#a lot of it was samples too so it might have actually been more than 3lb

[allalrightagain]

Cannot believe that 18 months after I bought literally three (3) pounds of tea*, I'm gonna have to buy more.

[quarklynx]

Casually flirting with the idea of fucking around and getting a master's degree. The time will pass anyway, right?

[ghost-of-a-dream-girl]

Vampiric vascular access PSA from your friendly neighbourhood fanfic writing medic: Where To Bite

For those of you who, like me, love to write/read this sad vampire (or indeed anyone who likes to write any vampire), there were just a couple of sexy little anatomy things that I wanted to highlight (purely for fun).

First: arteries vs veins - Arteries take blood at pressure generated by the left ventricle of the heart, hence the pulse, to tissues and organs. Veins are a low pressure system that take blood back to the heart (via all sorts of mechanisms like valves, suction pressure from inspiration, pressure gradients, etc). - The inherent not-quite-sexy risk to puncturing/bleeding from an artery (especially a big one) is the risk of clot formation and with that the risk that those clots travel (embolize) further down the artery. This can result in things like strokes or ischaemic limbs. - Major arteries have associated major veins running nearby them. - Because of pressure differences, arterial punctures can spurt blood out, whereas veins ooze. To drink from a vein you'd have to apply a little more suction, whereas drinking from an artery might be a bit more messy/squirty. - Sure, veins don't pulse in the way arteries do BUT the way that we find these big veins (without ultrasound) is via use of anatomical landmarks. Your fave vampire will likely know those landmarks. Durge will likely also know these landmarks...for other reasons.

The neck (the classic, and everyone's favourite) - One of the things we look for as part of a fluid status assessment/CVS exam is the JVP (jugular venous pressure), which reflects pressure changes in the right atrium. For this we look for the double waveform pulse on either side of the neck coming from the internal jugular vein. It's not really palpable in the way arterial pulses are, but it is visible in most people (especially at neck turned 45 degrees). - The internal jugular vein (IJV) AND the external jugular vein are the two chunky veins of the neck. The IJV in particular would be a good one to bite for the same reason it's often a favourite vein to use for central line insertion- it's large, superficial, and usually pretty straight in its course within the neck. - The carotids are the major arteries of the neck, sitting more in the midline and protected a bit by a muscle there (sternocleidomastoid).

The inner thigh (the smut writer's favourite) - Gods know that the femorals have been doing some heavy lifting in vampire smut fics. Given the fact that they are located on either side of the groin, any biting action there has the inference of a lot more physical intimacy. - Like the neck vessels, you have big arteries AND big veins in the femoral region too. You have the femoral arteries which lie again more in the centre (like the carotids), and you have the femoral veins which actually lie more medially (more towards the mid-line of the body, i.e further in on the groin). These then branch out. - For purposes of vampiric vascular access, the femoral veins would be just a bit easier to get into position wise, but they do run very close to the femoral arteries. Because of how anatomy and fat distribution works also worth mentioning that the femoral vein and artery also lie a little deeper, so would require a much deeper bite.

Peripheral pulses (for those little nibbles) - For a quick snack more peripherally, it's going to be much easier to chomp into a peripheral artery. Arteries have thicker, more muscular walls than veins and the more superficial veins get the flimsier they are (i.e would be bitches to try to puncture with fangs). - We often sample arterial blood by puncturing the radial arteries. The radial artery runs on the thumb side of the wrist, and is very easy to palpate! - One could also attempt the brachial arteries, which are just above the inside of either elbow. A little deeper, but still palpable. - For the more adventurous bloodsuckers, you could even go for the dorsalis pedis (top of the foot), or the posterior tibial (below and behind the innermost part of the ankle bone)! See below: Astarion sampling a little of that radial artery juice

Aftercare (for the bitten) - If you are biting an artery or big vein you will usually need to apply some pressure to stop the bleeding. - In terms of clotting, it depends on what magical properties you believe vampire spit has. If none, it generally takes a few minutes to stop bleeding with a bit of added pressure, but bigger puncture sites may take longer. - That said, all bleeding stops eventually in one way or another- just ask Durge. - Like always, after a big drink you may need to ask your cleric friend to help you out with a cheeky lesser restoration spell to stimulate erythropoeisis so you're not wandering around the Realms so deeply anaemic.

Happy biting, friends!

[1moreff-creator]

DRDT CH2 PT2: Full Analysis

While CH2 Part 2 was releasing, I chose to make liveblog-reaction posts to the episodes to record my immediate thoughts for posterity, but that meant that actual, coherent analysis was pushed to the side in favor of me freaking out over… everything going on. But goddamn; even accounting for recency bias, this might just be my favorite trial of any DR style killing game I’ve ever seen (though admittedly I'm working with a small sample size). So I felt it merited a bit more… cohesive analysis. That’s what this post is!

WARNING: This post is around 28k words long. Do not click "read more" unless you're ready for lag, and make sure to take breaks while reading if needed.

Spoilers for DRDT CH2. CW: Murder, suicide, hanging, execution, gun violence, self-harm, blood, stabbing (fork).

(Btw you can find my immediate reactions in my post masterlist. Not linking each individually here because I hit Tumblr's 100 link limit. I know, I know)

How do I even structure this? I guess I’ll start with the actual case itself, then go character by character because WOW.

Also, I hope you forgive that I can't put images for every referenced piece of dialogue (Tumblr 30 image limit when I catch you...), so I'll save them for when they're necessary and instead add links to the referenced quote in the episode.

The Case

Although I’ve made many posts talking about this damn thing, I don’t think I’ve ever expressed just how cool the actual mystery is. The evidence is all there from the beginning bar the note and alibis, introduced in a way that doesn’t make the method obvious, but that still allowed the audience to figure out the main aspects without much issue. Everything follows logically, and while there’s a few things that ended up being less important than some expected (that glove will haunt the fandom forever I fear), everything got explained in what I consider to be a pretty satisfactory way. It wasn’t obscenely complex or crazy, but I consider the method to be just right for a chapter 2 case.

Oh and the Nico case was cool too, even if half the shit in that crime scene will haunt me forever. Why were there two weights off to the side-? not important.

If there’s one critique I can give the actual discussion of the case (and this is legitimately the only real critique I have of this entire set of episodes), I’d argue that the way the method is presented is… weird. Like, I get why, DRDT is clearly more focused on character conflict than the murder mystery aspect, but there were still a lot of moments where it felt like Teruko’s thought process wasn’t explored properly, to the point where it sometimes felt like Teruko just… magically got the answers whispered to her by the ghost of Kirigiri.

As an example, take the ball of clothes over the rafters. Ace mentions the issue of getting the rope up there, and Teruko immediately jumps to the right conclusion of the seemingly completely unrelated ball of clothes.

To illustrate why this feels weird, let me tell you what my thought process was when I came up with the theory (because again, the evidence was laid out well enough that I did manage to call this, even if I got a fair bit of other stuff wrong). Obviously it's not the only admissible thought process, but it's a good example to see how I feel the presentation of evidence should have been handled.

We know Arei was hung from high up (Veronika’s account) -> We can confirm something happened on the rafters because the lights are broken -> Brainstorming how that could have happened (screening room connection? Secret ladder?) -> Perhaps something was thrown up there with the rope attached -> Ball of clothes.

In the series, however, we get:

Arei was probably hung from high (Veronika’s account) -> Discussion continues, literally the entirety of Nico's situation gets explained -> Ace brings up the issue for the first time like three years later-> Teruko immediately points to the ball of clothes -> The lights are only mentioned after.

You get what I'm saying? The progression doesn't feel as natural, because we immediately jump to the conclusion without discussing the evidence that leads to it. This also happens with things like the pulley method, where Teruko explains everything before bringing up the tape on the spinny thing, which is the only thing implicating said spinny thing in the method. And I feel like the reason quite a few people felt there should be more to the case is because the evidence wasn't presented properly.

That said, this is an extremely minor point. Again, DRDT is more focused on character drama than murder mystery, so I don’t particularly mind if I can nitpick a few things in the writing surrounding the mystery solving.

And oh boy, was there character drama this trial! Thank the gods I’m only covering Part 2, I think I’d die if I tried to talk about the entire trial as a whole.

Character Analysis

I’ll go in order, starting with the characters I feel had the least prominence, and making my way to the ones who really stole the spotlight this part.

Mai Akasaki

No content lol. Though this is probably a good time to mention that, in this post, I'll mostly ignore theorizing related stuff and focus more on straight up character analysis, even if the two sometimes intersect. Game Theory-like speculation will mostly be saved for dedicated posts :p

Xander Matthews

He got mentioned, but he’ll come up in David’s section so. Skipping him. 

Min Jeung

Well, there were a few references. Such as:

Min: I'll fix your mistake! - Teruko: But I'll fix my mistake.

Something something, David-Xander vs Teruko-Min parallels, etc. And also:

I like the visual symbolism that the images are effectively flipped (Teruko on the left-Teruko on the right and hugger on the right-hugger on the left, Teruko facing the camera-Teruko facing away), because the situations are inverted. In Min’s, the culprit hugs Teruko after she dooms them to their fate, and in Eden’s, a non-culprit hugs Teruko as she starts defending them. I did notice on first watch, but didn’t say anything because at the time it was still possible Eden was the culprit. Alas, the symbolism is consistent!

There's only one last thing to mention about Min. One tiny, itsy bitsy detail that probably has no lore relevance whatsoever.

MonoTV [2-16]: Now loading the default XF-Ture Tech personality drivers.

Min [BE1]: But one day, we were visited by the founder of that big company, XF-Ture Tech. He told my parents that he would sponsor me and pay for all of our expenses.

Oh yeah, MonoTV was created by the same company that sponsored Min as the Ultimate Student! Hey, what the fuck?

We'll get into it more later in the (I cannot believe I'm about to say this) MonoTV section (or rather the post linked to in said section), but MonoTV seems to have been created specifically for the killing game. This means there's a very real chance XF-Ture Tech is behind all this. That paints the sponsorship of Min as a strikingly shady thing (well, more than it already was), to the point there's a very real chance Min is straight up connected to the origins of the killing game, if not outright the mastermind. We'll have to see how this plays out later, since right now, we're still lacking a lot of critical context.

But hey! We might get more Min content in the future! I, for one, am very, very excited.

Charles Cuevas

Not too much character insight on this one, but he got a couple of cool moments. As always, funny, bounces well off Whit, very helpful in the trial, weirdly knowledgeable about jockeying (or maybe he just, like, thought about it, it’s not like most of what he says aren’t conclusions anyone could arrive at by simply knowing what horse racing is), and-

Charles [2-15]: I'm the only person reasonable enough to make that sort of judgement call. Everyone else who does so is being biased to the point of idiocy.

-it’s nice to see his pridefulness didn’t just go away after CH1! He’s neat :)

J Rosales/Moreno

Half of her dialogue this part is just her talking about how murder is bad. It’s fine, it’s just odd.

I guess if you want someone to point out murder’s bad, J’s one of the only real options, isn’t she? You need a confrontational character (so no Eden or Rose or Whit), who wouldn’t be a hypocrite (this eliminates Nico, Ace and Levi, arguably Hu since she defends Nico), who is mentally stable enough for their opinion to be held in high regard (this eliminates Arturo, David and Veronika, alongside half the cast), who is willing to derail the trial to talk morality (eliminating Charles and arguably Teruko), and who isn’t dead or missing (like Xander, Arei, Mai or Min).

Wait that’s the whole cast. Holy shit she actually is the only one that makes sense to be murder bashing how is this even possible. 

…Regardless, you could still argue that you don’t need someone constantly pointing out murder’s bad, meaning there could very much be a deeper reason J is being so vocal about it. Apart from possibly being setup for her to be primary support moving forward, I personally think all this points to her just having a very strong set of beliefs regarding most things, which we could already kinda infer anyways. 

Or maybe Mariabella killed a guy. Yeah, sure. Why not?

Veronika Grebenshchikoba

There were certainly a couple interesting Vero moments here, which is always fun. It was finally confirmed her secret was, as most theorized, the “took on your talent to distract yourself from the need to hurt yourself for fun” one. I mean, I feel like everyone called that one from the moment the curtain fell away from the screen with the motive secrets, but you get the idea. 

We also learnt she had a pact with Hu regarding their secrets, which I would love to learn the details of, and definitely makes me interested in where these Recap Foils are going, as well as-

Veronika [2-13]: After all, my own so-called secret isn't even the worst thing I've done. Isn't that so utterly disappointing of this motive?

… whatever the hell that means. Why’s she gotta be so ominous? (I love this about her).

The last notable scenes to point out are all the scenes where she's... Veronika, and I wouldn't have it any other way. Her psychoanalysis of Levi will probably wait for when I talk about him, and her help during the time Teruko was figuring out the murder method is appreciated, but specifically about her:

Veronika [2-15]: Swallow your pride and say that you're too weak, too stupid, and too incompetent to perform this murder. Accept the fact that no one thinks highly of you. Or defend your dignity at the risk of admitting that you're perfectly capable of committing this murder and continue to be our number one suspect.

I just think the voice acting in this line in particular is very auditorily pleasant so I wanted to point it out :D

But Episode 15 actually has a much more insidious Vero moment, which I felt was way more noteworthy. After Ace admits to the crime, he goes on his whole speech, which includes directly calling out Veronika's words as part of the reasoning why he killed, there comes a point when Ace calls himself a "piece of shit", and no one denies it. When that happens, Veronika smiles.

Veronika: Oh my. How tragic.

She is such an awful person, just such a piece of garbage. I adore her.

Anyways, my appreciation of actually horrible women aside, we need to discuss the biggest question she leaves us. And that is "hey, why is her reaction to Ace's execution and Levi's almost death so different from her reaction to Min's death?"

Veronika [about Min, 1-12]: Min died in such a cruel manner...

Veronika [about Levi, 2-16]: If Levi dies because of this... Kehehe... I'm sure I'll miss him, but... This is quite a way to go. I can't say I wasn't entertained.

Veronika [about Ace, 2-16]: Aha... Ahaha... How incredible...

So, after considering it for a little bit, I think we're lacking a little bit too much critical information on Veronika to confidently state why the hell her reaction is so different, but I can come up with a few different possible answers. I'll list them in ascending order of likeliness in my opinion, and we'll see just how wrong I am once we get more insight on her!

+Veronika cares more about Levi than Ace, and more about Min than Levi. This is because she just said Ace's execution was "incredible," while she mentions she'll miss Levi, and obviously looks genuinely distressed over Min. I see no actual reason to believe this, though, because I... don't think Vero and Min ever even interacted beyond the trial? So unless we're pulling some very strange Veromin agenda out of nowhere (or Veronika is Mai Akasaki), this doesn't work imo.

+Veronika was acting in T1, but doesn't care by the start of T2. Possible, and it's true that Vero was more self-conscious about freaking people out in CH1, but I'm not sure if there's enough evidence to truly say she was only pretending to be distressed by Min's death.

+Veronika's reactions are based on the executions (and execution attempt) themselves, not anything else. This is consistent with her specifically reacting to the way Min died ("Min died in such a cruel manner") rather than the death itself. She specifically says she'd be entertained by Levi's death, and is clearly entertained by Ace's. So, I guess she just finds Min's execution particularly cruel/boring? Does she... have wolf related trauma? Test related trauma? I don't know, but I think this fits decently well, so.

+Veronika's slowly getting worse. A logical conclusion from the fact that she reacted one way in T1, and another literally four days later. Certainly possible given her analysis of people shattering in the killing game, so for now this is the interpretation I'm going with.

Whit Young

.... Sigh. You're not even that important to this part, how are you still gonna require so many words of analysis?

Alright, let's start with the pretty infamous scene where he talks about drop hanging. I do want to make one thing clear; just because Whit talks for a pretty long time about drop hanging, it doesn’t mean he actually says anything particularly groundbreaking. Like, everything he says is very logically sound, which means they’re conclusions anyone could have drawn.

Like me. Because even though I don’t think I wrote them down explicitly, I did more or less arrive at the same conclusions as he did, and I don’t have any experience with drop hanging. I’m clarifying this because I’m on enough lists as it is just by firefoxing shit like “can turpentine knock you out” and “how long do people pass out after being strangled” I do not need any more allegations on my person! 

That said, I am also not a fictional character who exists within a story which follows narrative conventions (as far as you know, anyways). Whit is. And it’d be silly to instantly dismiss that the dev specifically chose Whit, a character who is otherwise not the most helpful in trials, to be the one to deliver this explanation, and without any interruptions no less. Even Teruko and Charles usually have one character or another finishing their explanations, like Levi when Teruko explained the slingshot or… Levi when Charles talked about jockeying. Huh, Levi kinda goated?

Thus, because the dev specifically chose Whit to give this explanation with no interruptions, we can infer that he may have a special connection to drop hanging. Given what we know, I find it likeliest that his mother committed suicide by hanging. At present, I don’t find much evidence that he would have attempted himself, though…

You know how Whit dyes his hair to look like his mom’s? And how Color Theory in LGI gives him (among other stuff) “degraded copy”, likely in reference to this? If his mother killed herself via hanging, do you think he would try to replicate that, too?

Food for thought. Again, not much reason to believe it yet. 

Other than that, there are... the allegations. The part started strong with MonoTV stating it let slide a rule violation because it was funny (especially weird given what we learn in 2-16, but Whit's not the only rulebreaker in the cast so we're chilling). And then, 2-16 happened.

Whit [seven seconds before Teruko's execution, 2-16]: Charles, stop talking and cover your eyes! [...] Whit [post Levi shooting]: Ah, crap. The smell of blood is really strong. Even though I told [Charles] not to look, he still...

And, of course.

Whit: ...

Of course.

Alright, so let me start by the elephant in the room. The hand behind the back. The moment the cast learns the elevator doors won't open, we see Whit with his left hand behind his back. Many have assumed this means, understandably in my opinion, that he may be holding a remote control of some kind to close the elevator. In other words, Whit's the mastermind. But, while I consider him one of if not the best mastermind guess in the market, I don't think this is good evidence of it.

You see, there's no reason to believe such a remote would be required. By all accounts, it should be MonoTV's AI who is keeping the elevator closed with no need for outside interference, regardless of who the MM is. There is simply no reason to believe that any MM would have an "elevator manual stop" or even an universal remote (apart from J!MM for obvious reasons), because it should be MonoTV who is running this stuff.

As an aside, I will point out that, per the CH1 QnA, every character is right-handed apart from Teruko (lefty) and Arei (ambidextrous). You could use this to argue Whit shouldn't be doing anything with his left (the hand behind his back), but that's not good reasoning, as the sprite might just be drawn that way for aesthetic reasons and you're supposed to ignore handedness. Eden also used her left to rip out Xander's eye, apparently. I haven't seen anyone bring it up, but I have made this mistake before with a certain bat swinging Milgram prisoner, so I'm saying this to avoid others making the same mistake.

That clarified, however, the first point is still valid. Although I consider it perfectly possible, at present I do not believe Whit is holding anything behind his back.

Why does he pose like that, then? To answer that, perhaps it'd be better to answer what the deal with his other behavior is.

Because it's weird, right? Whit focuses on Charles even when everyone else, Charles included, are fretting over Teruko and Levi. And then, despite being able to brush off things like Levi's secret confession and Min's execution with nothing but a "that's wack," joking about rewatching said execution, etc., somehow the elevator being closed is what finally gets him to bring out the breakdown sprite?

Well, yes. And this shouldn't be all that surprising, imo. Because everything about Whit's reaction is perfectly in line with his previous behavior. Not to say it isn't weird (it is), just that it's weird in the way Whit's always been weird, and not in any new special way.

This is because every part of this reaction comes from the already established way Whit deals with tragedy; he avoids it, and moves on. You'll immediately think of Whit's mom when I say that, the way he omits her death whenever he speaks of her to the point he genuinely forgets that's a thing until a few seconds after the secret Rose received was brought into the conversation, but there's more examples that are actually closer to this situation. In particular, I want to direct your attention to the investigations in both chapters so far.

For the first trial, Whit spends literal hours hanging out with Charles while the Chemist has a breakdown, to the point he almost didn't investigate at all. This is excusable, of course; he was helping someone in need, and the culprit was thought to be obvious enough that investigation wouldn't be necessary.

The second, though, is perhaps a bit stranger. First, Whit doesn't look closely at Arei's body because he was busy comforting Eden, apparently. Alright, fine. But, hey, how did he try to comfort Eden after everyone started to filter in?

Whit [2-8]: There, there. Pat pat. Do you want to sit down somewhere else?

He immediately wants to leave the room. But, he's still trying to help Eden; maybe he's projecting? Because he'd want to leave the room if a loved one died, so he's asking Eden if she wants to do it?

Except, he does leave the room. He doesn't have any other lines in the playground past this point, and then he starts investigating with Charles, the one dude he knows won't enter the scene of the crime.

And you know when he splits off from Charles?

Whit [2-8]: If you're worried about Rose tampering with evidence, then all you need is another witness to watch over her, right? I can do that, since I'm here. I mean, unless Charles needs me for something.

My guy will genuinely do anything except investigate the playground.

And that's where the pattern starts to be noticeable. Whenever something bad happens, Whit finds any excuse he can to distance himself from the situation. And to be clear, they're usually good excuses; it makes sense for Whit to do all this in a vacuum, it's just odd that he constantly finds them. Other examples include him bringing up alibis when the note first comes up, and then, when he's pressed about it:

Whit [2-9]: Eden has [the note]. Ask her.

He doesn't even... want to have the responsibility of the note? Admittedly that could be for other reasons, but still.

With this pattern of avoidance in mind, the things he says in 2-16 are perfectly explainable. Instead of focusing on Teruko's incoming execution or Levi's injuries, he chooses to focus on Charles, because that's easier for him. He's once again finding an excuse to look away from tragedy.

By the way, I don't want to make it sound like Whit doesn't care about Charles as anything but an excuse to get out of thinking of bad stuff. It's pretty clear a big part of why Whit does the shit he does is that he genuinely cares about Charles as a friend (crush?). Whit probably does want to help Charles just for the sake of helping him, but it does come with the benefit of helping Whit avoid stuff he doesn't want to think about.

This whole avoidance thing is also why Whit is so perturbed by the elevator. When Levi gets shot, Whit probably hopes that they get to leave the trial room quickly to take care of him, at which point Whit can just avoid the situation entirely by just sticking to Charles like usual. But they can't. The elevator is shut. Not only does Whit probably realize that means they have to watch the execution, but it also means Whit is not able to get out of the room where a guy is actively dying, and sticking to Charles only lets him ignore the situation so much.

Why does he have his hand behind his back? Well, this is gonna sound like I'm on anti-Whit!MM copium (I swear I like the theory well enough), but I think he's simply balling up his fist out of stress. It's just that Whit "I don't want to talk about any problems ever and don't want anyone to ever know when I'm suffering" Young is instinctively hiding it so no one sees any sign that he might not be okay.

Does that make sense? Barely? Well, it's not like "emergency elevator shutdown button" is particularly more believable in my eyes, so that's the answer I'm going with for now.

Anyways. Jesus Christ Whit you're barely even relevant to this part how the fuck did you still force me to write so much about you.

Arturo Giles

I have less to write about Arturo than Vero and Whit because he's a bit more straightforward, but I'm still putting him here because he was more directly important this part. Speaking of, what notable things did Arturo do these episodes? Ah, right.

Arturo [2-12]: You shut your whore mouth!

"I thought you were only doing necessary imag-" This one's necessary shut

I'm using this to talk about the big speech about his talent, that he started studying plastic surgery when he was 12 and that it's impressive he's a plastic surgeon this early in his life. Props to dev for addressing this, I know some people are irked when characters are in the medical field from way too early in life without good justification like this. The fact he started so young also adds to the theory that Arturo's home life sucked, because it'd be really odd for a 12 year old to already be planning to leave otherwise.

The way the cast keeps insulting his skill, even though as he's said several times over the course of the series, the shit they expect him to do is way beyond his area of expertise, is a good way to build up to the way the cast also dismisses Ace's intelligence and skills later.

Other than that, there was one more moment when Arturo took part of the spotlight. When Levi gets shot, despite everything that happened earlier, everyone still turns to Arturo to save the Stylist. This leads to one of the most human moments Arturo's given us since 2-10:

Arturo [post Levi shooting, 2-16]: I--! I'm not that kind of surgeon! I've told you, over and over, I have no experience with saving lives! Something like this! There's no way I can do it--

Apart from the stellar voice acting that cannot be pointed out enough times, Arturo's doubt over Levi's condition is certainly a good setup for CH3, I'm really interested in how he'll handle this. Especially because...

Do you think he'd think of Felicity, looking at Levi like that? Because just like Arturo ignored Felicity's feelings (to an extent) in pursuit of his dream, he also neglected to study the more standard medical knowledge in favor of becoming a plastic surgeon faster, and now he needs that standard medical knowledge to save Levi's life. Food for thought.

Arturo is definitely an interesting character to watch out for moving forward, he's certainly in for a very curious CH3. Final note:

Arturo [to Levi, 2-13]: How could you simply *forget* that you murdered your own family member?

Get it because the death of Felicity haunts him even though he didn't kill her himself- Man I love recap foils.

MonoTV

I cannot fucking believe that this hunk of metal is getting its own section, but it is. 2-16 what an episode you are.

Thankfully, I've already expressed most of my thoughts about this damn thing in this linked post, so I'll just refer you to that one instead of writing it all again. As a summary, there's quite a few lore implications to the fact that we now have a clearly stated purpose for MonoTV, a goal for the killing game, a connection to XF-Ture Tech (because MonoTV seems to have been specifically created for the game), and I'm really wondering why the hell the default XF personality seems to care so much about Teruko and where that could lead to in the future. Also, very curious where the theme of fate will be taken with it, as well as where dev is planning to take the fact that it seems to have feelings of grief and pain and maybe even cares about Teruko??? Or has compassion in general??? What is wrong with this dog-

Rose Lacroix

Btw I greatly appreciate everyone who colors her name rainbow, I see you and you're valid for it. I need to color code my highlighting though, and if I have to do rainbow for every word I highlight I will actually die. Also I would need to put in an epilepsy warning in my posts lol

Rose got a few nice lines, but when it comes to her, there's one big moment that's really on everyone's mind.

Rose [2-14]: Has it really gotten this bad? I think my brain is falling apart. I can't even recall what day it was when that happened. Levi: You can't remember? I was under the impression that your memory was the best out of everyone here. Rose: It's true that I remember everything I see. But that means that most of my memories are meaningless junk. The kind of thing a normal person would forget without a second thought. But I can't forget. My brain won't work the way I want it to. I can't draw associations so easily. Everything reminds me of something meaningless, and I get distracted. And the worst thing is that I remember it all in perfect detail. Xander's body. Min's execution. I can't even look at Teruko without seeing blood. I know I'm supposed to remember everything. I know I'm supposed to be smart. I know I'm supposed to be helpful. Yet I'm not. I... I'm sorry for being useless. Maybe if I tried harder, if I just got over myself--

Do I... need to talk about this, beyond pointing out how good the VAing is? Everything about it is heartbreaking, but pretty straightforward. It's an extension of the conversation she and Teruko had in 2-5, where we also throw in Rose's growing self-doubt and self-blame over everything that's going on around her. It adds into the theme of this cast pushing expectations on each other (like wanting Arturo to be a better doctor or Ace being too stupid to do a murder), throws in some parallels to Teruko and Hu and Eden (the self-blame sisters!!! *fire emoji* *fire emoji* *fire emoji*) and Xander (the survivor's guilt boy!!! *fire emoji* *fire emoji* fire emoji*), foils with J (J who rejects what others like Mariabella want from her VS Rose who internalizes the expectations and accepts the whole Spurling situation), there's the "a normal person would forget" wording that kinda connects her to Nico and Levi and David (the "feeling separated from other humans' experience" siblings!!! *fire emoji* *fire emoji* *fire-), obviously memory is connected with Charles and Teruko, etc.

