#Lindy Harlown

[a-dauntless-daffodil]

the handling of moving on from terrible things without ever forgetting them in the Nanoha-verse is something that will always get to me.

Fate, as the longest running and most visible example of that, gets to me.

Seeing her as a kid asking herself- after being thrown away by the mother she loves- wondering, maybe things haven’t really started for her yet?

To see that again after you’ve watched the later seasons and seen her in StrikerS, with a whole new life and sense of purpose, but with both her birth and adopted mother’s pictures framed and set out for Vivio to see.

Listening to her explain to curious little Vivio that both of these women raised her (like Nanoha and her will be raising Vivio from now on) and rewatching the memories Fate inherited from dead Alicia, the girl she was cloned from, the daughter she was meant to be, memories of her mother being so kind and loving… just never actually to HER…

rewatching Lindy so carefully reaching out to this little girl who’s lost so much, an adoption entirely at Fate’s speed and on her terms, as she flinches from a caring touch from a mother figure and apologizes for it and Lindy tells her no, it’s okay, she’s doing great- remembering Precia answering all of Fate’s desperate help and hopeful affection with harsh words and a whip’s snap-

and now Fate, nineteen and still so young, already the legal guardian of two other kids who had lost so much. Kids she reached out to, calm on the surface, reading through parenting books in the background, asking Lindy for advice

this Fate slipping past Nanoha to go pick up tiny little Vivio after she trips and falls and looks up with tears in her eyes.

Fate lifting Vivio up, holding her close, cheerfully telling her to be careful. If she gets hurt, her mothers would be sad.

(child Fate strung up and bleeding from Precia's lessons)

The playfulness in her and Nanoha’s first little tiff as young parents together “Fate-mama, you’re spoiling her” but Nanoha is smiling, and Fate’s exaggerated and teasing “Nanoha-mama’s just too strict” rings out lightly as Vivio clings to Fate’s neck and watches them with big, wide eyes, soaking in her first ever family.

Going back to the sound stages when child Fate found a dying wolf pup and had to do something, anything, to answer it’s cries for help. How she made Arf as a magical familiar not to serve her or even to keep her company in her lonely life of training training training-

she makes an open contract with Arf in the end, promising her magic to Arf with no strings attached, telling to go where she wants and live as she wishes-

seeing this, knowing how scared she’ll be over a decade later, about her adopted kids Erio and Caro.

How they both followed her into a military career and ended up being trained by her- old enough to decide what they want, but Fate doesn’t know how to be sure of that yet, and the villain tells her she’s just like her own mother- using her children as weapons just like Precia-

it comes so close to breaking her, before Erio and Caro butt into say no. No. It’s not like that at all. She gave them the safety to choose what they wanted to be. And they want to help people, just like she does.

Fate.

Watching the in-universe film version of her and Nanoha meeting as children. Watching a recreation of her child self being whipped by Precia, and saying, she never gave wounds magic couldn’t heal.

(she took the name Harlaown from Lindy, calls her mother)

(she keeps the name Testarossa from Precia too though. Reaching out to the very last minute, even after being thrown aside, a useless doll, a failed right-handed clone of a dead left-handed daughter- still dreaming of a happy life with Precia, but also letting it go for the sake of the friends and family she's found since then...)

There are so many things that never really heal. So many things that never go away.

even so, the rest of Fate has grown up around them. She was right all that time ago, things hadn’t even started for her yet back then.

She can’t leave them behind her but she still kept moving on with them anyway.

When you see the opening for the first season, before we even meet her, with kid Fate alone in a dark and empty apartment, tired, but still petting Arf softly…

…then she’s in her twenties in Vivid coming home to a house full of life. Smiling as she makes dinner with Nanoha and Vivio. The perspective of Vivio watching Fate and Nanoha sitting happily next to each other with Vivio musing on how Fate is Nanoha’s special person and that’s why she’s Vivio’s mama.

Fate, a few years before, sitting side by side with Nanoha in their shared apartment room, telling Vivio

“it’s my job to watch over you and your mother, Nanoha”

and this is the purpose she’s chosen for herself.

Passing down only the softest things she’s learned from Precia, through Alicia, with that determination to keep her children safe- doing with Vivio as her own adopted mother Lindy did with her, slowing down, but always reassuring and reaching out, never leaving any room to wonder if this new person in Vivio’s life would always want her happy, safe, would always run to Vivio when she cried.

And Vivio isn’t Fate.

She doesn’t end up living that painful childhood, she doesn’t carry that same weight with her.

She grows up more like Nanoha did, independent and steadied by knowing that her family- though not always with her, sometimes busy or far away- cares about her so much.

(Nanoha, who smiled and took care of herself from too small of an age, victim of everyday circumstance)

(little Nanoha knowing her family loved her, loved to see her smile, and her smiling for them, being strong for them while her dad was in hospital and her mother looked after him and her older siblings looked after the business and)

(she met a girl one day, with such beautiful, sad eyes. She saw Fate and couldn’t look away)

(Ten years later, she breaks down on Fate’s shoulder, alone on the roof top- she cries- like we’ve never seen her cry before- because Nanoha is strong, always, she’s full of hope and the power to push through… but Vivio is gone. And Fate throws her arms around Nanoha promising her, holding her as she shakes, they WILL get Vivio back)

(Nanoha has a person in her life now to stop smiling for. A sad, kind girl that knows loneliness and has done things she regrets as a child, so determined and so strong, seeking love)

(a woman with more happiness in her life now than sadness. Here, with Nanoha, in the life and pains they share)  

But Vivio also knows something Nanoha didn't back then.

