#I don't think the real one would appreciate it

[jaybirdluvr73]

You're my Best Friend (nanami kento x reader)

A longer fic version of this

Best friends to lovers with Nanami Kento. Fluff, a little tiny bit of angst but a Happy ending. Mild spoilers. Set in the early 2000s. I was thinking about what to call this and became inspired by the song "You are in love" by Taylor Swift

a/n: this is my first fic like this, i hope you guys like it. Feedback is super appreciated <3

"You're a…what?", you say in disbelief, trying to figure out if your normally level headed best friend has officially gone insane.

"A sorcerer", Kento says slowly, as if he hasn't fully accepted it either. "In the world, there's cursed energy and some people, sorcerers, are capable of using it. Usually to fight curses." 

Your mouth hangs agape as you wonder if this is some prank he's playing on you. But Kento has never lied to you before. (although he's never claimed monsters and sorcerers were real either.)

"I believe you", you say finally, to Kento's relief, "I mean this sounds completely insane but I trust you."

He finally cracks a small smile before frowning as he remembers something. "That's not all"

"What? Don't tell me aliens are real too"

"They want me to go to a school that trains sorcerers" he swallows before continuing, "in Tokyo"

You feel your heart stop as you realise that means you'll hardly see him anymore. Ever since preschool, the one constant in your life has been Nanami Kento. Sitting in class, eating lunch, walking home, no matter what you did or where you were, he was always by your side. 

You can't pinpoint the exact moment you fell in love with him, you just remember waking up one day and knowing. Maybe it was when he would ask the teachers questions for you in preschool, or in elementary school when he tried to bake you a cake by himself for your birthday. It might have been when he started reading all your favourite books so he could talk about them with you or when he spent half an hour trying to win you a teddy bear at an arcade. You may not know when you fell in love with him but you do know that loving Nanami Kento came as naturally as breathing.

"Promise you'll come back to visit", you say, trying to offer a smile. He nods, swearing that he'll never break a promise to you.

Nanami Kento remembers the exact moment he fell in love with you. It was fourth grade and your tenth birthday was coming up. He spent days looking up recipes and baking tutorials so that he could bake you the perfect cake. He spent hours on it. By the time he finished, his mom joked that there was more flour on him than in the cake but it was worth it to see the look on your face when he sowed it to you. The cake didn’t turn out great, the layers were uneven, the frosting was grainy and the entire thing was lopsided. When you saw it, you immediately started tearing up. At first he started apologising because he thought it was so bad that it made you cry. But then you threw your arms around his shoulders smiling widely and told him that nobody had ever done something so nice for you before. From that moment he knew that he wanted to spend the rest of his life making you smile like that. 

“- and  I put some of the new Fall Out Boy songs on the playlist too. The new album isn’t their best but”, you stop as you see a strange look on his face. “What’s wrong Ken?” 

“Nothing’s wrong it’s just,” he pauses then says, “You’re my best friend”

“The cheesecake was good but I think next time I want to try the brownie”, you say, shivering as you step outside the new bakery Kento brought you to. “I told you to bring a jacket, " he says, frowning while he takes off his sweater to give you. 

“I didn’t think it would be this cold!” you say trying to defend yourself as you tell him to keep his sweater on so he doesn’t freeze. “I’m not feeling that cold anyway”, he says as he forces the soft material into your hands. 

You put it on, closing your eyes as you feel the warm embrace of the fabric. “It smells like you”, you say before clarifying, “in a good way, I mean.” He just laughs and shakes his head before walking you back home. 

He laughs the same way years later, when you reveal that you slept in the sweater for a week, only stopping once it didn’t smell like him anymore. 

“Kento I know you’re in there!”, you shout, knocking on his bedroom door. “Your mom told me you were home.” He opens the door with a sigh before looking down at you and asking what you were doing here. As he gazes at you, you notice the deep eyebags that weren't there before, and a hardness in his eyes that you’ve never seen before. 

“I’m here because my best friend disappeared! Because you haven’t responded to my texts, or IMs or emails for weeks and I needed to know that you were okay”

“Well you can see that I’m fine. Thank you for checking on me, but you can go now.”

“Fine? Really” , you scoff, pushing your way into the dark room. “You won’t talk to me, your parents told me that you barely say a word to them and you clearly haven’t been sleeping! I want to help you Ken. I want to be there for you but you keep pushing me away.” Your voice softens before you continue, “I know you and Haibara were really close. I can’t imagine how you must be feeling right now”

“Exactly, you don’t know how I’m feeling right now and I hope that you never do”, he yells , “I’ve seen what this life can do to people, I’ve seen the toll it takes on the people left behind. I could die at any moment while on a mission, and I don’t want you to have to feel that kind of loss! I love you too much to put you through that! It’s better this way.” 

“Better for who Kento? Because I’m already miserable without you and you don’t seem to be doing much better! I know that being a sorcerer is dangerous and that something could happen to you. But isn’t it better to have loved and lost than to live life alone, because you’re worried about what might happen?”, you feel tears welling in your eyes before you continue, “I’m in love with you Kento and I don’t care how risky your life is. I’m willing to face any amount of pain if it means keeping you in my life. I would rather have you, and risk losing you, than not have you and lose you anyway.”

Kento feels his world stop spinning as soon as the words ‘I’m in love with you’ spill out of your lips. His mouth hangs open as he tries to figure out what to say. The only words that he manages to get out are, “Can I kiss you” as he leans closer. You nod slowly as you move towards him. 

You can feel his breath tickle your face before his lips finally descend to capture yours. Something warm grows in his chest, like the first flowers of spring blooming after a long winter. The entire world around him disappears as he feels your soft lips dancing against his own. His hands move gently to cup your face as he deepens the kiss. You snake your arms around his waist, feeling the soft caress of his hands on your cheeks. Feelings left unsaid for years come bubbling up and overflows.

When you two finally break apart to breathe, you notice a familiar look in his eyes. And this time, you knew what it was. 

He is in love

a/n: I'm not a huge fan of the title banner i made but lmk what you guys think.

tag list: @jasminelee324

[rosesradio]

tl;dr for the pjo fandom 🔱

• In the six years that I have been on ao3, 0.5% of all total readers i've had have left a comment on one of my fics. zero-point-five percent.

• Please support fic writers, fan artists, & other creators with comments. Kudos are great, but letting us know with words what you enjoyed about the piece or just that you're Unwell about it in general is the best thing a creator could ask for! It's why we do what we do!

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• This also goes for fics you think "have enough comments" (they don't, or this post wouldn't exist), or are "too old" to the point of which it would be "weird" to comment. I promise you, those stigmas are not real, and no author has ever thought it was "weird" to recieve a comment on a fic they still choose to have on their profile (in fact, they're probably thrilled that the work is still making people happy!).

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[ostermad-blog]

So, Queer is a political identity formed in opposition to a cultural default (cisheterosexuality). We created Queer as a unifying label as part of an organizing strategy to demand our rights and recognition in the face of larger structural forces that seek and sought to erase and eliminate us and the challenge to those forces we embody.