You see why I don't always talk about parallels? I have to bring up every single character up every time because that's the shit that happens when your writing is this *fire emoji* *fire emoji* *fire emoji*.

The other thing is Nico, but maybe it's better to keep that for their section. Overall, just a fantastic feast for enjoyers of Rose angst.

Arei Nageishi

You know this trial went crazy when Arei got a whole ass character arc during it, and she's the dead one.

For this part in particular, the big Arei moment was obviously during 2-13, when we finally got to hear the end of the conversation between her and David. I'm not transcribing it, because I'm sure we all got the gist. Arei figured out one of the main themes of the chapter, that everyone is a flawed person, and that means that no one's ever too far gone. There's always a possibility of becoming a less shitty person, and that's sweet.

But beyond Themes, learning what Arei's mindset about good and bad people was really helps to understand her actions before this point, though I do find it interesting that the whole "sorting people into good and bad" mentality she had is actually pretty similar to the way she talks about people in her FTE, which is some fun consistency!

Arei [CH1 FTE]: Yup, that's right! I organize everyone I meet into categories of how I should bully them.

... Well the context's different but you get the idea.

Arei used this principle of "sorting" people into "good" and "bad" to deny herself the possibility of getting better, because trying to change is scary. Man I wonder why that rings a bell.

Teruko [to Whit, 2-2]: But if you start talking about me and saying that I could be a good person if only I make an attempt to change, then I'm going to stop you right there. Don't say that I could be a good person, because all it'll do is make me feel bad that I'm not.

Ah right because Teruko's a well written protagonist. And actually wait, isn't there someone else?

David [2-11]: "People can always change?" What complete bullshit. No one ever changes. People who are born lazy, useless and stupid will stay that way until they die. If you were able to "improve" yourself into a better person, then it only means you were a better person to begin with.

Ah right because David is a well written character. Carry on then.

I do wonder why she waited until night three after the motive handout to talk to David about it, though, instead of doing directly after the playground breakdown. Was it, like, she didn't want to confront it directly after and only got the motivation/courage/whatever after talking to Eden? And then couldn't find David until then? It's odd, but I imagine there's no, like, big reason behind it necessarily.

Eden Tobisa

Hey Eden sorry I suspected you as the killer for a year can we still be friends? :,)

There's two big Eden moments to take into consideration, one in 2-14, one in 2-16.

Eden [2-14]: Why... No one... believes in me... Why? I'm... Arei's killer? No... No way....... Hu: Eden? Please don't cry. Eden: This whole time I've been trying to hold myself together... because Arei died...... I wanted so badly for this all to be a dream, and for Arei to be alive and by my side.... But now, you all think I killer her? Why? I cared about her! Arei is... She could have been my friend! Why would I kill her?? Levi: Eden, please calm down... Eden: Why am I being accused of murdering Arei? I wanted to help her! I just wanted to be friends with her! Why would you say that I killed her? Is it because you think I hated her? That's not true! I didn't hate her! Teruko: Eden.

I'm gonna cut it off there and resume in a bit, partly so I can organize this better and partly to make absolutely sure I don't hit the Tumblr limit on characters in a single text block (because my entire blog is evidently dedicated to testing this hellsite's limits lmao).

There's honestly a surprising amount of nuance in this small breakdown. We start with re-establishing that Eden is someone who constantly tries her hardest to remain strong in the face of adversity, holding herself together as best she can when her newest friend just died and she's more or less blaming herself for it.

Then, while I always praise the voice acting (because it deserves it), I need to bring special attention to the sheer amount of emotion in that "Why? I cared about her!" Hearing Eden genuinely frustrated at the accusations on top of her sadness is heartbreaking, and just a wonderful display of humanity from a character who is at times almost inhumanly patient. Makes me feel bad for suspecting her, and she's fictional in our world!

On top of that, "she could have been my friend" is an interesting choice of words regarding Arei. This is where having hyper-analyzed all Eden lines comes in handy lol. Because taken at face value, it means that Eden recognizes that her relationship with Arei wasn't at a stage where she could genuinely called her a friend, given that as far as we know the last conversation they had was after the Arturo thing. Nice depth!

The rest is pretty standard, though again the phenomenal VAing still makes my heart ache. Continuing:

Eden: Teruko... I didn't kill Arei..... Do you believe me?! Teruko: Listen-- Eden: *sniff* I, I didn't do it! Please.... Believe me... This whole trial has been cruel to me.... Help me, Teruko... I can't stand it... I just wanted to help Arei.... I didn't kill her... Teruko: You know I can't just take your words at face value, Eden. Eden: Please, Teruko... You're my friend, aren't you? Friends help each other... So please, help me... I promise I didn't... I didn't kill her.... I'm innocent... Please trust me..... Please.....

AAAAAAAAAAA-

Okay with that basic reaction out of the way, because evidently the reactions didn't have enough "text screaming" for me to fully get it out of my system, this is just a really heart-wrenching scene. Just the combination of VAing, music and visuals, man... ouch. It's especially tragic when taking the following line into account:

Eden [2-3]: Teruko, relationships aren't transactional. It's not that I did something good for you that you should do something good for me.

The Eden hyperfocus comes in clutch again- Is it weird that being an Eden!Culprit believer for so long is making me appreciate her character more now that she's confirmed innocent? :v

Teruko has, up to this point, never outright claimed herself to be Eden's friend, at least not as far as I can recall. Hell, her lines following Eden's plea for help seem to completely disregard the idea.

Teruko [2-14]: So for now, I'm going to assume you're innocent. Eden: W-What? Really? Thank you so much, Teruko... Teruko: Don't... get me wrong. This isn't out of kindness or pity or anything else. This is only because you helped me in the last trial. I'm repaying your favor, and nothing else. That's why I'll trust you, just this once.

How much she means that is for the Teruko section. What's important is that this means that when Eden says "you're my friend, aren't you?", she is actively going against her claim that relationships aren't transactional. She expects Teruko to consider herself Eden's friend because Eden has done a lot of stuff to try to make that friendship work.

This. Is. Wonderful. Don't you love it when characters fail to uphold their beliefs when faced with a horribly stressful situation? Well, I love suffering, so I sure do! :D

To be clear, I'm not trying to paint Eden as a hypocrite or anything. She's right in saying that relationships aren't transactional, and is justified in asking Teruko to help her because she considers Teruko her friend, even if it's a slight contradiction. After all, what are humans if not a swirling well of contradictions, desperately arranging themselves like the magnetic moments of a metal to try to make the slightest bit of sense of a reality they hopelessly seek to understand-

Ehem. The point is I like Eden a lot :D

Speaking of wonderfully human moments, time to switch to the other big Eden character moment!

Eden [2-16]: This... This all could have been prevented, couldn't it? [...] Of course I know [we can't blame ourselves for Ace's murder]. Ace planned to kill Arei, and even before that, he was planning to kill me. Rose: Then how can you forgive him? Eden: I never said I forgave him. It's just that... The Ace that I met for the first time wasn't a murderer. I... I can't forgive him. He killed Arei, after all. She was innocent, and he killed her for unfair reasons. But... Those unfair reasons were unfair to him as well.

You know, we joke about how awesome it is that the entirety of the DRDT cast is mentally unstable (because it is), but it's also cool to see the one actually more or less functional member of society in the group being the voice of reason like this. Not to spoil anything, but I find her stance regarding Ace's murder as the most reasonable stance one could have, and it's always cool to see a character who has reasonable opinions every now and then. But having such an opinion is easy when you're outside the show and the characters are all pixels on a screen; the fact that Eden can still find it in herself to be charitable towards Ace's situation while not outright forgiving him for his actions is a really powerful statement about her strength and sense of morality. Eden could not stop catching Ws this part.

Anyways, here's a few more fun Eden moments this part gave us.

Eden [2-15]: Wait, but... Is Ace even capable of doing a feat of strength like that? He's injured, after all.

I just think it's sweet Eden tries to defend Ace even when she's the other prime suspect :)

Levi [2-13]: And if tomorrow it turned out you all had passed away, I'd care as much as if we had never met. Eden: But you're a good person. Why are you saying these things when it's clearly not true? You're so kind to everyone. You're always helping others out, even when it'd be easier not to. Like that time Ace almost died. You kept trying to help him, even if he always pushed you away. Isn't that what "a good person" does?

For all the Eden Ws, she had to take an Eden L. Come on, Eden, Levi doesn't need to actually care to be a good person, he just needs to do good things, you know this :(

It makes sense character-wise, though. Eden has a surprisingly strong belief system, which is heavily shaped by her emotional nature, so it makes sense that Levi's Deal of doing good things with no emotional attachment to them would throw her off.

Still cool of her to accept Levi as a good person even though she just learnt he killed four people, however. It's good characterization; despite her misunderstanding with the lack of empathy thing, she still chooses to judge Levi based on the things she's personally observed, as opposed to making assumptions over things she only has half the story for.

Man, she's just so mature and cool and awesome and not fucked up in any way! Now that the tape thing's been resolved, I can't think of a single thing that would make anyone think that she might be a little-

Ah. Right.

Well, as a first reaction, this is definitely an Eden W in the oh so prevalent... DRDT powerscaling scene? She apparently managed to slash at Xander's eye, twice, with a fork. And with her non-dominant hand no less!

So... what the hell am I even supposed to do with this? Unfortunately, we're currently missing gigantic amounts of critical information regarding this situation, meaning I can't for the life of me come to any conclusions, at least not confidently. I tried to look at the pre-prologue dialogue to see if I could find anything, but...

Ouch... I really wasn't expecting her to attack me like that. I made a massive mistake to trust them. I can't rely on anyone. All by myself... I have to end the killing game. And even if I can't do that... I have to kill Teruko Tawaki. No matter what.

Fuck am I supposed to gather from this.

Uh... someone told Xander that Eden would be down with whatever plan Xander had to end the killing game if he just showed her whatever documents we're seeing in the Bloody Hands scene??? And she got too scared and just stabbed him with a fork??? Who is the "them" who told Xander this, a group of people, or a single person and Xander's playing the pronoun game? Or was it Nico???

Nico [1-9]: Are you really using unclear pronouns for dramatic effect? That's such a cliche.

Fuck it, locking in Nico as the one who told Xander to talk to Eden, just because that's the funniest possible reason Xander could have used "they" there. I doubt it's true, but it's gonna feed my God complex if I get it right, so-

Yeah, in case it isn't obvious, I have very little idea what this scene could even be about. Very excited to see where this could go :D

Nico Hakobyan

Nico stole the show for practically half of 2-14, so it's natural we should start at the main event.

First, the soft confirmation that Nico really did attack Ace with a plan to get away with the murder and escape as the blackened, particularly framing Hu by using her wire. This... vaguely contradicts something they claimed earlier, so we gotta discuss the implications.

Veronika [to Nico, 2-9]: Is this what you were envisioning when you tried to kill Ace? That the trial would happen like this, but with Ace instead of Arei dead? Nico: I didn't... I never thought about it... I... I never should have... done that...

Were they just... lying here? Did they mean something else?

My best guess to explain this apparent contradiction is that Nico thought about the trial in a more... impersonal sense? Like, when planning to kill Ace, they figured they should try to hide that so they didn't go down with him, but sort of... ignored that winning the trial would kill everyone else? It's hard to describe, but that's what I get from that line as well as:

Nico [2-14]: I tried to kill [Ace] because I don't like [him].

When they say they "never thought about the trial," they probably mean that they never thought about the full implications of it, even though they did plan for it. They knew in some level they were supposed to hide the murder if they did it, but things like escaping the killing game and actually getting everyone else killed didn't fully register. This thought process makes sense in my mind, I hope it makes sense in yours because I don't know how to describe it any better :v

Second.

Eden [2-14]: That's- That's so cruel! Nico, why? Aren't we all friends? If something was bothering you, you could have talked it out with someone else you trusted? Nico: ... Someone I trust? What are you talking about? I don't trust anyone here.

Fantastic bit of characterization here. Nico, despite being relatively civil to anyone they're not actively planning to kill, apparently trusts no one. However, I want to explore what exactly that means. Because it's not like Nico is paranoid they're gonna get killed per say:

Hu [2-12]: Nico does have an alibi. I was having breakfast and tea with them in their room early in the morning as well. Drop it, Ace.

I can think of few better opportunities to kill someone than being alone with them, in their room, at around 7:30 AM when it's still officially nighttime. Nico, at least, trusts that Hu won't kill them, though whether that's because they're confident they could survive anything she tries or because they genuinely trust she wouldn't try at all is up in the air.

Point is, Nico is distrustful, but not as paranoid as, say, Ace. Because of that, currently, I believe Nico's claim that they don't trust anyone is an extension of things they've said before; that they prefer animals because people are unpredictable. Really, Nico's lack of trust being interpreted as "not trusting people to react to their concerns properly" is very consistent with the way they've acted in the past, particularly their reaction to getting forced into revealing their secret, so we probably shouldn't be surprised.

Nico [2-6]: I thought you would laugh at me. I was worried you would pick up rocks and start throwing them at me or pick up clumps of mud and start throwing them at me.

Next point:

Nico [2-14]: You all are right. I tried to kill Ace and pin the murder on Hu. What else should I say? Ace: W-- "What else should I say"?? You tried to murder me. You fucking tried to murder me! And after all's said and done, you can't even say something as simple as "sorry"?! Nico: ... I tried to kill you because I don't like you. Even now, there's still no use to try and pretend that I like you. If I say "sorry," you're still going to hate me.

... Yeah.

Nico [2-2]: If you're having dinner and want someone to pass the salt, you can say, "Please pass the salt," or you can say, "Give me the salt." One of those things is supposed to be more polite than the other, right? But why? They both mean the same thing. They're just slightly different mixes of words. It's like that. I don't understand why some mixes of words come off as "rude," and some don't, even if they mean the same thing.

I don't even think I need to explain this further. I think it's pretty clear why Nico wouldn't apologize to Ace. Nico's just not to into social conventions.

Except:

Veronika [2-15]: What's wrong, Ace? You seem stressed. [Your neck injuries] are only wounds. What's the issue? Could it be that almost being murdered has traumatized you a little bit~? Ace: You think?! You think that almost being killed could have maybe given me a little trauma!? Nico: ... [Whispered voice clip: "I'm sorry"]

This one's... odd. Nico doesn't say it loud enough for Ace to hear, evidently, so it's just a genuine reaction to the harm they've caused. What could have triggered this change? Uh... maybe a little extra trauma dump will help? Let's pick up after where we left off in 2-14.

Rose [continued]: D-Do you even regret what you did to [Ace]? Do you regret what you were planning to do to everyone else? Nico: O-Of course I regret doing it! I'm not Levi, of course I feel bad about something like that. I'm not heartless! Levi: Heartless? Nico: That was the worst choice I've made in my life. I wish I had never done that. But looking back, I still understand why I did. I... I just can't stand being treated like that. My teachers, my classmates, my father... I don't ever want to relive what they did to me. It's because of those kinds of people that I can't be happy with who I am. That's why I hate Ace.

Okay cut off there. First, interesting to see Nico calling Levi heartless. I've seen it brought up that it makes sense for Nico, who struggles to relate to other people on a good day, to latch onto any defense of their "normalcy" they can, including "I'm not the weirdest person here" despite how hurtful that can be to say. That's some neurodivergent on neurodivergent hostility right there! Fun to see characters being flawed in new and unique ways /gen.

Apart from that, there's some nice reveals to Nico's backstory, which are always welcome. We already knew Nico was harassed because of their identity, but now we have names (as in, identity of aggressors); teachers, classmates, and Nico's father. That obviously comes with a question; was Nico raised by a single father, or did they have other relatives who were more accepting? For now, we got no clue.

But that final line is important, because I believe it's what explains Nico's whispered apology in 2-15.

Nico [already written]: It's because of those kinds of people that I can't be happy with who I am. That's why I hate Ace.

Nico's apology comes after Ace explicitly mentions being traumatized over the murder attempt, in particular in regards to his neck wounds. This can be taken as Ace revealing he's not happy with a part of himself (scars) as a result of Nico's actions. When abstracted this way, the comparison to Nico's situation (unhappy with a part of themselves (gender identity) as a result of others' actions) is much clearer. Nico apologizes for accidentally causing Ace a comparable trauma to their own. Which... I think makes sense from their point of view? People apologize when they do something hurtful they didn't mean to; Nico meant to murder Ace, so no apology for that, but they didn't mean the trauma, so they say sorry for it. Not that Ace heard it, but you know.

... That's a weird ass thought process, but I think it makes just enough sense to explain the apology. Let's finish the 2-14 scene.

Nico [continued]: Even so... I'm not a child. I know that murder is wrong. I'm not the victim here. I know that it was dumb to resort to murder. I don't even know what I thought I would have accomplished back then. I mean, I started regretting it as soon as Eden and Teruko saw me. I don't expect you to forgive me. Very few people ever do. So I don't see the point in acting sorry. ... That's the entire truth of my murder attempt. I don't have anything else to say.

So... "I don't even know what I thought I would have accomplished back then" seems to corroborate what I said earlier about Nico not truly grasping the full implications of a trial while they planned the murder, which is nice.

Nico's attitude over this ("I'm not the victim here") is nice to see, and makes me very interested in where their arc is going to go from here. Especially since Nico maturely accepting the blame is already causing friction between them and Hu (even if Hu doesn't seem to notice), and will likely continue to do so in the future.

Hu [2-14]: You all are too cruel! None of you understand how much stress Nico was under! And yet you continue to insist on bringing this up. Can't you see that you're traumatizing them? Nico: Hu, I-- Hu: Don't worry, Nico, I'm on your side. I'll always defend you. I can be reliable for you. You trust me, right? Nico: ... I never asked you to defend me--

... We're gonna have to talk about this in the Hu section.

Finally, "I don't expect you to forgive me. Very few people ever do."

Nico, what the hell does this mean? What have you done in the past that requires so much forgiving? What in the [DR2 CH3 killer]-?

Unfortunately, this is one of those "we're missing critical information" situations when we can't even begin to speculate what, if anything, this is supposed to mean. We'll move on and patiently yet eagerly await elaboration.

There's one more big thing to bring up in respects to Nico, and that's... Rose. For who knows what reason, Nico never gives an explicit answer to whether they actually were interested in learning to paint or not.

Rose [2-14]: Did [Nico] even want to learn to paint? Or to be my friend at all? Or were they only using me as a tool for murder? Nico: ...

Regardless of what the answer is, that's kinda weird. I'm leaning "no, they didn't want to learn to paint," because it sure would be a hell of a coincidence that they just happened to gain an interest in painting just when they're planning a murder that happens to require a painting supply.

That said, Nico does still seem to somewhat care about Rose, and probably would like to be her friend. At least enough to eventually apologize to her out loud.

Rose [2-16]: [Ace]'s right. Only Nico took [the turpentine] from me, and I really doubt they gave it to Ace afterwards. Hu: You're always attacking Nico like this! Nico: It's the truth, though. And Rose is right. I kept it. I still have the turpentine in my room. I'm sorry.

And it's not like anything this chapter erased the FTE:

Nico [FTE]: I was going to thank [Rose] for hanging out with me. I really enjoyed her presence.

So, while I can't know for sure, I hope Nicorose can make a comeback, at least in time for Nico to die so dev can inflict extra psychological pain on Rose! :D

Final highlight:

Nico [to Levi, 2-13]: If you said you killed [your father] because you just didn't like him, I could understand that. But you're saying you forgot about taking a life...

Apart from Nico obviously projecting their own murder motives on other people, do we think Nico ever considered killing their own father? I doubt they actually did, else that would probably be their motive secret (provided it's not a Veronika situation where their secret isn't the worst thing they've done), but I could see them considering it given how they talked about him and Ace in the same breath, and... yeah Nico sure did want to kill Ace alright.

Hu Jing

Hu was quite fascinating this part, wasn't she? For someone that actually ended up having zero relation to the murder, she sure had a lot of important character scenes. Let's start with the confirmation of a particular theory that really helps understand her character better.

Hu [2-13]: I've been quite selfish this whole time, keeping my secret because I didn't want you all to think less of me. Most of all, I wanted to lie to myself and pretend that I had no ties to the person that I used to be. I wanted to believe that the past never happened. But that's just self-centered. I've always been a selfish person, haven't I? I should put those feelings aside and do what is right. No, I should have done this from the start. I will share my secret as long as you all promise to immediately move on. I have Veronika's secret, and she has mine.

Well that's just sad.

I don't think I particularly need to analyze this, it's all pretty explicit. Hu wants to be relied on because she feels useless if she doesn't provide guidance:

Hu [2-11]: I have to be the one to give everyone guidance. That's the only thing I can do. If no one relies on me, then I won't be useful anymore.

And if it comes out that she's attempted suicide, then in her eyes, that makes her less reliable.

(Obvious disclaimer is obvious, the character's views don't reflect my own, there's no shame in having attempted suicide or needing help to keep fighting it, etc.)

As a result, she dislikes the memory of that "hopeless child" who attempted three times, and wishes to avoid talking about it if possible. Metamorphosis (butterfly) and rebirth (water by her name being "still lake") symbolism pulling through.

Also, while there's many reasons someone could attempt suicide, that little "I've always been a selfish person, haven't I?", especially combined with other statements she's made in the past, heavily implies her attempts were a result of self-loathing :( . Thus why she so desperately seeks value in herself by helping others, which is sorta crumbling as everyone she put her faith on (David, Nico especially) starts to reveal themselves as not-that-great-people.

Hence why I'm worried we might see a fourth attempt in the killing game. Her secret quote seems to go against the idea, which combined with some of her statements in the series proper make me doubt it, but y'know... The precedent's there.

Anyways, I'm bringing this up first because, again, it helps understand her other actions this chapter.

Hu [to David, 2-12]: Unacceptable! What on earth [sic] is your problem? I have had it up to here with you! Because this killing game requires us to live, you think you should just reject that notion and kill us all? You lied to me, manipulated everyone, and tried to make us all commit mass suicide! You really are the lowest of human beings. You have no right to decide whether I, whether any of us, live or die, all because *you* feel like you have no chance! If you're so bent on dying here, then die! But don't you dare try and make everyone else die with you. If we decide to continue living, then we will. It is not and never will be your decision as to what happens with our lives. David: ... Rose: Wow. Hu can be scary. Hu: ... I'm sorry to everyone else. But I've lost my patience. I won't apologize to David.

(Obligatory props to VAing ofc)

I mean, yeah, it makes sense for someone who used to be suicidal to be mad at David's bullshit. Especially considering that, in regards to "you lied to me, manipulated everyone here," the line I mentioned before about providing guidance continues like this:

Hu [to David, continued from before, 2-11]: I have to be the one to give everyone guidance. That's the only thing I can do. If no one relies on me, then I won't be useful anymore. You knew how I felt, and yet you... You... You toyed with my heart! All that time you acted like you were encouraging us to reveal our secrets to "prevent conflict." That was all a lie!

Assuming the whole "You toyed with my heart!" thing isn't referring to a conversation we don't have information on (which, to be clear, is 100% possible), it's possible that at this point in the trial Hu felt bad for going along with David's plan, especially since she might have believed it directly led to Arei's death. I think it's worth noting that she's one of the two first person to speak after Ace confesses, and she asks if he did it because of the motive.

Ace [2-15]: I killed Arei. That's exactly right. Shit, it sounds really bad when I say it out loud. Eden: Why? Why did you kill her? Why would you do such a horrible thing? Hu: Did you kill Arei because of MonoTV's motive? Because you wanted to keep your "secret" hidden--

Which could be read as her trying to confirm whether or not going along with David's plan was a good or bad idea, maybe?

Admittedly, "going along with David's plan" in her case literally just means "she told David, Nico and Teruko that people used to call her Julia," which you could argue is too small for her to genuinely feel like she contributed, but keep in mind the "you toyed with my heart" line is directly before a line referencing the "reveal the secrets" plan. At the very least, she didn't go against it, not in a significant way anyways.

If I'm right to be reading these lines the way I'm reading them (which, again to be clear, might be wrong), then David purposefully used Hu's desire to help and be relied on to get her to agree with his plan, or at least not go against it, or at least Hu feels he did. Whether he intentionally targeted her, or if his methods to convince the others to convince the cast of revealing their secrets just happened to strike a cord (zither pun not intended) with Hu, is still unclear, but both are possible.

So she's already incredibly pissed at him for that, then he says he wants everyone dead, yeah my girl's got the right to go off.

Though, speaking of Hu blaming herself for what happened to an extent:

Hu [2-16]: Arei wasn't killed because of an accident. Bad luck or not, Ace had made up his mind to go through with this murder! So we can't possibly blame ourselves for failing to prevent something like that.

This is after Ace confirms that the motive and David's BS had nothing to do with the murder, so Hu can fully deny blame for what happened. Which is relatively fair, it's not like being mean to someone makes you guilty if they then choose to kill someone, but it's also presumably really important for her mental stability.

Did any of that make absolutely any sense? Maybe. Hopefully.

And that's just all the Hu-only stuff. Because a big part of her character this chapter was defending Nico far beyond what anyone could possibly see as reasonable. I'll bring back the example I gave before, because I think it's by far the most extreme.

Nico [2-14]: Someone I trust? What are you talking about? I don't trust anyone here. Hu: Stop! Just stop it! You all are too cruel! None of you understand how much stress Nico was under! And yet you continue to insist on bringing this up. Can't you see that you're traumatizing them? Nico: Hu, I-- Hu: Don't worry, Nico, I'm on your side. I'll always defend you. I can be reliable for you. You trust me, right? Nico: ... I never asked you to defend me--

Like, this goes beyond unreasonable. Nico literally says they don't trust anyone in the killing game, but Hu still thinks they trust her for... some reason. And even though Nico says they never asked her to defend them, Hu continues doing it past this point.

The thing is, though... why? Like, I get the basics here, it's what we talked about earlier. Hu only finds worth in herself by being reliable, and she sees Nico as someone who needs her reliability, so she tries to defend them no matter what. Hell, she even specifically says "I can be reliable for you" in the quote.

But... is there a reason she's so adamant towards them in particular? She doesn't get like this when Eden starts being accused, even though they have a good relationship with each other. Apart from reciting Rule 10 when it first comes up, once that gets thrown into question, the only thing Hu says when Levi and Arturo talk about Eden possibly being the killer is:

Hu [2-14]: Eden? Please don't cry.

She never pushes back against David's claim that he saw the corpse, even though that would practically exonerate Eden via BDA; that's Nico who does that. And Hu never claims Eden is being traumatized by being accused even though she clearly takes the accusations a lot worse than Nico was taking them in 2-14.

So, like, what the hell? Is there a deeper reason she's so defensive towards Nico and not Eden, or am I just going insane?

Well, at this point, if such a deeper reason exists, I have no clue what it could be. I could speculate about Nico reminding her of someone in the past, be it herself or someone else, or maybe Hu just sees Eden as less "in need" because she's generally more stable and happier than Nico, but really, I have no way of knowing.

The thing I can talk about in regards to the Hu-Nico thing is its parallels to Veronika-Arturo and Levi-Ace.

Veronika-Arturo is funny because, well.

Veronika [2-10]: Arturo, you're... You're so... Fascinating. You're really entertaining. So I'll take your side. I don't care about morals. I don't care about whether people get hurt or whether they die. I just need to be entertained. If you become more and more irredeemable, then I'll only love you more~ I want to hear all about those terrible things you did with no justification. Arturo: For someone who's taking my side, you sure are making me look a lot worse!

I really love how a big part of the Vero-Hu recap foil so far can be reduced to the "I can fix them" vs "I can make him worse" meme :p There are their secrets as well, but that analysis will have to wait for further elaboration on them, presumably in CH3.

