soul: we're going on a road trip to vegas and salt lake city... can you believe we're actually gonna be in collage? i just wish.... you were here with us... --Silence-- soul: its weird.......can i be honest?........if you were still here.... after we graduated collage.... i would have asked you to marry me. --Silence-- soul:....*he whimpers and clings to the grave* --Soul feels something along him...like a warm embrace...-- soul: .... ?? --Nothing is there...but a wind blows through a tree, and something familiar feels like it was just there...-- soul:.........well.... see you later... i miss you. --Silence-- -elsewhere- Kid: "What kind of a vehicle is your father providing for our trip, Stocking?" stocking: welll..... *excalibur face* -a large van with an animatronic of mephisto laying seductively on top of - Kid: "??? Are we going to have to do any work on the vehicle before we leave? Does it run well?" stocking: dont worry, it runs well. and its got plenty of space. Kid: (nods) "That's good. Anything else you need to pack?" stocking: i'm just about done. Kid: "Same. I'm really looking forward to this trip...I just hope everyone behaves themselves." stocking: yeah. Kid: (smirks) "Will you behave yourself?" stocking: if i dont, will you punish me~? Kid: (holds her chin) "Yes." stocking: oh~ Kid: (draws her to him, as he kisses lightly on her cheek) -elsewhere- Arthur: (practicing with his sword...) "Damn." (switches back to his dominant hand) "I just can't be ambidextrous..." shinra: dude, it was one time, you dont have to lose your shit over it. Arthur: "You never know when it may come in handy. After all, what if I lost my right arm in combat?" shinra:..... robot arm? arthur: (sighs) "You've been watching too much Star Wars." shinra: TnT Arthur: "You should be practicing as well." shinra: i have! Arthur: "Wouldn't know it looking at you in combat." (continues practicing his sword-work) "Your reaction time seems slow." shinra: alright. here i go! Arthur: "?!" shinra: *he takes off* -elsewhere- Anya: (looking at the sunset...) kim: hey. Anya: "..." (sighs) "The sunset does look nice, but..." kim: but? Anya: "Just feels like something is missing." kim: how so? Anya: "Just feels like something is missing." kim: how so? Anya: (puts a hand over her heart) "I can't believe this...but I think I'm sounding like Tsugumi: in love with love..." kim: ?????? anya are you sick? Anya: "N-No, I'm not sick! I just...wonder whether I should...be dating, or if I'm not interested in boys or girls or anyone...I'm just really confused what I want." kim: hey, if you arent sure, then just take things one day at a time. it takes a while to know who you really are. Anya: (pouts) "I'm just impatient..." kim: you'll find someone. maybe. Anya: (sighs) "Maybe..." ("I'd ask about her love life, but that's a whole complication I don't need to pry into...") "...I don't know...I think about...people I find attractive. And maybe that's all I know: just that I find them attractive, not that I want to go any further than that...Why can't these things be predictable? The sun sets everyday, but I have no idea what to expect in a relationship." kim: hmmm.... who knows. i'm not exactly a love expert. if anything, if it were me, i'd want to be with someone who accepts me as i am. Anya: "That would be nice..." (shudders) "I can only imagine who my parents would want me to marry. The 'regal' type doesn't appeal to me..." kim: hmmm.... what do you think your type is? Anya: "I don't know. Someone...simple. I mean, I don't mean dumb--just someone down-to-earth, practical. Someone who...can pull me back when I'm being too silly." kim: i see... Anya: "...I couldn't even have a good date with Clay: Akane tricked him into it. So embarrassing." kim: try again maybe on your own terms? who knows? Anya: (squirms) "Maybe...Just not now. Now, just watch the sunset." kim: yeah.... -elsewhere- Black Star: "Done!" (holds up luggage...with a shirt poking out of it) tsubaki: *her luggage is more organized* Black Star: "What do you want to do in Salt Lake? Maybe rafting?" tsubaki: sure. Black Star: "Oh, and Kid wanted to know whether there were any stops we wanted to make on the way to Salt Lake and Vegas. We each get to stop at one tourist spot, but no one more than one." (holds up a postcard) "Ogden, Utah, has a one-day arm-wrestling competition! Guess who's going to win that?!" tsubaki: ah. Black Star: "Want to go swimming in Salt Lake?" tsubaki: like rafting? sure! Black Star: (smiles) "Awesome! Good thing I packed some swimtrunks." tsubaki: *she smiles* Black Star: (thinks of something) "Oh, and Olympic Village in Salt Lake City, too! That'll be great! Imagine the cannonball I could make in the Olympic-size pool!" -elsewhere- Kid: (sips on tea) "Thank you for making this, Father. Will you be okay with all of us gone on this road trip?" lord death: we'll manage as best we can. Kid: (sad smile) "Any souvenirs you desire?" lord death: if you can get one of those souvenir collector spoons, i would love one of those. Kid: (nods) "On it." (smiles) "I was thinking of stopping by a magic shop in Vegas...I mean, a stage-magic shop, not magic-magic." lord death: oh? Kid: (nods) "I've...felt inspired lately...Father, I used to not write poetry like I do, draw like I do, perform magic tricks like I do...I'm not ignoring how difficult things can be for me...but I feel happy." lord death: that's wonderful kiddo! Kid: (blushes) "Thank you." -later- Patty: (asleep on top of her luggage) liz: zzzzz... Kid: (sighs) "They tired themselves out." -the next morning- Kid: *yawn* liz: welp, today's the big day. Patty: "Yep! So eat up!" (slams down a stack of pancakes in front of Stocking) stocking: mmm~! Kid: (bites into his pancakes) "Excellent work, Patty!" Patty: *griiiin* -later- liz:.........wow.......... Kid: O_____O stocking: *excalibur face* yeeeeah... Patty: "...Well, now we know where Stocking gets it..." liz: there are many things i wanted to see in my life.... this is definitely not one of them. Kid: (frowns at Patty) "Just...It's a nice gift from Mephisto...Let's just get our luggage on board..." -and so- soul: please tell me that isnt our ride. Kid: "This is our ride." soul: mother of god.... Kid: "Look, it was nice of him to provide us with _anything_." Patty: (poking the Mephisto atop the van) "And it'll fit in in Vegas!" tsubaki: its....nice. Black Star: ._______. soul: i have stared into the abyss....and it fucking winked at me. Kid: "Would you just inside the Mephisto-Mobile already?!" (...) "I can't believe I just called it that..." stocking: its better than what my dad calls it........... Kid: "...Do I want to know?" stocking:.......................'van-service' (BA-DUM-TSH) Kid: "..." (facepalm) Black Star: "Dude, Stocking better be worth it for this..." stocking: ,////,;;;; Kid: (frowns at Black Star, holds Stocking's hand) "She's worth everything." stocking: *she blushes and smiles* Black Star: (eyeroll) "Fine. Let's just get going." tsubaki: awwww. -inside- soul: holy shit this thing is huge on the inside! Kid: "It must be similar to the Death Room spatial manipulation." stocking: well, my dad is called the demon king of time and space... Kid: (nods) "Who will be driving?" -there is a driver up already- Patty: (frowns) "It's like someone thinks we can't go on a roadtrip on our own..." -meanwhile- Yumi: (lying on the couch, reading) kirika: *playing with mocha using a cat toy* Yumi: (smiles at Mocha) "Kirika, do you wish you were going on this road trip?" kirika: eh, i can entertain myself here. Yumi: (nods) "Maybe you and I could do something with your father?" kirika: like what? Yumi: "Well, maybe we could go out to dinner, or go out for the day. Was there anywhere you wanted to visit in Death City?" kirika: *shrugs* Yumi: "Do you like going to the theater? We could see a play?" kirika: eh, too stuffy. Yumi: "A movie?" kirika: nah. Yumi: "...Burgers and shakes?" ("...I really do not know what she enjoys...") kirika:...sure. Yumi: "...Okay." (closes her book, tries to sit up) -later- Yumi: "Which flavor did you get, Death?" lord death: moose tracks! Yumi: "Tasty! I had orange with jalapeno sauce." kirika:............ Yumi: "How is yours, Kirika?" kirika: good. -she had black cherry- Yumi: "...How have classes been?" kirika: same as usual. Yumi: "Which class has been your favorite this semester?" kirika: *shrugs* Yumi: "When I was your age, I enjoyed math and drawing..." kirika: figures... Yumi: "Death, which subjects do you like?" lord death: as a young lad, i was instructed in many subjects, such as foreign language, history, arcitecture, the likes. Yumi: "I'm sure learning architecture helped with building the Academy, yes?" lord death: indeed it did~! Yumi: (smiles at Kirika) "And a lot of my studies helped me be an expert shot and to finish paperwork quickly and properly." kirika:........ Yumi: "...I really liked school...more than, well, being outside of classes..." kirika: ............. Yumi: "..." (starts crying) lord death: sweetie? are you ok? *worried* Yumi: (nods) "I just really liked my classes, I liked studying, but...I felt alone outside of class." (sniffs) "I'm sorry, it must be hormones." kirika: hmph....at least _your_ parents let you go to a decent school during childhood... Yumi: "I-I'm sorry. I didn't mean to ignore what you have gone through." kirika: eh, its like, whatevs. Yumi: (shakes her head) "No, it's not..." (moves her chair--and hugs Kirika) kirika: !?!? Yumi: "We will do whatever we can to provide for you, Kirika." kirika: ..... Yumi: "..." (lets go...wipes away a tear) "How about another burger? I'm still hungry." kirika:...*nods* -elsewhere- Patty: (looking out the window) "Are we there yet?" liz: not yet. Patty: "Man...Isn't there anything entertaining in this sex van?" Kid: "Stop. Calling. It. That." stocking: there is a tv. Patty: "Oh, sweet!" (puts on the TV) "I wonder what's on." -seems to be anime.- stocking: ah. -elsewhere- Spirit: (skimming Mandarin-English dictionary) flight attendant: do you need anything sir? Spirit: (smiles) "Could I have another orange juice, please?" flight attendant: of course sir. *she smiles* Spirit: (returns to his book..."I really hope I can get the accent correct. It's been awhile since I had to speak Mandarin...") -elsewhere- tamaki: ok, this should be the place. ~Cave of Eternity~ tamaki: ok....just a little further now... Fairy: "Oh! Hello!" tamaki: !! ah! huh? a fairy? Fairy: (chuckles) "Why, yes, I am! And you are?" tamaki: .... name's Tamaki Kotatsu. i'm here looking for the holy sword. Mainly to prove an idiot boy wrong. Fairy: "..." (ﺧ益ﺨ) "Oh." tamaki: (thinking: that face again?) so.... where can i find it? Fairy: (sigh) "Just follow the stream to its source--you can't miss it." (shakes head..."Poor deluded soul...") tamaki: ok thanks. *she follows the path* (thinking: heh. soon i'll get to prove that idiot kid wrong, gain glory and power, and arthur will finally notice me!....wait what?) --It gets brighter in the Cavern as Tamaki reaches a pedestal...-- tamaki: wow.... it's.... *ahem* ok.... lets do this.....*she inhales and pulls the sword out* --Removing the sword was easier than expected...-- tamaki: YES!!!! ???: "Congratulations!" tamaki: *victory dance* tamaki: SOON I WILL GET THE GLORY, RESPECT, AND THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS I DESERVE! and arthur.... he'll.... *fantasizing a shoujo romance scene of her and arthur* ???: "Welcome, young one! How good of you to come!" tamaki: huehuehue- huh? --The Holy Sword glows, pulling out of Tamaki's hands-- tamaki: eh-eh?! ???: "Allow me to introduce myself!" ???: "I am the Holy Sword, Excalibur!" --Blinding explosion of light-- tamaki: KYA! *she falls on her rear* owww.... what the heck?! --Standing over her (...not really...) is a short, white, penguin-looking creature-- tamaki: *blinks and tilts head* huh? Excalibur: "Fool!" tamaki: h-hey! Excalibur: "What is your name, young one?" tamaki: !! *she gets up* name's Tamaki Kotatsu, member of the 1st brigade serving under Leonardo Burns! i'm here to prove a stupid boy named death the kid wrong and- excalibur: "My legend begins in the Twelfth Century!" Excalibur: "From the looks of you, you are a Fire Being from the 1st Brigade." tamaki: yes. thats what i just said. Excalibur: "Fool!" Excalibur: "You have come to bast in my glory!" tamaki: ?? Excalibur: "Would you like to hear my heroic legend?" tamaki: look i just- Excalibur: "My legend begins in the Twelfth Century!" tamaki: you just said that- Excalibur: "Where did you come from?" tamaki: like my childhood or just recently? Excalibur: "I was born on the Fifth of December!" tamaki: i didnt even ask when- Excalibur: "Of course, that was before the changes to the calendar, so my Fifth of December is technically your Thirtieth of February." tamaki: there's no such thing as- Excalibur: "That is why everyday is my birthday! Now, then, where are my presents?" tamaki:.... -elsewhere- Hiro: (shudders) hime: hmm? whats wrong bro? Hiro: "I just sensed...something wrong...Really wrong." hime: ?? -back with the group- liz: looks like a tourist trap up ahead. Black Star: " 'The Bottomless Pit'? Dude, let's go inside it!" -later- tsubaki: it was only 30 ft deep... at least there was an elevator. Black Star: "Dude! I could punch the ground into the center of the earth and make a deeper hole! What a ripoff! Hey, give us back our money!" -elsewhere- Arthur: "And that, Lord Death, is why you should have a Round Table in your office." lord death: zzzzz..... Arthur: "...Sir?" (approaches, pokes his shoulder) lord death: snrk geh huh wha? *yaaawn* oh, hello arthur. Arthur: "I have been here for two hours! Explaining why you need a Round Table!" lord death: i get the table itself, though when you started rambling, i must'a dozed off~ Arthur: "...That's very hurtful, sir. I thought my opinions would be valued here." lord death: though i will consider it. Arthur: *beaming smile, gets on one knee* "Thank you, My Lord!" -elsewhere- justin: *he's talking a walk* Giriko: "Hey! Priest!" justin: ?? oh. good morning. *smiles* Giriko: "Yeah, whatever. Look, I, um...I need your help with something." justin: oh? and that is? Giriko: "I, uh, want to try to find a better apartment..." justin: well my home always has plenty of room. Giriko: (blink) "Your home? Um, I'm not looking for a roommate. I, um...I found someone." justin: oh? Giriko: "Y-Yeah...So I was trying to find a place that wasn't so seedy." (smirks) "I mean, I bring my own sleeze wherever I go..." justin: ah. well, i'll see what i can do. Giriko: "You mean it?! Thanks, man!" (hard pat on the back) justin: of course. *after that, he continues on his walk until he spots something* hmm? *he investigates it*.... ah!! -elsewhere- Meme: (wipes her brow) "There! Finished watering the garden!" tsugumi: *humming* Meme: "What are you working on, Tsugumi?" tsugumi: just watering the pumpkins. Meme: "Just a few months until Halloween. I can't wait for the dance!" tsugumi: not sure who i'm going to ask out... Meme: "Maybe a certain man with eyeglasses..." tsugumi: ... o/////o -her pigtails stiffen up- Meme: "?! If you wanted to! N-No pressure!" tsugumi: ./////. Meme: "T-Tsugumi? Do you think I should ask out..." tsugumi: hmm? Meme: "...Mio?" tsugumi: ...totally! mio: !!!! *her foot turns into an axe blade, causing her to fall onto her back* ow.... Meme: o\\\\o "Has she been there the whole time?" mio: i was gardening with you guys....uh... tsugumi: mio-chan! you grew a blade! Meme: o_____o; ("I forgot...Maybe I'm losing memories...") "CONGRATULATIONS ON TRANSFORMING!" (hugs her, then runs away) mio: wha- .//////////. .......................... *NOSEBLEED+faints* Anya: "..." (dumps water can's contents over Mio) "Wake up!" mio: *screams* why. -elsewhere- Excalibur: "Provision #41: Teacups are to be arranged in order from largest to smallest, then by color, then chronologically." tamaki: ............. *her soul is desperatly tries to flee her body* Excalibur: "Finally, you will sign this abbreviated contract, pledging you as my meister..." (shoves a stack of 2,000 pages into Tamaki's hands) "...which you will sign with this!" (holds up a pen--with an Excalibur topper) tamaki:................say, can i see your sword form for a moment? Excalibur: "Aw, you wish to marvel at my splendor once more--of course!" (transforms with a blast of light, his sword form elevating over her, waiting for her hands to reach him) tamaki: *she puts the sword back in the pedestal*...................................... Excalibur: "Um, excuse me, young warrior? What are you doing?" tamaki: *muttering* its not worth it.......its so not worth it....... -later- tamaki:............... Fairy: "Oh, hello! Did you find the Holy Sword?" tamaki: .......................................... what do you think....? Fairy: "...Oh. Yes, that reaction is rather typical. Even the young Shinigami reacted as you have." tamaki: ...... *GLARES* Fairy: o_o "Y-You aren't the first to have tried and failed! There was one boy who managed to be his meister for a few days...but even that boy, Hiro, ended up disowning Excalibur." tamaki: whatever... i'm going home...... i'll take one of these glowflowers as a souviner. Fairy: "Well, I guess it's only fair after putting up with...him." -later, elsewhere- Patty: (asleep in Van Service) liz: so when do you think we'll arrive? Kid: "In Salt Lake? Another half hour." liz: ah. Black Star: "Hey, Stocking? Any tourist traps you wanted to check out?" stocking: not sure. *she checks her phone* --Black Star sees the wallpaper on her phone-- Black Star: "Cute pic of you and Kid.” stocking: *she smiles* Black Star: (glances at Tsubaki...blushes a bit) "So...what kind of tourist traps do you like, Stocking?" stocking: *shrugs* shops, graveyards, supernatural stuff. liz: ^^... O___O;;;; Kid: (smirks, whispers to Liz) "She likes being around Death himself: I got lucky." liz: Q-Q;; Black Star: (whispers to Stocking) "What would you recommend if I wanted to...take Tsubaki somewhere she would like?" stocking: oh? well, i guess gardens and stuff like that? as much as we hang out, i dont know her that well, just a little bit. Black Star: (nods) "Yeah, gardens would be good. Maybe Salt Lake has a botanical garden or something..." stocking: maybe. Kid: (looks out the window) "This is lovely scenery. It's good to see more than just a desert all the time." stocking: *she looks out the window, what does she see?