In a world where that default does not exist, where those structural/cultural forces are not in effect, both cishet and LGBT+ people still exist, but the latter group are not Queer.

This construction of Queerness is similar to black vs Black. Little b black is a color that skin can be. Capital B Black is a racialized political category formed in opposition to a presumed default of whiteness. In a world without white supremacy, black people exist but are not Black.

Dream Askew, a ttrpg by Avery Alder, is a Queer game because your community is expressly marginalized and exists on the fringes of a 'normal' society. Arguably almost all Belonging Outside Belonging games are Queer, due to the depicted communities existing on the margins of and in opposition to a larger, dominant cultural mode (this includes Dream Apart, a game about shtetl Jews living on the fringe of goyish society).

D&D is not, and has never been a Queer game. The existence of gay, lesbian, trans, ace, etc. characters within a text does not make it Queer unless the systemic force of cisheterosexism also exists. To play Queer within D&D is to find an identity at odds with and marginalized by the structures and assumptions of the game world - the followers of a faith that believes there should only be one God and are thus discriminated against and ridiculed for their obvious foolishness, or a movement that rejects the use of magic in all its forms.

Stardew Valley is also not a Queer game. You can be gay in it, but a gay relationship functions exactly the same as a straight one. I like Stardew Valley a great deal. Playing as a farm dyke is a ton of fun. But the game is not Queer.

Deadly Weapons by Adira Slattery is a Queer ttrpg. You play a girl, whether your character knows it or not, and you are endlessly entangled (both romantically and oppositionally) to demons the rest of the world cannot engage with and refuses to acknowledge are real.

To put this another way, games offering dark skin tones and weaves don't automatically allow the player to play Black. If Elden Ring let me add top surgery scars or choose my character's genitals and secondary sexual characteristics separately, my character would not be Queer.

I can play gay or trans on D&D all I want, and that does not make it a Queer game, no matter how welcoming WOTC is. Hell, one of my ttrpgs is a trans-themed magic school game, and it is arguably not a Queer game either.

I understand and appreciate your work to make Queer/not Queer less binaristic, but in doing so you've conflated LGBT+ identities with being Queer which, while absolutely true in the real world, is not necessarily true in our fictional game worlds. I think there's a lot of joy and wish-fulfillment in playing LGBT+ characters in worlds where they are not marginalized for their identity, in dreaming up futures in which we are fully normalized and assimilated into the mainstream. Many of the games I run do this. But that normalization, where LGBT+-ness is commonplace, makes these games not Queer.

“This RPG is a queer game!” “No it’s not!”

Have you seen these kinds of arguments on the webz? So have I! And I think this is an issue of people arguing without a common baseline of terminology. So let’s see if I can help out with that.

Like all sorts of other Queer Nonsense™️, how queer a game is isn’t a binary, it’s a spectrum! In this case a spectrum corresponding to the NPC attitudes from 3rd Edition D&D.

Queer-Hostile: this game explicitly does not want you to tell queer stories. It hates you for who you are. Do not tell this game you’re queer!

Queer-Unfriendly: this game doesn’t actively hate you for being queer, most likely because it doesn’t acknowledge the existence of queerness in any way, but might make you uncomfortable in general by just being too conservative and weird about other stuff like race and gender equality. If you tell this game you’re queer, it will say “if you must, I guess.”

Queer-Indifferent: this game probably won’t acknowledge queer identities in any way, but not in any kind of malicious way. It genuinely doesn’t care. If you tell this game you’re queer, it will say “okay.”

Queer-Friendly: while not explicitly about queerness, the general vibe and acknowledgment of queer identities will most likely make you feel welcome, and the writers probably genuinely want you to enjoy yourself! If you tell this game you’re queer, it will say “yay!”

Queer-Helpful: this game is about queer narratives. Don’t like it? Tough! This game will tell you you’re queer.

Hope this helps. ☺️

[saintsenara]

idk if you have ever talk about this before but in case you havent, what do you think of the infamous "Albus Severus" Potter name? overall how do you feel about Harry's naming his kids?

thank you very much for the ask, anon!

i'll be honest, its infamy always strikes me as a classic case of the fandom not being able to separate what characters would do from what they would do.

because i completely appreciate that most people probably wouldn't name their children after a teacher who bullied them and a man who sent them to the death...

but harry would.

albus severus makes perfect sense as a name on the basis of who harry is, how he understands honour and lineage, how he comes to think of both snape and dumbledore over the course of deathly hallows, and how those thoughts would expand and deepen as time passes after the end of the pre-epilogue canon.

i also don't find the james and lily thing weird. i know plenty of people who are named after their dead relatives, including a couple of people who are named after murdered relatives, and it's not something anyone i know would look twice at. nor do the families of any of those people have trouble understanding them as their own person. i presume this would be considered stranger - and/or more inhibiting to a child's sense of identity - in other parts of the world, but i just understand it as something families do.

what does strike me as odd, though, is how much of this fandom forgets two things: that there are generally two people involved in naming a child; and that ginny is not a doormat.

it always seems to me that - whether people think the kids' names are suitable or not - harry is assumed to have been exclusively responsible for them, while ginny is assumed either to have been railroaded into doing what harry wanted, or to have nobly forfeited any say in the naming process because her only goal in life is to sacrifice everything to make harry happy.

[when it comes to the boys' names, at least. people do seem to go for the idea that ginny's responsible for the luna part of lily luna.]

but i think this is nonsense - and it clearly puts enough of a bee in my bonnet that i've had her say so in two pieces of my writing...

in everlasting ink:

James will be born with the cord wrapped around his neck, grey and still, and there will be hours - or maybe just seconds which feel like hours - in which she doesn't breathe, skin going cold and vision whiting, until he roars, rattly and indignant, as though being born was an unwelcome disturbance in his otherwise busy day.   That's why she'll want him to have Sirius' name. His first cry will sound like a motorbike.

and [when i finally get around to posting the next chapter] one year in every ten:

'What on earth possessed you to agree to that name?' 'I didn't agree to it. I picked it. I hope you don't think so little of Harry that you think he'd deny me a say in the names of my own children?' 'But Albus -' 'He was very kind to me. Dumbledore. After what happened... It was like I was sleepwalking. Nothing felt real. It was like I wasn't fully in my own body. And everyone was acting like everything was fine - yay, Ginny's back to normal! - and I just went along with it. I don't know why... There was this afternoon, just before the end of term, and I was trying to go down to the lake, but I'd got stuck - I guess that's the word - on the stairs. I literally couldn't move... And then Dumbledore came round the corner and he said "are you quite alright, Miss Weasley?" and I said "oh yes, I’m right as rain" and he just looked at me - you know the way he used to look at you, like he could read your mind - and it all came bursting out of me. How I didn't think I'd ever feel happy again. How I thought a little bit of me might have been left in the Chamber. How I worried my whole life had been broken by what you did to me and it would never be fixed. And he said - I'll never forget it - "there is nothing wrong with being broken, Miss Weasley, if you try to see the cracks as how the -" '"- light gets in". I should have known that was a pre-rehearsed bit of sentimentality...' 'I remember thinking about it when he died. He was lying there, broken, and I remember thinking "where's your light now?" But it turned out that he knew what he was doing.' 'That's one way of putting it...' 'And then we picked Severus for his middle name because we thought it would annoy Snape and that would be funny. And it did and it was.'