Meanwhile, Levi-Ace... will have to wait for the Levi section, because this is already getting quite long for Hu, and it requires a bit more context on his character.

Miscellaneous highlights!

Hu [2-14]: Hang on! Eden isn't the killer! Don't accuse her! Charles: Not this again. You can't keep blindly defending the people you hope to be innocent if you don't have evidence, Hu.

Hu: I do have evidence! Why are you writing me off? All because I-- ... *sigh* Rule 10...

Damn she really gets defensive when you question her reliability huh?

Well, moving on. That was a pretty long section, hopefully the next one will be easier to write.

...

Oh. Oh no.

David Chiem

YOU

WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU?!

Genuinely what is this motherfucker's problem? Everything he does seems to contradict something he did before, for reasons unknown. The only way I can even begin to try to analyze this son of a bitch is to go through everything he does in the series in chronological order, because trying to figure out his thought process in any other way would drive me in circles harder than anything in LGI ever did.

The first thing David truly does that informs us on his later actions is forming a genuine and positive relationship with Xander. In case the LGI MV didn't make it clear that David genuinely cared about the Rebel, we finally got near 100% confirmation of why exactly David liked him so much.

David [2-12]: You, and everyone else listening. I do so kindly request that pretty please stop talking about Xander at all if you don't know what the fuck you're talking about. It pisses me off to no end. After all, it's still unbelievable to me... ...That I'm the only person here who remembered him. Even if you all lost a year of memories for this killing game, there's no reason you shouldn't have recognized who he was.

While we unfortunately don't get much more clarification, it seems David knew what Xander did to earn the title of Ultimate Rebel, and likely admired him as a result. As per Xander's numeral I in LGI, "I have always looked up to you."

This admiration is presumably why David was so adamant in the first trial that there was no way Xander really tried to murder Teruko.

David [Debate Scrum, 1-8]: Are you saying that Xander is a killer? I find that difficult to believe.

You might argue that maybe he was just trying to throw the first trial, the same way he tried to throw the second. But that's not possible.

This is where we get to Weird Point #1. David didn't want to lose the first trial.

Nico [1-11]: Ah, right. Min was going from the laundry room to the kitchen. That path crosses the computer lab. She would have seen Teruko's body if the door was open. Min: ... Ace: And why exactly would the fucking door be open? Nico: U-Um... David: I suppose Min may have arrived near the computer lab's entrance just as Charles left. If she was curious, she would have even gone out of her way to see what was happening in there.

If David was trying to throw, he wouldn't be the first to explain how it would be possible for Min to be involved in the murder. And this is only one example, there's other lines where he specifically suspects Min. Apparently, he simply cannot handle a bad bitch winning (committing murder and trying to sacrifice 14 lives for her own benefit).

However, something in David shifts upon seeing Min's execution.

David [1-12]: I... I've seen enough. There's no point in keeping my hopes up anymore. We are all certainly going to die here.

This line is said pretty somberly.

Which is weird. Because not four days later, David will be trying to throw a class trial, which will kill everyone and him. Interesting detail about that, David doesn't seem to believe that the blackened will escape if they actually voted wrong, based on this line.

David [2-12]: 15 lives. Some of them are very dear to you. And your own life as well. Is there anything at all that could be more important to you than those 16 human lives?

Where he seems to imply a wrongful vote will cause 16 deaths.

But the thing is, it's not just the trial, is it? David also tried to instigate a murder through his "reveal all motive secrets" idea. That's what he does during the majority of CH2, starting in 2-4, just two days after Min's execution. Now, it's fully possible that at this point, he wasn't yet planning to throw the next trial, but rather, he was just doing this to hide his own secret. He certainly considers losing his "speaker persona" a genuine sacrifice, so it isn't unbelievable that he'd hope for a murder even if he was planning to win the trial if it happened.

David [2-12]: Even so... Lying about all that wasn't easy. Even I like to have good relations with others, however fake they might be. And I had to throw that all away. I know that no one will ever trust me, believe in me, or look up to me again after this. But doing "good" things requires sacrifice. Sometimes that sacrifice is being seen as "a good person." That's what I learned from Xander. Even if doing something will make you hated, if that action is for a greater good, then it's an action that you have to take.

(By the way, his views of goodness as martyrdom are quite interesting and I'm curious to see where it will go, but currently we don't have much more than this line for insight on it)

However, I don't quite think that he just wanted to keep the others' goodwill; I think he was already hoping to throw from the moment he started instigating the murder. And this is where we need to ask; what was it that made David switch up? What happened between the first trial and the second that made his goals change from surviving to... whatever he's cooking now? Because in case it wasn't clear from how I'm talking about it, I don't believe David gave the real reason for his throwing to the class. Let's look at the "confession."

David [2-12]: Ugh, fucking fine. You want an answer so badly? Any answer? ... I...

Ah... We're... in a television show, after all. That's... what MonoTV said, right? "Entertainment" is an ongoing show. If Min successfully got away with the very first murder and escaped while we all died, then isn't that way less interesting for a TV show? What's the point of roping 14 other people into one murder, only to kill them all off immediately? The killer is supposed to fail and be executed. We're all supposed to catch the killer, again and again, and participate in trial after trial. You're *supposed* to try to survive. All of you who are trying to solve these class trials to continue living on are playing straight into MonoTV's hands. [Confident] As if I'll accept that. I don't care how low I'll sink, or how despicable I'll have to become. I'll do anything to carry on Xander's ideals by ending this killing game, even if it means that I have to dirty my hands.

Although I wrote it all out, I want you to focus on the start: ".... - I... - Ah... We're... in a television show, after all." Even beyond the meta argument that it's unlikely we'd actually get the answer to why Xander wanted to win the class trial this early in the series (which is a valid argument, but I prefer to theorize without meta reasoning), that hesitation should tell you everything. The way it's written, it makes it seem like David is hesitating because he's making everything up on the spot, up to the "Ah..." potentially being the exact moment David figured out what angle he wanted to take. Given he's already admitted to both being manipulative and wanting to get everyone killed, this is the only reason I can see for why he'd hesitate to give such a relatively simple and "reasonable" (as in, it logically follows even if it's still insane) answer.

So, now we have two questions. What does he actually want to achieve by throwing, and why did he only start pursuing it after the first trial ended?

Well, let me say first that I don't think we're supposed to be able to answer these questions yet. Obviously; we're dealing with shit very closely connected to some pretty large, overarching mysteries of the series, which we probably won't get full answers for until much later than CH2. But we can try to speculate the general direction of what the answer will be. Let's look at another one of his lines to try to do just that.

David [2-13]: Achoo! Ah--Bless me! Also, excuse me! Wow, thank you for your support, everyone!

(I only included that line because it's fucking hilarious and I didn't want that to go unappreciated :p)

I have another interruption~ Hu: ... David: Teruko. Own up your [sic] goddamn secret already. You are the last person to do so. [...] Teruko: ... My family. David: ...

So, just like everyone who is somewhat deep in the DRDT theorizing community, I don't think this is true. I am pretty sure David has Teruko's secret, that secret being "How could I even select what secret to be your motive? Just about everything you've done in your life is worth killing for. The killing game is all your fault." There's many reasons beyond the weird ass David sprite pictured above, which many have already covered, but as a quick overview: the family secret ("you're constantly blaming yourself for the death of your parents and siblings. It doesn't matter that it's not your fault, just that you didn't go with them") fits Xander better (see: Bonus Episode 2, Xander's secret quote being the definition of survivor's guilt), the family secret mentions "siblings" plural when Teruko's only claimed to have one brother, we don't know what happened to Teruko's parents and brother when we know Xander's family is dead, Teruko didn't believe David when he said he got Xander's secret so she probably suspects the killing game one is hers, "this killing game is all your fault" is consistent with the second anniversary art code ("It's all your fault" in a picture which only features Teruko reaching out to presumably-Mai's hands, which disappear), etc.

So now we have four questions, because evidently I'm quite bad at this. Apart from the two mentioned before, we need to ask why David lied about the secret he received, and why he was happy when Teruko answered with the family thing.

But sometimes, one question can answer others. The reason I'm bringing this up is because I believe David's heel turn was likely motivated in some way by receiving Teruko's secret. Take a look at his immediate reaction when the secrets are first handed out.

Pretty frowny, huh? Yeah understandable given the secret he received is "hey the killing game is all the girl that Xander tried to kill's fault." Unfortunately this is the only reaction David has to any of the secrets, as the rest of his dialogue after this is just explaining J's secret. Well, and this:

Eden [2-1]: Then let's end the killing game before [the motive secret reveal]! Nico: Eh?! David: Optimistic as ever, Eden. I'll do my best.

Which is kinda funny in retrospect. Yeah, he sure did do his best to end the killing game before the secret reveals.

Tangent aside, the important thing is that David wasn't necessarily surprised by Teruko's secret, but rather, uh... Well it's hard to read him on expression alone. Frustrated, maybe? Possibly mad that Xander didn't succeed in killing her? It's also worth noting that this is shortly before Teruko goes into her whole "I don't plan on leaving" shtick, which includes the following tidbit (and yes David is in the room to hear this).

Teruko [2-1]: And I'd recommend that you drop that foolish optimism for making it out of here alive. With 100% confidence, I can say that... You will all die down here without ever seeing the outside world again. Ace: This bitch is totally out of her mind. Teruko: I'm not saying this out of ill-will. It's simply how this story works. You all have the misfortune of being "characters" in a story where I'm the "protagonist." Because of that, you're all doomed.

What's so important about this? Because I believe that, in David's mind, this proves Xander right. It proves that there is something off about Teruko, that he probably did have a good reason to attack her, that the note he received wasn't complete bullshit. If there is any single thing that would get David to follow Xander's footsteps, regardless of whether he has the full story or he's just doing what Xander was trying to do even without knowing the reasons the Rebel made the moves he made, it would be getting confirmation that the person he tried to kill specifically has something suspicious going on.

Especially because David does, in fact, seem to have a very weird fixation on Teruko.

David [2-14]: As long as there's a possibility that the evidence is false, as long as there's even the slightest reason to distrust others, then Teruko cannot trust Eden. Isn't that right, Teruko? Teruko: ... David: It's in your nature to distrust people. Everyone you know has already betrayed you. There's no one in this world who won't hurt you. Even the people you love will turn their backs on you in the end. You know that well enough, don't you? So distrust in others. Because that's the only way you know how to live. Teruko: ...

(Obligatory props to VAing ofc)

... Alright so it's five questions. Because how does he know all that?

Let me knock that one out quickly, though. Right now, I don't think this is solid enough reason to suspect that David knows more about Teruko than he's letting on. I could be wrong about that and David could just be aware of her entire backstory, but I currently don't believe that.

Instead, I think this might actually be an extension of his talent, in a way. The joke that he gave Teruko a "demotivational speech" is funny, but I also think it's actually on the right track. David knows the right things to say to someone to inspire them, to push back against their insecurities, as he did with Arei in the playground breakdown. Thus, it logically follows that if he's able to identify emotional weakness to push against it, he would also be able to exploit it.

Or, try, at least. He actually fails pretty spectacularly, since Teruko ends up trusting Eden anyways, and I don't think there were any reverse psychology 5D chess moves on David's part given his immediate reaction to Teruko's 2-14 speech to Eden.

Like, that's the face of a man who tried to be slick and failed miserably.

(And in case it isn't clear, I don't think his lie of seeing the body had anything to do with the trial, he did it just to fuck with Teruko)

In any case, what happened here is that he figured out the (relatively obvious, it doesn't take an Ultimate to see this) trust issues that plague Teruko, and is trying to make them worse in order to... uh... fill in the blank I guess. One option I've considered is that he knows something about how her luck works, that it hurts people she likes, so if she doesn't trust anyone then her luck's effects will be concentrated entirely on Teruko. However, that requires a pretty deep understanding of something he shouldn't have that much info on, so I don't find it that likely. Also I'm not 100% sure if this is how her luck actually works so there's that.

Yeah, unfortunately, at this point I struggle to see exactly what David's angle is here, which is probably intentional given, again, CH2. However, it does somewhat tie back into what we were talking about. Along with everything else I've mentioned, this fixation on Teruko's trust makes me believe that David's heel turn is at least partially motivated by receiving her secret.

And if we once again combine questions 3, 4 and 5, we can actually arrive at a new conclusion. We know David's hiding Teruko's secret, we know he's happy that she's not calling him out on it, and we know that he has a vested interest in getting her to distrust others. With all these combined, I believe that David is trying to look for a way to manipulate Teruko specifically as a backup plan if the cast managed to win the trial, which they did.

By getting her to distrust others, she'd isolate, making her an easier target for manipulation as she wouldn't have anyone to fall back on if David starts getting to her. And the secret is good blackmail, pretty straightforward why he he hasn't revealed it yet. That's also why he's happy she helped him keep it hidden; he can pull it as a card to make her seem less trustworthy and isolate her further. "She lied about her secret, she was trying to hide it." If she had been honest and said that neither the family nor the poison secret fit her and that someone lied about their secret, it would make her look comparatively better once the secret came out. In other words, it makes the blackmail even better, especially because now David knows for a fact that she wants to keep it hidden.

That brings up to question 6: why does David want to manipulate Teruko in the first place? And this is where we finally reach a dead end, because again, CH2, we're not gonna get all the answers yet. I have less than zero idea what David will try to manipulate Teruko into doing, when he will make his move, what his end goal is, or any other question you can imagine. I have my doubts that he'll succeed, obviously, but of course that depends a lot on what his final angle ends up being.

So, let's recap.

David knew of Xander before the killing game, admiring him because of his work as the Ultimate Rebel. As a result, David tried to establish a good relationship with Xander once the killing game started.

David originally rejected the idea of Xander attacking Teruko out of denial and nothing else. He had genuine faith his friend wouldn't do that. David wanted to catch the correct blackened in the first trial.

Upon receiving Teruko's secret and hearing her speech about everyone dying as a result of misfortune, David begins to believe Xander was in the right, and chooses to pursue what he thinks Xander was trying to accomplish. This includes trying to instigate a murder and admitting to killing Arei.

David lied about his motivation to throw the trial. I don't know if he's specifically trying to kill Teruko, or if he thinks everyone in the cast needs to die for some reason, or if he genuinely has no idea what Xander was trying to do and he's just following his actions blindly, or if it's something else entirely; whatever motivation he actually has, it's not what he said.

As a backup plan if the cast manages to win the trial, he hides Teruko's secret and plans to manipulate her via blackmail, for reasons yet unknown. This is why he's happy that she also keeps it hidden, and why he tries to build her distrust in others.

And that's the basics of what I believe regarding his actions... related to throwing the trial and Teruko. We still have one more David Moment TM to deal with.

David [about the Arei conversation, 2-13]: ... Nothing. Absolutely nothing. I didn't say anything to her, and she didn't have much to say to me either. Arei simply got annoyed with me and left without saying anything else. Nothing else happened between us, I promise. Eden: You promise? You absolutely promise, you didn't say anything to her? David: One hundred and one percent, I promise. Ace overheard everything, and what he told you all was the entire truth. Does that satisfy you? Eden: ... That's... a relief. That you didn't make her feel bad, I guess.

So, question 7, why does he hide the truth from Eden? I doubt he suddenly gained an interest in progressing the trial without further interruption. He's also not doing this for Eden's sake; what Eden wanted to hear was that Arei walked out of that conversation still hoping to change for the better, which she did. Hearing that Arei still wanted to "be less shitty together" even after knowing David's a manipulative asshole would have made Eden very happy.

But David doesn't want to hurt Eden, either. If he did, he'd lie and tell Eden that he said something that made Arei run out crying and having lost all hope, or something. I also can't really think of anyone else who would have much of a reaction either way, since as bad as it sounds to say it, Eden's more or less the only person who was genuinely invested in Arei's progress. Maybe "the blackened," but if David doesn't know who the blackened is, there's no way he'd know how they'd react, so it's likely not because of that.

So, if David doesn't hide the truth for the sake of the trial, and he doesn't lie because of Eden, and he doesn't lie because of anyone else, then he's lying for his own sake. I believe that David is trying to hide how much he genuinely cared about Arei, and probably doesn't trust himself to be able to tell the story without giving the game away.

And to be clear, he did genuinely care about Arei. If his immediate reaction to her death doesn't convince you, his breakdown after hearing the Arturo-Eden-Arei story should.

David [2-8]: Of course. Of course this would happen.

David [2-10]: If Eden and Arei really had that conversation, then it explains a lot. I had my doubts. A clearly suspicious note, asking her to meet alone and with no explanation as to why. During a *killing game* of all times. What kind of person would fall for such an obvious trap? You'd have to be shortsighted, naive, foolish, senseless, downright idiotic. ... Unless, of course, you were Arei. That girl wanted desperately to prove herself as a "friend" to Eden. And yet she completely lacked any experience with what "friends" were actually like. Of course it never occurred to her that handing out suspicious notes was not something that normal people did. What could she know about "friendship," after all? Someone like her, who had not once experienced kindness in her entire life up until now? Even if she had her misgivings about something so suspicious, she must have pushed it aside due to her unwavering faith in her blossoming friendship. A friendship that she didn't understand in the slightest. It's... It's so... Ahaha. It's just so foolish. For someone to take advantage of Arei like that. It's absolutely unforgivable. All she wanted was to change. What a reprehensible person this killer is. I look forward to seeing their painful execution.

(Do you think all this talk about "suspicious notes" is making him think of Xander with the suspicious note he received? Don't know, maybe :p)

Between David hiding the end of the conversation and the whole "Arei was a temporary weather spell" line, it seems he's really committing to the role of someone who doesn't care about Arei.

There are many reasons he could be doing this, but I believe he's just pulling a Teruko: Showing no vulnerability, because if he did, then maybe people would actually try to reach out to him. And then they'd get hurt like Xander and Arei; quote one of the Hamlet quotes in LGI (one of the eight lol): "I did love you once. You shouldn't have believed me." And/or David would need to confront how awful he is to try to change and better these new relationships.

Because it's a lot easier to be an irredeemable asshole who will never get better, than to confront the reality that he can, just that it's hard. Cue parallels with Arei and Teruko and Ace and you get the idea.

Final note, completely unrelated.

Whit [2-12]: Hey, hey, you could say those fish were a... red herring? David: Ugh! Goddamn it, Whit, does everything you say have to be made into some shitty dumb joke?! You're actually really fucking annoying! Shut the fuck up!!

Question 8: Why is David so pressed about Whit's jokes? At the moment, my only guess is that Whit's attitude of always remaining positive enough to crack jokes reminds David a bit too much of his "cheery" persona, which also is supposed to always remain optimistic in the face of adversity, and David either hates that because he hates himself, or because he's envious that Whit can hold that optimism without trouble (as far as David can see). I lean on it being a combination, where he does hate his "cheery" persona, but also wishes he could genuinely be like that, but it's very hard to tell atm.

Alright that took way too long. Can't wait for this all to be proven horribly wrong the next time we get any solid info on David!!!

Levi Fontana

Hey Levi sorry for calling you an accomplice for like a year are we still cool? :,D

Although Levi had a lower amount of Big Moments than David, I consider them more impactful to the chapter. And when you're talking Levi, you're talking 2-13 and 2-16. Let's start with the former.

Levi [2-13]: The secret that Arei received, "You're a murderer, and you hold no remorse...." That's my secret. [Cast reactions] If you were wondering, it's not in my legal records. The court struck it from the records. Ace: No shit! There's no way Hope's Peak would have scouted a murderer! Levi: Don't make the mistake of switching cause and effect.

Let's take our time with this one, it's a long speech. First, nice to see we called this secret, it's nice. Also, I'm not the first to point this out, but it's a neat bit of characterization for Levi to first talk about the legal side of his secret instead of anything more related to emotions; he only really cares about the effects things have in the present (that'll become explicit in a bit), so the first concern he thinks of are the legal repercussions.

Then, Hope's Peak... Hope's Peak why are you this shady. Between Rose's situation, the Ultimate Contest for Eminent Students, and now this, it's now three times they've specifically targeted people in vulnerable positions. Four if you count Teruko, but that would imply they rigged the lottery for the Lucky Student, which I would believe but we currently don't have evidence for. No wonder Xander has issues with them, they're cooking something weird.

Rose [1-4]: I'm sure Hope's Peak wants me to become some sort of appraiser or forgery detective with the skills that I have. Taking some offending youth and turning them into a productive member of society would be a pretty good look for them.

Unnamed Classmate [BE1]: Why would Hope's Peak announce [the UCES] 12 years before it would actually take place, when all the would-be contestants are just children? Min: Because they wanted the contest to hang over the heads of kids like me for 12 years, from childhood all the way into high school. They wanted to single out those who were obsessive enough to spend their entire lives preparing for this one test from childhood.

Unnamed Classmate [BE2]: If you set out to do something, then never give up on that, no matter what obstacles may stand in your way. Even if it's risky or against the rules, as long as it's for a good cause... I'll trust that you know to do the right thing. Xander: Yeah. Of course. That's why I've come to Hope's Peak, isn't it?

We currently have no clue where this is going, but I'm noting it for further reference. Let's pick off from where we left.

Charles [continued]: Care to explain yourself? Levi: At the time, I was confronted by three guys who tried to start a fight with me. I believe they were some old enemies. I killed their leader first, which may have been justifiable as self-defense, but then I tracked down his two remaining friends several days later and beat them to death. J: "Old enemies?" "Leader"?? Were you in the freakin' mafia or something? Levi: No. J: ... Levi: ... J: Are you not going to elaborate?? Levi: I don't particularly think I need to elaborate. After all, that happened in the past and has nothing to do with Arei.

One question this speech leaves us with is "why did Levi track down the other two after killing the leader?" We don't have enough info to tell for sure, but I assume it's a matter of safety? Like, Levi thought those two would try to attack him again if he left them alone, so he needed to make sure that didn't happen. I think that makes enough sense for me not to lose sleep at night over it, but of course I'm open to being wrong.

Also, this is the point where Levi's pure pragmatism becomes apparent. "It's not important right now, so why would I elaborate?" A philosophy which is born from his lack of empathy which will be discussed later. This pragmatism is probably why he's the one to argue that Eden was in an advantageous position to kill Arei; the logistics of murder come before emotional aspects in his mind, which is understandable.

Eden [continued]: Who... Who did you even kill? Levi: They were three guys... a few years older than me... Uh... I don't remember their names or who they were.

Do we think Levi knew their names at one point and forgot, or did he somehow track down two people without learning their names? I find the former more likely, just wanted to point that out.

Levi [continued]: I was a bit of a delinquent when I was younger, so they could have held a grudge against me for any reason. Maybe I smashed their windows and robbed them? Or, wait, maybe something to do with that car I blew up once? Rose: That's... kind of a lot to admit all of a sudden.

One thing I always enjoy is when the character who reacts to cut off a monologue has some kind of connection to the thing being discussed. Like, of course Rose is surprised at everything Levi is saying. She's out here being haunted by the crimes she committed, to the point where the debt she put her family in is her motive secret, and then this other guy has broken All the Laws and is just admitting it openly lol.

Levi [continued]: I've forgotten most of the details, as I haven't though much about it since I was cleared of my charges. Sorry, I can't really remember why that happened. Arturo: How could you forget something so important? You can't even be bothered to remember their names? Did you not care that you killed three people?

Speaking of matching reactions to character, Arturo "I feel unending guilt over the death of my sister who I did not even directly kill" Giles cannot conceive how someone else isn't haunted by the lives he took, more recap foiling at eleven.

Veronika [continued]: You say that your backstory and secret aren't relevant to this trial, but they are. That second part of your secret, that you "felt no remorse" for killing people... If you don't care about murder, then you'd have a much easier time killing than anyone else here. You may even be unbothered by the fact that passing the trial would mean everyone else's execution. After all, you seem completely detached while admitting not only to murdering 3 people, but to several other crimes as well. Almost as if you didn't care about any of this. At least not from a moral standpoint, that is. Levi: I won't deny it. That is indeed how I feel. Ace: You are one sick bastard. What could you possibly say in your defense.

This is the first big hint of Levi's low to non-existent empathy, but I'll wait until it's fully elaborated on to discuss it in depth. Also this hints to Ace business that will be discussed in his section. Why am I even writing here.

Levi [continued]: That incident happened when I was in my junior year of high school. My junior year was also the year that Hope's Peak scouted me as the Ultimate Personal Stylist. To my understanding, it would have reflected poorly on Hope's Peak to recruit a murderer, so they pressured the court into not pressing charges.

I do wonder now why Levi even started styling in the first place. By his own admission he's pretty new to it, though he's got at least a year or two of experience if he was scouted in junior year (I think? USA why can't you fucking number your grades like sensible people I don't know what "junior" means without firefoxing that shit). Maybe a job he picked up after disownment? Though that heavily depends on when and why he got disowned in the first place; was it because of his father's murder, the murder of the three dudes and the court case just took a while, or was it something else? Questions to mull over, but can't answer without further info.

Levi [continued]: Err... Hang on. Now that I've thought about it a little more, my motive secret may not be referring to those guys. It could also be referring to the time I murdered my father. J: Wait, you-- YOU WHAT?! Levi: It's quite difficult yo tell what these motive secrets truly mean because they're all phrased so vaguely... It's a bit of a bother. J: No, fuck that noise! Go back! The hell you mean, you fucking killed your dad? Levi: Correct. I simply forgot about it up until now. That would make four people in total that I've killed, not three, I think...? Arturo: How could you simply *forget* that you murdered your own family member? Nico: If you said you killed him because you just didn't like him, I could understand that. But you're saying you forgot about taking a life... Levi: It wasn't that important. Not even the police cared about a man like him, so nothing came out of it. I truly just forgot.

(why is everyone blue you're fucking up my color schemes-)

Back to the whole "appropriate reactors" thing, while I've already mentioned the Nico thing, I think it's cool J (the anti-murder spokesperson with a bad relationship with her mother) specifically says 'dad,' while Arturo generalizes to 'family member.' Someone's being reminded of his past~

I find this admission pretty funny for a few reasons, and very interesting for many others. Funny because my guy is complaining about the vagueness of the motives while admitting he killed his dad and not elaborating in the slightest. Interesting because... why did that happen? Levi doesn't respond to Nico's comment, so it seems like he didn't particularly dislike his father or anything? Especially in the context of the way he's talked about his family in the past.

Levi [responding to Eden, 2-1]: No, not at all. It's for the best that neither I nor my family see each other ever again. Eden: Eh? If you don't mind me asking, why? Levi: Why? My father, my mother, my brothers... We were all bad influences on each other. That's all that needs to be said.

I mean, Levi's father probably wasn't a shining beacon of hope or anything, given the police didn't even investigate his death, but like... lumping him in with the mother and the brothers, and just saying they were "bad influences" instead of, like, genuinely shitty people, it all makes it sound like there's no specific grudge against the father. Which makes sense, right? Even his father would feel like a stranger, as Levi will describe later. I really wish we get some elaboration on this, because I'm pretty curious about what kind of situation would lead Levi to this. I did try to check what's caused Levi to snap before, see if I could figure out what could have prompted it:

Ace [1-9]: What's the damn point of this whole trial if we're going to make choices based on dumb crap like that?? You useless shit-for-brains! Are you even taking any of this seriously?! Whit: Huh? Am I taking this seriously? Nah, not really. Ace: YOU--! Levi: Ace, calm down. You are not helping at all with this argument-- Ace: You shut your damn trap too, Levi!! I'm done with you trying to play the moral high ground by pretending to be some peacemaker! "Oh dear, oh my, calm down, everyone. Let's not fight, alright? Aren't I such a level-minded pacifist?" Stay the hell out of this if you know what's good for you. Levi: ... Ace: That's right. Shut your damn mouth, you coward-- Levi: Fuck. Off. Ace. How far do you want to push it? Do you think that I don't have a limit to my patience? I would gladly strangle you right here and now to shut you up if I were allowed. But if you're the coward I know you to be, then you should back up before you dig your own grave. So shut. Your mouth. Before I shut it for you.