* --There are hills, mountains, and a river running through them. The trees are a vivid green, the sky large and blue.-- stocking: wow... soul: its like that time i went camping when i was in boy scouts. Black Star: (snort) "You were a Boy Scout?" soul: 7///////////7;;; hey, i was like... 5-7 years old during the time.... Black Star: "So, if we need camping expertise, now we know the expert to turn to.  " Kid: -_- "Stop teasing him." Patty: "Zzz..." Kid: (looks at the water reflecting off the river, looks at Stocking) "It is beautiful, isn't it?" soul: alright, but i dont remember much of it.. stocking: yeah... Patty: *yawn* (wakes up, looks out window) "Oh, are we there now?" liz: *she looks at the map* Patty: "So, the sign outside said we are here--" (points at the map) "How far is that from Salt Lake?" liz: about 3 and a half miles. Patty: "Woot!" (accidentally hits a button on the van's wall) "Um..." stocking: *she looks up* OH GOD NO! -she activated boxer's mode- Kid: o_o Black Star: "What the heck is boxer's mode?" -the animatronic is now in its boxers- liz: dang stocking your dad is ripped. stocking: STOP LOOKING AT IT!!! Patty: "...I'd tap that." stocking: NO! Kid: "Just push the button again, and it will stop!" (pushes the button again) -they veered a wrong turn and end up someplace- Black Star: "...So, where are we?" (looks outside at a sign...) " 'Fort Douglas: Haunted Military Base.' ...Creepy." liz: Q____Q stocking: *she looks at another sign* 'Lysandra City'.... 'turn back now?' weird... Kid: "...Ominous." -liz, stocking, patti and kid went to investigate- -the city is in ruins, no signs of life anywhere- Kid: "I can't sense any souls...not even ghosts." liz: Q_______Q stocking: seems we have a mystery to solve! Patty: "Scooby Gang: go forth!" liz: whyyyy... Patty: "Because the plot says so!" (holds Liz by the hand, pulling her along) Kid: "Hmm...What could have caused this kind of destruction?" stocking: ...... Kid: "We better keep moving. Keep an eye out for anything abnormal." stocking: yeah.... Patty: (holds something up...) "Hey! I found snake skin! Looks like one of them shedded it!" liz: snake skin?..... stocking: guys....hide in the ally, now. Kid: "?!" (grabs Liz and Patty) "Stocking, come on!" -a large hound like creature sniffs the air and looks around....it seems.... wrong....- liz: Q_____Q Kid: "...Transform. Now!" liz: uhhh.... stocking: shhh! we need to sneak around it. Kid: (nods) -the creature looks, then leaves deeper into the city- Kid: (whispers) "Stocking...You know what that is?" stocking: not a clue....but something told me that thing wasnt very friendly...instinct i guess... Kid: "We should alert the DWMA as to this location..." stocking: *she takes out her phone.....seems the signal is jammed* Kid: "?! Let me try my mirror..." (removes pocket mirror, flicks across the surface...What does he see?) lord death: how----do! ho------ing? Kid: (whispering into it) "Father? You're cutting out? We have an emergency..." lord death: cou------eak up? i----fuzz ov----here. Kid: (trying to focus his soul, in hope to augment the signal...) "Emergency: we have spotted a creature, coordinates 40.7500° N, 111.8833° W..." lord death: a creature? what kind? ????: dont.... move.... Kid: "...?" -a young woman stands before you, holding up a gun- Kid: (frowns) "Identify yourself." woman: identify yourselves first. you have 10 seconds..... 10....9... Kid: "Death the Kid, DWMA." -an older woman appears from behind a hidden door- ???: heather? whats going on? girl: i found these two hanging around out here, saying they're DWMA or something. Kid: "???" woman: well whatever the case, you come on in.... its dangerous out here... Kid: (looks to Stocking) stocking: ....... -gingerly, they enter- -inside is a small house, an older man and a young girl are there as well.- Kid: (stands in front of Stocking, waits for the door to be shut behind them, and for one of the occupants to speak) -the girl walks up to them- child: did mom and sis invite you to come play fort too? Kid: (looks to Stocking) "...Yes." (smiles at the child) "We did." -the older girl puts her gun down, said gun then turns into another girl, younger than the meister, but older than the child- Kid: "Liz, Patty, revert..." woman: ?? Patty: (emerges out of weapon form...waves meekly) liz: um....hi? woman: well i'll be..... *she walks up to them and hugs them* liz: ?! Patty: "...Have we met?" older girl: mom? what's going on? woman: you two have grown up to be lovely young ladies. Patty: "...!" woman: *she looks at the 3 girls* Heather, Riley, Julie. meet Liz and Patti Thompson; your cousins! Kid: o_o liz: wait what?! Patty: o___o stocking: well, i can see a little resemblance. -later- Patty: "It's great! It's like a family reunion!" (stares at Heather) "Can I borrow 50 bucks?" heather: no. Patty: (pouts) "Well, I disown you, then." (turns to Riley) "You are now my favorite cousin!" Kid: -_- "Please behave." riley: 7-7; heather: -_-; is she always like this? liz: yes. yes she is. Kid: "...Stocking, maybe we should give them some more time..." -in the van- soul: wonder what's taking them so long... Black Star: (tapping his phone) "Man, I can't even get a signal..." tsubaki: ...... driver: just a little longer, and we should be good to go. soul:.....*he notices a full length mirror in the back* huh.... Black Star: "And what about Kid and the rest? Man, I should just go find them..." soul: *he taps into the mirror and calls kid* yo dude! Kid: "Sou--? Are y-- the--? Hello?" soul: *he knocks the edge, which seems to even out the signal* sup. Kid: "Hello. Are you still in the van?" soul: yeah, the driver is working on fixing the car so...where are you guys? Kid: "...Hiding." soul: from what? Kid: "Some creature is navigating the nearby ruins..." -back at the 'fort- liz: wow... woman: and that's basically what's happening here... Patty: "I didn't expect _this_ to be our vacation surprise." liz: well, we cant just leave you guys here with those....those things wandering outside. Kid: "Have you determined weaknesses?" heather: as far as we can tell, no... -in the other room, stocking and julie are coloring- Kid: (taps a finger) "I have been able to use mirrors to send people from one location to another...but I would need one big enough, and I don't know whether we have one here." man: there is a mirror in the back store room, though it's pretty dusty. Kid: (follows) "I'm sorry that this has happened to you..." liz: so... aunt...roxy was it? roxanne: yeah? Patty: (stares at Roxanne, trying to see family resemblance) man: ...... we told julie we were going to play fort. she's just a little kid, she shouldnt worry about these things. Kid: "I understand..." (sees the mirror) "Is this the one?" man: yep. Kid: (removes his pocket mirror, which is still connected) "Soul, I am going to try to link another mirror here to the one on the van. Step back and let me know whether your mirror changes color." soul: ok. Kid: (breathes onto the mirror, forming a fog, then holds his pocket mirror to its surface) "Death calls..." soul: ok its changing to purple, is that good? Kid: "Yes...I'll have to test it." (to the man) "If I am not back in 10 minutes, notify Liz, Patty, and Stocking." man: of course. Kid: (inhales, exhales, and starts walking towards the mirror...) soul: hey dude. Kid: (breathes in) "Hey...Good. This is how we are getting them out of there. Black Star, toss me a rope." Black Star: "...What makes you think there is rope in here?" Kid: "...It is called 'Van Service.'" soul: OH GOD! Black Star: "...I hate you." Kid: "Just give me the rope!" -back at the fort- man: looks like we're going to be getting someplace safe. roxanne: for real? jack that's wonderful! heather: should i get the knapsacks? jack: yes. go do that, ok? Patty: "...Sis?" liz: yeah? Patty: "Was this fated?" liz: i dont know.... Kid: (having returned through the mirror, holding two ropes, tied together at the end, that have passed with him through the mirror) "I am taking each of you back one at a time. Stand in line, be orderly, and be quick." (looks to Liz and Patty) "You two will transform and stay on my person." (to Stocking) "I'll need you to be the last to return, and you'll need to keep an eye on everyone left here. Okay?" stocking: ok....take julie first, ok? julie: *with a backpack on* *she smiles* Kid: (nods to Stocking, then looks with a smile to Julie) "Okay, I'm going to tie the rope around you, then