[thydungeongal]

can you think of any mid-sized, easy-to-get-into ttrpg you'd like to see me dig into? Failing that, is there any way to get rolemaster for free?

Oh, I can think of at least a couple I'd love to hear you talk about!

Ironsworn and Flying Circus would be fun to see you tackle, and both are definitely on the mid-sized side, but both are also very interesting to me because they very much represent very maximalist applications of the PbtA framework. Ironsworn is very easy to get access to since the base game is entirely free.

There are ways to get Rolemaster for free, but they involve piracy. I'm unsure about your personal feelings about piracy but I understand if it's not something you can exactly talk about openly on your channel. There are also a few free Rolemaster-likes, Lightmaster being the most meticulously crafted one. It's weird, because it's basically an exercise in taking the OGL and D&D 3.5 system reference document and trying to build a d20-based simulacrum of Rolemaster 2e from the ground up. It's a neat product and the one I always end up coming back to when people ask for a free sampler of Rolemaster without having to put money down.

(By the way, if you decide to look at Rolemaster, I don't want you pulling any punches: I know I am very loud about my love for that dang game, but it is a game that I love almost in spite of itself.)

And finally I would really appreciate seeing you tackle something like Mythras or RuneQuest! (For the record, Mythras effectively is a legacy version of RuneQuest but stripped of the RuneQuest branding and rereleased as a toolkit game.) Based on what I have understood about your tastes in RPGs I think both of those games may very much be emphatically not your cup of tea, but speaking only for myself I have only very recently started delving into the history and many incarnations of Chaosium's old workhorse Basic Role-playing System (that has powered RuneQuest, Call of Cthulhu, and Stormbringer, among others) and have been especially taken in by Mythras's meticulous approach to verisimilitude and trying to provide GMs with tools for creating world's which feel real. This has partly been due to one of my good friends hyping up her homebrew setting (some of which she's posted on her blog @mythratica) and I have also caught the worldbuilder's disease simply through reading the rules of Mythras.

Sorry, that got very long. But yes, I love listening to you talk about games :)

[maryonmega]

Like a heavy blanket

A little feelings buddies moment because they deserve it. And also so I can have Siffrin live one of my fantasies.

The room around you feels cold. Nothing unexpected.

You must have frozen yourself and don't remember. You dreamed of being surrounded by stars. Not on the ground, but up, so high if you didn't know better you could believe they were in your reach.

Back to the stage.

You slice through sadnesses.

You destroy that blinding counter.

You get key after key.

You see visions of your allies.

You reach the King.

Your body feels heavy.

You

You know what comes next.

You would be panting if you could breath.

You wake up in a soft bed. Your throat feels tight.

Clocktower?

No, doesn't smell like the clocktower.

You open your eye. Doesn't look like the clocktower.

You look around.

You're on a large bed between Isa and Mira. Bonnie is clinging to Isa's back for dear life. Odile is sleeping on a sofa just across the room.

Oh, right.

You're in a village. A nice family let you borrow a room. Mira had to insist on them letting your group help around the house as thank you.

And, you were high in the air yesterday. On Isa's back.

It still feels surreal.

Well, it was just a dream! You can go back to sleep! You're so tired, it's gonna be easy.

...

You can't sleep.

Stars, you can't have one easy thing.

You climb out of bed, and slip out of the room, careful to not wake up your bedmates. You're soon out of the house and into their yard. It's cold, but at least this time it's physical. It's not very cloudy. You can see stars.

Despite everything, this is something the loops did not take away from you.

You take deep breaths of the late summer air. It's been a week and a half. It's colder. Time is passing. Why do you still need reminders?

"Still up?"

You need to hold the impulse to jump at Mira's voice. You turn to face her. Still in her sleep clothes and looking tired. Did you wake her up?

"You're up, too."

"Someone got out of bed."

You did.

"Bad dream again. Was facing the King alone."

"Siffrin..."

"It was as if, those past days had been a dream..."

You, can't face her.

She gets closer and stands beside you. You don't mind, but...

"Which is stupid. It's been over a week already! I know the loops are over! Why it's like I don't really get it?"

You feel her take your hand.

"Siffrin, I, uhn..." You look at your joined hands. Her small but calloused hand is grounding "I don't think I really understand, I never got stuck in a time loop, but, I, kind of do?"

Hum?

You finally face her. She's looking away, but in a thoughtful way.

"I mean, I, might feel similar about the King? And the curse?"

!!!

"He's frozen and harmless now, and Vaugard is moving again, and I get to spend more time with all of you! But..." She gives you an awkward smile "I sometimes feel like, it's too good to be true? Too much good stuff happening? Like something bad will have to happen because it's too much good at once? Or, like stopping the King was too easy so there's gotta be catch?"

Hum!

"I had no idea!"

"I know." She's the one looking at your hands, now "Not the most honest feelings buddy."

Oh, no! None of that!

You put your other hand on top of Mira's.

"But you said it now! And... And it does help, to know it's not just me." You rub her hand. This is nice, so nice. You hope it's nice to her, too "Does it help to know it's not just you?"

She smiles, a real one, and nods.

"It does. Thank you for telling me."

Stars, you could bask on her presence forever.

"Good, then!"

You open your arms.

"Can we?"

Mira doesn't hesitate and all but scoop you up. It was, so easy to forget she's strong too. You hug back, feel the softness of her curvy body against yours.

Your mind drifts. You look at her arms. Her smooth arms. Earlier? Yesterday? Hours ago, they weren't smooth at all. And Odile got it all. And didn't even get to appreciate it, too focused on not panicking on top of the lovely housemaiden...

"Can-" oops! Almost slipped!

"Can what, Siffrin?" Oops! Too late anyway!

"Nevermind, it's nothing."

She let's go of the hug to hold your shoulders. The look on her eyes is, not angry, but you know she's putting her foot down.

"No, you started, now finish."

No choice now. Live with the consequences!

"I thought if, uhn, we could, hug, while you're on your dragon form? You don't have to! It's silly! I just, thought back and you looked soft, and-!"

Stop embarrassing yourself!

Mira makes a noise and lets go of your shoulders. You messed up you messed up you-

"Ah, sure!"

What?

"Are you sure?"

"Yes, of course!" The awkward smile comes back, her hands clasped in front of her chest "I just, don't usually hear that. But, I'm glad, really! That despite not knowing before you don't think I'm scary."

Even if the dragon form itself was scary, you don't think you would be scared knowing it's your friend Mirabelle.

"Just one moment..."

She takes a few steps away.