Uh... Personal attacks against Levi? Yeah I have no idea what the hell his father could have done to prompt the murder. As usual, we're missing too much critical information to make a call on it. I'm gonna wager a guess that Levi didn't plan the murder, but rather it was an in the moment decision, but again I have no actual way to be sure.

Levi [continued]: Frankly speaking, I see no reason to remain hung up over some incident that is long past, especially as it ultimately had no impact on my life. Eden: You forgot about all of the things you did simply because you didn't face any consequences? That's incredibly selfish! Shouldn't you feel even a little bit bad? Those were human lives you took! I don't know what happened within your own family, so I can't pretend to understand why you killed. But even then, I'm sure those other people had families and friends who cried over their deaths!

Again the responders; remember how Eden feels guilty over both Min and Arei's death even though she never "faced any consequences" for them (mainly because she didn't actually do anything wrong but you get the idea)? Yeah that.

Levi [continued]: *sigh* I wonder if I should really tell you the truth, or if it's best to keep it to myself. I don't know how you all will see me after this. Teruko: You've already admitted to murdering 4 people. If you insist on not being completely honest with a secret this bad, then you're going to be the next one on the chopping block. Out with it.

Considering the stuff he says later, it's interesting to me that Levi seems to be more worried about revealing his lack of empathy than admitting to murder, especially with the knowledge that he's only doing this because he thinks being honest will make him "a good person."

However, I think it makes sense. Amongst the cast, there's already several people who either killed or tried to: Xander, Min, and Nico. But a lot of the others still speak of them in good terms; David talked about how good of a person Xander was for several minutes, Eden has made it clear she still misses Min, and Hu still defends Nico. Not to mention that Levi himself already threatened to kill Ace, and got called "a good person" by Eden just a few hours later. That means that, although admitting to murder will probably make the others more wary of him, there's precedent that Levi will still have people who stick by him after all's said and done.

Meanwhile, as far as Levi can tell, he's the only one who doesn't understand empathy in the slightest. And that means he has no way of telling how the others will feel about him if he reveals it, which is why he's more nervous about it than the murders. It plays on the themes of feeling disconnected from the rest of humanity that characters like Nico (via gender identity) and David-

Tally 5 Page: "... I wasn't capable of ever becoming human in the first place."

-have going on, which is definitely something that's cool to mull over. I hope these three get some kind of interaction about this in the future.

By the way, as always I'm just kinda guessing why Levi does the things he does and says the things he says, I could always be wrong.

Levi [continued]: It's not really that I don't care about killing people. Rather, it's more accurate to say that I don't care about people at all. No matter how much I hear about such things like empathy or compassion or love, none of those concepts resonate with me. Are those emotions really universal? The idea that people naturally "care" about others is a completely foreign concept to me. Nico: Eh? What are you saying? Levi: Judging by your reaction, I suppose that's a bad thing. But I wouldn't understand why. On the other side of this planet, there's a person who's suffering. Maybe they're even drawing their last breath. But none of you care, do you? Why would you? They're a stranger, after all. You don't know them. Their life holds no consequence for you. For me, everyone I've ever known is that distant stranger. It doesn't matter how long I've known you, how much we've done for each other, or even if you were my own father... You're still a stranger to me. And if tomorrow it turned out you all had passed away, I'd care as much as if we had never met.

So here's the big reveal, bolded text and all. Levi has extremely low empathy. I'm not gonna try to assign any specific disorder because I'd have no idea what I'd be talking about, but the empathy thing is pretty clear. I'm also no authority on whether this would be good representation for that or not, but for what it's worth, I think it's done pretty well. Levi's perspective is presented neutrally, in a way that shows his lack of empathy doesn't inherently make him a bad person, but not shying away from some of the real effects that can come from it (combined with other factors of course), such as the whole 4 murders situation.

I also like the way Levi describes it. It does a good job of getting the audience to understand his feelings, while still holding quite a bit of characterization in there. For example, the reason he gives for why the cast wouldn't care about the stranger on the other side of the world is because "their life holds no consequence to you." Even when trying to speak from the others' perspective, his understanding of why someone would care about someone else is still shaped entirely by what tangible effect that person has in the other's life, in a way sorting people by "holds consequence/holds no consequence."

Eden [continued]: But you're a good person. Why are you saying these things when it's clearly not true? You're so kind to everyone. You're always helping others out, even when it'd be easier not to. Like that time Ace almost died. You kept trying to help him, even if he always pushed you away. Isn't that what "a good person" does? Levi: In all honesty... I don't personally care what happens to Ace. Whether he lives or dies is none of my concern in the end. Ace: ...?! Levi: But it is a "good" thing to make sure someone else doesn't die, even if I personally do not care about the outcome. I truly believe that. But I adhere to that principle out of duty, not sentimentality. Does that make any sense?

So I'm gonna do a funny here and skip Ace's reaction to this, because that's more for the Ace section than this one. I also already talked about Eden's reaction to this.

Instead, I'll focus on Levi, particularly the question of "does Levi actually care about Ace?" To answer that, it'll be helpful to get the full Veronika Breakdown TM.

Veronika [continued]: Hm hm... I understand now. You're quite the interesting person, Levi. From what I've seen of you so far, your personality has been awfully inconsistent. It's like you don't know how to act. Trying to act like "a good person" without any intuitive sense of what's good or bad is hard, right? For someone like you, who lacks compassion, it must be quite difficult to pretend to be nice. You're always guessing as to what a normal human would do in your situation. You're so awkward in social settings because you can't tell what other people want. You act like a big pushover because if you go the other direction and stand up for yourself, you won't know where to stop. You offer to do things for others because you've observed that "good people" help others, and you parrot noble assurances without understanding why. Such things like that. Not only are you trying to act without a script, but you don't even understand the story. And you slip up constantly. Levi: You explained it better than I could. You really have an intuitive understanding of other people, Veronika. That's a trait I envy. The way I see it, it would be beneficial if I was "a good person." Then other people would trust me and not pick fights with me anymore, and they'd do things for me because they "liked" me. If I was a good person, then I wouldn't have to live a life full of violence anymore. I did everything so that I could have a better life.

Okay hold on there's a bunch to talk about here. Let me do that before circling back to the Ace Question.

Veronika is thankfully good enough at describing the stuff she said that I don't feel the need to elaborate on that. It's basically just a perfect read of Levi's actions so far under this new frame of someone who lacks empathy yet still is a good person. His awkwardness, his outbursts towards Ace, him being sort of a pushover, everything. I also like the little comment of Levi envying Vero's understanding of people, it's neat characterization.

Aside from that, there's also cool contrast between the way Levi sees being a good person as a sort of purely pragmatic social contract (being good leads to a peaceful life and ensures others help you) and Eden, which as referenced earlier sees friendship in a purely emotional and non-transactional way. Not exactly fully comparable, but close enough, and still worth mentioning given the chapter starts with a conversation between the two of them about how they're good people. Both of these have their merit, the point is that, in the end, no matter the reason you have for doing good things, regardless if it's out of sentimentality or just duty, doing good is enough to be a good person. While still of course keeping in mind Arei's message that no one is effortlessly good 100% of the time, and simply trying to be as good as you can be and improve on your flaws is enough.

Also, "I did everything so I could have a better life," huh?

Arturo [referring to Felicity's suicide, 2-10]: How is it possibly my fault that I wanted to live my own life!?

Get paralleled, idiot >:D

Wanting better things for yourself can end up having good effects on others (Levi being good to the cast), or negative (Felicity dying), fun contrast.

But I'm beating around the bush. The question I asked earlier, does Levi actually care about Ace?

Well, there's definitely room for interpretation, but my read is... well, not in the usual way. I mean, Levi explicitly says he doesn't particularly care if Ace lives or dies, so that's kind of a giveaway that he still very much does not feel empathy towards him. To better understand Levi's perspective, it might be helpful to analyze the previously mentioned Hu-Nico and Levi-Ace parallels.

Fandom has long since grouped together Hu and Levi as the "parental figures" of the group, and while I don't particularly enjoy applying familial relations to friendships, there's some basis for the interpretation. They both (to varying effect) commonly act as peacemakers and moderators in the context of the group, but have had this position compromised by emotional outbursts (Hu's defense of Nico and Levi's threats to Ace). Hell, there's even parallels in the way people react to some of these outbursts.

Levi [after the previously linked outburst, 1-9]: I'm terribly sorry for that, everyone. Please continue discussing as you were earlier. Ace: So scary!!

Rose [reacting to Hu's "fuck David" outburst, 2-12]: Wow. Hu can be scary.

To be fair the 2-12 outburst is far more justified than a lot of Hu's others, but you get the point.

They both act this way for similar reasons; to control the cast's perception of them. Hu wishes to be seen as reliable in order to feel useful as a way to counteract her suicidal tendencies and self-loathing, while Levi wishes to be seen as a good person for the reasons he states (to live a peaceful life where others do things for him). And in order to do this, they've both chosen to focus on one person in particular to "protect" or help in some way; Nico for Hu, Ace for Levi. The reasons for this are different mind you, but the effect is similar enough.

However, while it's still unclear why exactly Hu is so adamant about Nico in particular, we kind of know why Levi is focused on Ace. Simply put, before the second trial, Ace was sort of the only person who had legitimate reasons to dislike Levi, at least in Levi's mind. Because of the death threat in trial one of course. Most people haven't really expressed an opinion on Levi either way, but they're civil and at least neutral towards him. Hell, Eden even specifically says Levi's a good person after the death threat, and since she's a pretty rational person, it follows most of the cast would see him that way as well, given how quickly they all moved on from the death threat.

Ace was the exception, however. Ace was very explicitly (and understandably) pissed at Levi for the death threat, so he stood as somewhat of a threat to Levi's goal of being seen as a "good person." Levi trying to fix things with Ace is an extension of this goal, and I don't think there's much else to it. Even to the very end, Levi's frustration at Ace doesn't come from a sense of betrayal or sadness or remorse for not being able to stop the murder, or anything like that. Levi only gets frustrated at his inability to understand Ace, which we already knew from his envy of Veronika's psychoanalysis abilities is a point of insecurity for him.

Ace [2-16]: I just needed a reason to stay mad at you, any reason at all, goddamnit! [sic] Levi: Why? Why do you have to force yourself to be angry at me? You just said you know that you're in the wrong, so why do you still do it?! I don't understand. I can't understand you, no matter how hard I try.

Levi, under this reading, still doesn't "care" that Ace is about to die, not in the way Eden felt bad about Min's death for example. He's frustrated that he's trying to be a good person towards Ace, and it isn't working for reasons he can't grasp. More on those reasons in the Ace section.

I am very curious as to how he'll react to Ace wanting to speed up his execution to try and save his life, and I predict Levi will probably try his best to honor Ace's memory and his sacrifice, but as always, out of duty and not sentimentality. Sorry Acevi fans, hope you still find a way to make it work :/

Since we're on the topic (and Ace's section is gonna be long enough as is), I'll talk about the other side of the Hu-Nico and Levi-Ace parallels, the way the "protected" act in respects to the "protectors." The main point of contrast is that, originally, Ace specifically sought out Levi for protection, while Nico never asked Hu for it.

Teruko [1-2]: Since when were you two so friendly? I distinctly recall yesterday a certain someone being terrified whenever Levi came near him. Ace: Whaaaat? Me, scared? Are you just making things up? Teruko: ... Ace: Okay, fine. Yeah, Levi's scary as hell! But I realized that MonoTV is even scarier than Levi! At least Levi is sorta safe to be around. And I like to be safe, you know?

Nico [to Hu, 2-14]: I never asked you to defend me--

Then comes the aspect of "betrayal" in both these relationships, where the roles are flipped. It's Levi who originally "betrays" Ace by threatening him, while it's Nico who "betrays" Hu by trying to frame her with the wire. However, Ace takes this betrayal much more personally than Hu, getting mad at Levi while Hu continues to defend Nico. As a result, Ace gets a bit of a victim complex, while Nico fully acknowledges blame for the murder attempt. Etc.

Okay time to continue with 2-13 because no we're not done with it.

Levi [continued]: After listening to David, I concluded that a good person would also be honest, even if the truth makes them look bad. Ace: You're taking advice from David of all people? Look at this asshole! David: Try looking in a mirror before you talk, Ace. Levi: I thought David was a prime example of a good person. Is he not? David: Wow, you really don't understand people at all, do you. Levi: I don't want to distract you all from this case any further. So, I apologize for this tangent.

Another really cool bit of characterization here. Levi struggles so much with understanding most people's sense of morality that he still thinks David "I actively tried to kill everyone here by pretending to be the blackened" Chiem is a good person. There's also the quick implication that David doesn't see himself as a good person, but I feel we're well past the point where that's news.

We also get the reason why Levi even said all this; he thinks being honest will help him be a good person, and presumably only brought it up after the whole David thing got resolved because "good person" David was (eventually) honest with both his motive secret and the reason he tried to get voted out. Or, rather, Levi thinks David was honest on the latter. Fair ig.

Levi has a few other lines in this part, but the next most striking thing to talk about is, fittingly, not a set of words, but an image.

Levi's protective streak has always been a big part of his character, and now he's literally taken a bullet (or 5) for Teruko. Just for the record, I imagine he'll survive, because there'd be no real point to most of the end of 2-16 if he didn't.

The big question around this is, naturally, why did Levi jump in? Obviously, it's not that he particularly cares if Teruko lives or dies, not from an emotional standpoint anyways. It could also just be Teruko's luck somehow manipulating him the way it seems to have influenced Min somewhat, but I can't see that as the only reason this happened. So, like most people, I believe he feels he owes Teruko.

Teruko [1-2]: No... I should be the one apologizing. It's my fault you got hurt. Levi: What do you mean? Without your warning, I could have gotten fatally injured. I should thank you that my wound is not more severe.

Teruko warning him in the prologue is the most obvious case where Teruko saved Levi, especially since it parallels this scene. Teruko saves Levi from execution, so he returns the favor. However, we also need to keep in mind that, without Teruko carrying, these people would not have made it through the trials, so Levi might feel he owes her for that too. And "good people" repay their debts, don't they?

Very interested in seeing where Levi's character goes from here!

Teruko Tawaki

You know a series is doing something right when the protag has so much shit going on in a trial where she didn't even have strong relationships with either the victim or the killer. Now, a big chunk of her screen time was devoted to crime solving, so her section might end up smaller than Levi's even though I consider her more important, but the order of this analysis is kinda all over the place anyways :v

I'll go in the order of Teruko moments as they appeared, though I'll skip the whole "fix my mistake" thing since I already mentioned it in the Min section.

David [2-12]: Xander is a good person. He's the only good person I've ever known. I swear, I'll follow in his footsteps and-- Teruko: And get everyone killed in the class trial? Xander is a good person? Are you hearing yourself right now? What virtuous reason could he possibly have for trying to kill me and everyone else here? David: I'm sure he had a good reason. I believe that he did. Xander is not the kind of person to do anything for frivolous purposes. Teruko: You *believe* that he had a good reason!? Hah! Based on what? The 3 days you spent with a fan who was too infatuated with the ideal of you to treat you like an actual human-- David: SHUT UP!

She says all this like she wasn't play-acting her Xanruko fix-it AU with cacti, like, two days ago lol.

Teruko Cactus [2-3]: That's right. Give up now, and surrender. Then I'll consider letting you live. Xander Plant: Teruko... I've changed my mind. I promise, I will turn my back on whoever made me do this and stay by your side from now on. Do you forgive me?

I don't actually have much to say about this. Teruko's complicated feelings about Xander aren't exactly news; genuinely angry at him for attempting to murder her, also genuinely upset that things didn't go better. No wonder David's uncritical view of the guy ticked her off.

2-13 had a lot of murder solving from Teruko, which is cool but not crucial for character analysis. Meanwhile, 2-14 had quite a bit more going on.

Rose [2-14]: I... I'm sorry for being useless. Maybe if I tried harder, if I just got over myself-- Teruko: Rose. Don't blame yourself anymore. You are helpful. It's because of you that I can solve this murder. Besides... I'm as much to blame as you. Maybe more, even. If only I listened to you when you said the tape was missing, then maybe I would have realized the truth of this case much earlier. Once again, I've made a stupid mistake. I simply wanted to believe that I could make it through this killing game without relying on anyone else. That I could be dismissive of everyone around me without consequences. So I refused to listen to anyone other than myself. I thought that if I did that, then I could avoid a repeat of the last trial, where I had made the mistake of trusting people too much. But now I'm making different mistakes instead. Again and again, I keep messing up this class trial with hasty assumptions and overlooked evidence. So... Rose: ... Teruko: ... Thank you, Rose.

Yuri stays winning.

Again, it's hard for me to add any commentary when Teruko's just... explaining all the themes out loud. We go back to the idea of Teruko fixing mistakes that she seems to have taken to heart from Min's CH1 breakdown (YURI STAYS WINNING), which ties into the idea of self-betterment that Arei's scene conveyed; and we basically have Teruko stating a reworded version of her secret quote, "It is an equal failing to trust everybody, and to trust no one at all." It makes me wonder how Teruko will behave moving forward. Will she trust a few select people? Will she continue to keep other's at arm's length, but being slightly more open? Well, based on what she does with Eden, it seems Teruko is willing to trust select people until the situation merits distrust, which is a pretty solid way of looking at things.

Speaking of that.

Eden [2-14]: I just wanted to help Arei... I didn't kill her... Teruko: You know I can't just take your words at face value, Eden. Eden: Please, Teruko... You're my friend, aren't you? Friends help each other... So please, help me... [...] Teruko: Eden. Eden: *sniffing* Teruko: Eden. Pick up your head. Look at me. At this point in the trial, since I've narrowed Arei's killer down to just two suspects, I'm going to pursue each suspect individually under the assumption that they're the killer. That way, I can see if any evidence matches up to them only. [...] So for now, I'm going to assume you're innocent. Eden: W-What? Really? Thank you so much, Teruko... Teruko: Don't... get me wrong. This isn't out of kindness or pity or anything else. This is only because you helped me in the last trial. I'm repaying your favor, and nothing else. That's why I'll trust you, just this once. Eden: Teruko... T... Thank you, Teruko... Teruko: ... Let go of me.

YURI STAYS WINNING!!!

That's what I was talking about. Choosing to trust Eden over Ace, but being willing to turn suspicion on the Clockmaker if Ace turns out innocent. A very reasonable approach! We love character development in this house.

That said, Teruko is still being a bit of a tsundere, with the whole "repaying a favor" thing. Levi parallels anyone? Well, not exactly, since Teruko does feel empathy towards Eden, but close enough. What's more interesting is that Teruko is using the exact transactional logic that Eden warned her against, which is intriguing setup for the future when it becomes more undeniable that Teruko is definitely not doing this just to repay a favor.

Also, the Trauma remains. Teruko telling Eden to let go fully completes the parallel to the Min scene, where she says the same thing (among others). I imagine our girl won't be too receptive of hugs for a while.

Before we get to the next big moment, real quick, we gotta fulfill our "Teruko's life is miserable" quota.

Teruko [to Ace, 2-15]: And three. You took the tape for first aid. Arturo: That's ridiculous. Who uses non-medical tape for first aid? That's sickening. Teruko: It's not that weird. I do it all the time.

Alright quota fulfilled. Let's move on. In this case, I'll skip to when Teruko gives up on the "show me your injuries Ace" line of reasoning.

Teruko [2-15]: No. It's fine. That's not a very fair line of logic, so forget it. You were almost murdered, after all. I should have understood that.

I don't know why Teruko really thought this line of logic was even worth following in the first place, but it makes sense for her character to ignore Ace's possible emotions in favor of the trial. But it's also cool to see her backing down when she realizes the harm she may be causing, especially as someone who has very notably hid how much her own murder attempt affected her, and in particular the wound that came from it.

Teruko [2-15]: The point of this trial is to determine who the killer is, not to determine every single little detail of what happened. It doesn't matter that you're not convinced. It's not going to help you, nor change your fate. No matter how you feel or what you think, nothing will change. [...] I've been fighting this entire trial to find the truth using real evidence. And when I make mistakes, I own up to them. What have you contributed? Show me some concrete proof of your innocence. Otherwise, shut up and stop wasting everyone's time. Ace: ... Teruko: Are you silent now? What happened to all those things you were shouting earlier? Don't you have anything to say for yourself? Ace: ... Teruko: Any evidence, any deductions to show that you're innocent? Come on, Ace! Don't you want to live?! Defend yourself!

So, a few things. First, regarding that second paragraph. "It's not going to change your fate"? "Nothing will change"? We'll circle back to it, but it seems Teruko is projecting how she feels about her own fate (before the Levi incident at least) on Ace. You could even say-

Literature Girl Insane: Even if we cry make noise shout go mad - this world won't change!

The foils ever.

Anyways, I assume that's why Teruko gets so worked up over Ace remaining silent. She sees a bit of her situation in trial 1 (almost murdered, suspected as the killer) in Ace, so her emotions run high with both the frustration of a long trial and the bad memories this is probably bringing up. At least, that's how I interpret it.

Also another mention of correcting mistakes, which shows up one more time before the episode ends, which I already mentioned as being tied back to Min and Arei; alongside with another "fate" drop. "Fate" is becoming the new "good person" isn't it :p

Teruko [2-15]: Confront the mistakes you've made. Then accept death. That's the fate of everyone who choose [sic] to participate in this killing game.

Also I find it endlessly funny that Teruko's reasoning for the Closing Argument being necessary reads a lot like "this is a DR trial we gotta do this, it's in the contract." Consider me amused.

But I've beaten around the fate bush enough. Let's get all of that over with in one fell swoop.

Teruko [2-16]: It's just... misfortune. That's why Ace killed. That's all.

Teruko [regarding her execution, 2-16]: What's the point [of running]? I should have known this would happen. [...] Even if I shield myself behind others, even if I search for an escape, it always comes down to this. I have to face the consequences of my actions. There's no escaping that. [...] Arturo: What are you talking about?? You're going to be killed!! Teruko: Killed? I doubt it. As if something so kind could happen to me. [...] I won't die, even if MonoTV puts a hundred bullets in my body. I'll only be badly injured. Possibly lose a body part. Maybe I'll even end up in a coma for months. [...] But I won't die. I never will. There's nothing I can do but accept my fate. It's what I deserve, after all. [...] I was perfectly willing to get shot. I thought I didn't have to care about what happened to other people, and especially not about what happened to me. I thought that if I lived alone and died alone, nothing would stain my conscience. Even if that was a selfish way to live. But even so...

Teruko [to MonoTV, 2-16]: Can you really say it's fate's fault for everything you've done, and pretend that you hold no blame in the matter? I have always said that my misfortune, my personality, the choices I make, everything was all a product of a bad luck that I can't control. That I grew up in such terrible circumstances, so I was destined to grow up to be a terrible person. That everyone else abandoned me, so it's not my fault that I'm alone. I want to say it's fate's fault, and that I had no choice in the matter. But, even so... Even so... Everyone. Xander, Min, Arei, Ace. Maybe even Levi. Is it my fault that they died? [...] MonoTV: You have to decide the answer for yourself. Teruko: Whether it was the fault of fate, or my fault... I already knew the answer. I had known what the answer was since a long, long time ago.

Alright I made myself sad, so something's been achieved, I guess. Poor Teruko :(

Just to start somewhere, we get confirmation of Teruko's suicidal tendencies in the present, which was already implied strongly enough, but now she straight up says she considers death something "kind to her." Just sad in general, but I wonder if there will be some discussions of it with the fellow suicidal characters like Hu. In fact, I wonder if that's the reason that Hu was the one to see the scar on Teruko's back during 2-2; so she'd have a vague idea of Teruko's backstory for some interaction in the future.

But the main point of these scenes is Teruko's relationship with the concept of fate. She basically goes through an entire character arc from the moment she says Ace's murder was just misfortune to right after Levi jumps in to save her. Basically, she used to blame fate (or "bad luck") for everything she did and what happened to her, thinking that just accepting this fate would allow her to live more easily. Especially noticeable because part of her "bad luck" is being betrayed, which gives way to her trust issues.

Teruko [2-2]: If I get in a car, it'll crash. If I stand in a construction site, it'll crumble to dust. If I trust others, they'll turn their back on me.

Hence her internal monologue about "living so nothing stains my conscience." If everything that happens to her is fate's fault, then she doesn't have to change, she doesn't have to confront her faults. Even when she talked about accepting the consequences for her actions, it was always in the context of accepting her fate. If she just accepts whatever consequences her actions bring, then she can excuse herself from fighting back against that, which is an easier way to live, but as she says, could be considered selfish. What's easier for Teruko is not always best for others, exemplified perfectly by Levi protecting her; Teruko chose not to fight her fate, and it got Levi hurt. Funnily enough, this somewhat parallels Hu feeling selfish for not sharing her secret, which is fun contrast. Hu is more justified in not sharing her secret, so it shows that feeling selfish for doing things that are good for you can be pretty bad. Meanwhile, Teruko shows that not taking others into account can also end up hurting people.

Of course, the whole "not fighting fate" thing also obviously parallels Mr Literature Boy Insane's feelings on the whole thing, to the point where they have practically the same character flaw. Believing themselves and others unable to change as a result of fate is the way they try living with themselves, because of the whole self-loathing thing, but that means they're resistant to changing their flaws. MonoTV says similar things, but it's a machine so it's not so much a flaw as just the nature of its character. It was a flaw Arei had, though, but she grew out of it through Character Development, similarly to the way it's implied Teruko is growing out of the "all fate's fault" mindset in the last inner monologue. You might also notice that tying fate into self-betterment allows you to draw a connection to the theme of admitting mistakes and fixing them, tying to Min who is also connected to the concept of fate through her entire backstory of being "destined" to be the Ultimate Student from the moment her family accepted XF-Ture's Tech contract, and obviously Min contrasts Xander who is all about fighting fate as the Ultimate Rebel, and that's without mentioning all the other "fate" bullshit going on and-

Yeah you get the idea. Too much peak for me to write it all out.

Very excited to see where Teruko's character goes now that she's not going to blame her bad luck for everything now. I worry she'll swing too hard the other way and end up blaming herself for things she shouldn't, but oh well, that's just more character development to be had.

That was the biggest Teruko thing, but there's still more to cover.

Teruko [to Ace, 2-16]: If you can't [attack MonoTV]... If you can't do that, then tell me, why did Arei have to die?! Ace: ... Teruko: It's because unlike Arei, *you* couldn't make amends with the people you made enemies out of. *You* were too scared to confront the people you hurt, say you're sorry, and promise to be a better person. So instead you took out your own personal problems on other people by murdering someone who had nothing to do with you! Arei died because you're a coward, Ace!

Uh... someone's projecting~

Teruko [already linked, 2-2]: But if you start talking about me and saying that I could be a good person if only I make an attempt to change, then I'm going to stop you right there. Don't say that I could be a good person, because all it'll do is make me feel bad that I'm not.

Damn it's almost like she hates herself because she already knows deep down that her mindset is flawed and so when she sees someone else behaving like she does/did she gets upset at them that's crazy :O

(I mean it's not 1:1 because Teruko never did anything as bad as Ace, but the point stands :v)

Final note, as always, voice acting was peak, just that there's too many good examples to point them all out one by one. Same with Levi btw, I think I forgot to mention it in his section.

Teruko continues to be probably my favorite protag of any DR or DR inspired story, though as always I'm working on a small sample size. Really excited to see her development in the future!

Ace Markey

Well if it isn't the man of the hour! It's only natural the blackened gets to close things out. Let's do the same thing as we did with Teruko and go by (mostly) chronological order.