the other one around me, and I'll be holding your hand throughout our walk through the mirror. Is that okay?" julie: ok mr. --Kid ties the rope around each of them, nods to the others, and speaks to the pocket mirror-- Kid: (to the pocket mirror) "Soul, I'm bringing the first person through. Be ready." -soon, julie goes in, after that, riley, then roxanne, then heather, then jack- Patty: "Wow, that's gone well!" stocking: the place was thoroughly cleaned out. Kid: (smiles, hugs her) Patty: (leans down to Julie) "Welcome to Van Service, kiddo!" -once everything was double checked, and the van was fixed, they went on their way- julie: ??? heather: *covers julie's ears* Black Star: "Um...Not to interrupt the happy family reunion..." --Black Star is pressed hard against a window-- Black Star: "BUT COULD WE MAKE THIS VAN BIGGER! I'M GETTING SQUISHED!" stocking: its plenty big! -and so, they are on the road- Patty: (smiling all the way at Liz) roxanne: well, now we just need new living arrangements... riley: *playing her ds* Kid: "...Liz? Do you think Death City would be an option for your family?" liz: yeah. we should give them a place in the mansion. Kid: (smiles) "Exactly what I was thinking." julie: but what about the fort? *she is hugging her stuffed doggy* Kid: "...Well, um...our home is like a fort?" liz: more like a castle almost. julie: wooooah! *shiny eyes* Kid: (laughs) "You like queens and princesses?" julie: *she smiles* stocking: she does have a coloring book on stuff like that. Kid: "Then I think you'll like it." (looks to Roxanne) "If that is acceptable for you and your family?" roxanne: of course. i think it would be a nice change of pace. Patty: "I'd say so after where you were staying...So, um, where to next? We sticking with going to Salt Lake, or should we get my most wonderful extended family to their new house first?" -they did the salt lake trip, but skipped the vegas trip- Patty: (holds up 'Salt Lake City' shirts for Julie and Riley) "For you two!" riley: neat. roxanne: that thing on the van.... stocking: long story. Kid: -_- -after a while, they arrived back to death city- Yumi: "...Death? We have company." lord death: welcome! *he had a small party to welcome the new residents* Kid: ^_^; "I know these weren't the 'souvenirs' you were expecting..." ellen: we'll prepare some rooms for you. roxanne: this is....quite the property. hello, roxanne thompson, nice to meet you. *she shakes yumi's hand* Patty: (puts Julie on her shoulders) Yumi: "Yumi Azusa. Likewise. I am Kid's mother, and this is my husband, Lord Death." kirika:..... hey. riley: yo. kirika: nice hair. riley: nice eyepatch. Kid: ("They're like twins...") -soon, they settle into their new rooms- Patty: (bouncing on Julie's bed) julie: ...... this is a big room. but i dont have enough stuff to fill it up. Patty: "Want to go clothes shopping tomorrow? We can get you a princess outfit..." julie: yay! roxanne: this feels nice... a lot better scenery than a fallout shelter, haha. Yumi: "I can imagine. Roxanne, what exactly did you encounter?" roxanne: well, we did make some sketches of the creatures. Yumi: "Care to show us?" -the drawings are of various mutants; 'baskers', 'banshees', 'lickers', 'big bubba', etc- lord death: ..... (thinking: low ranking clowns....) Yumi: (sighs) "You are lucky...Roxanne, are you the only survivors?" roxanne: as far as we know... Yumi: "...I can't imagine what losses you experienced." roxanne: at least my family is safe and happy....*sigh* that must sound so selfish... Yumi: (puts a hand over hers) "You kept your family safe: that is all a parent can do." roxanne: *she smiles* so....have you decided on a name yet? Yumi: (smiles) "Yes..." (looks to Death) lord death: we were thinking 'Shiori’ Yumi: (nods) -later- stocking: that was quite the vacation, huh? Kid: (nods) "I'm happy for Liz and Patty...Stocking? This 'family' is getting bigger: Heather, Riley, Julie, my sister..." stocking: it sure is.... Kid: "...Stocking? I'm sorry to ask this again, but in the future, are you still interested in having children?" stocking: of course i am. Kid: "As am I...I looked at Julie, and I just felt this desire to take care of her. I see how Patty is around her and Riley, and I want to be like that for my sister." stocking: *she smiles* yeah, i felt the same way... Kid: (smiles) "I hope we can babysit." (kisses her forehead) "You are so great with children." stocking: *she smiles* Kid: (sad smile) "There was at least one thing I had hoped to give you while we were in Las Vegas..." stocking: what was that? Kid: "...I don't know...Would you be in the mood for it?" (smirks) stocking: depends on what 'it' is~ Kid: (kisses her cheek, guides her to his bedroom, and has her take a seat in his desk chair) "Here..." (hands her a blindfold to put on) "And wait until I tell you to take it off..." stocking: *she blushes and puts it on* --Noises are heard as items in the bedroom are moved around...and the door is locked. Stocking can feel something...like fog?-- stocking: ??? --Club music starts playing-- Kid: "Paging Dr Hottie! Take off the blindfold!" stocking: *she takes it off* uhh.. --Kid is in short-shorts, a nurse outfit...and there is a fog machine and a stripper pole-- stocking: ......... *NOSEBLEED* Kid: (dancing to the music, then talk into his fake shoulder walkie-talkie) "We got a nosebleed! I have to administer medical attention..." (rips off his shirt and holds it to her nose) stocking: huehuehuehue~ -later- Patty: "...Huh. Thought I heard something, like loud bass music..." (shrugs, falls back to sleep) -in kid's room- Kid: (panting) stocking: *naked, panting, sweating* ahhhh.... *twitching* Kid: "Oh, God..." (continues to complete her...twitching) stocking: *moans as he cums inside of her* ahhhhh~<3 Kid: (grips her behind harder as he finishes thrusting and cumming) stocking: AHHHHHHHHHHH~<3 Kid: (pulls out...) o_o "Oh no!" stocking: huh? Kid: "...I didn't put on a condom..." stocking: 0__0 uhhh... Kid: "A-Are you on the pill?" stocking: no! Kid: ._____. "Oh crap oh crap oh crap oh crap--" stocking: kid. kid breathe. Kid: (holds her, the side of his head pressed against her chest) "Okay, okay...Um, do you...We have tomorrow off. First thing in the morning, do you want to get the morning after pill?" stocking: yeah...for now, that may be best... Kid: (nods) "S-Stocking? I do want to have children with you--really. I just--I mean, are you ready for that?" stocking: of course i want children but.... i want to wait on it. Kid: (nods, kisses her lips) "..." (gets out of bed, goes to his laptop) "I don't think I'm going to be able to sleep until I find a pharmacy with it..." stocking: well....we'll just roll with it as it comes.... ok? Kid: (looks back, stares at her...nods) "Stocking, I'm sorry." stocking: its ok kid. Kid: (staring at the computer as he searches...) "I-I-I screwed up...I just..." (finds it) "Okay. The nearest pharmacy with it is Death Mart. Over-the-counter." stocking: ...... *she hugs him* Kid: (pulls back from the computer, leans against the back of his chair...and wraps his arms around her...) -the next morning- Kid: o__________o stocking:.....*sigh* looks like i'm not pregnant.... Kid: (sighs) "That is what we wanted...right?" stocking: i guess but..... Kid: "???" stocking: i did want a baby....but i know i'm not ready for one yet... Kid: "...I would rather wait. We are very young compared to many parents. I mean, look at Father. I mean, I'm not saying wait 800 years--" stocking: hahaha... *she smiles* yeah. Kid: "...Stocking? Have you taken the birth control pill before?" stocking: no. Kid: "Oh...Would you want to?" stocking: i dont know... Kid: (nods) "Then I'll continue to use protection..." (puts his head in his hands) "I'm an idiot." stocking: kid..... *she hugs him* Kid: "I don't want to make that mistake again. I want to learn from this, and I am sorry to have put you through this." stocking: its ok.....and if i did get pregnant unintentionally.... i'd want it to be from you. Kid: (strokes her cheek) "Me, too." (kisses her lips) -elsewhere- Black Star: "Hey, Soul." soul: yeah? Black Star: "How is post-Salt Lake treating you?" soul: alright i guess. Black Star: "Well, it's about to get better, dude!" (holds up two tickets) "Bam!" soul: oh? Black Star: "Hockey! The all-American beat-'em-up sport! Front row center! You up for it?" soul: ....sure. Black Star: "Sweet! Clear your schedule for Friday!" ((It's, I don't know, Saturday right now.)) soul: ok. Black Star: "So, how are you doing get back in the swing of things at your job?" soul: doing good. we got a new guy working there. not much of a talker. Black Star: "Silent type? What's their name?" soul: *shrugs* Black Star: "Well, are they weird? I mean, given Death City, silent people tend to stand out since everyone is so loud and noisy around here." soul: *shrugs* but this guy....lets say lookin at him would give kid a heart attack. Black Star: "What, asymmetrical?" soul: oh yeah. Black Star: "Jeez...Well, if you see Kid around your job, try to kick him out or something, I guess." soul: and miss him shit himself? as if! Black Star: "Bro, that's not cool, man...Not without filming it!" soul: oh boy. Black Star: "Well, I'm going to pick up some snacks--we're having a movie night! You're invited if you want to come along!" soul: ok, sure. Black Star: "It's a great film, too--fighting, ninjas, romance, a dog!" soul: ok? -elsewhere- Meme: "..." Anya: "..." Meme: "We're cursed." Anya: "Completely. Absolutely." ao: now what seems to be the trouble? Anya: -_- "Dating is complicated. How do commoners do it?" ao: ?? -elsewhere- Hiro: (whistling) "Ah, what a great day! The sun is shining, the sky is blue, and nothing can go wrong!" tamaki:................... Hiro: "Oh!" (smiles) "Hello, Tamaki! Isn't it a wonderful morning?" tamaki:...... *she grabs his shoulders and knees him in the crotch* Hiro: ._O "EEEEEEEEE!!!" tamaki:.......... *she walks away* Hiro: (collapses on the sidewalk, high-pitched) "Whyyyyyyyyy...?" -elsewhere- Arthur: (panting) "Good work out..." (takes off his shirt) iris: *watering plants* Arthur: "How're they growing, Iris?" iris: quite well. shinra: they're nice. Arthur: "What do you call these plants?" shinra: tomatos. Arthur: "Ah...Nutritious." (stretches) -elsewhere- Patty: "Ready or not, here I come!" julie: hehe. *she's hiding under the bed* Patty: (hearing the sound, but ignoring it) "Hmmm...Where could Julie be?" (opens the closet doors) "Is she hiding in here?" julie: *quiet* Patty: "Hmmm..." (picks up a large teddy bear off of the toybox) "No, she's not under the giant teddy bear! Darn--she is one good hider!" julie: hehe. Patty: (tiptoes to the bed) "I wonder..." (sits atop the bed) julie: >w< Patty: (hangs upside down over the edge of the bed) "Found you!" julie: eek! haha! Patty: (picks her up carefully, hugging her) "Hee hee hee!" heather: that sister of your's is a strange girl. liz: yeah, but she's family, you know? Patty: "What you want to do now, Julie? I know where Lord Death hides his secret stash of gingersnaps!" -elsewhere- kirika: *having just finished training* Giriko: "Man, how many more people you going to fit in that house?! When your mom has that baby, it's just gonna get more crowded." kirika: yeah, then again, place is huge as fuck. Giriko: "Tch. Doubt Lord Death has room for two more, huh?" kirika: i doubt 'lottie's’ gonna be let in. Giriko: "No kiddin'. At least the priest got me some leads." kirika: typical. Giriko: "Yeah. Need a fair housing law in this city or something." (tosses her a bottle of water) kirika: this being said to a girl who lived in an abandoned motel for 4-6 years. Giriko: (sips) "Too-chee." kirika:.... *she senses something* >_> Gopher: -w- ("Oh, sweet light, bathe me in your rays, so that I, your lowly dandelion, may grow in your garden...") kirika:........................ T_T# Giriko: "..." Gopher: (inches closer, trying to hide behind objects: fence post, boulder, a tumbleweed...) Giriko: "This is just sad..." kirika: 3.....2.....1.... Gopher: (awkwardly stands up, sweating and shaking) "H-Hello!" (awkward wave) kirika: *turns and punches him in the face, not even shifting her expression* Gopher: o_O (knocked to the ground) kirika: what did you want from me now? Giriko: (sips on his bottle) "Good form. You applied the maximum amount of force right at the point of impact." Gopher: "I-I-I just wanted to see you! See how you are were doing! Um, how are you doing?" kirika: doin good. got more people living at my house, so that's a thing. Gopher: (pops up--not even shifting his legs, just as if you were pushing down on a rake to make it erect again) "R-Really? Oh, um, are they...good people?" kirika: eh. *shrugs* alright i guess. Gopher: "Your parents were okay with more people moving in?" kirika: its a long story, jr. Gopher: "I-I-I got time! I have all the time! Want to talk about it over lunch?" kirika:........... *she suplex's him* Gopher: .\\\\\. ("She is hugging me! Yay!") --CRUNCH-- Gopher: ("...Still a hug...") kirika: T-T Giriko: "...So, you like this little v-mouth dude a lot, huh, Kirika?" kirika: THAT'S NOT HOW IT IS! >///< Giriko: (smirks) "He's submissive, you’re dominant. I think that's cute." kirika: are you being serious right now?! Giriko: (shrug) "Maybe half-serious." Gopher: "...I require medical assistance. I think I stopped breathing. Someone give me mouth-to-mouth..." kirika: *drop-kicks him in the stomach* Giriko: "That's not how you do CPR, Kirika..." (finishes his water bottle, burps, tosses the bottle into the dirt) Gopher: T_T "Why does everyone I love hurt me?" kirika: come on, get up dummy. Gopher: "..." (holds up a hand) kirika: *she rolls her eyes and helps him up* honestly... Gopher: "Thank youuuuuuuu--" (as he gets up, he slips on a pebble...) kirika: ?! Gopher: (he falls--and his hand is still clutching hers) -later, elsewhere- Kid: "..." stocking: *nuzzling up to him* Kid: "I love you." stocking: i love you too, babe. Kid: (holds her) "I did enjoy last night...despite my grievous error." stocking: me too.... and i forgive you.... it did feel nice though....having you take me raw. Kid: o\\\\\o "I was afraid to say it felt the same for me, too...Like when you hold me in your mouth, or between your breasts, only...Well, I mean..." stocking: y-yeah... *bluuuuuuuuuuuush* Kid: "...You feel amazing." o\\\\\\o stocking: >///////////< Kid: "S-Sorry...Maybe we should talk about something else." -later- Black Star: "Soul! What do you want to drink?" soul: i'm down for whatever. Black Star: (brings out three waters) "Tsubaki, how did your day go?" tsubaki: pretty good. Black Star: "Cool. Hey, did you see Tamaki today?" tsubaki: no. Black Star: (frowns) "I did." tsubaki: oh no, what happened? Black Star: (pulled up his shirt, showing a large bruise on his stomach) tsubaki: !! what did she do?! Black Star: "She punched me! I said, 'What's up?' and she straight up punched me in the gut! I didn't do anything, I swear!" tsubaki:..... Black Star: "And she made this face, while mumbling something about Arthur or something." tsubaki: ?? Black Star: "I think she saw...Excalibur." tsubaki: o_o oh.... Black Star: "I already texted Arthur as a warning, but I don't think he understands." -elsewhere- Spirit: <Pardon me? I'm here to check in.> clerk: <of course. right this way sir.> Spirit: (wheels his luggage behind him. "At least the DWMA makes sure I can get a decent hotel room...") -at the 8th brigade- Arthur: "...I have no idea what he is talking about. Excalibur is fine!" (holds up his Excalibur) "See?" shinra: *shrugs* Arthur: "Black Star also said to hide from Tamaki. But why? I mean, she's weird, but she's not homicidal or something...Right?" shinra: >_>;; Arthur: "...Maybe I should stay indoors for a bit...Um, if Tamaki comes by, tell her...um...I got transferred." -SLAM- tamaki: WhErE iS bOyLe?! shinra: canada! Arthur: o_O (hides in a closet) tamaki:.......... *PUNCHES SHINRA then leaves* Arthur: (sigh of relief...then knocks over a broom in the closet) tamaki: *SNAP* what. was that? Arthur: o_o ("Don't move...Don't do anything..." (the broom then knocks over an entire stack of paint cans) "ARG!" (falls out of the closet, landing on the floor...) -what happened next is too violent to describe- Arthur: (pixelated mess) -that night- iris: tonight, we mourn the loss of a valued member of the 8th brigade. Arthur: (mumbling through face bandages) "I'm not dead. I'm getting better." maki: SHH! Q-Q shinra: (thinking: cant believe we're holding a funeral for a potted plant...) Oubi: *sniffs* "Keep it together, Akitaru...Don't cry, man." takehisa: .................... *stoic* Arthur: (groan) shinra: shh! Arthur: (muffled) "You 'Shh'!" -later- Patty: "Zzz..." Kid: "...Who drew on the wall? _With crayons?!