You watch her form shift.

She’s big, but not the type of behemoth you would see in a book. Her head is about twice the size of a horse’s without the feathers, and the rest is proportional.

She raises a wing.

You raise a hand towards it, and stop.

“Is- Is this fine?”

Mira nods. Still takes psyching up, but you touch her wing.

Up close, you can see that she’s covered in feathers, in a variety of sizes. You run your hand over one easily the lenght from your shoulder to your fingertips, and see that the base have some not bigger than your thumb. There’s smaller ones coating her body, too. Making her look fluffy.

She’s not scary.

“You’re beautiful.”

You hug her neck, and she curls around you, her wing over you, heavy, yet gentle. Her snout touches your back and you lean into the touch.

She's as fluffy as she looks. You can feel even smaller feathers on her neck. A sharp contrast to the scaly feeling snout. It's not bad. Shows you that's still a living being. Still your friend.

She's so warm, too. Like a heavy blanket near a fireplace.

You sink your face into her feathers and inhale. Smell fruity.

"Thank you, Mira."

She rubs her face on you again, and you can't help but smile.

You don't think I've felt safer in a very, very long time.

You close your eye and just take in the feeling.

When you open it again, you're being carried back to bed.

[starscreamingg]

Okay to respond to most of the replies on this post- I do get where you're coming from, androids are treated poorly in the game because they're an analogy for people of colour, the androids themselves don't deserve poor treatment just because they were put in a position of having to take a job that could've gone to a human.

I actually do think it could've been a decent way to get people who don't get involved with overt political discussion thinking about underprivileged people and the ways in which society has and continues to harm them. Like give the people something to latch onto (personable robots) and then go "hey you know who ELSE has been historically treated like this—"

Like that's. That's fine.

My point is that. Uh. I don't think making the androids an analogy for people of colour is a particularly good idea.

Okay let me get incomprehensible- within the real world the replacement of human workers with automated labour can and does fuck over actual people (some quick corroboration)

So we're shown in the game that androids are functionally automated labour built and inserted into industries for the explicit purpose of replacing human beings, which is an actual thing that actually happens.

And the game showcases that nothing has been done to stop employers (or cyberlife itself) from implementing them EVERYWHERE, which causes dbh's unemployment epidemic.And therein lies my problem.

The narrative comparing androids to people of colour (especially black people during the civil rights movement) and villainizing the unemployed humans by making them hyper-violent zealots (see- Markus' opening section for some of the most overt examples) is SUPER WEIRD TO ME because unlike actual people of colour the androids ARE functionally replacing jobs. They're being inserted into the workforce by corporations who have allowed the United States unemployment rate to rise to 37.4% but the game VERY ADAMANTLY STATES that the problem here is the unemployed who are violent. To the androids.

You see what I'm saying here? Like why did they write it like that? Like in real life labour being automated to this degree would be a PROBLEM. Wanting the androids universally decommissioned irl is such a reasonable point if you look at them as robots replacing the workforce without any limitations, which. They are.

And like, the game could've been sympathetic to the androids AND people fucked over by their implementation but it REFUSES to reckon with the actual problems (the corporations allowing this to happen, the lack of regulations on androids) in favour of going "humans bad for treating androids unfairly because the androids are equivalent to black people fighting for their rights."Like that's WEIRD, right???

Detroit Become Human and why does this game decide that the problem in society is individual people treating androids poorly because those androids are choking them out of the workforce and NOT the corporations and governments who deliberately designed the androids to do this

[jewsinfandoms]

hey

So like Esther, I've been hiding my people and my homeland on tumblr dot com, because *points vaguely at the whole world*

I'm Israeli, so I've never had to contextualize my Judaism or represent it—which is to say, I don't actually know how to incorporate Judaism into my fanworks?

Can you give some examples of what that would look like? The only examples I know of are actually offensive in the other direction (Jewish!Peter Parker who speaks like Mel Brooks' rabbi character in Men in Tights).

Can the Judaism just be in the background? Like, the plot happens in a synagogue instead of a church? Or does it have to have a real role in the story? Does one of the characters have to be Jewish? Can it be just thematically Jewish, like a midrash-inspired story that's applicable to 911 characters?

I'd appreciate any direction or ideas you can offer!

(and also I salute you for being a publicly Jewish blog. That's... unfortunately brave these days)

Hello dear anon, and apologies for taking so long to answer! It is a great question that requires some thinking, we hope the explanation will help.

First, a hug from far away. Mods are from all over the world, including Israel, and we know how you feel. That's why we started this – to give Jews a safe space, where they could be proud in their identity and not hide it.

And now, for your question! In a true Jewish way, the answer will be – it's up to you. Do you want to make all your blorbos Jewish? Maybe only one of the main characters? Or just one supporting character will mention they went on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem when they were younger?

It can be a Jewish Spiderman who goes to synagogue for a Shabbat prayer and notices a criminal activity, and needs to decide if to break the sacred day. Maybe Batman fell in love with a Jewish man, and Alfred needs to learn how to make Kosher food? Perhaps you want to explore the ways Judaism influenced the writing of Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri?

All forms of creation are welcomed - you can cosplay as a biblically accurate angel, draw a character with a Kippah, or podcast (after getting permission from the writer) your favorite fanfic.

Good luck, and may we all have a safe time!

[blueishspace]

Hero, Villain, God 8

(Prev) (Next) (First)

*Scar's pov*

It's been almost a month since Poultryman appeared for the first time and more then two weeks since your first encounter with him... And you keep failing at catching him.

You always get so close to it too, you corner him or lure him to get close to you but he somehow manages to evade you each time. If you try to keep your distance he just escapes or avoids your arrows with agility you didn't think was possible.

In short, you are really trying your best here but it seems your best is not good enough to catch this specific vigilante, if you were a lesser man you would argue that It's like the universe itself is bending around him to give him the chance to escape but if you blamed the gods for every failure you wouldn't be a good hero.

The worst thing is that the Hero association had to assign Ocean Queen and Sheriff to help you catch him... And instead of catching him the first revealed a very important secret and the second was seen bantering with the vigilante in front of a crowd...that's just embarassing for you and for them and the association...

Cub has been constantly complaining about ever since he saw it go down in real time.

"Are they stupid? The number one hero failing to catch a vigilante was already a big hit on public opinion and they decided to publicly assign the same job to the number 2 and number 3?"

"Uh...Cub?"

"What's going to happen now? Did they think about that? If the top 3 heroes fail to stop a single vigilante the association is going to become the laughing stock of Hermittopia! Not that it isn't already considering the three of you act like you have never used social media before."

"Cub! You are tightening the straps too hard!"

"Oh... I'm ...Sorry Scar, I'm just...frustrated at their incompetence...*sigh* is this better?"

"Uh... Yes. Can actually feel my hand now"

"Right, I think you should avoid Poultryman for a while"

...

Record scratch, what? Why would you stop? He was the one that told you the association wanted you to catch him!

"What!? But It's literally my job to catch him!"