That includes the quick, retrospective observation that a lot of Ace's behavior in the trial and investigation now needs to be re-analyzed with the understanding he's the blackened. It mostly just adds an extra layer to Ace's constant accusations towards Nico, though, since Ace didn't really do much most of the trial. The only other notable thing he did was revealing David's secret, and even then, nothing too big. I know it's a bit silly to go so hard on Nico when David is almost easier to frame, but this is Ace we're talking about. He's emotional and not quite the most strategic, so nothing weird there.

Although, speaking of Ace knowing about David's secret, why did he not hear the end of the Arei-David conversation? I doubt he's hiding it, because he doesn't really have a reason to, so apparently he just, like, left. I guess he just didn't care enough :p

Finally getting to PT 2 itself, we have a 2-13 speech we skipped earlier, don't we?

Levi [2-13]: I don't personally care what happens to Ace. Whether he lives or dies is none of my concern in the end. Ace: ...?! Levi: But it is a "good" thing to make sure someone else doesn't die, even if I personally do not care about the outcome. I truly believe that. But I adhere to that principle out of duty, not sentimentality. Does that make any sense? Ace: You... Hah. Hahaha. You-- You fucking piece of shit. Levi: ... Ace: I was right all along. That you felt bad for me... That you actually wanted to help me... That even if everyone here treated me like shit, there was at least one person who still cared about me... That shit's too good to be true, isn't it? Yeah, good thing I didn't fall for that in the slightest. Not one bit. I was totally right all along to burn our friendship-- No, I can't even call it "friendship." There's only one person in my whole life who I've ever been able to call my friend. That I ever thought, even for just a short time, that you and I were "friends" is an insult to his memory. I probably sound real pathetic admitting that. But I'm not nearly as pathetic as you. After all, you're a piece of trash who probably has never had a single friend in your life. Levi: ... Ace: Got nothing to say to me now? That's fine. Hey, Levi. I really hope you fucking die.

Okay there is... so much to unpack there. Let's... start by the smaller thing, which is the Taylor Riley drop in "there's only one person in my whole life who I've ever been able to call my friend." This guy's name was revealed in a now deleted CH2 PT1 QnA answer, alongside with the name of a friend of Veronika's who gave her her green triangle earring, Alyssa Belyaeva. We got main series confirmation of the name in one of the graves of Thanatophobia, alongside the names of Elliot Cuevas and Felicity Giles.

We know... zero about Taylor, apart from the fact that he was Ace's friend and is now very evidently dead. Thankfully, we get a bit more context on his death by one of Ace's comments:

Ace [2-16]: Execute me right now, you hear me, MonoTV? MonoTV: ... Ace: Because... Because Levi is gonna fucking die, and I'm going to have a third goddamn death on my hands!

Third, huh? Arei, the hypothetical Levi death, and presumably Taylor. Sure, the third could be Ace himself, but I feel the line makes a bit more sense with Taylor.

So, Ace blames himself for the death of Taylor. Given he liked the guy, probably not intentional murder, but who knows what the hell he did. At this point, we really have no way to deduce the way Taylor died or how Ace could have caused it somehow, though. Maybe we'll get some answers in the Bonus Episode? Hopefully :p

But that's the easy part. The hard part is Ace's feelings towards Levi. Immediately, we can tell the whole "I never thought you cared about me, not one bit" thing is a complete lie, not just because the line itself is extremely unconvincing, but because of something Ace says later in this episode.

Ace [to Levi, 2-13]: You piece of shit. I can't believe there used to be a time I actually liked you.

So, yeah. Similarly, based on the fact that Ace wanted MonoTV to speed up the execution to try and save Levi's life despite his fear of death, we can infer that Ace is also lying when he tells Levi "I really hope you fucking die."

No, Ace really does care about Levi. For the reason stated at... some point in this analysis; Ace feels safer around Levi. And that creates a bit of a problem for him, because if he wants to escape the killing game, he's gonna have to kill Levi to do it. It's unclear if that's the reason he originally pushed Levi away, "burning their friendship to the ground" in his words, or if he just didn't want to trust him after the death threat in trial 1. However, guilt over trying to get Levi killed is definitely part of why he says this:

Ace [2-16]: I knew... I knew that I wasn't allowed to call [Levi] a murderer. I had no right to act betrayed, because I was the one who betrayed everyone. But still, I...! Levi: Why-- Ace: But still, I--! I don't care what it was! I don't care if it made me a hypocrite! Even if I was completely in the wrong, and even if it made my life worse! I just needed a reason to stay mad at you, any reason at all, goddamnit! Levi: Why? Why do you have to force yourself to be angry at me? You just said you know that you're in the wrong, so why do you still do it?! I don't understand. I can't understand you, no matter how hard I try. Ace: Good! Stay that way! I hope you never understand me, even after I'm buried a billion miles deep in the ground and you're weeping at my grave, you piece of shit!

Ace tries very hard to find reasons to hate Levi because he's afraid of growing close to anyone in the killing game, mostly because he thinks he'll be betrayed, but by the point he starts plotting murder, also because he's trying to kill them all. Being close to them is a good way to feel more horrible about himself than he already does.

To be clear, the reason I say the first reason is more important is because I think I can more or less pinpoint the moment Ace starts thinking about murder, and by that point he's already trying to cut Levi off.

Ace [2-2]: In this killing game, everyone is out to get me. Especially people who love picking fights with me, people like you [Teruko] and Levi. I can't believe I wasted my time with all that dumb shit like arm wrestling and running around screaming at meaningless stuff. I was fucking stupid to not take this killing game seriously from the start. I'm done with being everyone's kickable scaredy cat. The only thing I should do is look out for myself and myself alone.

Well he sure did take the killing game seriously after this point now didn't he?

Obviously, this is a pretty direct parallel to the way Teruko tried pushing everyone away in this chapter, and the way David pretends not to care about Arei after the magical girl transformation. More on this whole thing in a bit.

The relationship between Levi and Ace is one of contrast. Levi, who doesn't actually care about Ace the "usual way", chooses to try to get closer to him. Meanwhile, Ace cares about Levi maybe too much, and his fear of this attachment drives him to push Levi away. The yaoi truly is doomed with this one. Moving on.

Ace [to Nico and Hu, 2-14]: You two are a real fucking joke. It would have been one thing if Nico gets away scot-free with trying to kill me, but now they apparently also have a fucking defense brigade to shield them from even having to think about the fact that they're a murderer. Who's gonna stick up for me, huh? No one. Because I have a spine and I don't need other people to lie to me constantly to keep me happy.

Ace [to Nico, 2-14]: You tried to murder me. You fucking tried to murder me! And after all's said and done, you can't even say something as simple as "sorry"?!

Ace [to Teruko, 2-15]: Were you convinced by Eden because she had a little sob story ready? Should I start crying and wailing too to change your mind? Teruko-- No, everyone here. You're always attacking me for stupid reasons. Everyone always has it out for me. That pisses me off. All of you piss me off.

Ace [2-15]: You all actually think I'm too goddamn stupid to accomplish anything? Do you really think I'm 2 seconds away from choking on my own spit and passing out?

This is where we start to see Ace's persecution complex on this part, which was already alluded to in the previously linked 2-2 Ace quote. He thinks everyone is out to get him, and to an extent, he's not horribly wrong. Very few people in the cast have favorable opinions on Ace, and he knows that if he gets revealed as a murderer, that "few people" will likely turn to "no one." I mean, not even Levi wants to defend him.

Ace [2-15]: Hah... I expected everyone else to get on my ass, but for you of all people to think I'm the murderer... What happened to ever wanting to make things up, huh? Besides, between you and me, we both know who's really a murderer.

And hell, Nico's already tried to kill him! Ace is the victim in that situation, even if he did "start it."

Which gets us to one of the most interesting moral quandaries this trial presents us with, Milgram style. Because the thing is, Ace has given the cast reasons to dislike him. Ever since the start, he's been confrontational, insulting, and just generally not the most delightful person to be around. Especially to Nico, who he specifically targeted to bully. Obviously it doesn't justify being horrible to him back, including things like Hu's slap and Levi's death threat, and especially Nico's murder attempt, but... well, if people don't feel about Ace the same way they feel about some of the calmer cast members, there's a reason for it.

How justified is the cast in the things they say about Ace? How much of it is Ace's responsibility, and how much is it the cast's? How much responsibility do they hold for creating the hostile environment that pushed Ace into murder? How does the mastermind and the killing game itself factor into this valuation? These are all interesting questions the series asks us to ponder on, and by their nature don't have any one right answer. Especially because "blame for a thing that happened" isn't a number that can be evenly divided by percentage, it's a very complicated and subjective thing. J puts it pretty well in her speech to Ace in 2-15, giving her perspective as well.

J [2-15]: Maybe I was too harsh on you. Me and everyone else here, I don't think a single one of us stopped to think where the breaking point is. ...But. Murder is unacceptable, no matter what. Your problems might be awful, and they might be the worst in the world, but they're still not so bad that killing 13 people is acceptable. You can't be forgiven as a murderer just because your life sucks.

My personal opinions on this are probably best saved for when we get the full picture in just a moment.

And speaking of the full picture, since Ace's persecution complex feeds into his fear of death, why don't we skip right into the big speech?

Ace [already linked in the Hu section, 2-15]: ...... God damn it. I'm such a piece of shit. [...] You're right. I'm screwed. There's no way I'm making it out of this trial alive. I just... wanted to stall for time. I'm scared of dying, I really am. [...] I killed Arei. That's exactly right. Shit, it sounds really bad when I say it out loud. [...] Hu: Did you kill Arei because of MonoTV's motive? Because you wanted to keep your 'secret' hidden-- Ace: Hell no! I don't give a damn about that motive, or my dumb little secret, you idiot fuckwad! Who do you think I am, you?! *sigh* That wasn't why I killed her. I was scared of dying, that's all. [...]

Quick thing, but I think it's cool that the motive really had jack shit to do with the murder. Hate to bring the guy up so much, but it helps make David's "plan" of revealing all the secrets unequivocally wrong, which I feel is important for some of the themes of the chapter. In particular, the idea that gets pushed that everyone should be allowed to reveal their secrets at their own time, aka privacy is important. Nico's public secret reveal happened before they were ready to share, and that was a bad thing, after all. And a lot of the conflict in this chapter came from MonoTV giving the motives in general.

Ace [continued]: I'm definitely going to die in this killing game if I don't escape. Everyone hates me, right? Because I'm a volatile asshole who can't help but pick fights and make people mad at me. Veronika was right. If pushed to kill, everyone would feel the least guilt if they killed me. They might even have some sort of grudge. I wouldn't be surprised. When Nico tried to kill me, that just confirmed it. There's a part of me that's a little pissed that Nico didn't succeed back then, because that would have saved me the trouble of having to go through this stupid-ass farce. Although I'd be real fuckin' pissed if they *did* successfully kill me. I'm kind of pissed at Nico for trying to kill me, either way. Nico: ...

Interesting to hear part of Ace wanted Nico to succeed. It certainly speaks to a great level of defeatism, where everything is horrible and death would be preferable, which parallels Teruko nicely. That defeatism for Ace comes partly from the persecution complex discussed earlier, and some other stuff we'll talk about in a moment.

Ace [continued]: But still! If I didn't kill someone and escape... then I was going to die. I'm fucking terrified of dying! I can't sleep at night because I keep thinking about how I'm going to die young in this goddamn killing game! I didn't want to die! I want to live. Just like everyone else. Live, and escape this killing game, and go back to my shitty life where I can't do anything on my own because I can't control myself. Back to that life where I can't do anything but a sport that I hate because I suck shit at everything else. I was forced into that fate, to kill someone because I'm scared. It was either that, or I would be killed first. There were no other options for me, because I'm a coward who can't fight my own fate. [...]

I think an underrated part of Ace's character is just how much damn symbolism is hidden in his talent.

The first connection is the more or less obvious "if I didn't kill someone, I would be killed first" mentality, where Ace literally views the killing game as a race to be the first blackened to get away with it. But that's almost an extension of the other connection.

You hear it from him here; he feels he completely lacks control of his life, that it's all decided by a fate he can't control, the same way that a jockey doesn't walk on their own, but rather is carried by a horse to their destination. And it's no wonder that this feeling of lacking control is referenced in his secret quote, "I don’t know what to do with myself anymore." After all, it's this feeling of lacking control of himself and his situation that causes him to seek control of anything he can, be it bullying Nico because he sees them as an easy target, distancing himself from others because it's easier to control his feelings that way, killing someone because it's the only way he can control his place in the killing game, or anything else I might be forgetting.

And this fear of lacking control is probably part of his fear of death, isn't it? Because no one can control what happens after death. Maybe yes, maybe not, but regardless, Ace's thanatophobia is pretty evident. I mean, it's the name of his execution, and it's a fitting one. Ultimately, Ace's fear of death is what gets him killed, both metaphorically because it's the reason he became a blackened, and literally because he dies of a fear-induced cardiac arrest. That, alongside with the incredible art and banger music, is why I consider Thanatophobia one of, if not the single best DR style execution I've ever seen. Simply peak.

Ace [continued]: Do you think I give a crap about you all? Why would that matter to me? No one gives a crap about me either! None of you even respect me enough to think I was capable of killing Arei! In fact, that made me feel way less guilty about killing-- [J makes her anti-murder speech] Ace: ... I know that [I can't be forgiven]. I'm the one who murdered Arei, so of course I know that. Arei... She was a piece of shit too. Just like me. Even if she said all that nice bullshit to Eden, there was no guarantee that she really was going to change and become a good person. Maybe if she lived, then by tomorrow she'd be right back to her annoying bitchy self. ... But at least she was trying. And I can't even change one thing about myself. Not my shitty job, not my shitty personality, nor my shitty life. I really am a piece of shit, huh?

At the end of the day, Ace is his own worst enemy. What really gets Ace killed (apart from the already mentioned fear of death) is the inability to change, to see the flaws in the way he behaves himself and try to better himself. Or, rather, he does see the flaws, he knows he's a target of the killing game because of his aggressiveness and that he drove himself into a corner out of fear, but he considers himself incapable of changing that. Changing is difficult, and Ace is scared to even try. Like he says, maybe Arei couldn't have managed it either, but she was trying. And that's what ultimately separates the two.

In case it isn't obvious, my take on who's to blame for everything that happened is pretty much squarely on Ace. Sure, there were things the others did to Ace which aren't justified, but you can't blame people for disliking someone that knows he's unlikable and cannot find it in himself to try to change that. Arei tried to change; she died a good person. Levi tried to make amends for trial 1; he's a good person too. The tragedy of the situation is that Ace himself could have been a good person too, because everyone can be, but it's a decision that must be made, as Eden put it earlier in the chapter. And it's a difficult one, too difficult for Ace.

Teruko, David, all these people... they can also be "good people," in the sense of always trying to be "less shitty together" in Arei's words. Ace is a cautionary tale of how not doing so can end up really, really badly.

Which is the setup for Teruko and David's continued foiling, isn't it? Teruko will presumably look at all of Ace's flaws (lack of trust, unwillingness to change, accepting fate without fighting it) as pitfalls to avoid, because of how similar the two of them acted in CH2. Meanwhile, David, since he heard Arei's speech and knows just how hard she tried to change, will see those same flaws as strengths. In his eyes, Arei died because she trusted the note, because she tried to change, because she tried to defy her nature. At least, that's my prediction. Where all of that will go is anyone's guess.

But, how do we know that Ace could have been a good person? How do we know that it isn't David who is right, that neither Ace nor Arei could have ever gotten better, had they simply tried? Well, simply put, because in the end, Ace does start changing. As a final, tragic note, Ace's ability to confront fate and try to correct his flaws only surfaces when it's far too late. And not only when he punches MonoTV, though that also is a good example of it, but also when he chooses to face execution quicker in an attempt to save Levi.

Ace [already linked, 2-16]: Execute me right now, you hear me, MonoTV? MonoTV: ... Ace: Because... Because Levi is gonna fucking die, and I'm going to have a third goddamn death on my hands! Arturo: E-Even then, there's no guarantee that he'll live--- Ace: Shut up! What the hell are you talking about? Aren't you a surgeon? Can't you fix him? Arturo: I--! I'm not that kind of surgeon! I've told you, over and over, I have no experience with saving lives! Something like this! There's no way I can do it-- Ah! Ace: SHUT UP! Shut up, Arturo! You *can* save his life! Shut the fuck up! Stop saying you can't do it, because you can! Don't you understand? I'm going to die right now, and you're going to live! So decide whether you want to at least *try* and put in some fucking effort for once, or keep making excuses for yourself like a sniveling coward for the rest of your life. I don't even get to make that decision anymore! Stop complaining, you whiny little shit! Grow some fucking balls and save someone's goddamn life, asshole! Because you can!

There's layers to Ace's shouting barrage at Arturo. Obviously part of it is just Ace trying to convince himself that Arturo can save Levi so he can die with a relatively clearer conscience, but there's also a sort of self-awareness of Ace's faults in the things he says. Try swapping "save Levi's life" for "be a better person," and pretend it's being said to Ace by someone else who is about to die.

You *can* [be a good person]! Shut the fuck up! Stop saying you can't do it, because you can! Don't you understand? I'm going to die right now, and you're going to live! So decide whether you want to at least *try* and put in some fucking effort for once, or keep making excuses for yourself like a sniveling coward for the rest of your life. I don't even get to make that decision anymore! Stop complaining, you whiny little shit! Grow some fucking balls and [be a better person], asshole! Because you can!

Because moments ago, it was Ace who was making excuses like a coward for why he felt he would never be a good person, and why he had no control over his shitty personality that made everyone hate him and made him a target of the killing game, etc. He never put in the effort to change because he thought it was pointless, that he was unable to, and didn't realize the falseness of that preconception until he was faced with death. Seems I was on the right track when I connected his thanatophobia to his issues with control; death robs him of the decision to try and be a good person ("I don't even get to make that decision anymore!"), which he hadn't even realized he had until that moment.

It's no wonder Ace was a popular survivor guess; he could have changed, could have been a good person. And despite the harm he's caused, the way he robbed Arei of the opportunity to do what he couldn't and attempt to change, the intention he had of killing everyone in the trial, his death remains a tragedy for the hypothetical of what could have been. Maybe if Levi had managed to properly reach him the way Eden reached Arei, this could have all been avoided. But alas, Ace didn't accept the hand strectched out to him, and now it's too late to fix things.

I said during my reactions that I felt just as emotional during Ace's execution as I did with Min's, which was certainly true and very impressive given my massive bias towards the Ultimate Student. And while I can't say that I'll miss Ace as much as I miss Min (because come on), I'll certainly hold him close to my heart for as long as I live regardless.

As a final note, holy shit the voice acting. If I pointed out every line where the acting for Ace was spectacular, I would be here all day. I doubt I need to elaborate on this; the sheer perfection of the performance should be obvious to anyone who can hear it. Godspeed Seth Raffield, you truly were incredible. Can't wait to hear what you do in the Bonus Episode, provided there is one.

---

I am free! Holy shit that took way too fucking long. I need to figure out a better way to do this shit for later chapters, because geez. You have no idea how much Tumblr's drafts lagged because of this shit, I had to write the final sections in different drafts and copy paste them over because it was unbearable. Not to mention hitting the goddamn link limit which is just clinically insane from me. Anyways, if you somehow managed to read all of that, I feel genuinely sorry for you. You know you can be a good person if you try, right? There's no need to punish yourself like this.

I'm being silly, of course. Thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed!

[dearsnow]

MANIC MOVES & DROWSY DREAMS (3)

- after discovering something that forces all of your relationship’s problems to the surface, you seek solace in your only potential friend in san diego. (bradley “rooster” bradshaw x fem!reader, hurt with future comfort, part of the series “out of touch” ⚠️ ADULT TOPICS, please be 18+ to read)

OUT OF TOUCH: It’s been twenty years since you last saw Bradley Bradshaw, and, suddenly, you realize he’s finally grown up.

word count: 3,110

a/n - this chapter is lowkey crazy 😭 i hope y’all enjoy because i’ve had a blast writing this. the next chapter might take a bit to write up because i need to plan out the rest of the series, but it hopefully shouldn’t take tooo long!!

The next few days were relatively uneventful as you attempted to get your life in perfect working order. There were a few visits from the navy men, with Fanboy (who you learned was actually named Mickey) being one of your best customers until he witnessed firsthand your boyfriend giving you flowers and a peck on the cheek. He seemed a bit crestfallen after that, but you knew he would perk up eventually. He hadn’t gone through it for nothing, though- you always slipped him an extra cookie sample when he came by.

The best part of your life was not interviewing potential employees or ordering more vintage tables, but instead, it was Derick. He was truly your rock in the midst of a change that otherwise would’ve thrown you into chaos.

He handled your calls, he mopped the floors and shined the counter, and he took you on amazing dates. You can firmly say that you’ve never had a boyfriend as respectful and supportive as him.

Too respectful, however, is an ever-present problem.

You’ve been with him for almost fifteen years and you can reasonably count the times he’s been anything other than a perfect family-friendly gentleman. If you look back on it, it was probably around fifty-two instances.

That seems like a lot, but spread out over fifteen years of young adult antics, it’s almost like he didn’t want to be intimate. He didn’t want to make out, or put a hand just a bit too low on your waist, or do anything passionate or fiery or heated. He just wanted dinner dates, a kiss on the cheek, and a hand to hold. You were fine with that, because in essence, that’s what you needed at the time, right? Stability. Comfort. Romance. Someone to wipe away your insecurities and hold you down at ground level.

A lingering thought, always bouncing around in the back of your mind, whispers that it shouldn’t take hours of tempting and teasing for a guy to want you.

You ignore all of that for right now. Derick is currently sitting across the table from you at the fanciest restaurant in the area.

Fancy places always make you a little nervous. You’re afraid to say the wrong thing or mispronounce a word on the menu, and your dresses get rumpled as you fidget with them. Even your nail polish doesn’t survive as you pick at the edges with your thumb. Derick smiles.

“What are you thinking about ordering?” He asks, setting his own menu down. You cease your picking and clear your throat. He looks especially nice tonight, with his dark hair gelled back and his black suit nice and crisp. It doesn’t quite fit with your dress, though you suppose it doesn’t need to.

“Uh, the caprese salad sounds good.” It’s the cheapest thing on the menu. He always pays, but you know that he gets a bit bothered when the bill racks up too high. You’ve offered to pay for yourself numerous times, but he waves the suggestion away, even when his face makes it known that he doesn’t want to.

“I make more money than you, babe, just let me take care of it.”

You try to smile sweetly, but it doesn’t reach your eyes. If he can tell, he doesn’t show it.

“Sounds good. I’m having the truffle alfredo myself.” He flags down a waiter, and you shrink a bit in your seat.

You can tell that this night is going to be another awkward one. After being with someone for so long, you come to expect certain things. Despite that, you wouldn’t trade this stability for anything. He makes good money, he buys you gifts, and once or twice a year, he’ll even sleep with you. What more could a girl want?

Bradley hasn’t had stability in a long time. He has a home in San Diego, sure, but going out for drinks every once and a while with people who have vastly different schedules isn’t really enough to make him want to stay. In truth, he almost misses being deployed because, at least then, he has a purpose.

When he saw you, he thought he might have an opportunity to right a wrong that has been tearing him up inside. He despises what he was like as a teenager, taking nothing seriously except his dreams to be a naval aviator. He’s learned throughout his life that everything matters, especially the feelings of other people, and even the small, mundane things he couldn’t care less about. The small, mundane things are what keep the world working.

He’s sitting on his couch, enjoying a small, mundane thing (a shitty reality show with acting so bad it makes him laugh) when an unknown number lights up his phone. He perks up, staring at the number as the reality show carries on. It’s probably just a spam number, but on the off chance it’s you, he picks up.

“Hello?” He hates how shaky his voice sounds. Just the idea of you sets his nerves on fire.

“I need a friend,” your soft voice mumbles. “Where can we meet? A place that serves strong alcohol would be preferable.”

Right after your early dinner date with Derick, you walked into your shared apartment, boxes lining every walkway. You really ought to have put everything away more quickly, but after a long day’s work, all you and your boyfriend could seem to do was pull out a few objects and give them a place in your new living quarters.

He immediately went to take a shower, as he usually did after a long day, and placed his locked phone on your nightstand. You collapsed onto your bed and looked up at the ceiling, still dressed, and began to dread opening shop in the morning. You love the cafe, but your lack of employees hits harder every day.

Derick had been handling most of the hiring process, with the good majority of the interviewees being his connections. It was helpful having a business major boyfriend, as his college networking and current accountant networking proved extremely useful for managing an actual business. He was always so enthusiastic about helping you run the place. You seriously don’t know what you would do without him.

His phone lit up next to you with a series of texts. You lazily let your gaze drift over to see what was going on. He wouldn’t mind if you checked who was texting, right? When you picked up his phone, the name that popped up was “employee candidate 4”. You smiled to yourself; Derick was so responsible, you thought. He must have given the candidates his number to see if they needed anything.

You unlocked his phone with your thumbprint, which you so sneakily added to his password bank a few months ago when you first started collaborating on the cafe’s business plan. What you saw made your heart drop down to the floor, splintering into a million little pieces that got stuck in your fresh linoleum.

Bradley hands you another drink, a strong one at that, and you gulp half of it down in one breath. “Want to tell me what’s going on?”

You look up at him through your eyelashes, makeup half-rubbed off from tears and friction. The sun began to set when you first entered, and in the dimming light, Bradley could tell that you were rattled. You still are, evidently. He waits for a moment before you clear your throat and offer a few gut-punching words.

“I checked my boyfriend’s phone.” He can tell where this is going. He doesn’t want it to be true, because who in their right mind would cheat on you?

“What was on it?” He prompts gently. You take another breath. You don’t want to dump this all on someone that you barely know, with the only history you have being a failed almost-relationship when you were teenagers, but you don’t have anyone else. When you moved to San Diego, you left everything behind, including your friends and family. You haven’t even talked to your friends in ages, as you’ve been so busy with the cafe and Derick that you couldn’t so much as call them. The idea of having Bradley nurse your broken heart is both gut-wrenching and just a little bit like a dream.

“A lot. I… I don’t want to ruin your night by bothering you. I should go.” You try to stand up from your bar stool, but he catches your wrist in his warm hands.

He shakes his head, eyebrows creased. “Just tell me. I’m here for you; I meant what I said in the cafe.” You nod, fresh tears welling up in your eyes as you sit down.

“I’ll get a few drinks in me first.”

You keep your word, managing to take down a sizable amount of alcohol within a few minutes. It’s not enough to get you passing out or throwing up, but enough to loosen your lips.

“Do you want to know what I saw?” Your face is warm, either from the alcohol or Bradley’s hand on your back. “Twenty-eight photos of his dick. It isn’t even good enough to warrant one photo, Bradley, one! None of them were sent to me, of course. Just the girls he would chat up online and fuck.” The words tumble out of your mouth, every pent-up frustration making its way into the light of the bar. “I looked through his search history, too, and then our finances, because I was suspicious of everything at that point. I found four subscriptions to porn sites in our bills and three more for online dating premium memberships. Who the fuck even needs a premium membership? God. I hate him.”

“Slow down, princess.” He says. His lips are quirked into a small smile as you ramble on and on about every small thing Derick has ever done to piss you off. “He seems like a real piece of work.”

“He is! He so is. I never get to order what I want, he always makes me feel responsible for his mistakes, and not once has he made me finish. I mean, we’ve had sex maybe twice in the last two years because he can’t get it up. Probably because he’s been sticking his dick in STD central.” Those last few items slip through your internal filter, but even in your state, you recognize that you probably shouldn’t be talking about your sex life with a guy you re-met a few days ago. “Sorry. That was personal.”