_" liz: patti and kirika. thats who. Kid: (pinches the bridge of his nose) "They know better...When children younger than them know not to draw on the walls...Sigh...I'll deal with this tomorrow." liz: yeah.... -they would be made to clean the walls- Kid: "I'll just have them wash the walls...No point prolonging a punishment." -the next day- Kid: "--And it is your responsibility to set a good example for children, so you cleaning these walls will help you." kirika: 7__7 Patty: "Next you're going to tell me I can't curse in front of children." -elsewhere- Hiro: (whimpering) hiro's mom: *giving him ice* honestly, what's wrong with that girl? Hiro: (voice still pitched up a bit) "She's pretty violent, even among DWMA students. And I'm not the only one she hit--she attacked Arthur, too!" -elsewhere- Sid: (reviewing paperwork) "Great. When I was alive, I had to deal only with students' misbehavior at school. Now, I have to give detention for students' off-campus behavior." kinuta: uuuuuuugh i'm boooooooored! Sid: "Then do something productive..." (throws a book at her) kinuta: *grumbles* you people are savages! right mutt? *she looks at alone* Alone: (shoveling his meal into his mouth) "Food's okay, though." kinuta:.... its barely cooked! Alone: "I like raw meat, though." kinuta: *she rolls her eyes* Alone: "...Want some?" (offers the slop in his doggie bowl) kinuta: ugh, no thanks. Alone: (shrugs) "More for me! I don't get why you're so annoyed: three square meals a day, shelter, good conversations." kinuta: ...... *she notices a crude drawing that alone has made* ?? Alone: "...Oh! You like my masterpiece! It's us!" kinuta: how....nice.... *forced smile* -there is another drawing of him and eruka- Alone: "And that's me and the cute frog witch." kinuta: i see.... -she examines it- --They are holding hands with a heart over them-- kinuta: ...... Alone: "Wait 'til you see my next artwork! That's when things get interesting!" kinuta: oh....really? Alone: "Yeah! I was thinking of drawing our next date, then our wedding, then our honeymoon, then us having little wolf-frog hybrid babies!" kinuta: wow. Alone: "Hey, what do you call wolf-frog hybrid babies? Tad-puppies?" -elsewhere- eruka: *shudders* Free: "Hmm? What's wrong?" eruka: i felt a disturbance in the force. Free: "...Nerd." eruka: TnT Free: "Er...Want to see Force Awakens again?" eruka: sure. Free: "Cool. Ugh, man, I can't believe there is another Werewolf now in Death City..." eruka: what about that green-haired chick from the school? Free: "Yeah, but she's not an embarrassment like that guy. Trying to hold a conversation with him is like talking to a tree stump." eruka: at least he doesnt leer at you and drool like he's fantasizing about something really reeeeally unsavory. *shudders* Free: o\\\o "Yeah, that'd be bad..." eruka: free! D : < Free: "What?!" eruka:..... 7////7 n-nevermind. Free: (looking away) "I'll just get some snacks for the film..." -elsewhere- Meme: (looking around the corner of the dorm hallway...) "Okay, the coast is clear." mio: *blushing* *in a dress* Meme: (blushing as well) "Um...A dress?" mio: blame gumi. tsugumi: aww, but it looks nice. red's a good color on you. Meme: "Y-Yeah, it is..." Meme: "But did you lose a bet or...?" mio: its...f-for the dance... Meme: "Oh...I, um, really like it." mio: t-thanks.... 7////7 Meme: "Um...Maybe someone will get you a new necklace to go with the dress..." -elsewhere- Yumi: (reviewing documents) "Shanghai...What is going on there?" -in shanghai- agent: we're not sure what happened, she just started attacking us... Spirit: "What is she like? Any problematic behavior in the past?" agent: a little bitchy sometimes, but not too bad. Spirit: "Any recent changes that you know of? Maybe in her habits, her diet?" agent: she did get some new nail polish recently. Spirit: "...Nail polish? That's all you can give me?" agent: we did keep it though. *he hands him a plastic baggy that says 'evidence'* Spirit: (looks at it) "What's the brand of it?" agent: looks like a knock-off on hibana's new nail polish she debut at a fashion show recently. Spirit: "Hibana? Hmm...Makes sense people would make knock-offs. Do you know where she bought this stuff?" agent: sadly no. Spirit: "Get to work navigating through every spot where you think knock-offs are sold: street corners, private sales, flea markets. Keep it undercover, contact any informants you have." (thinks) "There any bars near here?" agent: just the fox den a few blocks down. Spirit: "Good--we're going to need drinks." (marches towards the exit) "You can tell me more on the way." -elsewhere- Kid: (wearing a tiara, sitting at a very short table, holding an empty toy teacup) "May I have some tea, Princess?" julie: of course. *she pours some lemonade* Kid: (smiles) "Thank you." (sips--and it is mostly sugar, as he grimaces a bit and forces a smile) "Um...Tasty!" julie: ^^ stocking: this tea is delicious~! Kid: (still forcing a smile..."Of course it is..." he finishes his drink, smiles at Julie) "May I have a snack, please?" julie: *she gives him a chocolate cupcake* Kid: "Why, thank you! Did you make this yourself?" julie: mommy got the cupcakes when she went shopping. Kid: "That was very kind of her. How do you like the cupcakes, Stocking?" stocking: mmm~! Kid: (smiles) "It sounds like Stocking likes them, Julie." julie: she's pretty. are you gonna marry her one day? stocking: o////////o Kid: (spits up his lemonade) "Wha-What?! I mean, it's just--That is to say-say-say..." .______. (falls backwards, unconscious) julie: waah! Q.Q Patty: (pokes her head in, sees the scene) "...Julie, did you kill Kid?" -elsewhere- grimoire: so you understand your mission, nals? Nals: "Of course! You need only ask, and I shall fulfill your task!" (over-acting) "I will complete the mission so well that it will take your breath away!" grimoire: T-T;; um... yeah. although keep in mind. milia will be accompanying you. Nals: "..." (struggling to force a smile) "That's...good." grimoire: she should be in her room as usual. Nals: "...I am looking forward to this mission. Thank you. I will go see her." (screaming internally as he walks to her room and knocks on her door) -seems the door is open- Nals: "..." ("My eyes have died...") "Milia? Are you here?" -TACKLE-GLOMP- milia: NAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAALSIIIIIE~!<3 ^w^ Nals: o_o; ("Wrong wrong wrong!") "Please let go of me. We have a mission." milia: ooh! what're we dooooin'~? Nals: "Surveillance and extraction: we are to gather information by observing targets--their patterns of behavior, their friends, their locations--as well as acquire a certain item." milia: oooooh sounds cool! who're we watchin'? Nals: "We are following a target in Shanghai." (removes a photograph from his pocket to hand to Milia) milia: SQUEEEEEEEEeeeee...... who's this loser? Nals: "The Death Scythe of North America...who for some reason is in Shanghai. We're going to find out way." milia: ohhh. Nals: "You will need some of your best magic." (dramatic flair, as he now is holding a rose) "Whereas I will commence with my brilliant performance to deceive this individual, acquire the information he has, and capture the artifact he seeks." milia: wowie~! *heart pupils* Nals: (dramatic flair as he gets into his role, holding her hand) "Let us depart!" milia: huaaaaaaa =w= <3<3<3<3<3 Nals: -_- "I'm just acting. Learn to read the difference between artifice and reality." milia: =w=..... owo huh? were you saying something? Nals: "...Nothing. Get packed: we leave in an hour." -elsewhere- medusa: *panting* haaa..... Noah: (kissing along her back) medusa: f-fuck... Noah: "Hmm?" (puts his hands along her breasts) "What's wrong?" medusa: i-i'm fine... (thinking: like hell i'm going to admit it feels good....which it does.) Noah: (notices something...) "You seem tense, though...Maybe you need to let out some pressure..." (he grinds against her from behind) medusa: o////o h-hey! Noah: (stops) "Sorry. Would you prefer from the front?" medusa:......... j-just keep doing that then. Noah: "Medusa, I want what you want..." (kisses along her neck) "Tell me what you really want..." medusa: *forced smile* go fuck yourself. Noah: (frown, as he leans against her from behind) "You could do the same..." (He takes her hand, guiding it down to her slit, as with her fingers and his own he massages her) medusa: h-hey!! .///. Noah: (frustrated groan) "What now?" -elsewhere- eibon: hmmm.... hmm? my child? is something wrong? Gopher: (shivering) "I feel...Cold? Or maybe a phantom pain? Or..." (taps his head) "Something's in here! Not what should be!" eibon: ..... *he hugs him* would you like some tea to calm the nerves? Gopher: "..." (nods) -mother?: its ok sweetie.... it's going to be alright... i'll take care of you.... i promise....- inori: *studying* Gopher: " 'Sweetie'? I don't--Why would--?" (beats a hand against his head) "Not right!" eibon: shhh. there there... Gopher: "I see someone..." -mother?: *she smiles warmly*- Gopher: "She's...smiling..." inori: ?? -elsewhere- medusa: *panting* Noah: (panting) "Was that better?" medusa: alright i guess...... say, what ever happened to that weird servant child of yours? y'know, the one you had with your previous servant... ilyana was it? Noah: "..." (sneaks through his pants' pocket, removes a carton of cigarettes and a lighter. Lights up.) "I threw him away, like the trash he was." (holds the carton to her) medusa: so you killed him? Noah: "Tried. Then some little cunt ran off with him." medusa: oh? *she takes one* Noah: (lights her cigarette with his own) "Some annoying girl got in my way. I had to escape, so I cut my losses: leave the little shit for dead. I saw him recently, when he helped that shinigami invade my Book." medusa: really now? Noah: (frowns) "I batted him around. Then the shinigami's little shits rescued his whore." medusa: did you knock her up? Noah: (smirks) "Wouldn't be surprised..." medusa: haha. you slut. Noah: (puts out his cigarette) "You whore..." (puts his mouth against her neck, throws an arm around her, tackling her) medusa: !!! -elsewhere, away from this debauchery-