Something Nanoha's learned since then, with Fate failing her Enforcer exams over and over while Nanoha is hurt and recovering, more worried about Nanoha than anything else- and then passing those same exams with flying color in the end, not at all burdened down by her worry for Nanoha, those failures meaning nothing in the end, so easy to move past, once Nanoha was okay.

Vivio has the memory of a parent who slipped past Nanoha's lesson on learning to stand up on your own, lifted Vivio carefully off the ground, and said all that matters is Vivio being okay. She doesn't have to be strong.

(Nanoha doesn't have to be strong)

(she's the hero and she doesn't save Fate. She's only there to catch Fate when she falls, when Fate makes the choice and leaps into a new life)

(Nanoha, crying into Fate's chest as kids standing on a bridge right before saying goodbye, at the end of season one, the start of more things than they can imagine)

Fate’s name is so ironic and so apt.

She was named after the project that failed to decide who she would be.

And every child she meets who other people have already decided on- too troublesome, too dangerous, useful only as a weapon- even the ones who've shouldered a decision they think was already made- have to keep smiling, stay strong- she only sees them as someone for who things haven’t even started yet.

There is no fate binding the people she loves, only Fate, wanting to protect them. So that they can keep making choices for themselves.  

Like she did.

[ninjakittenarmy]

In fairness, JoJo characters are named after musician stage names, there’s also a guy named Vanilla Ice.

Full Metal panic has a dude named Kurz Weber, and one named Teletha Testarosa, and Negima has, among others, a character named Kurt Goddel, and a villain named Fate Avernacus.

Lyrical Nanoha has a Fate too, of the opposite sex. And characters named Jail Scaglietti, Precia Testarossa, Alicia Testarossa, Amy Limietta, Lindy Harlown, two officers named Allex and Landy, Crono, Gil Graham, Liesearia and Lieselotte (twins), Letty Lowran, Mariel Atenza, Clyde Harlaown, Signum, Vita, Caro Ru Lushe, Erio Mondial, Teana Lanster (house Lanster sends its regards), Griffith Lowran, Shario Finieno, Alto Krauetta, Lucino Lowran, Vice Granscenic, Aina Triton, Schach Nouera, Carim Gracia, Quint, Vivio, Mira Barret, Leone Phils, Largo Kiel, Midget Crowbel, Laguna Granscenic, Karel and Liera Harlaown, Lutecia Alpine, Zest Grangaitz, Auris Gaiz, Regius Gaiz, Voltz Stan, Runessa Magnus, Tredia Graze, Einhart Stratos, Rio Wesley, Corona Timil, Els Tasmin, Micaiah Chevelle, Fabia Crozelg, Sieglinde Jeremiah, Victoria Dahlgrün, Harry Tribeca, Chantez Arpinion, Lilina Sagaris, Elsa Edix, Edgar, Erie Stout, Yumina Enclave, Edelgard Barkas, Fuka Reventon, Rinne Berlinetta and her relatives Lorrie Dan and Roy (Dan and Roy are fairly normal), Lyra Caprice, Carrie Tercel, Adeel Telstar, Karna Maven, Janice Goat, Lily-Strosek, Rosalia-Strosek, Isis Egret, Thoma Avenir, Curren Hückebein, Veyron of Hückebein, Cypha of Hückebein, Arnage of Hückebein, DeVille of Hückebein, Fortis of Hückebein, Stella Irvine, Sonica Lilian, Hades Vandein, Kurt Grendel, Mariya Ranevskaya (that one may be normal actually), Quinn Garland, Lolo Endive, Amitie Florian, Kyrie Florian, Phil Maxwell, Iris Units, Jessica Waverly, Andy Penton, Iris, Elenora Florian, David Bannings, Jodie Bannings, Yuri Eberwein, Dearche, Granz, Amitie, and Kyrie Florian, Levi, and Stern.

Anime is great. Anime will be like “this is my character of ambiguous western descent. Their name is the most incomprehensible combination of made up sounds. And if not that, it is a name that has not appeared on a single birth certificate since 1773.

Code Geass went and said “most of these character hail from Future Sort-of-Britain, including our main character, who will be named Lelouch just like every single British person isn’t.” Then they decided to distract you from this by naming his love interest Shirley, cornering the market of 80+ year old grandmothers clutching their 3 bowls of strawberry sucker candy in delight. Code Geass didn’t even call it a day here they had one more trick up their sleeve and it was to name the third character in the group Rivalz, a name and a character which appeal to exactly no one.

Tiger and Bunny said “What should our western young-20′s heartthrob successful pretty-boy deuteragonist be named? What screams ‘young’ and ‘trendy’ and ‘brilliant’ and ‘sexy’? Barnaby. Barnaby Brooks. This is our Sex Symbol Barnaby.” I bet a bunch of ghosts from the 17th century were stoked about that one. I bet Barnaby walks into gift shops asking if they have any of the travel keychains in his name and he gets laughed out of the store. I bet Barnaby’s parents didn’t die, they just faked their deaths to get away from him seeing as they hated him enough to name him Barnaby.

I haven’t followed Attack on Titan in 7 years but yall have a character named Pieck Finger. That’s it that’s my roast.