Bradley lifts his shoulders in a shrug. “Nothin’ I can’t handle. I can’t believe you stayed with him that long when he can’t do a single thing for you. If you were my girl, you wouldn’t know a day without pleasure.” It’s his turn to be embarrassed about what he said, but as his cheeks turn red, you don’t even seem to notice.

If you were his girl, he thinks, he’d treat you so well. He’d actually get you your favorite flowers instead of the ones he thinks would look nice in the aesthetic of your apartment, and he’d cook for you, and he’d never make you feel bad for loving him.

“Exactly.” You say. “He just wanted someone to come home to without even thinking about how I would feel. I wanted stability, and he gave me that, but nothing else.” You suddenly sound sober, but the tears are back, and they’re stronger than ever. “I loved him.” You choke out. “I don’t think I could ever get something better, not after so long.”

Bradley feels bad for even considering picking you up after this. You’re distraught, more than he’s ever seen anyone before. It’s clear that this is something you’re going to take a while to heal from. “You can and you will. He’s a dick, and I’m sorry you wasted so much time on him, but you will find some kind of relationship that deserves you. You can have a fresh start, and he’ll just be another asshole that you put in your past.”

You nod, taking in his words as you sip your soda. Bradley cut you off a while ago, which you’re eternally grateful for. If you had one more sip of alcohol, you think you'd either be dancing on a table or crying on the floor. Now, at least you’re crying upright in a stool, with the man across from you handing you tissues once in a while. The lady running the bar seems to know him, and she also seems to know that an endless supply of tissues is necessary for you tonight.

The doors of the bar open, and though you don’t want to peel yourself away from the sight of someone caring about you, you turn around anyway. When you do, your blood runs cold.

Bradley sees you stiffen and follows your line of sight to the person that just walked in. He’s handsome, in a way, with short, dark brown hair and a five-o-clock shadow. He seems like the stuck-up type. Your eyes are blown wide at the sight as the man walks over, a sort of fake concern lacing his expression.

“Baby-“

“Don’t fucking call me that, Derick. How did you even find me?” Oh. The soon-to-be ex. Bradley sits up on his stool, pulling himself to a position where he can easily stand if the moment calls for it.

Derick pulls out his phone sheepishly. “You left your location on.”

Goddamnit. Fuck.

“Get out. I don’t want to see you right now.” You’re seething, the anger coming off you in waves. You think that if you weren’t angry, you’d be sad, and you can’t handle that right now. The devastation of finding out your boyfriend is a freak and a cheater is something you just opened the box to, and you don’t feel like unpacking it in front of him.

“I’m sorry, okay?” He protests. “They didn’t mean anything to me. I love you, and I want to marry you, and I’ll never do it again. I- I have the ring right here, see?” He pulls out a familiar velvet-lined box, and you scoff.

“You should’ve thought about that before you cheated. Multiple times.”

Bradley stands up, placing a soothing hand between your shoulder blades. “Leave, man. She’s made it pretty clear that she doesn’t want you here.”

Derick bristles, his pasty face tinged red with anger. Bradley almost rolls his eyes at how small he looks. “You don’t need to stick up for her.” He takes a step forward. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you were fucking her behind my back. That’s what this is, isn’t it? An excuse for you to leave me because some navy fucker had some nice enough sex with you?” He’s approaching fast. By the time he finishes his sentence, Derick’s fist is wrapped around your wrist tightly.

You let out a soft sound as his bruising fingers close around you, but as soon as he’s there, Bradley shoves him away and loosens his grip on you. “Okay, that’s enough. You’re either going to walk through those doors or you’re getting dragged out. I don’t care which.”

Derick scoffs. “Fine with me. I never liked you anyways.” He gives you a pointed glance, tucking the ring box into his jacket pocket.

“You have tonight to get your stuff out of the apartment that I paid for.” You say, rubbing the space between your eyebrows with your thumb. “I never want to see you again.” The second part comes out as a mumble, but he clearly gets the message.

“Fuck you.” He walks out, and the group of navy men by the door give him a dirty look. He’s more than ruined multiple peoples’ nights by this point. It went from one crying girl at a bar to the start of a bar fight in the two minutes he stood in front of you.

Bradley, concerned, gives you a soft look. “Do you have anywhere to stay tonight?”

You shake your head as more tears drip down your jaw. You hate this. You hate Derick, you hate yourself, and you hate the pitiful way Bradley is staring at you. Your California dream has turned into a nightmare. “No, but I’ll get a hotel somewhere. It’s not that big of a deal.” Your attempt to downplay the situation has Bradley on the verge of running after Derick and slapping the back of his big groomed head. You’re too nice for this, too sweet to be cheated on and forced to sleep in a cold bed that you paid $200 for.

“You can stay over at my place if you want. I’ll sleep on the couch.”

“I don’t want to put you out like that. It’s fine,” you assure him, though your voice is the least sure it’s ever been. “There’s a nice enough place a few streets away.”

Bradley shakes his head. His warm hand is on your shoulder, like he’s trying to ground you. “It won’t put me out. C’mon, princess, it’s not a big deal. You can rest up and we’ll figure out what else to do in the morning.”

He called you “princess” again. It’s nice, you think, in your drunken mind. Right now, you’re too tired to fight anything about the situation you’re in. “Alright. As long as you’re sure.”

He pays your tabs, slipping a look to the lady running the bar. She nods at him and mouths something that you can’t quite make out. As he leads you to his car, a nice, blue, vintage bronco, he keeps one hand on the small of your back. The heat feels nice, like you have someone securing you. Like you won’t ever stumble or fall before his strong arms catch you. He must be a real nice guy if he’s doing all this after so long.

He buckles you into your seat, and you let your head fall back onto the headrest. Your eyes close, and you desperately try not to think about what your life has come to. You feel a buzz in your jacket pocket, but you don’t pick it up. Everything is fine, you assure yourself. You didn’t just break up with the man you were going to marry, and he didn’t cheat on you, and your phone isn’t going off wildly through the fabric of your coat, and you’re not strapped into the car of your high school self’s dream boy. You ride that feeling, that denial, right into sleep.

You’ll deal with the real life problems in the morning.

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Taglist: @m1dnightsnackz @itsarabellebabes @shanimallina87 @sadgirlgiselle @callsignstingray

[pantherxrogers]

Dating Luca (The Bear Headcanon)

Content warnings: kinda smutty 18+ only, explicit language, there's fluff too :)

A/N: Idc how much screen time Luca got, he has a whole personality in my head LMAO 😩 I hope you guys enjoy more Luca content! This is super short, but I had so much fun writing it 😄 My requests are wide open, so let me know what you'd like to see next! <3 If you liked this, please like/reblog! It means a lot! 😘

Summary: A short headcanon of what I imagine it'd be like to date our fav pastry chef 🥰

Let’s start with the fluffffff 😊

I feel like most of the reason we all love Luca (aside from the fact that Will Poulter plays him) is that he’s so gentle (but have you guys heard the term Stern Brunch Daddy?)

Let’s say you’re not very good at baking, doesn’t matter because he’s fully committed to teaching you. He will literally start with something as basic as baking a cookie from scratch and later making more complex desserts. It doesn’t even matter how long it takes because he just enjoys being around you :’)

Speaking of spending time together, Luca’s love language is defffff quality time.

When he spoke about learning from the chef who was much better than him (Carmy??) it made me think about how much he would enjoy just being around the person he loves. Whether you’re baking, watching a movie, or even napping together, the pair of you are like magnets.

He shares his love of food with you every chance he gets (he wants to combine two of his greatest loves 😭)

Going out to dinner with a chef is always a unique experience, but no matter what he’s letting you choose the restaurant (if he has to choose he'll just wind up cooking something for you at home since he can make it better anyways)

Thinking about how he’d definitely bake a birthday cake for you, spending hours on it because it needs to be perfect 😪 (he could bake a cake in his sleep but this isn’t just ANY cake)

He asks you to sample everything whenever he's coming up with a new menu item, he trusts your judgement and knows you'll be honest with him

When he’s working late, he tells you not to wait up for him (much to your displeasure) but every morning, you wake up to a new dessert in the fridge 🥺

He’s been doing it since you moved in together just because he knows it makes you smile (he’ll even leave little notes behind, sometimes silly, sometimes super sappy) you eat it up regardless

Now for the smutty stuff 😈

In the beginning of your relationship, Luca is SUUUPER shy. Like to the point that you have to literally spell it out that you want him to make a move. 

Like Carmy, he doesn’t really have much time for socializing, so he might miss the cues that you throw at him. 

The first time Luca spends the night at your apartment, he’s sure he’s going to pass out on like three different occasions 

1. When you open the door, you’re wearing a satin robe that leaves very little to the imagination (He’s hard before he even sits down)

2. You’re baking together in the kitchen, taking every opportunity to bend over and "grab a mixing bowl", flashing your lacy thong in the process. 

3. When you move into your bedroom because you’re getting “tired”, you ask him to unhook your bra for you, making a show of sliding the robe down your shoulders. And whoops! It just so happens to fall to the floor. 🤗

By that point, you’re done with the subliminals, pushing your ass back, feeling him straining against his jeans. For a moment, he doesn’t know what to do with his hands (it’d be adorable if you weren’t painfully horny rn)

“Luca, you can touch my boobs if you want to, I swear I won’t mind,” you playfully tease him, shifting into a sigh when his hands immediately connect with your sensitive nipples. 

That’s actually how the both of you found out that manhandling is one of the quickest ways to turn you on

Later in your relationship, he makes a show of tapping your ass (when it’s appropriate of course)

He casually shows his strength a lot because he knows it gets you going (thinking of him picking up those packs of flour 😓)

Both of you love the soft moments too. He’s a passionate lover, so slow, gentle sex is always amazing

Back to our regularly scheduled, fluffy programming 😋

Overall, I see Luca as a sweet, loyal boyfriend. The way he spoke about the chef he shadowed (again, do we think it was Carmy??) it seems like he really values the close relationships in his life

Of course, he values his relationship with you the most, always wanting to be the best version of himself for you (and vice versa) 🥰

Taglist (please let me know if you want to be added/removed):

@wakandamama @wakandama2 @blowmymbackout @nolita-fairytale @douceurrrr @mercang @eddiemunsonreader @cryobabyy @superhoeva @kdoxkeic

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

AITA for creating and running a gimmick blog?

A few months back, I was bored and decided to hop on the trend of gimmick blogs. Since I don't have any crazy skills like identifying cars or programming bots, I settled on something I thought was extremely simple: correcting typos. So I'll sometimes reblog posts that have typos in them and comment with corrections. I would only do this on posts that were already lighthearted or joking in tone; I would never derail a serious post with it. And I really haven't used it very often - maybe a couple times a week at most, just when I happen to notice a good candidate.

Well, recently I was inundated out of nowhere by a bunch of anons telling me this was a horribly offensive idea. According to them, I was insulting dyslexic people, non-native English speakers, people without access to education, and a whole bunch of other groups with these unwarranted corrections.

I had honestly never considered that angle, and I've paused using that blog so I can try and reflect on it. But when I replied to a couple of the asks asking for a better explanation of exactly how this was harmful - because I genuinely wanted to be informed - the vast majority of the replies, with few exceptions, were obscenely rude to me. I've been called classist, ableist, racist, and a lot of much worse words I don't care to repeat here. I blocked exactly two people because they were being extremely hateful in my notes, while still trying to engage with the more polite ones, but of course I still got accused of blocking and ignoring everyone I disagreed with.

The truth is, I'm still not sure whether or not I disagree with any of them on the actual subject at hand; I just can't deal with people being bitter and rude and assuming the worst of me. I tried to make it clear that I was more than willing to listen and have a conversation in good faith, but that has proved impossible.

So now I'm really hurt and really, really confused. I'm not going to just blindly trust a small group of hypocrites on the internet who claim they're worried about people's feelings while at the same time trying to completely villainize me as if I don't have feelings too. But I also understand that they might have a point. Sadly, politeness is not always correlated with correctness.

I absolutely do not want to continue running this gimmick blog if it's truly harmful and offensive to people. I've just never encountered this take before, and it was delivered with such vitriol that I had to take a break from tumblr entirely just to recover my sanity. So I'm hoping a much broader and less biased sample size will help to clear this up. I know an AITA poll isn't perfect, but it should do.

If I get a YTA verdict, I will delete the typo-correcting blog and stop immediately, no questions asked. If not, I'll know I just angered an extremely vocal minority that has no idea how to deal with conflict.

AITA?

What are these acronyms?

[aealzx]

Don had been quick to rush out of the plane to get the infirmary ready, but Leo found it was hard for him to put too much urgency into his movements. Twice now Donnie had reacted better to slow, careful motions than abrupt ones. So Leo found he was continuing to be a lot more gentle and careful than strictly necessary when picking him up. He was completely limp, even after having had two and a half hours of sleep. But at least a little bit of color had returned to his skin now. At least Leo thought he looked a little less pale. When both teens were asleep Don had shown Raphael and Leo the video of what Augustine had ordered to be done, and through it they had learned the assistants had taken nearly a liter of blood from Donnie, along with cutting tissue samples from him. It had been enough to get Raphael rapidly walking the length of the plane several times to calm down, and gave Don more of an idea on how to take care of Donnie. Leo just understood a little more why Donnie had reacted defensively towards him, and hoped the teen didn’t wake up in the middle of them treating him.

“Thank April,” Leo found himself saying distractedly to Mom April as she welcomed them home. It was always nice to get a hug from her, but Leo found he was too anxious to stick around and fully catch them up on everything. “I’m okay, can we talk later? Maybe over dinner? You guys might be able to meet the kids then too.”

“...Sure thing, Leo,” Mom April relented, noting how absent he seemed and not wanting to stress him out more. He always had been the one to worry a lot. Even when they were kids.

Leaving them with Mikey, Leo moved quickly to the infirmary to find Raphael sitting near the surgery table with Lil Mikey in his lap, and Don scurrying around the room to gather the supplies he needed. “Over there, Leo,” Don directed, pointing to one of the beds he’d already started gathering items next to. Obediently following the directions, Leo gingerly lowered Donnie to the soft mattress, silently praying that he didn’t wake up just yet. At least they were all breathing better after each getting at least one dose of the antidote. Leo could only wait patiently for Don to finally stop at the bedside, slipping his tactical sleeves off in the meantime, and by then Raphael had managed to convince Lil Mikey to accept treatment and was casually chatting away with him.

“Okay, I think I got everything. Can you support him so his back is to me? I need to figure out how to get that device off,” Don directed, sounding just slightly breathless. Wordlessly doing as he was directed once again, Leo pulled Donnie upright to lean forward against him, looking over the metal backpack from his angle as well to try and help Don figure out how to safely remove it.

“Hey!” Lil Mikey’s voice suddenly grabbed their attention while Don was running his fingers over the cool metal. “Don’t take that off! He needs it!”

The scolding caused Don to flinch, and turn to look over at the other table. “...Needs it as in it’s physically attached to him and offering some sort of life supporting function?” he asked, wanting clarification on what exactly Lil Mikey meant so he could judge if he actually needed to obey his demand, or explain that it was necessary to remove it. He didn’t want to ignore Lil Mikey’s concerns, but he wasn’t sure if they would hinder treatment for Donnie despite being in good will.

“N-no… Nothing like that. It’s just… it’s not safe for him to have it off. Especially when away from home,” Lil Mikey faltered, having not thought his choice of words would make the others think Donnie was some sort of cyborg.

“...Mikey, it’s okay. You’re both safe here,” Raphael assured, reaching out to rest his palm on Lil Mikey’s shoulder.

“Even if it’s a prosthetic, it’s not safe to wear one while sleeping. And I need to check him for injuries. We saw evidence that Augustine’s people may have done something to his back…,” Don explained gently, understanding that Lil Mikey was still wary despite everything that had happened. He couldn’t expect the teens to trust them fully just yet.

It seemed that mentioning that something may have happened to Donnie’s back was enough to get Lil Mikey to completely flip his stance, sucking in a tense breath and wiggling his feet as he considered. “...There’s a button on the inside of the right shoulder,” he relented, frowning miserably. “Just make sure to be super extra careful, okay?”

“We’ll be extremely careful. Don’t worry,” Don assured, grateful for the tip on where to find the trigger to release the device. Once he knew where to look Don quickly found the button and pressed it, marveling as the shoulder pieces flexed outward with a slight hiss, and the belt went slack. “Fascinating…” he breathed, earning a chuckle from Leo as he hefted the metal aside, distracted by trying to get a quick analysis of it while he moved it away..

As Don took the equipment a short ways away, Leo adjusted his grip to keep Donnie supported against him, resting his hands on the teen’s back. But what he felt caused him to stiffen in shock, suddenly afraid to move. His fingers were able to push into what should have been a hard keratin shell, and when his gaze snapped down he saw a significantly flatter shell with four jagged marks across the surface. “....Donnie get back here now,” Leo blurted rapidly, flexing his fingers just slightly to make sure he wasn’t imagining things.

“What is it- Oh!” Don rushed, semi dropping the backpack device the rest of the way to the floor and rushing back over to them. What he saw caused him to freeze as well, but then he gingerly reached out his fingers to brush against Donnie’s back. “...Oh wow…”

“It’s soft right? What does that mean? Is that bad? Shells aren’t supposed to be soft,” Leo rambled, his concern overflowing and pushing his bubbling thoughts to words before he could fully consider them. What had Augustine’s people done? Was it shell rot? Was it some crazy experimental garbage Augustine had infected him with?

“He’s a softshell you idiots. Stop manhandling him!” Lil Mikey blurted irritably, offended on behalf of his brother for the other two curiously running their hands all over his back. “So rude,” he huffed, creating small chains to wrap around Don’s wrists and pull them away.

“Sorry!” Don gasped, snatching his hands back as the orange chains broke him from his stupor, and not minding Lil Mikey scolding him. “Sorry- Let me just… do some quick research- I thought you were both box turtles like us…,” he rambled, pulling his phone out to access the internet.

“Ohmigosh- He’s not an alien. Just treat him like me, but be extra careful, and make sure you clean your hands and everything you use. Leo- my brother says he’s prone to infections. He’s always using antibiotic stuff on him and making sure he gets washed up properly for even small cuts. Otherwise he does everything else pretty much the same,” Lil Mikey huffed again, rolling his eyes in exasperation.

The interaction caused Raphael to snicker despite the situation. He didn’t want to admit he was curious to head over and take a peek for himself, but he figured Lil Mikey would probably throw him across the room with his chains if he did. So he decidedly remained where he was and continued to be amused from afar.

Don listened to what Mikey said, but also sped read through a few sites and different search parameters before he grew more relaxed and sure of his thoughts. “Infection… right, that would explain the fever,” he spoke, mostly to himself, then nodded firmly. “Okay. I got this. Leo, go ahead and lay him back down, then get some water and antibacterial soap. They both need to be cleaned up, and I’ll check the incision sites…”

Leo wasn’t quite as sure of himself as Don was, but at least he had directions now. What Don said made sense to him. If Donnie got infections easily then getting him cleaned up from the grim on him was a priority. Resting him back on the bed, Leo darted off to fetch a soft rag, soap, and water so he could wash off the debris from Augustine’s facility. Don had returned to his focused state after he started peeling the bandaids off, carefully inspecting each injury as he did so. He could at least count it a small blessing that Augustine had apparently ordered only the smallest possible samples be taken. The cuts were only 15 millimeters wide, and less than a millimeter thick. But it looked like they were pretty deep, and Don gingerly cleaned each wound again before rubbing antibiotic ointment on them and getting them covered again.

It didn’t take long before Don had finished addressing the injuries, started an IV with a small amount of antibiotics added to it, and strapped a heart monitor to Donnie’s finger just in case. When he began pulling a blanket over Donnie and tucking him in, Leo knew the treatment was done for now, and asked what he’d been wondering for a while now. “Is he going to be okay?”

Don paused for a second to think, but nevertheless nodded. “I think so. Aside from the bloodloss there isn’t anything incredibly concerning. I think he’s just incredibly exhausted, and that’s why he hasn’t woken up yet. We’ll need to keep an eye on him of course, but at this point I think it’s safe to just let him sleep. The IV fluids will help until his body restores the blood he lost, and we’ll need to get him a good meal when he’s up. But he’ll be fine.”

The explanation, and plans for what to do later, earned a sigh of relief from Leo. It could have been much, much worse. He was glad that, aside from Lil Mikey’s gunshot wound, nothing seemed to be critically serious. “I’ll go check what Mikey is cooking then. And let Master Splinter know we’re all home safe, in case he’s still up.”

“You know he is,” Don gave a small grin, and slight shake of his head.

Leo just laughed quietly, rising to his feet to head to the exit. “Yeah, I know.”

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the fun thing about adding drawings to these is that I can throw in random lil details without derailing the story X'D

Also after seeing some of the comments, don't worry, they're all gonna be fine. I don't believe in hurt without comfort =3= Donnie is just taking an extreme nap to process all the overstimulation and stuff.

[anonimityblog4000]

I actually hate having to post this, but

I feel like I have to post this in response to some recent drama stirring. I will cop to making an alt blog to post this because the hate around this has been virulent.

Recently this post has been shared regarding another artist creating locked tomb fan art

In this post which you should read they make the claim that the creator of these pieces 100% for certain created them with AI image generation software generating quite a lot of attention. The problem is that their supposed supporting evidence is INCREDIBLY flawed to the point of contradiction and nonsense. For example both of these cropped images

are given as evidence of AI generation, claiming that the smudge is the result of AI failure and that the hand is CLEARLY ai generated…except that even a cursory examination and familiarity of what AI image generation ends up looking like would make it obvious that these aren’t AI hands and are just…normal hand drawn hands. As for the smudge we could easily explain that as the artist not noticing a mistake in one of their layers before posting, but we don’t know that. Except we do.

Because if you were to look at the artists blog now you might notice they have made some corrections and small edits to the original piece and lo and behold…no smudge. Now here is where things get properly silly, instead of drawing the obvious conclusion from this that the artist being able to go in and fix the layers of their work means that they actually drew it THEY CLAIM THAT THE ABILITY TO DRAW AND EDIT IN THE EXACT STYLE OF THE PIECE IS FURTHER EVIDENCE OF AI.

WHAT.

I don’t think I need to point out to most people that AI image generation tools do not work that way and they certainly don’t allow you to make subtle targeted fixes and edits.

There is also a claim that the artist admitted to using AI to produce the piece which is a gross distortion of what they explained, the artist openly stated that they have tried using image gen tools to assist with their thumbnailing process. Let us be clear that thumbnailing is NOT producing any sort of final piece but is simply the process of brainstorming ideas and concepts. It’s seriously gross to flat out lie and claim the artist said anything different. Thankfully someone else screenshotted this so there’s actual evidence that accusations are being made that are straight up lies.

It is also at this point we should take a look at some of the artists other publicly available work.

I chose this selection because another accusation in the post that is hard evidence of AI is that because the posted pieces are “too different” in style from other earlier work posted on their blog, it should be fairly obvious how silly this is with even a small sample of what they have produced. This is an artist who obviously has the ability to work in a wide range of artistic styles and mediums but instead this is being used to claim they…can’t art? It’s also worth pointing the obvious that there are plenty of works in that artist’s portfolio in the exact same mucha style, including ones that are literally hand drawn on paper. Works that literally predate the availability of image generation software going back years. It is a complete farce to suggest this person CANT DRAW HANDS.

Frankly it is incredibly disappointing that the community is barraging this artist with insults and hate because of one persons incredibly flawed accusations. A person that I might add has deleted comments on their post that disagreed with them while at the same time castigating the artist for blocking them and deleting their post as evidence of their guilt.

While this isn’t conclusive in and of itself I’ll end with this.

It’s more effort than the accuser went to before rallying a witch hunt against someone else.

[mantisgodsart]

@bug-oc... round ONE! Finally! Still counting this as "round one" of transmutations because of the blog round numbers despite the fact that we've already done a round of like two bugs! We... didn't realize how many of these characters were yellow until it was actually time to draw them. It's like we went in with a theme, and then stuck to it. Except for with Holly, who presumably lost the dress code along with their head. Please vote for our cool dune cricket in the handful of hours before this round ends, and thank you!

Individual characters and transmutation notes below cut.

[...though I briefly considered another form, limiting surface area relative to the size of the entity is crucial for stability in ectoplasmic entities, and I don't currently intend to attempt to form a "swarm", as similar entities often form in the wild - a more simple, and thus more stable, form is better. The energy pack in the subject's possession upon intake appears to be either nearly or fully impossible to reclaim, unfortunately - ghosts can be hard to separate from things with sentimental value, so it's likely a lost cause. I'll continue obsevation...]

Beera by @longeth-dayv. An actual design, this time, rather than our fucking-around-with-maybes! This one, we think, does a lot more for the actual character, though from our understanding of Luigi's Mansion the species choice might be slightly more "generic". We particularly enjoyed tinkering with the wire of the power pack - ghosts and transparent things are VERY fun to draw, and we liked working out where that wire would go in the areas normally hidden by the body. Long, winding lines are very fun to draw sometimes. Hopefully this one works better for you, too!

[...successful partial isolation of the fungal element proves both that it can be isolated and that transmutation of cordyceps symbiotes may be less of a barrier than previously thought. Results appear similar to "Moka" back in the first year of experiments, where the cordyceps remains untransmuted within the new body - is this a quirk unique to vertebrate physiology? The failed transmutation with Fulminis pulled from a largely bug pool, whilst both successful cordyceps transmutations have been with beasts.]

[The avian physiology doesn't seem to have produced much difference from reptilian, minus some differences in visible fungal growth, but the subjects started with varying quantities of visible fungal growth to begin with, and the magic present in both of the previous round's subjects presents an additional variable... at the very least, I know that the fungus on its own is either resistant or immune to conventional transmutation, considering Mop, though I still need to work out how the host-symbiote synthesis alters things...]

[I'll have to do further testing- I dearly wish that these subjects were easier to get my hands on, but I don't know where I would be able to source them in my own universe, much less if they even exist there, since I'm no longer certain if the time portal event through which I met Holly Holiyxeiul was from the past of my universe, the past of another universe, or the present of somewhere else. Omelette's successful transmutation proves that I can manufacture them, but I won't be certain as to the limits of this until I can collect samples...]

Butterscotch from @w-krajobrazie-zapomnienia. The wings on this took... FOREVER. Deciding to make Butterscotch a bird with individual "charring" on the feathers was an act of monumental hubris, and EASILY the most labor-intensive part of this page. Doing this in watercolor would have been easier, probably. Alas, if we want to be capable of using a marker, we must put effort into marker drawing. At the very least, we think the effect came out fairly well! We like the sort of "scorched" effect that Butterscotch's base design has, and though difficult to recreate in marker form, we think we pulled it off! Hope this works decently well for you.

[...expanding lizard experiments from the ones found in the former grounds of Five Pebbles to their closest resemblances in the fleshbeasts of our world, I found quite a few points of similarity. Though for obvious reasons, I haven't had the opportunity to observe any specimens of the original species, given that most vertebrate beasts have been extinct since before I was hatched, the underlying biology is similar enough that I could carry through a significant amount of understanding forward.]

[Though majority of traits seem typical for what I can observe from preserved specimens, I am noting some minor divergences - typical for the lizards of RW9089-1, but not, as far as I know, typical for the reptiles that once roamed the wastes. The subject has developed sensory whiskers, narrower than those observed on Black Lizards but seeming to serve a similar function of detecting scent and motion in the air.]

[Additionally, the subject has developed a short coat of setae across the back, with a similar texture to the subject's former ruff - some surface-level similarities have been found to the hair on the pelts of Northern Moths, particularly those found in areas where significant quantities of water make leviathans a dietary staple. Though fur "coats" can be found in RW-9089-1 specimens such as Strawberry Lizards, this trait is, as far as I can tell, unique to this specimen.]