"If you keep going on like this without a good plan you'll just be giving him more chances to turn you into a meme. We cannot risk your reputation any more... I'm not saying to give up, just let things quiet down first."

Oh... That's fair you guess. You don't know if you are going to be able to do it but you can see Cub is serious about it. You can't exactly promise him anything but at least...

"I can try?"

"... Alright, I guess that's the best I'm getting, I'll trust you Scar"

*Grian's pov*

You keep going out as Poultryman for a few more days before you realize something is different... Going around is still fun but something is just off.

Then you get it, Hotguy seems to have lost interest in you and for some reason that irks you like very few things have done before.

You wanted to stick to only your vigilante persona for a while before introducing the other ones you had prepared but now your hand has been forced... It keeps happening. You wouldn't have it any other, more boring, way.

If you were mortal it would have been quite hard to mantain 3 different identities but you are not one and you can exist in different places at the same time.

You don't exactly know why you decided to bring Mother Spore in this early, you never cared about human aknowledgement before...but something about HotGuy...Scar... Is different, you feel ignored and that is not something you appreciate. Is it petty? Yes, very much so. Do you care? Not really, you are the god of chaos, It's natural.

And so Mother Spore is born, you decided to go less flamboyant and more mysterious with this one...With a slow walk and a long opaque veil which design is partly inspired by Lady Death... It is a good thing you already have an in with the villains, though he's still very much unaware, a certain... roomate of yours. Mumbo.

Mumbo...or Boogeyman does not expect your arrival into his secret lab, why would he? Nobody should have had access to it. Especially not a stranger never seen before. You walk towards him slowly and he is powerless in front of you.

"Who are you!? How did you get here!?"

"...Call me Mother Spore, at your service"

"W-what? Why-?"

"I'm here with an offer...one you'll greately enjoy"

He seems to calm down at this...or maybe it is intrigue.

"An offer?"

"A collaboration of sorts, I have sheer power you lack and you have a network that I need access to..."

"So what, you want access to my sources and info? In exchange for?"

"My power, of course, you have your machines but you are limited to this laboratory. You cannot act when you wish. I give you a way to do what you cannot now"

Boogeyman's anxiety almost vanishes as he grins and shakes your hand... He's still wary but you knew he was going to cave in.

"Well then Mother Spore, I'm sure this will be the start of a great collaboration."

Oh yes, it will be great.

"Indeed"

[rakubalka]

@khr-guilded-cage is right

Its so FUCKING EASY to usurp Vongola

Just treat Tsuna like A PERSON INSTEAD OF A TOY

And you have the boy loyality

Soul Society taking over Vongola by approaching Tsuna and taking the boy under their control

While he kinda still would be a pawn, he would be treated better

Reborn would die, Soi Fon as Tsuna teacher would kill him

Soi Fon as Tsuna's teacher ?

Ohh Hell Yeah !

But I don't think Tsuna would be put in the 2 division after all the kid was so willing to listen to them because he didn't want to be part of the underworld (even with the best position in it) so they aren't making the same mistake . Instead Tsuna will probably end up in the 4th , 5th or 13th division .

Soi Fon is still the person who was put to teach him effective combat but that has less to do with assassin tactics and more to do with their similar fighting style .

After all it would be kinda hard to find someone specializing in highly maneuverable hand to hand combat style , Soi Fon is the closest they got .

But did she teach him good ? She did . A few months in and Tsuna is already strong enough to be a seated officer in the 11th after they started to rework his very very full of weakness and wasted movements combat style .

Now granted a sizable part is because of Tsuna's monstrous combat talent (because Reborn is such a shit teacher he immediately started throwing a non-combat trained civilian against seasoned mafioso so Tsuna had to quote literally learn on the fly or die ) . But that doesn't change the fact that Soi Fon is both a competent teacher and the best teacher Tsuna ever had . One of the reasons being she doesn't rush him to move to harder and more complicated parts , because Soi Fon knows that a slowly built but strong base will get you far far farther than a fastly built but weak base . So in that Tsuna's lack of interest of anything beyond his level is a real blessing . And the fact Soi Fon is here to help with his combat style and not train him to be a member of her squad makes it easier on them both .

Soi Fon training actually became a time both of them enjoy . In parts because they are both terribly deprived of affection people that finally found someone who they can give their affection and it being appreciated and also returned (as in platonic affection) . Because Tsuna finally gets an adult figure in his life that hasn't abused him and to who he can go for anything (he thinks Soi Fon is what having an older sister or mother is like) . Soi Fon on the other hand gets someone who she can give her affection to , someone who by just having her in the room makes them be happy , someone to whom she can be vulnerable to without worrying of betrayal or it being used as a blackmail (She tink that having Tsuna is what having an younger brother or even a son is like) .

The moment Tsuna and Soi Fon go to the Shinigami archives to both adopt Tsuna and change his family name to Soi it becomes common knowledge how they thought of each other . After all it's not everyday a family's head adopts someone let alone like a sibling (the last time was Byakuya ) so by a week time everyone starts referring to Tsuna as Soi Tsuna .

[mydearestbeloved]

okay chapter 5 review here bc word limit.

amazing how your very first and latest draft can change how I feel about your story as a whole lmao. ngl the jinwoo in your first draft reminds me of those daydream yandere!jinwoo fics lolololol so imagine my whipslash when i read the revised and expanded draft of this.

i love those to death i will be honest here but sl reader fics that depicts jinwoo more closely to his canon counterpart always hit different fr. i love how jinwoo isn't trusting of reader and constantly trying to figure her out. he's so inquisitive and smart when trying to piece everything he can find about reader (that makes a lot of sense since he becomes a detective in the revised timeline).

i really appreciate you writing him like this and it's a shame canon kinda stop writing the strategic and observant jinwoo after over the half of the story. of course if you wanted to be more canon compliant (and an excuse to keep reader involved), jinwoo would have to be more suspicious and distrustful of her and monitor her (such a jinwoo move) bc yk his deep trust issue (that has been forgotten or somehow resolved on its own in the canon story just bc. no im not bitter about it nope). therefore, it's so intriguing to read fics where his issues being addressed and his worldview being challenged. i know solo leveling is a power fantasy but it's frustrating to see our protagonist keep proving right about his very flawed and detrimental outlook, carrying the world on his shoulders alone and all that and the story acts like none of that affects him negatively or has any long lasting consequences. again it's a power fantasy but i think i can overlook this very real potential issue only if the story isn't set in a modern and semi-realistic urban setting.

anyway i skimmed through all the drafts you have and i love how they are mostly about him slowly opening up to reader. my god i cannot wait until jinwoo becomes absolutely whipped for our fae queen like in the old drafts. i know it will be absolutely satistfying and worthwhile. (can't believe all the chapters are still drafts???)

?System¿:

[ Review of (14/11/2024) has been submitted.

We thank you for your feedback, Reader.

System will now connect you you to 《AUTHOR》 ]

.

.

.