[battleborntap]

  Crappy Concepts Confounding Co-op

  A few years ago, I was in a great relationship with someone who played games, so we did a lot of co-op gaming.  It was a large part of the relationship until her raging alcoholism came back and ruined everything.  On the other hand, my son was reaching the age where he could be a competent gamer, and since then, he and I have been doing a lot of co-op gaming.  As in, this is literally most of our Friday nights these days after I pick him up.  Aside from playing games mostly by myself, this is the other way I prefer my electronic entertainment.  Someone else on the couch with me as we grind, power, shoot, maim, jump, help, and/or destroy our way through an awesome game campaign. At times, I even enjoyed some online shooty times with my brief time regularly playing Call of Duty with my ex.  My son is starting to reach the age where I feel more comfortable playing some M-rated games with him that aren't, you know, the hard-M titles.  So this is broadening what we can do, and it only took about 5 seconds of Diablo III for him to think it was the greatest thing ever made.

That said, I've now grown very familiar with a lot of couch co-op gaming, and I have a few gripes about absolutely moronic concepts that utterly murder otherwise great games.  Or if not great, they at least had some damn potential.  So here are the concepts I've found that, sadly, all-too-often make the co-op gaming experience a waste of effort if not just a regular old pain in the ass.

  Player 2 is a Non-Character

This is probably the smallest element that can hamper a co-op experience.  The game is still very playable, you can move through it, have fun, maybe even get Achievements or Trophies.  But Player 2 is a nobody.  These are the travesties where player two might as well be a white square with "P2" stamped on it.  They have no unique elements, no specific design, with a bare minimum of existence.  Yes, these things exist.  Picture a game where player one is an awesome, unique, interesting character-or a selection of characters-while Player 2 is basically a clone, a duplicate, or in some cases-literally nothing but a reticle. 

I know, this sounds like an absurd step backwards from the era where we could all choose our own Ninja Turtle before diving back through time, or pick our own human or kangaroo to fill the streets with rage.  But this actually happens.  Notable offenders include Enter the Gungeon, Sin & Punishment: Star Successor, Super Mario Galaxy, and yes folks, even most Halo games. 

Enter the Gungeon is particularly baffling because there are multiple unique characters to choose from.  So Player 1 gets to choose some rad, unique character while Player 2 is stuck with a bland filler avatar with no special powers aside from an extra life.  In S&P and Mario Galaxy, player 2 is reduced to just a targeting reticle.  Halo games, aside from Halo 3 (I haven't played 5, so I don't know), the set-up is relegated to Master Chief and Master Clone. 

  Not the Campaign

Another issue that comes up are games that look like they'd be fantastic co-op experiences where the multiplayer is little more than some badly tacked-on "extra" mode, and not the primary campaign.  You know what this is-the game has a multiplayer mode completely removed from the core of the title.  So the skills, experience, and fun of the focus of the game doesn't translate over to this tacked-on multiplayer nonsense.  It feels like a mode mashed into existence so that they could tick another checkmark on the description.  "Yes!  It has multiplayer!"  It's crap, but it's there!

It's baffling garbage is what it is.  A waste of space.  A throw-away distraction that you can't even be bothered to be distracted by.  ZombiU, Pikmin 3, and Splatoon spring instantly to mind as games that offered some multiplayer element, but it was completely removed from the main game and was certainly not the main campaign.  They fundamentally altered the damn game for ZombiU and Splatoon to cobble together some semblance of multiplayer gaming.  So who cares then?  You aren't surviving zombies or splatooning together.

Especially confusing is Pikmin 3, which featured a cast of playable characters and yet they couldn't give the game a co-op campaign?  Really?  You switch between these characters in a single-player campaign!  They're already there!  Let player two join in!  On the upside, at least the multiplayer offerings delivered a variety of modes and didn't alter the game completely.  But this just annoys further seeing as major changes did not occur in that regard.  So why couldn't we play the story together? 

  Hampering Progress and Unfair Set-up

  Believe it or not, this *** also happens.  Yes!  Co-op gaming designed so poorly that the game becomes a broken, unfettered pain just to slog through ultimately inspiring you to tell Player to just go away so you can play the game properly. Alone.  Whatever it is, the core issue here is that the two players are not treated equally in the game, or it is not smoothly designed to facilitate enjoyable gameplay. 

I'm sure this will angry up the blood in some of you as Nintendo fans seem to have a default setting of "defend regardless of criticism", but Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze is one such a disaster.  DKC:TF does feature full campaign co-op, but is so brutally designed that it punishes players of even slightly different skillsets.  This is on top of controlling like you are physically trying to push a live gorilla forward through a crowd.  Instead of being a smooth and enjoyable experience, the game feels like a forced trudge through a headache while the characters amble about the environment awash in sadness.  The camera can't seem to decide which character to focus on, failure of one player seems to punish both-it's just a giant pain and staggeringly un-fun.  For a comparison of how to do co-op platforming well, seek out either Rayman Origins or Legends, where failure is not harshly punished, momentum can be maintained even with differently skilled players, and the games are actually bloody fun.

Another one I want to note in this travesty entry is Onechanbara: Bikini Samurai Squad on the Xbox 360, which was one of the first co-op games I played with my ex.  It is a game no one should play alone, as you will no doubt feel a deep depression at your lot in life at some point.  At least with someone, you can share in open mockery of what is so clearly a stupid, but occasionally fun hack-n-slash game.  While the campaign can be played in co-op, about 2/3 of the way through, it comes to a grinding halt and literally forces you to proceed in single player.  That is not an exaggeration.  Player 2 is no longer allowed to play, and player one has to work through 2 or 3 levels alone before you can pick up that second controller again.  And to top it all off, this ends with the most difficult and annoying boss battle in the entire game.  That must be done alone.  During the co-op game.

  Shared Pause or Menu Screen

We all love leveling up and then taking a moment to open our menu and dig through the new skill points and see what new power or strength we'll be adding to our character, switching out armors, repairing things, what have you.  Especially when that character has just leveled up several times because your co-op partner is 60 levels higher than you. 

You know what's not fun? 

Sitting there while one player does it and one sits there and waits. 