[When following up, I'll want to examine the dorsal frills to be certain that former shape's traits are not overwriting the end shape's traits to too significant of a degree - this is not an unknown trait in salamanders, but I'll need to be certain the structure isn't too similar to insect wing structure, as this many traits carrying over may indicate mid-point speciesation, which will mean any parts harvested will have wholly different traits from the originally sourced...]

Lote from @fallenvoidhere! We went through a handful of design iterations on this, mostly trying to home in on making it clear that it's the character - we sort of underestimated how much blue we'd need to add, but when you're turning into a lizard several times your normal size, it's probably understandable to lose a lot of your accessories…? Since the black on the design, respectively, is mostly accessories, most of these markings are improvised - we based our placement at least partially off of an orca whale, after going through a lot of markings from IRL salamanders. Originally, we planned to make the wing further in to the body a bit more transparent, but… well, as it turns out, we're probably a bit too used to watercolors for our own good, and working with markers is a bit of a different beast. We still think it came out pretty decent!

[...previously noted properties of fireflies appear to ease the rougher edges of this, though it will still need some refining before it's ready to go to market. A working prototype is better than I've gotten with previous generations of this recipe. I'll have to spend some time going over the readings to work out how to route things on anything that isn't a firefly.]

[With the way that most of these particular transmutations have gone, forming a "chamber" for the light before the light-producing compound itself is produced appears to be key for the survivablity of the subject. I suspect that there's a reason that the gas compound found in the component-introduction artefact hasn't been found in natural beings; despite the multitude of uses it has in charmcraft, mercury tends to be quite toxic with continual exposure, and mercury vapor in particular can be deadly. Another reason to stick to proper PPE..]

Nox from @erijuice! This one's quite a dramatic modification to the body plan. We may have gotten a bit carried away with things here, but... okay listen we will be fully honest with you this is just an elaborate plan on "glow wyrm". We based this one heavily off of tatzulwurms and similar creatures, and from there mostly just went into "having fun with it". The wings might grow in more later, or they might not - this was one of our personal favorite designs to draw, and though we sort of wish we tinkered with the pose a bit more, it's a bit hard to do here without running into issues with... space. Such is the consequence of making a big page o' transmuted bugs.

[...more experimental brews have their pros and cons, and with this one, it's a bit hard to define which is more present. On the plus side, the resulting form seems stable; lack of mandibles aside, it's standing and walking, and seems in fine health from the readings that I can see. Subject is alert and appears to have either full or very close to full former cognitive capacity, as shown by the multiple attempts at escape via manipulating the lock. It's just that I don't have the slightest clue what it is, or how its biology... works.]

[I intend to collect samples once the transmutation settles enough for properties to solidify. From initial testing, I think that its digestive system may rely partially on the fur-like... appendages, on its ventral side, but it's presently somewhat unclear. Upon coming into contact with some spare biological waste (see: Vessel project, Voidless transmutation attempts), the material appeared to "tangle" in the ventral fur, and was gradually dissolved over the course of about eighteen hours. From what I can gather of the data, this appears to have given off similar readings to a more conventional being having eaten a large meal? Will test with other forms of biological material once I can gather enough material to recreate the end organism if existing subject is lost.]

Yasmine from @darth-moth - and this is one that was very fun to do! The lines in this were very, VERY fun to work with, and we had quite a lot of fun just banging this out! - the design here is, probably fairly obviously, based heavily on Rain World's Rain Deer, as well as the multitude of "creepy deer" type stories that are practically everywhere on the internet. We were tinkering, if vaguely, with the concept of something like a terrestrial filter feeder, or similar - did you know that some whales have begun hunting behavior of pretending to be shelter so that fish will hide in their mouths and, thus, be eaten?

We'd picture that this, whatever it is, wanders places and passively snags prey with the dangling "fur", avoiding any sort of need for energy-intensive chases while keeping itself fed on whatever it walks over. A passive scavenger, probably with not a lot in terms of personal self defense. The vents on the sides, though they might be slightly unclear as is, are just about the only active method of offense - releasing toxic gas or something similar in an attempt to choke out predators. Our greatest desire in life is to design enemies for a soulslike poison swamp and we think that Yasmine is an excellent poison swamp candidate. We hope that this is a normal and usual motivation and ambition to have, we had a lot of fun with it.

[...uncontrolled crystal growth took over before the transmutation had completed, at roughly 4 days, 8 hours after the initial administration of the formula. I was lucky to be awake at the time - the remote monitor that I imbedded appears to have been consumed by the same phenomenon shortly before my arrival. I can only assume that this is due to pre-existing contamination - if not accounted for, Crystals can react very unpredictably to transmutations, and I didn't account for contamination of this assumed level.]

[Though I've observed this sort of effect before, it's been years since I've experienced a bloom of nearly this extent. What really surprises me is that the subject appears to still be moving, despite the extensive damage to... everything. The head appeared to have been fully destroyed at the time of arrival, and the crystals sprouting from the back have to have gone right through the ganglia - the weave of the transmutation has been fully destroyed, so it can't be sustaining itself on the former body's imprint, so I can only assume that the crystals captured some of the host body's mind during the overgrowth event and are attempting to continue to run the same old patterns of behavior.]

[I am currently unclear on how much of the former bug remains. What scans that I've taken suggest that the new crystals may have linked up with their companion Warden, though to what degree is still unclear. If I want to properly analyze this, I'll need to take it back to the lab. From there... diagnosis work, and maybe trying to work out how poor Snakemouth Den's lab security is, really.]

Holly from @thetroupemaster! Our first transmutation failure of the tournament! Holly, unfortunately, fell victim to poor lab safety - a more open-ended formula intended to gather a form from environmental factors, combined with some unfortunate lab contamination. This actually links in to a few personal headcanons on how Crystals work, though we don't think we've posted them before.

A crystal is a colonial organism, much like coral, storing both data and magical energy. Generally gathering energy from the sun to power itself, it grows so slowly as to be unnoticeable to the bug eye, but it does grow, and when exposed to, say, a charm engineered to allow for rapid change of a physical form, it has the potential to rapidly grow and consume that energy, stopping its growth either when it grows out of magical energy or when the handful of elements present in the original weave to let it change and grow are consumed.

Some people in external kingdoms do this to avoid having to constantly ship in Crystals from Bugaria, but it's not particularly common, as this method of growing Crystals tends to consume things like your other projects, or the lab shielding you probably want to keep intact, or yourself if you have the poor foresight to not properly protect yourself against contamination. Under control conditions, the chances of this happening are nearly zero! Under these conditions... well.

Crystals are very, very good at preserving memories. The rest of Holly's body, on the other hand, might be a bit of a lost cause at this point. You can work in a lab without seeing things, right...?

...yeah, we aren't counting on it, either.

Bonus: for those who scrolled down this far, a quick compilation of labels. As well as, of course, a teaser for what's yet to come.

[...the most complimentary thing that I can say about Mal, I think, is that Hobbes would get along well with xir. Terrible lab safety protocols. AWFUL cross-contamination protocols. Just looking at this bug's methodology is giving me hives. Venus give me strength. I suspect that any brew that I attempt to use will suffer from enough unknown, uncontrollable outside variables that none of the data I get will be even remotely applicable to any other situation. "Edge case" is generous - I struggle to call this sort of tampering anything less than an utter abomination of science.]

[I will be using one of the more heavily conceptual brews for this. The REMW-19 formula is reasonably stable enough that the weave shouldn't just collapse in on itself, but it has been remarkably poor at producing organisms capable of surviving on their own once the transformation has set enough that they don't have enough former anatomy to "fall back" on - I suspect, currently, that the survival of targets afflicted with the effect I am attempting to recreate relies the support on some sort of internal magic system, and if so, the sheer amount of lingering cross-contamination likely seeped into every ounce of aer chitin might actually boost survivability. I have no positive expectations for this, however.]

In spending ingredients on this, I hope to assemble an encyclopedic list of all of the ways that a charm's effects can go stupidly, horribly wrong. Venus willing, it will not double as a list of ways that my lab can be destroyed, or a list of ways that tampering with Charmcraft can go wrong. I have had enough recent trouble with repairing the lab's seals after the Vessel experiments - I have no particular desire to replace anything else now.]

[sardonic-the-writer]

𝐌𝐞𝐫𝐜𝐬 𝐖𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐀 𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫 𝐓𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐇𝐚𝐬 𝐂𝐡𝐫𝐨𝐧𝐢𝐜 𝐏𝐚𝐢𝐧 𝐖𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐈𝐧𝐜𝐥𝐮𝐝𝐞

↳ includes: scout, medic, pyro, sniper, and spy

↳ warnings: talk of pain but nothing too in detail. specific area of pain is kept ambiguous for inclusiveness

↳ song: teenage dirtbag—dsiboys

masterlist!

𝐒𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐭

• Scout is honestly just bummed you won't be playing any baseball games with him anytime soon

• He strikes me as the type of guy to not take your illness as seriously as he should, often making pokes and jabs of you just wanting to get out of stuff, until he sees one of your bad days with his own eyes

• After that, he's so ashamed of himself for how he acted. Shuffling his feet and rubbing the back of his neck anxiously; all that jazz

• Is a lot more aware of your needs now

• Still puts up a front. Refuses to be anything sort of quote unquote 'manly', so expressing that he's worried about your wellbeing is hard to do in front of the others

• Does care about you, though. He might get teased for it— resulting in the tips of his ears turning red and a bunch of angry denial —but at the end of the day he'll offer up his prized comic books for you to read as a distraction

𝐌𝐞𝐝𝐢𝐜

• Medic has undoubtedly noticed your condition far before you chose to tell him. How he had figured it out so quick, you had no idea, but he probably found out the same way he knew what your blood type was. Despite never having given him a sample

• It's a bit weird at first, having someone who constantly wants to do invasive surgery on your body actually offering to ease your pain.

• It is Medic after all. A small part of you had been nervously wondering if he would get some sort of sick joy out of watching you struggled to do basic tasks

• Instead, he was giving you special visitation hours with Archemedes while he tinkered with what he dubbed 'Your Problem Area'. Whether that was your knees or back or shoulders, a file on your condition quickly opened and the quickest course of action was taken to remedy it

• Gives you little suckers at the end of your visits and a big smile for a job well done

𝐏𝐲𝐫𝐨

• You aren't sure if they understand what you're saying when you first explain it

• To be fair, you can't decipher them on a normal basis, so this was expected

• But Pyro just tilts their head before letting out what sounded like a sniffling noise and bringing you into a bone crushing hug

• You wouldn't be able to tell, but in their own special Pyro Vision, the arsonist could occasionally see a painful red surrounding you anytime you felt like this. And it pained them to know you were hurting from something other than the scheduled battles

• Colors you crude little drawings with their box of crayons Engineer bought them. It often depicts you and them riding unicorns or jumping over rainbows. Always smiling and having fun

• Takes to plastering little cartoony bandaids over your skin. They don't really solve any actual pain, but the thought is still there

• Will make little fires for you and bring you to them happily. Normally, it's followed by Heavy or Engineer rushing over to put it out before it spread

𝐒𝐧𝐢𝐩𝐞𝐫

• On the off chance that he actually came out of his trailer, Sniper would be awkwardly helpful

• He most likey heard you talking to Medic or complaining to Spy about your chronic pain, and put two and two together

• Why you were shut up in your room durring mealtime somedays, constsntly seen walking in and out of the med bay, taking numerous amounts of pills in the morning, etc

• Is discreet in his care. It'll be little things, like telling Scout to 'lay off mate' if the Bostonian is hounding you about your lackluster performance that day; even if only as a joke

• If Sniper is lucky enough to bag some game on one of the ceasefire days, he'll approach your bedroom door and offer you a bit of the meat he cooked. Won't be offended if you're not up to it, just puts it in the fridge for later if you change your mind. Makes sure that the rest of the team knows it's for you, too

𝐒𝐩𝐲

• Spy is probably the most elegant of the team when acknowledging your condition

• If he's feeling nice when you approach him about it, he'll nod along to your small explanation and even indulge you if you choose to rant about it for a bit

• If he's not in a good mood, then just wait it out. It's not worth the wrath of an angry Frenchman for bothering him. Will become slightly less angered if you explain you were only there to share some vulnerability, however

• Tells you there's no shame in it. As an older man himself, he's no stranger to the pain that comes with this job

• Might allow you to crash in his smoking room a few times if your room is being overrun by the others. Spy knows that you won't pull any funny business on him, and god help anyone that tries to barge in in search of you (namely Scout)

• Content to sit in comfortable silence as you rest up and sleep away the pain. Spy might be a no-good lying back stabber, but at the end of the day, he's still a gentleman

[sophieinwonderland]

Found a Hate Blog in The #Plural Tag. 😮‍💨

As I covered recently, "Plural" is an inclusive word with origins in endogenic and non-disordered systems.

If any anti-endo posts in the "#plural" tag or other inclusive tags, don't expect your DNIs to be respected.

They also are doing this knowingly. People have already tried to contact them about using the inclusive plural tag and the hate blog has stubbornly refused.

So if they're going to post in inclusive tags, I figured I might as well respond to some of their vent posts in anti-endo tags. As always, if anti-endos have a problem with this or feel boundaries are being unfairly crossed, please take it up with the hate blog I'm responding to that's invading our spaces.

Also, really weird how they just jump straight into saying "pro-endos" aren't systems either. Hate to break it to you, but there are a lot of traumagenic DID systems whose disorders and trauma are just valid as yours. And they manage to not be bigots too!

Wait... are they claiming that ALL dissociation can only be caused by trauma?

Although previous research has implicated a history of childhood trauma in the development of dissociative tendencies, insufficient cognizance (in this context) has been taken of the distinction between pathological and nonpathological dissociation. In this study, the relationship between childhood trauma and both pathological and nonpathological dissociation was investigated in a sample of 100 Australian adults. Pathological dissociation was positively predicted by dimensions of childhood trauma, but no such relationship was found for nonpathological dissociation (psychological absorption). The data are consistent with the traumagenic model of the dissociative disorders, but factors other than childhood trauma may also be pertinent.

Amazing how they compare us with anti-vaxxers while trying to claim all dissociation is traumagenic. This wasn't even hard to find. 🙄

"I don't care about any morals"

Well, at least you're up front about it.

Also, I tend to check the DID tags every now and then and you know what I don't see there? Endogenic systems!

"#Endo Safe" tags are more often than not used by pro-endo traumagenic systems.

Guess what! If you have DID, you get to post in the DID tags. Being a hateful bigot isn't a requirement! Anyone with DID has the right to post in the DID tags, and can tag their post as endo safe too!

Maybe you wouldn't get as many anons from endogenic systems if you stop posting in inclusive tags. Just a thought!

How are they harmful to the community again?

Weren't you just saying earlier that pro-endos were stealing resources? Now you're acknowledging that they're making resources for the community, but this is also bad?

LOL!

Genic labels literally only exist because of the pro-endo community. And the anti-endo community notoriously hates xeno-origins like NPD-genic. Yes, people will assume you're endo-safe when you use xeno-origins because these terms, like most resources in the plural community, were made by pro-endos.

Keep it up guys! It's working! We're spreading!

Sorry, I don't feel like rebutting anything here. I just appreciate seeing that our efforts are paying off!

The Future is Plural! 😁

Stop!

This talking point has been completely debunked.

System hopping was used by pro-endos 15 years before the earliest association with RAMCOA. The idea that it was a RAMCOA term is a total lie invented by anti-endos!

OSDD-1A and OSDD-1B are not actually official disorders. There is an OSDD. The first example, called OSDD-1 sometimes, gives two possible presentations. One with less distinct alters and amnesia, and another with no amnesia. But these aren't called OSDD-1a or OSDD-1b.

If your goal is education, this nuance is important.

Could it be because ASPEC people have dealt with a ton of exclusionism from some queer communities, and are more accepting of other people as a result? And perhaps they also recognize similarities between system exclusionists and queer exclusionists?

You're coming and posting in our tags!

That's why people keep interacting with you! "Plural" is a term coined by non-disordered systems, you've been told this, and you insist on posting in inclusive tags anyway!

You don't get to bust in someone's door, complain about them in their home, and then tell them not to interact with you! It doesn't work like that!

Funny how these are the only sources they can provide. And they exclusively deal with DID without even touching on other forms of plurality.

Anyway...

The ICD-11 says you can experience "multiple distinct personality states" without a dissociative disorder.

The creators of the theory of structural dissociation have said hypnosis and mediumship may involve self-conscious dissociative parts of the personality.

And Transgender Mental Health, written by Eric Yarbrough and published by the American Psychiatric Association (who publishes the DSM) says you can be plural without trauma or a disorder.

Sources repeatedly affirm that it's possible to be plural without trauma!

Anyone who claims it's impossible to be plural without trauma is either ignorant or lying.

And if you're going to keep spreading hate and misinformation, at least keep it out of inclusive tags!

[broodparasitism]

Everything I've Learned About Querying from Talking to Agents (And Traditionally Published Authors)

Disclaimer: I'm UK based, as was everyone I spoke to. I didn't include any country specific advice, just what I think is applicable regardless of where you live, put it might be useful to know this is from a UK lens.

As part of my course I was able to go to a lot of talks with literary agents (a mixture of literary, genre and nonfiction) and I picked up a lot of useful information - a lot of it not quite so bleak as I feared! - and thought it might be helpful to compile it for anyone looking to query agents in the future, so, here goes, under the readmore:

Querying

Remember that agents want to find and publish new authors. They're not at odds with/out to get aspiring authors. They want to work with us. This is someone you're working with, so don't pick an agent you won't get along with.

Manuscripts should be queried when they are as close to finished you are able to manage. There are a few agents that are open to incomplete manuscripts, yes, but many more that flat-out refuse unfinished work. Manuscripts generally go through about ~15 rounds of edits before landing an agent.

Send query letters in batches - around five or six at a time. There is no limit to how many agents you can contact, but you can't contact more than one agent from the same agency, so make sure you've selected the most suitable one from each.

In most cases you can't submit the same manuscript to the same agent twice - so having it be as finished as possible is all the more vital.

Some of them will take a long time to respond. Some never respond at all. If it's been three months of nothing, it's safe to assume that's a rejection.

One agent said she took on about two new authors a year, which likely isn't true for them all but is probably a reasonable average. For all of them, the amount of queries they get can be in the three digits a week. I can't emphasis enough just how many they get. I take a lot of authors to mean that means it's a 0.001% chance and despair, but that assumes each manuscript has an equal chance, and they don't. Correct spelling and grammar, writing in a genre that appeals to the agent, quality sample chapters and respecting the submission guidelines (more on this later) improve the odds by a significiant amount.

One agent said he rejected about half of his submissions from the first page due to spelling and grammar mistakes and cliches, for perspective.

You'll need to pitch your book. If your book cannot be pitched in three sentences, that's a sign it has too much going on and you'll need to do some pruning.

Please don't panic if you cannot come up with an accurate pitch for your book on the fly - you're not supposed to be able to do that. A pitch takes many edits and drafts just like a manuscript.

Send your first three chapters and a synopsis (this should be a page, or two pages double spaced. It should not include every single plot point though, again, if major things end up not there at all, question if they're necessary for the manuscript).

Three chapters is the standard - as in, if the agent web page doesn't specify how many, that's what to opt for. If they say anything else, for the love of God listen. If there was a single piece of advice that the agents emphasised above all else, it was to just follow each submission requirement to a T.

There needs to be a strong hook in these chapters. If your manuscript is a bit of a slow burn, that's fine, but you can cheat a bit with a 'prologue' that's actually a very hook-y scene from later on.

Read the agent's bio page throughly and make a note of what they like, who they represent, and what they're looking for, and highlight this in the query letter.

Your query letter has to say a little about you. It doesn't have to be really personal information (but say if you're under 40, because that's rare for authors and they like that), and keep it professional but not stiff, they say. If you have any writing credentials, such as awards won or creative writing degrees, include them, as with any real life experiences that pertains to the content of your book. But no one will be rejected on the basis of not having had an interesting enough life.

Apparently one of the biggest mistakes for debut authors tend to be too many filler scenes.

In terms of looking for comparative titles, think about where you want your book to 'sit'. Often literally - go into bookstores and visualise where on the displays you could see it. It's really helpful if you can identify a specific marketing niche. Though you want to choose comparisons that sell well, but going for really obvious choices looks lazy. A TV or film comparison is fine - as long as it genuinely can be compared.

Do not call yourself the next Donna Tartt. Or JK Rowling. They are sick of this.

Don't trust agents who request exclusive submission.

Or any with a fee. Agents take a percentage of your advance/royalties - you never pay them directly.

In terms of trends (crowd booing), there's been a boom in uplifting, optimistic fiction, but more recently dark fiction has been rising in popularity and looks to have its moment. Fantasy and Gothic are both huge right now. Publishers also love what's called upmarket/book club fiction - books that toe the line between genre and literary.

But publishers aren't clairvoyant and writing to trends is a futile effort, so don't let them shape what you want to write. Some writing advice I got that I loved was to not even THINK about marketability until draft three or four.

If any agent requests your full manuscript - this is crucial - email every other agent you're waiting to hear back from and let them know. This will take your manuscript from the slush pile to the top, and you are more likely to get more offers of representation.

The agent that flatters you the most isn't necessarily the best. Be sure to ask them what their plan for the book is, and what publishers they're planning to send it to - you want them to have a precise vision. It might be that their vision misses the mark on what kind of book you wanted to write, and if so, they aren't the right agent for you.

Research like hell! A good place to start is finding out who represents authors you love (the acknowledgements pages are really helpful here). if you can, getting access to The Writer's and Artist's Yearbook is very helpful, as is The Bookseller, the lattr for checking up on specific agents. (I was warned the website search engine is awful, so google "[name] the Bookseller" to see what they've sold. That said, only the huge deals get reported, so it's not indicative of everyone they take on.

I also want to add Juliet Mushen's article on what makes a good query. I owe a lot to it, and I feel like it's a useful template!

Once Agented

Agents send a manuscript to about 18-25 publishers, typically. Most books will end up having more than one publisher interested.

It can be hard to move genres after publishing a debut novel, especially for book two, not only because it means it takes longer for you to establish yourself, but the agent that may be perfect for dealing with manuscripts for book one might not have the skills for book two.

Ask the agency/publisher about their translation rights, their rights to the US market, and film and TV rights. Ask also what time of year the book is going to come out, if being published.

It's less the book agents are interested in than it is you as an author. You will be asked what you're going to write next, so have an answer. Just an answer - you don't need another manuscript ready to go. One author said she flat-out made up a book idea on the spot, and she got away with it - just have an answer. (This is also useful to put on the query letter.)

Caveat that this is, of course, not a foolproof guide to getting a book deal, nor is it in any way unconditional endorsement of how the industry works - I just thought it would be useful to know.

[olivia-anderson-fanfic]

Thalassophobia

Thalassophobia: The persistent and intense fear of deep bodies of water, such as the ocean, seas, or lakes.

Deuce sighed as he trudged through an empty base, trailing puddles onto the floor. The others were still out exploring, since their biomes were way less harmful to humans than the oceanic one that Deuce had gotten. Spending too much time in the water on Earth was liable to make you slowly waste away, cell by cell, and humans are actually made to live on Earth.

He pushed damp hair out of his eyes, tossing a wasted battery into the recharging bay. He hummed as he replaced it, watching his tablet flicker to life once again.

Not that the tablet had much data on it, not yet. The nearby sealife did not trust the new outpost that had been built in the water, and were steering clear.

Also, he wasn’t particularly good at the whole… ‘formal speech’ thing that their superiors tended to prefer. He was nowhere near as bad as Epel, but it still took him far more time than it took the others. The idea of making a Log right now was exhausting.

But there wasn’t much else he could do…

After some thought, he jotted down that the wildlife was wary. It was probably a hostile environment with a decent amount of carnivorous animals, if they were this distrustful.

That would make things harder than they had been on the last planet, where almost all of the sea life he had come across were herbivores. The ‘fish’ had allowed Deuce to swim right up to them, just as curious about Deuce as Deuce was about them, not even minding when he poked and prodded them, so long as he came with food to sate them with.

It had been so easy then. Now, though…

He sighed, unzipping his wetsuit, peeling it away from his chest, looping the sleeves around his waist so it wouldn’t fall in an indecent way. He had half a mind to go change, but he liked to think that tracking water over the pristine tiles was a tiny act of rebellion. The quality of the wetsuit was not great, but why would their superiors ever bother giving one of their ‘favorite’ exposable workers something that might actually protect them?

Ugh. If he died here, he was going to throw a fit in the afterlife. When he had said he wanted to be a biologist, since they earned a lot of money, he had meant that he wanted to observe alien lifeforms from the comfort of a controlled lab, and the grunt work he had been assigned was hardly high-paying. But, if he ever wanted to get to that point, he had to keep this up for a few more years.

This is what he got for not being born into a rich and influential family, he supposed.

The airlock hissed as it opened, and Deuce heard a high-pitched scream.

Deuce rolled his eyes.

“I know this is the first time you’ve ever seen a person’s body and all, Ace, but chill out. I’m shirtless, not naked.”

Ace’s hands were still determinedly covering his eyes despite his extremely sound logic. “Put some clothes on!”

Deuce sighed and disappeared into his room to change into something far more casual. A tank top and jeans. The slightly too acidic water was probably slowly eating at his skin and clothes, but he was just going to have to deal with that, because Ace had stolen the shower.

Ace stepped out ten minutes later. At least he was nice enough to let him have some hot water.

“One day I’m going to feed you to the fish,” Deuce said, regardless.

Ace snorted. “I’m going to let the not-snakes I found in the desert today bite you.”

Deuce raised an eyebrow. “Wait, you found a specimen? Did you bring it home?”

“Several specimens, actually,” Ace said, smirking widely. “Want to meet them? I still need to collect a couple of samples from them, I could use some help.”

Deuce grabbed him by the hand. He wasn’t particularly interested in helping collect samples, but collecting them with Ace was usually a fun time.

“... take a shower first,” Ace said, tugging his hand out of Deuce’s, frowning at his palm, which was already redder than it should have been.

Right. Acidic water.

Deuce groaned and slunk into the bathroom.

By the time he came out again, Jack was back, too.

“... please tell me you didn’t take all of the hot water.”

“You spent all day in the jungle, Jack, I think you need to cool off,” Deuce said.

Jack groaned, tucking sweaty bangs behind his ear. Said bangs fell right back in front of his face immediately after.

He flashed a wink, and then headed off in search of Ace’s lab. It wasn’t hard to find, all of the labs were in the same wing of the facility. Say what you will about NRC (they all certainly did), but at least they knew how to design intuitive research facilities.

Deuce stopped for just a moment to poke his head into his own lab. It was relatively bare, save for a giant aquarium in the center, stretching from floor to ceiling, and then some. It was accessible from the ocean, which was convenient, but cordoned off enough that nothing should be able to escape. There were currently no animals in it, Deuce had been spending most of his day simply exploring and getting his bearings underwater (and he couldn’t find any fish, besides).

He hummed, pleased, before continuing on.

He had samples to collect. He pulled a lab coat around his shoulders, nearly skipping into the room dedicated to Ace’s animals. The snakes he’d mentioned were lazing beneath a sunlamp, apparently unconcerned with the fact that they had been stolen from their homes.

Ace was leaning over a table, his lips pursed into a thin line. A dead snake lay before him, and he was carefully taking a scalpel to its mouth, probably trying to extract venom.

Deuce smiled, tiptoeing over.

“Hey, Ace.”

Neon green blood spurted over Ace’s gloves, and the redhead cursed quietly before turning to glower at Deuce.

“You did that on purpose.”

Deuce blinked back at him, oh-so-very-innocent. “I could never. I’m very stupid, actually, you’ve seen my test scores. I had the lowest grades out of any of us.”

Ace sighed, peeling off the bloodied glove and throwing it into a container. Probably intending to test the blood later.

And then he reached out and flicked Deuce’s ear.