Thank you for sending your review, this genuinely made my day! 💞

Now onto your review:

Original vs Now

Funny story, this Trial Player AU's original idea was just supposed to be a single, one-shot thing. So, you're not wrong to think that it feels like a daydream yandere!Jinwoo fic, because IT IS.

I even format it like so because I didn't want to get overboard, and that I was afraid of losing interest if I held onto it for too long just because I don't have enough time to write it as long and detailed as I would've liked.

But as it turns out, I just fooled myself, because here we are with a full blown series. And me with too little time still.

The original concept of a trial player isn't even mine. I was inspired by one of @circeyoru's fics, where I just wanted to write a similar story but with a Reader that have different powers and personality.

I ended up having too many interesting ideas to expand this after posting Imagine #1, which now became the summary of this series instead of its original purpose as a one-shot, one-time thing.

To simplify: I hyperfixate. Drafts started piling up. I wanted to work out the details little by little but they were too messy for me to find the time to sit down and edit them. New method: try posting it. I can edit them as I go as long as I gave warnings beforehand to Readers that my writings can change. If this goes well, there's a chance I can receive feedbacks to improve further. Two birds with one stone. A win-win scenario for me.

I mostly write when I'm stressed out from studying and needed a temporary escape. So, it brings me extra joy when people actually enjoy my stress-induced vomit of words. 🥰

How I write canon characters

I LOVE Reader Inserts/x Reader stories, and one of the things that most of the time ruined them for me personally is if the canon intended act too OOC.

Like, I get it, we Readers aren't in the canon story, of course the canon characters will act out of script since they literally are. But if they act like a different person all together with little to no explanation, no reason that can tie them back to the essence that make them just them, then what's the point of canon x reader when it's just the same as oc x reader?

At least add a warning/note/anything else to inform readers if you're going to do that, or if you're not too sure you can write them to stay true to their canon counterparts (like me 😓).

In real life, we already proven that we are fickle beings. We kept changing for one reason or another, but we can still stay true to ourselves or be recognize as just us.

And that is what I tried to do in writing the canon characters, especially the MCs since we readers follow their story the closest, which resulted in us knowing about them more then the side/supporting characters.

We don't truly know them, we never will, but we can predict them when we put those characters in different scenes/scenarios/settings because they already have a pattern that we know.

That is what we readers of Readers Inserts ultimately sought after, to be able to imagine interacting with those same characters that we know through the pages.

At least, this is what I want. Different people, different views and opinions. This is mine.

How I write Sung Jinwoo in this alternate scenario

I only know of Solo Leveling through its webtoon/manhwa and anime adaptations. I know little no none how they are in the original webnovel/novel and game, and the little that I know are form spoilers, tidbits of them.

With this in mind, I do feel that the manhwa are missing some things, and as it turns out (from the spoilers I read), it does skip many scenes from the novel.

No hate for the artist though, if it were not for him, I wouldn't have known Solo Leveling. And I could only imagine how hard it would be to draw everything from the original.

As for Jinwoo, I'll try my best to stay true to his character from the manhwa. But note that I also added the 'Yandere' element. So, to make him not too OOC, I'll explore his thought process from the start to then falling in love to the point of madness with someone like Trial Player!Reader.

Back to the topic, this Trial Player AU of mine will mostly follow the manhwa, and I'll be using the manhwa-specific plot-holes/gaps to further integrate Trial Player!Reader into the story.

That said, I won't write/in detail all scenes there are in the manhwa. I'll only detailed scenes where I can show Trial Player!Reader's impact, while the rest are either skipped or summarized for the purpose of smooth transition between one scene and another.

I don't want this to be a slowburn, but I also needed to work out the details to Jinwoo's feelings if I want to execute this as smooth as I can get.

Hence, I apologize for the later instances of Jinwoo acting not himself, I'm still figuring out the details for those scenes, that is why I still labeled them as drafts.

Extra related topics

There is two points I shared that can be tied back to Player!Reader's personality:

One, she is a casual fan of Solo Leveling. To make this easier to write, what she knows about the original story is what I know. Reader reads the manhwa, watches the anime, and knows little of the game and original novel from spoilers only.

Second, her view of the Yandere trope. I already I wrote it somewhere in the (for now) unknown chapter 0.1, the only writing that I managed to finish.

I explained there how Reader views this particular fiction trope. It is in many ways similar to mine too. It's just so interesting to see how different people with different personalities spiral down to the far end of the emotion called love, more often associated with warmth and healing.

Emphasis on 'how', I want to see the process. Tying back to how I write Jinwoo.

It is just such an fascinating concept to imagine. And fiction have less restrictions to express that ideas than in reality, as long as we can (and should) differentiate which is true or not, which is good and bad, even if the line that separated them often blurred.

I DON'T condone yandere, toxic and extreme behaviors and actions in real life. All of my works are purely FICTION.

---

I think that's all I can say for now. Thank you once again for reading my stories and for sharing your reviews. I really means a lot! 💞

Also, a piece of advice:

Perhaps you should hold off reading the last two chapter for now (9 and 10) until I updated them. Because they are of the newer drafts, there are certain 'too-fast-of-a-development'/OOC instances there that you might find a bit weird if I assumed through this review of yours.

I just feel responsible to point this out.

You're still free to read them, of course. After, you can just keep watch if I updated them, though by then you might want reread them. Hopefully, this is not too much. This is the downside of posting drafts. I apologize for the inconveniences.

I'll always inform a major draft update in my Masterlist. So there is no need to check each draft individually everytime.

[cookienort]

Ven is here to support you today!!!

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Smell Check [Easy: Failure]

MDZS Disco Elysium AU part 1 (part 2 - part 3)

[lizzylucky]

Draxum hadn't accounted for the fact that when he gave four hatchling turtles the DNA of a human being in order to give them greater intelligence, he would effectively be making himself a surrogate father to actual children, with wildly different needs.

When he sent his gargoyles to obtain a sample of DNA from Big Mama's prized warrior, the intention was to create his own. They were to be the prototypes for an army of simple creatures with just enough heightened intelligence to learn combat and follow commands, that he might defend Yokai kind with.

Instead, he quickly discovered the integration of human DNA had been a little over successful in allowing his test subjects to learn and think and feel in a civilized manner, going so far as to override some of their natural instincts as turtles that would otherwise allow them to learn to care for themselves. He had to feed them, by hand, with bottles.

Like infants.

They were easily distraught by unfamiliar things, and quickly became dependent on Draxum in every sense of the word. They babbled, they cried, they explored things with their hands, their tails, their mouths.

It was an unplanned adjustment needed to be made, but no matter. If anything, learning to understand the new hybrid emotions of these turtles would allow Draxum greater advantages when they grew enough to safely learn combat. Preferences, likes and dislikes, needs, diet, and so on, all became more complex areas of study.

Even a couple years in, he found himself continually surprised. Brain scans had shown that the turtles were more intelligent, still, than anticipated. They, truly, seemed more human in mind and function than anything else, with only some base instincts and behaviors left to influence their personalities. They retained many reptilian traits, but overall had the bipedal anatomy and function of humans and some Yokai. It had been an infuriating discovery at first, but Draxum had to admit that over time he became fond of it.