When we pause the game to go into these menus to tinker with our badass mass-murdering wasteland wanderers, the game in question pauses for both players.  So why the bloody hell can't both players access their damn menus at the same time?  This infuriating lack of foresight doesn't just hamper co-op games or shooters, either, but seems to infect a face-palming number of fighting games.  When I pause to look through my moveset, why can't the other player do that for their damn character?  I read over a few moves, make note of them in my mind, then the other player pauses, does the same thing, and lo and behold, I forgot everything by the time we're back to playing.  Even the otherwise perfect Mortal Kombat X makes this bold, idiotic mistake.  Why, back in the day, when I was looking up moves in Tekken 3, the other player could do it at the same time.  This was back on the original Playstation.  That is three Playstations ago.  This should not be an issue now.

Even Diablo III, which I'll gush about later, makes this moronic gaffe.  You can spend several minutes digging through those menus, tinkering with your character, adjusting moves, armor, abilities, and skillpoints.  It turns us into rude couch monsters forcing others to wait on us when the solution should be so simple:  Design your menu to be accessible to both/all players at once!

  Font for Ants

Bear with me on this one as I'm not bragging or anything, but I have an awesome TV.  It happened to be clearance priced (50% off!) at Target as some poor sap had just returned it because they couldn't handle being as awesome as I am.  It's a 65" 4K TV, so I'm future-resistant for a good 6-10 months before 8K 3D Hologram TVs or some crap start appearing.  But this is relevant, so stick with me.  I also have stellar eyesight.  This is also relevant. 

I should be able to read the font on the f**king TV screen. 

And it shouldn't mysteriously get smaller when I'm playing a co-op game. 

Previously, my TV was a 42" 720 Panasonic.  I loved that TV, and still do because it was awesome and is now in my son's room with a Genesis hooked up.  We played Plants vs Zombies: Garden Warfare 2 on that Panasonic and lo and behold could not read a bloody thing on those menus.  The font, which was already ridiculously tiny, became positively microscopic when we got together for some co-op gaming.  My couch is only about six or seven feet from my TV, so it's not like we were far away from the screen, either.  One of the first things I cheered about with the new TV was "we can read the menus in Garden Warfare 2!"  That should not be something to champion.

Worse is Battleborn, the infamous red-headed, born-on-the-ground, perpetually-kicked-while-it's-down shooter that failed to live up to Overwatch.  One thing it does have, however, is offline couch co-op, and my son was more than happy to plunk down ten whole dollars on the game (new, mind you) to give it a shot.  The text in this game is so damn small, it is almost unreadable on a 65" television from 6 feet away.  What the hell is the point of this?

  Crap Screen Real Estate

Resident Evil 5 is a lot of things, and most of them are not good.  One thing that was particularly awful was the obvious fact that it was designed with co-op gameplay in mind, where they completely forgot to balance the single player game.  While I'm now a much bigger fan of co-op games, I was not when RE5 released, nor is Resident Evil a game I typically want to play with someone else.  However, I did give it a try at first, and boy, that splitscreen was some contemptible garbage. 

Instead of smartly separating the screen 50-50 to give both players adequate screen real estate, RE5 chopped things up in a manner more like 40-40 with an addition 20% of screen space taken up by useful black space.  They didn't even bother putting HUD elements in there, they just left it black.  Great design elements, guys.  While Battleborn does a similar thing, they at least fill that extra space with, you know, stuff.  Life bars of bosses and maps and crap. 

Top-down, or angled games tend not to have this issue, but instead suffer from either piss-poor camera distance or making your characters nearly impossible to see amid a sea of, oh say, dozens upon dozens of zombies.  Dead Nation: Apocalypse Edition is one such a game where players are pretty much just identified by the color of laser sights on their guns which, during hectic gameplay, basically makes them just plain old invisible.  That makes the fun equally visible.

  Partner Impact

An ideal co-op game should involve both players equally, treat them equally, and encourage them to play towards each other's strengths, right down to basic teamwork.  You can tell the games that accomplish this, because players actively rely on one another.  Left 4 Dead and Gears of War instantly spring to mind-your co-op partner really is a partner.  You depend on them to watch your back.

Any co-op game that ultimately makes your partner a negligible add-on, or a worthless hindrance is missing the point.  In Diablo III, you can recruit characters to fight alongside you in a single player game, which allows for a constant co-op dynamic.  They help draw the attention of enemies so you are not constantly overwhelmed.  The same with Divinity: Original Sin.  In the latter game, success in battle is dependent on players working together and communicating.  Lara Croft and the Temple of Osiris and Portal 2 require players to work together to solve puzzles and levels. 

Donkey Kong Country, again, does not work in this regard.  One player can, whether deliberately or not, totally hinder the other.  Working together is difficult and hardly required, and if one player up and dies, the other can just keep going without them.  In Super Mario Galaxy or Sin & Punishment, the second player can put down their controller and just leave, and nothing changes.  In a co-op game, for the most part, you should both matter to the other person playing.  Not hinder them.  Not be pointlessly unnecessary.  You're a team, dammit.  If you didn't want to be a team, you'd play the game alone.

  Trophies for One

This one, for whatever reason, bugs me the absolute most.  Trophies/Achievements are not bloody hard to implement.  This is literally just a few lines of code and Valve, Microsoft, and Sony all handle them in pretty much the same way.  If they work for player one, it should not be so terribly hard to get them to work for any additional players.  While this gripe will, admittedly, hamper the game the least as it is outside of regular gameplay, it is also the one botched the most frequently and in such an absurd number of ways.  This category counts double for player stats and records. 

For instance, Guns, Gore, and Cannoli Trophies only work for player one, but the actions of player two actually affect them!

Nom Nom Galaxy's Trophies can barely be tracked, and Trophies you'd expect to work don't, while others seem to occur almost randomly.  My son accomplished all the same things I did during our campaign, but has less than half the Trophies.  What the hell happened here?

Another even more sinister bone-headed design goes out to Brut@l, wherein the co-op is a pretty big draw.  Players can evidently go through the entire campaign together and even use unique characters-and yet, quite literally every Trophy demands you play the game in Single Player.  Who the hell thought that was a good idea?

A simply ludicrous number of other games exclude them completely for additional players, which I personally view as both lazy and just plain old unfair.  Again, this should not be difficult to implement.  A few lines of code that recognizes that another person playing is, indeed, a different gamer profile.  But it can be a motivation killer to see one player constantly earning Achievements or Trophies while the other player gets nothing.  No, they "don't matter," but then again, neither do video games as a whole, so if this is your retort, shut yer trap for a change and try listening.  Players have thrown tantrums about a great many things in recent years from the terror of women playing video games to a boob slider being removed from Xenoblade Chronicles X, so don't act like getting shafted on something that would literally be a few lines of code to implement is not annoying.  Especially when there would be a constant reminder of that shafting every time player one unlocks one.  It's a bummer.  It makes player two an afterthought. 

  The best that I've found:

1.       Diablo III  (Only major fault, the lack of split menus.)

2.       Borderlands 1 & 2 (Almost no failures on any front:  Campaign, personal menus, adjustable camera, teamwork, etc.)

3.       Divinity: Original Sin (Still playing through it, but aside from some camera issues, everything is done really well.)

4.       Gears of War 2 & 3 (Pick me up! Pick me up!!)

5.       Alienation & Helldivers (Most skillpoint checking and leveling is done in menus outside gameplay, good camera, teamwork, and Trophies.)

6.       Rayman Origins and Legends (Learning-curve friendly, fast-paced and smooth, only missing Achievements for both players, at least on the first game.  Players could use different characters, easy rescues of fallen pals. I played the second on Wii U where both players got shafted on an Achievement system.)

7.       Lara Croft & the Temple of Osiris (Puzzles require teamwork!)

8.       EDF: Insect Armageddon (While the outlier in this franchise, this one handled co-op gaming far better than 2017 or 2025 on pretty much all fronts: Stats, achievements, leveling, etc.)

9.       Ratchet & Clank: All4One (Only failed on the Trophies front, because the PS3 couldn't do this in general.)

10.   Left 4 Dead (Does everything really well.)

11.   Portal 2 (Has a separate co-op campaign, but designed specifically for it.)

12.   Halo 3 (Arbiter)

13.   Rocket League (Across the board.)

14.   Crimsonland (So much noise.)

15.   Any old-school beat-em-up:  Streets of Rage, Die Hard Arcade, TMNT II-III-IV, etc.

16.   Forgotten Worlds way back on the Genesis (also on Wii).  The only way to fail at this shmup is if you both die at the same time. 

        source : http://ift.tt/2lakKFC