Each turtle had developed his own personality. The eldest, for example, had a love of plush toys, and showed a fierce protective instinct over the others. The youngest, Draxum had learned, was contrastedly reckless and excitable, not nearly so reserved or gentle as the first. Additionally, he was, decidedly, to be kept away from any and every writing utensil unless under strict supervision (unfortunately, this was learned a little too late, as was evidenced by the clear markings left in several work benches). Then, of course, were the slider and the softshell, who had the most bizarre relationship. They were constantly fighting with each other, but utterly inseparable, and each showed an incredible and unique curiosity, constantly exploring and watching and studying, with concentration filling their eyes in ways Draxum had never seen in other children so young.

Embarrassingly, it took another couple years before Draxum realized he couldn't simply refer to them by their species' names. It certainly was effective, but they were not the mild, simple creatures he had once expected them to be, and he knew that they never would.

Now, they were vocal, playful, inquisitive... energetic. By the gods, were they energetic. They never stopped moving, never stopped talking, never stopped eating, never stopped wanting or needing.

...This is why Draxum never had children of his own. It took all the time and energy he had to spare, and then some. Although it would be a lie to say he wished they were any other way.

They had so much capacity to learn, and with their emotional propensity could one day come to understand exactly why Draxum was doing this, which he knew would be an edge in their combative styles.

As he introduced them, slowly, to more of the world's culture and knowledge, he felt, in a new way, that their very existences were revolutionary. A perfect, synergistic unity between two entirely different families of genetic material, with numerous enhanced abilities. And they were children. They maintained all the properties of regular children, but had so much more in store! Such grand destinies! They would be, inarguably, the greatest warriors of their time when they were grown. They would be the compassionate, skillful heroes of all Yokai, the first of a new generation of super mutants, and the key to overcoming the evils of the humans who had overtaken the surface and posed such threat to all who lived below.

It was with great reluctance that he allowed himself to accept, however, that not all of mankind was evil. There were many forms of art, beautiful in different ways, there were some rare people filled with kindness, inventions that utilized resources in ways Yokai kind had never thought to. Perhaps he had been a little stubborn in his ways, a bias cementing over time that blinded him to some of the beauty that did yet exist in such a species.

Make no mistake, humans were a threat. Innocent families lived in fear, in hiding, of the governments and ruthless sciences designed to invade, to blaspheme the name of knowledge, with no regard for the safety of this people.

Draxum could live with being an outlaw to the Yokai if his experiments would lead to their salvation. He may be their villain in today's papers, but in history books he would be a hero.

Still, he wished to amend some of his practices. Even if only to his turtles, he would be known for his ability to change and understand. He would be fair, and he would be truthful.

And so it was that he told the turtles the nature of their existence. Perhaps he muted some of the details, to protect their minds until they had more understanding, but he would not lie to them about their DNA. He told them of Lou Jitsu, and their human genetics, and he begrudgingly allowed them access to the culture of the humans. He would let them choose their interests unbiased.

In the process, he came to know of some of the revolutionaries of human history. Though he wasn't particularly inclined to believe there were no evils involved, he was intrigued by the strange moral code that the humans boasted from their different time periods. The turtles, as well, were fascinated by the stories of war heroes and generals, seamstresses and inventors, artists and royalty.

Initially, when it came time to redesignate his turtles, Draxum had been inclined toward the names of those whose legacies persisted in the humans' culture even today- perhaps a president for the slider, a scientist for the softshell, a great general for the snapper, and an artist for the young box turtle. It seemed, somehow, clandestinely right; carefully considered to exemplify each of their personalities.

And although he had begun to get used to the possibility of names like "Monroe" and "Edison", his indecision on the matter seemed to be working against him. He was taking too long, and the boys were growing smarter.

It was a day in August, later that year, that he found his two youngest arguing over a Renaissance book, oddly enough. The elder two took to a game of knocking "secret patterns" on each other's carapaces, which he dismissed before he could allow himself the confusion that came with wondering why a five year old would want to knock on a spiked shell for fun.

After breaking up the fight and confiscating the book (which, as it turned out, the youngest only wanted because it had pictures in it, much to the chagrin of the other, who insisted that reading it was much better than just looking at the pictures), Draxum found himself idly flipping through pages of rustic images and rudimentary ideas, developed by people with strange names.

Maybe he was simply too tired to consider it properly, but, feeling defeated in his endeavor, he chose four names at random and assigned them to the young turtles, deciding it had been long enough.

It took a while to get used to, but soon "Raphael", "Leonardo", "Donatello", and "Michaelangelo" truly fit.

Over time, the boys grew... ravenous. They devoured everything- food, information, technique. They were learning quickly everything Draxum taught them. They practiced with Huginn and Muninn, leapt up, around, over, and through everything in the lab, and took special interest in action-filled films.

And Draxum grew fonder. He wasn't entirely surprised, of course; it's natural to develop some sense of sentimentality when caring for anything this long. Even if they had been the simple minded turtles he expected, he knew this was inevitable, to a degree.

What startled him was the sudden sense of fear that came with watching them train. The alarm that made his heart beat harder when one of them fell from somewhere high or any time they ran simple drills with weapons not blunted and made from wood.

He subtly began to intensify their defensive strategies, taught them where they were most vulnerable so they could protect those spots, insisted on perfecting their abilities to parry, block, and dodge before anything else.

And, over time, he found himself training them less often than before, thinking, "I must preserve their innocence and prolong their childhood experiences". After all, it was an essential part of development, was it not? If it were tarnished too much, they might become unwise or unjust as warriors. And, really, Raphael was only 8 years old, and he was the eldest; they were much too young to be exposed to the harshness of what their combative training was really for.

He told himself that, time and time again. He told them that, making certain they understood that their training was not a game. It wasn't untrue, certainly.

Really, he just wasn't ready. He wasn't ready to admit to what extent he cared about them, because it was too much. It was more than he could ever have been prepared for. It was more than that passion to protect Yokai kind ever was, and if he ever realized that, he might become the compromise to his own purposes, to the very reason these turtles exist this way to begin with, and then what? What was he to tell them, why was he to train them, who did they exist for if not the inhabitants of the Hidden City?

No. He couldn't do that. He simply would not allow it, not when so much was at stake.

And yet...

More and more often he desired simply to watch them. He was growing weary with worry, and with that tight feeling that arose in his chest each time one of his boys so much as frowned.

Raphael loved to carry his brothers on his shoulders. And he prided himself on being the big brother, in every way. He liked repeating instructions Draxum gave to the others, and tended to play caretaker anytime someone was sad, or had a bruised knee. He often played the "bad guy" in their made up games so the younger ones could "win", he was the mediator in big decisions, like what book they should read before bed, and he seemed always ready with an armful of stuffed animals when he wanted to express affection. So strong, incredibly strong, but soft spoken and sweet.

Leonardo adored Raphael. Just as Raphael did Draxum, Leonardo liked to imitate and repeat instructions. He tended to take charge in many of their childish endeavors, and had a propensity for dramatics and heroism, often pretending to rescue his brothers. This seemed to irritate Donatello to no end, unless he was also playing the hero, and often times he was. The two were usually glued to the hip, though Leonardo liked to make a point to tell all his brothers about everything that went on, and would take a movie night with the three of them over a one on one outing with Draxum any day. He was exuberant and joyous, and very driven by the concept of justice.

Donatello, similarly, seemed to care very dearly about maintaining a bond with all three of his brothers, but he was peculiar, often more reserved and enjoying his alone time. That child read and read like he might never get a chance to again, and he absorbed what he read like a sponge. Quite a few times Draxum found him pulling apart whatever he could get his hands on, and though an effort was made, there was no hiding place the boy couldn't discover in his quest for Draxum's tools. In spite of his quizzical, sometimes stoic nature, Donatello was sensitive, and very thoughtful. He would spend hours talking about his books and his ideas- some of which were very clever- and he was expressive in secondary ways- sitting nearer his brothers even without interacting, crafting things out of paper as gifts. Even the little heart-shaped mark on the back of his soft shell seemed a fitting part of him- he wore his heart on his sleeve, so to speak, and didn't even realize it.

And Michaelangelo. There was an innocence and joy and goodness about the smallest turtle that had struck Draxum. Even when he was younger he always wore a smile and liked to see the good side of things. And he idolized his brothers. With him had grown his creative inclinations, filling every colouring book, drawing on every wall, and absolutely plastering the other turtles with stickers. They were a pain to wash off, but Draxum couldn't bring himself to mind it, especially given the elder three always loved their baths. Ironically, it seemed Michealangelo did not, enjoying it only under specific circumstances. Heat, bubble bath, and bath toys had quickly become a necessity. So too did bath crayons, the need to express himself coming through even when bathing. Everything about the ornate box turtle was bright and colourful.

Draxum... loved them. Dearly. Every facet of their personalities and growth. Every unique trait and behavior.

It was terrifying. He couldn't afford to love them. He couldn't afford to see any more goodness in the humanity they showed. He couldn't afford to change his goals right now.

So he continued disregarding the feeling, trying to reason that everything he did for them was to nurture their instincts as warriors, as science experiments, as specimen.

But a pained scream one day, different from any of the ones he heard when they were frightened as infants, when one of them tripped and fell, when a spat led to hitting, sent his heart into his throat and had him racing through doorways with more urgency than he had felt for anything before.

He had demanded an explanation, panic translating to perceived anger, and three of his boys looked up with teary eyes. Three, but Donatello remained curled up on the ground, wailing his little heart out without ever looking up, and it was one of the most heart wrenching, painful sounds Draxum'd ever heard.

Raphael sat not far from the smaller boy, looking over his shoulder seemingly at nothing, at Donatello, then up at Draxum and back again. Both Leonardo and Michaelangelo burst into frantic, panicked explanations, none of their words coherent enough to understand through their tears.

When Raphael stood, exposing red-tipped spikes on his shell and pointing frantically to Donatello's, it didn't take long to figure out well enough what had happened.

It became quickly a very long day. All four turtles were distraught, and though Draxum had more than enough first aid knowledge to address the situation, bile had threatened to rise the very moment he pulled out the suture kit.

The cuts were deep, and jagged. And poor Donatello cried the entire time, even after a numbing agent had been applied.

Draxum had never thought that in depth about Donatello's soft shell. Not like that. He chose a softshell for the experiment because it would provide greater flexibility, greater agility. It gave an advantage that the hard-shelled turtles did not have.

Now, here... The soft carapace, spongy and leathery and bloody...

It was an accident. Of course it was, Draxum never doubted that. He had to assure that none of his boys were in trouble, no one was in trouble, no one had done anything wrong.

But for the first time he had to be honest with himself. For the first time he couldn't deny how much he cared about the turtles. His turtles. His boys.

He wouldn't, either. If this was what it was, if this was something that could happen again because he insisted on making them into warriors, into fighters- if this could happen on purpose, if this could happen worse, if this could happen with malice and hatred in mind...

Draxum wasn't unused to physical affection, by now. All four boys adored hugs, although Donatello was usually more reserved about them. Now, Donatello clung like his life depended on it, sniffling and whimpering, having cried so long he had no more tears. Draxum clung back, idly smoothing over the edges of the bandages, holding the frightened, exhausted turtle to his chest, cradling.

He did so until well after Donatello fell asleep. He couldn't bring himself to put him down. He accompanied the others to bed, assuring them once more that things were alright, and then simply stood in the walkway, holding his boy tightly.

He couldn't do this. He couldn't go through with it. They were children, every bit as innocent and deserving as the Yokai he wished to avenge and protect. He could train them, prepare them to protect themselves, but he could never send them into battle, ask them to put their lives on the line, much less demand it.

How could he?

It took months of processing, of agonizing his way through the healing process with Donatello, of watching the other boys proving their humanity, their curiosity, and their innocence time and time and time again. His mind was constantly at war with itself, his heart constantly in turmoil and distress, worsened by the turtles' confusion at his sudden change in behavior.

What was even worse was that they would.

They would absolutely sacrifice everything they had for his approval, and for what they understood as "right". He could see them, easily, being willing to submit their very lives to a greater cause if he asked it.

But was he "right"? Even if this experiment had gone exactly as planned, was he right for ever considering putting these turtles into the station of a warrior? Even if they had remained turtles in mind, if they never expressed complex emotion, if they could not speak, if they did not have distinct and colourful personalities, would it have been right?

Was what he saw in them now what they would have been at heart, regardless of circumstance?

Or was it the humanity, that he stole from Lou Jitsu?

Perhaps... perhaps it was time to learn. To consider the root of his motivations.

He couldn't do this to them.

How could he?

[undead-moth]

I know I've been on about this for a while now and I'm being a hater but you're telling me SydCarmy was "always meant to be platonic" even though there are two seasons of writing making use of tried-and-true explicitly romantic tropes, themes and writing signals, and SydLuca is going to be romantic because...he was nice to her on screen for a few minutes?

I don't even care if people ship SydLuca, or if they just prefer it, but you can't honestly tell me that you believe Carmy was always meant to be a friend but Luca is an obvious love interest.

Just because Syd and Carmy haven't kissed or confessed their love to each other doesn't mean that isn't very obviously the direction this show is going. The Bear has already shown you who is endgame. It has shown you every episode of the show so far.

Honestly I really don't think The Bear fanbase understands this show or cares about these characters or the story being told here, which is unfortunate because this show is shockingly well-written in comparison to most shows right now, and we should be so grateful for it but all we're doing is complaining that the writers led us on by not making a ship canon fast enough. It's just. Sad.

[longagoitwastuesday]

Kusakabe, dear, you're too beautiful to be saying that kind of stuff