“Ow?!”

“Deserved.”

Deuce disagreed. He was helping. Now Ace could test the creatures’ blood, too. He was a great friend.

The snakes, however, were… less great friends.

“They’re pretty chill about you dissecting a snake right in front of them,” Deuce observed, stepping closer to the tank. The snakes stared back at him, slitted eyes barely open, as if they were on the verge of falling asleep. “Did you drug them or something?”

“No. They’re just… weird, I think. They didn’t care when I picked them up. Even this one over here –” Ace jerked a thumb toward the dead one on the table. “– didn’t seem to care when I came at it with a knife.”

Deuce tipped his head to the side. “You sure they can die?”

Ace gave him a flat look.

He cleared his throat, awkwardly, blushing under the flat look sent his way, scrambling for a better explanation: “Complacency?”

“Must be. Can’t think of any other reason why they’d be so…” Ace squinted at the snakes for a minute, before shivering. “If we ever get kidnapped by some higher being, and I’m super chill about it, you need to kill me. ‘Cause that ain’t me.”

Deuce grinned. “Don’t worry, I’m always down to kill something that looks like you.”

“Gee, thanks.”

“No problem!”

Ace glared halfheartedly at him for a minute, before his expression softened. “Whatever. Help me get some samples?”

“That’s what I’m here for,” Deuce said.

This was, of course, a teensy-weensy white lie. Deuce wasn’t like Epel, who had gone into this field because he was genuinely curious about alien worlds. He was like Ace – someone who had simply ended up here. Ace got good grades, and he hadn’t had any preferences for what field he went into, so he had gone into science. Deuce was intending to provide for his mom, and the people who survived this job were paid well, so this was where he was.

In the end, neither of them were genuinely all that interested in the scholarly aspect of things.

Maybe that was why they had gravitated to each other.

Much to their supervisors’ chagrin. Frankly, Deuce was stunned that the vein pulsing in Riddle Roseheart’s forehead hadn’t burst yet. It was only thanks to Trey Clover and Cater Diamond that they didn’t get thrown out within the first month, and it had been a close thing.

Regardless, they weren’t a particularly productive pair.

Which, really, wouldn’t matter all that much. Despite Rosehearts-senpai’s insistence that their work might one day get picked up by higher-ups like Divus Crewel, Mozus Trein, or (Seven forbid) Dire Crowley himself… well, it had never happened before, and at this point it didn’t seem likely that they ever would.

So, who cared if they slacked off a little? Lived a little? Had some actual fun instead of working all the time?

It wasn’t like Rosehearts-senpai could fire them at this point. They were good at their jobs in a field where a lot of people didn’t make it past the first few weeks – they were keepers.

By the time Ace and Deuce had finished for the night (because they were hungry, not because they had reached any real stopping point), they found that Epel and Sebek had both returned from their own expeditions.

Yuu was tending to Sebek, who must have fallen at some point, as he had scraped up his knees.

This was all well and good, Deuce preferred it when his coworkers weren’t injured… but, if they were tending to Sebek, then who was cooking dinner?

“Yuuuuuuuu…” Ace said, slumping over the kitchen table. “I’m hungryyyyyyyy.”

Yuu rolled his eyes. “Good. Starve.”

Ace squeaked.

“I miss when you first started out,” Epel said, his chin in his hands. “You were waaay nicer then.”

“I’ve been cleaning up after you lot for the past seven missions. I’m sick of you,” Yuu said. He shuddered. “If you guys make me clean your sheets again I’m going to kill myself, I swear.”

“What’ve they been doing to the sheets?” Epel asked, frowning.

Deuce’s face flushed. “Do – do you need help making dinner, Yuu?”

“I don’t trust you to know how a microwave works, but thanks for the offer.” He stood up straighter, patting Sebek on the arm. “You should be fine, now. Tell me if you have any weird reactions to the flora you touched.”

Sebek nodded, firmly. “Thank you for your help,” he said, solemn and genuine.

“Aw, he’s so cute,” Epel teased. “He still has respect for everyone ‘n everything. How long do you think it’ll take for that to get beaten outta him?”

Sebek’s face flushed. “I’m simply –.”

“Three weeks, max,” said Ace. “That’s our record. Congrats on setting that, by the way, Jack.”

Jack gave a vague grunt, taking a seat. “Live to please,” he said sarcastically.

“I thought I had the record?” Deuce said, frowning.

“You’re in denial, that’s different,” Yuu said.

“I will be beating everyone,” Sebek said. “This is an amazing opportunity, and I intend to make the most of it.”

“Adorable,” Deuce said, exchanging nods with Epel. Newbies are always so sweet and full of hope. Of course, most newbies ended up dead within a few days, since alien planets aren’t exactly the most hospitable places, but they’re pretty cute in the meantime. And the ones who survive tend to realize just how terrible their situation is after a while, so they aren’t hopeful long enough to get annoying.

“Rosehearts-senpai isn’t here, he can’t hear you badmouth him, go wild,” Ace said, bluntly.

“They won’t date you,” Yuu said, even blunter.

Sebek’s face flushed beet red. He spluttered. “I don’t want –!”

“Here, we can start for you,” Jack said, patting Sebek on the shoulder. “Dire Crowley is incompetent.”

“Scathing insult,” Deuce said, rolling his eyes. But he could admit that insulting people when you don’t swear is an art – one that very few people can master.

“Thank you. Now it’s your turn, Sebek.”

Sebek was busy staring at all of them, openly horrified that they would say anything mean about their leader.

“A week,” Deuce decided.

“Mmmmm, I give him two,” Jack said.

“What’ll you do if he beats your score, Jack?” Yuu asked.

“Cry myself to sleep, I guess.”

“Alright. I’m betting four weeks. Don’t let me down, newbie,” Yuu said.

Sebek seemed to have realized that he had no say in this, as he flopped back onto the table, his hands over his face. “M’name’s Sebek,” Sebek grumbled, halfheartedly.

“See, you say that, but every time you say your name all I hear is ‘Fish’,” Ace teased.

Sebek peeked through his fingers just enough to glare at him.

Deuce wasn’t particularly pleased, either. He had spent several years with fish, and Sebek didn’t look nor act like most of the ones he’d seen. “If you have to dehumanize him, at least call him, like, ‘Fresh Meat’, Ace.”

“I like ‘Frosh’,” suggested Jack.

“‘Newest sucker’,” Yuu said.

Sebek finally had enough. He gathered his things, and then stormed off, probably towards his private quarters.

Epel rested his chin in his hands. “Y’all’re kinda the worst, ya know? Don’t’cha remember how it was when you were still new?”

“Exactly like this,” Deuce said.

“You guys literally hazed me,” Yuu said.

“In our defense, that was funny,” said Ace.

“It was not.”

(It was.)

Jack raised an eyebrow. “What did you do to Yuu?”

Epel opened his mouth.

“Tell him and go to bed hungry.”

“We did nothin’ at all,” Epel said, sweetly.

Yuu narrowed his eyes, as if he wasn’t sure whether he liked that response, either.

But, he did make them all food, so it must not have offended him too much.

(He set a portion outside of Sebek’s door, and regardless of whether Sebek had forgiven them all yet or not he still ate it).

The rest of the night was relatively uneventful, save for a couple of debriefings about what they found – nothing out of the ordinary, it seemed, which makes sense, there’s a reason why it’s called ‘the ordinary’, after all.

They turned in pretty quickly, tired and sore from traversing unknown environments.

The following week was… also pretty uneventful, all things considered.

Deuce couldn’t call his job fun. It was, in the end, a job – and one that paid a low wage at that. He would spend a few hours underwater, looking for and trying to capture various fish, and then head back to the base to analyze any specimens he happened to lure into traps.

The most interesting thing that happened was that one of his traps ended up broken, somehow. It had probably lured a fish that was a little too big for it. Deuce hadn’t seen any fish large enough to do that yet, but they surely had to exist. He made a mental note that, if he wanted to use that particular type of bait again, he’d have to make the trap larger.

Outside of that, it was pretty boring. Hell, even considering that, it was still painfully dull.

You would think that exploring an alien planet would be interesting. It had been on the first few missions. But, in the end, fish were still fish. Slick body to traverse water faster, something sharp to tear apart food if it didn’t simply swallow it whole, fins or webbed limbs…

Well, frankly, Deuce couldn’t say he entirely understood why any of his work was seen as ‘necessary’. He was happy to be paid, of course, but the only benefit he could see to any of this was a possible food source. And they weren’t even sending the specimens to NRC, nor were they putting any of them in their mouths to taste test them, so it wasn’t that!

He groaned as he dragged himself ashore, his body aching just slightly as gravity was forced upon him once again. Deuce set his bag of collected fish in the tank. The temperature of the water wasn’t any different from that of the sea he had just been in, so he wasted no time in releasing the fish. He watched them rush out, into the water, crowding in the corners, as far away from Deuce as they could get, joining the other fish in the tank.

Some of these were natural predators, cowering alongside their prey, but in the face of something larger than them the fish weren’t all that hungry, it seemed.

He watched the fish swim around for a few minutes, mulling over the pros and cons of getting some decorations for ‘his’ aquarium, before turning his attention back to the task at hand. He pulled the mouthpiece of his oxygen tank from his mouth, grimacing as the planet’s air rushed into his lungs in its stead.

The air wasn’t necessarily bad, it was breathable, but it was about akin to the air on a mountaintop – crisp, fresh, and entirely too thin for comfort.

Deuce took a few gulps of air, his chest already aching just slightly, before waving frantically at a nearby security camera.

It only took a few minutes before a familiar face stepped out. Yuu walked over, visibly taking a moment to steel himself before taking his own oxygen mask off. “We should be doing this inside.”

“I’m saving us both time,” Deuce shrugged. “You’re going to be out here for a while. A couple of the fish I’ve found can jump out of the water, so I can’t contain any of those live specimens right now. Can you increase the walls’ height some?”

“Sure,” Yuu said, though he seemed preemptively exhausted at the prospect of doing more work. “How much higher do you think I’ve got to go?”

“Maybe a meter?” Deuce said. He hadn’t seen the fish jump that high, yet, but it would be best to keep things on the safe side, he thought.

Yuu flashed a thumbs up, and Deuce headed inside, and that was that.

For the next few days.

Deuce dragged himself over the wall, flopping into the aquarium, fighting the urge to pant, as he really didn’t need seawater in their lungs.

He pulled his bag o’ fish from his waistband and turned to the tank at large.

Only to pause.

Slowly, he let go of his bag, barely paying it any mind as it slowly sank to the bottom of the tank, the fish squirming inside making it ripple strangely. Not that he watched it for long. He looked around. The aquarium hadn’t been fully furnished yet, it only had a few places for fish to hide.

But they weren’t anywhere to be seen.

Bubbles streamed from his nose as he groaned, and he pushed his way back up to the surface. He clambered right back out of the tank, and strode over to the airlock, his foot tapping impatiently as he waited to get inside. The moment he could, he yanked out his oxygen feeder, ignoring the slight burn in the back of his throat, and yelled, “Yuu!”

It took several minutes for his coworker to appear, and when he did it was reluctantly, poking his head around the corner and eyeing Deuce like he was scared Deuce might take a knife to him. He was considering it, so this was a valid fear to have.

“What’s up?” Yuu asked.

“I told you to let me change the water in the tank,” Deuce said, pointing at the now-empty water. “They’ve all escaped, now, and I’ll have to –.”

“I didn’t change the water, though?” Yuu cut in, frowning.

“Wait, what?” Deuce said, utterly bewildered. If Yuu hadn’t let the fish go on accident, where did they go? He frowned. “You’re lying to me, aren’t you.”

“I’m really not…?” Yuu said, slowly approaching the glass, squinting into the brine. He seemed genuinely confused to find that the fish really were all gone. “Do you think they escaped or something? You said they could jump and all…”

“I said that some of them could jump,” Deuce said. “And none of the species I caught yesterday could.”

Yuu could only shake his head. “It wasn’t me. Check the newbie, maybe?”

But Sebek didn’t know anything, either.

Deuce ran a hand through his hair, turning around to go to check the security cameras, only to jump when a hand caught him by the arm.

Deuce glanced back at Sebek. “Yeah?”

Sebek, absently, shook out his hand, his palm red from the remains of the acidic water Deuce had long since learned to tolerate. For a moment, he didn’t speak, mulling things over with a slightly red face.

“Uh…”

“Is there any chance that there are intelligent lifeforms on this planet!” Sebek burst out.

For a moment, thanks to the tone, Deuce didn’t even register it as a question. He just stared, blankly, at Sebek as his mind struggled to catch up.

And, even once he had processed it, he remained silent, unsure.

The short answer was ‘No’, but that probably wouldn’t be enough of an answer to satisfy him. Deuce was stuck trying to recall what they did before sending people to new planets. It had been on a test, once, but Deuce had never been one to go over past exams to see what he got right and wrong, so he wasn’t sure whether he even knew the answer then. Ace would have been a better person to ask.

But Sebek was looking at him, surprisingly vulnerable, and Deuce couldn’t help but feel a bit bad for him.

The first few missions, regardless of the wonders you might come across, were always the most nerve-wracking. And Sebek had gotten assigned to the Wastelands, so it wasn’t as if he had all that much beautiful stuff to look at to make up for all of the terror.

“Let’s see… I mean, firstly, we try to pick up radio waves on the planet to see if anything has developed tech yet, and then we start looking for complex cave systems…”

He was probably forgetting some things, but those were the most important ones, he was pretty sure.

Sebek didn’t seem that much calmer, but he nodded once and said, “Thanks!”

Deuce nodded, slightly, and then continued off towards the camera room.

Yuu was sitting in their usual chair by the cameras, their eyes glued to the screens.

“How did you miss what happened to my fish when watching over things is your literal job?” Deuce asked.

Yuu glanced at him out of the corner of his eyes, briefly, before fixing back on the camera feed once again. “Besides the fact that I need to eat, sleep, and bathe sometimes?”

Deuce winced a little at the pointed tone, feeling a little bit like a child being reminded that their mom actually had a life outside of them. “Send the camera feed from today to my tablet?”

With a few swipes of Yuu’s fingers, Deuce now had a huge file to scrub through. He dropped into the chair beside Yuu’s, smiling a little when the wheels rolled him back a few paces, and then started going through the footage.

It was, for the most part, uneventful. The fish darted about their aquarium at super speed thanks to the magic of video editing, but outside of that it wasn’t all that stimulating to watch. His eyes glazed over.

Until something large dropped into the tank.

He didn’t get a great view of it, it was large to the point of being excessive. A long line of deep green scales, writhing about, covering the camera on accident.

Ah, so this was one of the larger predators of this world. Deuce had to admit, it was quite the jump from the smaller-than-his-torso fish he had been observing thus far.

He sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. They could build the walls of the aquarium higher, but then Deuce would have to climb it while soaking wet, and the fish he brought back might die in the process of climbing up and down. This also assumed that the animal couldn’t climb ladders either, which wasn’t guaranteed…

“Yuu, I need you to do something for me,” Deuce said.

Yuu gave a quiet hum to show he was listening.

“If this thing –” Deuce held up the tablet for Yuu to get as good of a look at it as was possible “– comes back, I need you to tranquilize it.”

But, two weeks later, Deuce came back to an empty tank.

He groaned, frustrated, and started making his way through the base…

Only to stop cold when he noticed blood trailing along the floor, slowly leading toward Yuu’s bedroom.

Deuce knocked, quietly.

Yuu, inside, hissed a curse. Things collided with other things on the other side of the door.

At least he wasn’t dead.

After a few seconds, Yuu’s door slid open, to reveal that it might have been a close thing. Yuu’s skin was paler than it should have been, sweat plastering his hair to his forehead.

“What happened?” Deuce said.

“Tranqs didn’t work,” Yuu said, shortly.

The door slammed shut in his face.

Deuce sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose.

Alright, well. He supposed he would just have to trap the thing through other means.

The next month was… frustrating.

Nets wouldn’t keep it for long (the net he used was sliced to shreds, it had sharp teeth and/or claws). Slamming a ‘lid’ shut on top of it ended in a hole burrowed through expensive metal (a large portion of the scratches were made on the outside, suggesting it might have had help). It learned what sensors looked like, forcing Deuce to hide them better and better.

Deuce wanted to catch the thing alive, but that seemed less and less possible as time went on.

He sat in his lab, watching the aquarium, his eyes drooping as he waited for it to show up.

Deuce couldn’t say for sure how intelligent the thing was. Even the most simple of creatures were capable of learning patterns. All he knew was that it was actively ruining everything he tried to do, and the higher-ups were going to get impatient sooner or later.

So, it had to go. One way or another.

A loud splash drew his attention, and he jolted into awareness.

It was long and green – it had probably evolved to hide among the kelp-like fauna nearby. He couldn’t tell where it ended, the tip of its tail was hidden somewhere in the mess of swirling limbs.

It was looking right back at him. It didn’t have a face in the way humans did, certainly wouldn’t be expected to emote like one, but the way it had gone as still as anything in the water could spoke of an otherwise unexpressed surprise. It looked like asking Yuu to head out into the water in his stead had worked, it had been convinced he was gone for the day… it had been waiting for him to leave.

Deuce peered into the animal’s eyes. It didn’t blink, but then again most fish don’t have visible eyelids.

Slowly, it drifted closer to the glass, peering at him. Inky, black eyes, and yet he had no doubts that it was looking solely at him.

The glass separating them would keep it from trying anything. It had arms, but no legs, so it was an entirely water-based creature, and the oxygen in the base was even more concentrated than the air outside. It wouldn’t last long in here.

Despite knowing this, Deuce longed for the knife that he carried around with him while diving. For it had a wicked set of claws, and its mouth was full of long, thin, razor-sharp teeth. It was definitely a carnivore.

Deuce took a deep breath to steady himself, before approaching the glass, slowly circling it. The animal followed him around the tank, making it hard to get a good gauge of its actual size.

He sighed, pulling his tablet from beneath his lab coat and pressing a button.

A lid slammed down on top of the tank.

The being floated there, once again, seeming almost offended.

Deuce sighed, and with another tap on his screen, the water in the tank began to slide out through a barely visible set of tubes at the bottom. It was supposed to be used to clear out the water before it got too dirty and made the specimens ill, but it was perfectly capable of killing a particularly annoying specimen for him, too.

Said specimen didn’t seem… particularly thrilled that the water level was shrinking.

It threw itself at the new ceiling, beating against the metal.

It wouldn’t be able to get out in time. Deuce was pretty sure that it knew that.

It threw itself at the ground, trying to stop the water from spilling out. Then, it seemed to realize that this wasn’t going to help in the long run, because it’s head jerked right back up to the top of the tank. For a moment, it wavered, before it swam right back up to the top, banging its fists on the metal, trying to make even a dent.

Deuce swallowed thickly.

It had to be done. If not for the sake of science, then for the sake of his job security. This thing was messing with his ability to do his job, and Deuce’s superiors weren’t exactly known for their leniency. If it was between Deuce’s ability to support himself and his mother, and… whatever this was…

Well, the choice had been made.

That didn’t mean it wasn’t horrifying to watch. Usually, Deuce tried to ensure that all the specimens he took had the quickest, most painless deaths possible. Yuu had said that the tranquilizer gun hadn’t worked, though, so Deuce really wasn’t sure how to incapacitate the thing, let alone put it out of its misery.

Should he – should he leave?

His job had never felt particularly invasive. Sure, he was dissecting dead animals, but it wasn’t as if he did it in a particularly cruel way. The deaths were quick, the dissections were purposeful and never extended past what he was required to do for his job.

This was just…

And then the specimen threw itself at the glass.

What the – huh?!

Sharp claws and teeth scratched at the glass. Its tail beat against the thin wall separating itself from Deuce. But it didn’t seem like it was doing it blindly. The second its tail managed to make a small spiderweb of cracks appear in the glass, it zeroed in on that area, beating its fists against it.

It was a water animal! It wouldn’t last in the lab! What was it doing?!

Deuce hugged his tablet to his chest, his eyes wide.

Was it… trying to take him down with it?

A shiver ran through Deuce.

He’d faced off against plenty of beasts in his time working for NRC, and none of those fights had been done in the comfort of his own home, but at least in the water he was prepared to fight for his life at any moment.

This was his home turf. He should have a home-field advantage.

But he felt terribly wrongfooted. He was supposed to be safe here.

He turned tail and ran, making sure to close the door to the lab behind himself, locking the entire room off. He couldn’t care less if all the equipment flooded and ruined. It was an expensive debt to get into, but he could worry about the bill when he got his nice, cushy job as a lab manager instead of an assistant.

He would much rather deal with debt than death.

But, when he finally mustered the courage to check the security cameras to see whether it had managed to break through the aquarium, an hour later…

Well, he found the ‘cage’ empty.

And the question of debt versus death became much more serious.

He couldn’t go back into the water. Whether the thing had escaped on its own or with help, whether or not the thing had died, none of that mattered. Its ‘helper’ wouldn’t be fond of him, and they knew that he left the base every day for work, and he was dead.

Deuce sat in his bed for the next few days, staring at the ceiling.

You would think that someone would spend their last days doing… something. That one thing they’d always wanted to do, but what could he do? He was on an alien planet, and all of his coworkers were stuck in their jobs, so all he had was a tablet.

Nothing on the Internet seemed interesting.

Hell, it was so boring that he almost wanted to go out into the water and get things over with.

Almost.

He ran a hand through his hair.

Being bored was better than being dead.

Should he write his mom a letter? He certainly had the time.

But that would make it too real.

Was it selfish of him to want his mom to think that his last days were normal? Happy, even?

He didn’t know.

He wasn’t sure whether he would ever know.

But he had a lot of time to think it over.

The aquarium was broken, so he had an excuse not to go out (where would he put the fish he captured?), but they would expect him to get back into the field once everything was fixed.

Deuce asked Yuu to take their time with the repairs. Yuu did slow down, but Deuce wasn’t sure whether this was because he had asked or if Yuu was just that tired – the bags under his eyes were getting large enough to hold some of the fish Deuce caught.

But all of this was just stalling. They weren’t set to go home for a few more months.

Silently, as they waited for Yuu to finish cooking dinner, the day construction had finished, Deuce added up all of the money he now owed NRC, thanks to everything the monster had broken in its desperation to get out. It was… not a meager sum, to say the least. If he never took a break ever again, it would take him ten years to pay it off, even if he managed to get promoted within three years like he was supposed to. If he didn’t get promoted – and he definitely wouldn’t, if he were to abandon a mission – it would take upwards of thirty years for him to pay it all off with his current salary.

And there was no way he would survive thirty years of this.

On the other hand, if he simply died, his debt would be cleared in an instant.

Deuce felt a hand clap him on the shoulder. He sent Jack a wobbly smile.

“It was nice knowin’ ya, Deuce,” Epel said, leaning back in his chair. He said it in a joking tone, but it didn’t feel quite as lighthearted as he was probably intending it to be.

Deuce thought back over the time he had spent at the Corporation. They had never had something like this before, where they knew ahead of time that someone was on their last few days. It was always sudden, someone taken from them ‘too soon’.

He wondered if this was better or worse.

“Don’t talk like that,” Ace said, grinning. “The guy has plot armor or something, he’ll probably luck his way into killing those things and clearing his debt all in one.”

Yuu set a plate of omurice down in front of Deuce. Tears pricked at the corners of his eyes. Unfortunately, he felt sick at the mere thought of crying – water was the last thing he wanted to touch him at the moment.

The next day, he stood at the small hatch that would let him out into the ocean.

No one had come to see him off.

Work waits for no man, he supposed.

Deuce swallowed thickly.

He shoved his breathing tube into his mouth, grimacing just slightly as he felt it stick to the front of his throat, carefully winding its way down his larynx, before spreading itself out to make sure that nothing but its oxygen could sneak its way into his respiratory system.

He hadn’t missed this.

But he almost wished he was young again, that he had gagged and struggled to get it down his throat like he had back in his early days, that he had more time.

He didn’t.

He dove into the water and started swimming, as close to the surface as he could get, as far away from anywhere the monsters could hide…

But they didn’t try to sneak up on him, instead the monster simply poked its head out of a small gap in the rocks, not even large enough for Deuce to squeeze through without fearing he’d scuff up his oxygen tank.

Slowly, languidly, it swam up to him.

Its tail seemed to stretch on forever.

He kept his hand on the knife at his hip.

It swam around him, just out of reach, in large circles, its winding tail following it wherever it went. Deuce got the impression of a boa constrictor just waiting to tighten around its victim.

His heart thudded wildly in his chest. He wondered if it could feel the vibrations in the water.

Deuce flinched when he felt a touch, almost feather-light, on his oxygen tank, immediately jerking away from the curious hands, his knife at the ready.

It almost seemed to smile at him.

No, that was ascribing human traits to animals.

It was baring its teeth. A warning he wasn’t stupid enough to ignore.

But one he wasn’t fast enough to react to.

There was a hissing sound, and Deuce’s mouth filled with water. He gasped instinctually, only to choke. It burned his throat, his lungs, his eyes –.

He turned to find himself looking at another, identical creature.

It spat a piece of metal at him.

Oh.

Oh.

That…

Wasn’t good.

He kicked off of its chest, taking a moment to get his bearings by looking for where the kelp touched the ground, before booking it towards the surface.

His fingers brushed against the crest of a wave, slipping out into the open air.

A hand grabbed his tank, yanking him downwards once again.

He spat the tube out of his mouth, ignoring the way metal scraped up the inside of his throat, sliding the oxygen tank off of his shoulders. He threw it at the creatures. It was useless now anyway. If they wanted it, they could have it.

He kicked his way to the surface.

Never had the thin air ever been such a relief before. He coughed up water, the taste of blood on his tongue, his legs still swinging wildly to help him tread water even as he struggled to clear his lungs.

Something grabbed him by the ankle and he screamed as he was dragged back under, the little air he’d gotten spilling from between his lips.

He found himself staring into the eyes of a creature that was more of a congealed mass of limbs than anything else. Millions of eyes stared back at him; trailing after the bubbles that were slipping away from him; watching the two creatures from earlier as they neared, one of them holding his oxygen tank like a prize.

For a moment, Deuce was frozen, simply staring at the creatures that he should be observing, but were instead watching him, as if he were something interesting.

A shiver ran through him, and it wasn’t just because of the frigid waters.

He tugged, frantically, at the tentacle wound around his leg, digging his fingers into the flesh, poking at all of the eyes that he could reach. The creature didn’t seem to care. If it was hurt by his efforts, then it was too enthralled by drowning him to do anything about it.

Deuce’s vision blurred at the edges, a black vignette washing over his vision.

And then he was pushed back to the surface.

Deuce nearly choked on the air. It was as if his body had gotten used to the water, and was now protesting the idea of oxygen, as if he hadn’t breathed it for his entire life.

He keeled over against the tentacle that he had just been attacking, digging his fingers in once again, but this time for support.

He gagged on his own tongue.

He threw up nothing but water.

Despite the sorry state he was in, he couldn’t help but be relieved.

They were toying with him… which meant, eventually, they would grow bored, right?

Please.

The creatures lay just beneath the waves, watching him.

Slowly, a hand reached out of the water, scales shimmering in the sunlight, and poked at his goggles.

He didn’t try and bat it away. He’d learned his lesson with that. And, besides, he wasn’t sure his body was really responding to him anymore. The lack of oxygen made moving strange, like he was still underwater, moving through the murk, his movements sluggish, dragged down by an unseen force.

They continued to pull at his goggles, until the band holding them to his head snapped.

He whimpered.

His fingers, slowly, detached from the creature, fumbling to his waist. His tools. His bag for fish – he wasn’t sure why he’d even bothered to bring it. A flashlight. The place where his knife usually rested, though he had lost that to the brine at some point…

His emergency flare!

He pointed it directly at the monster beneath him, and fired.

A hole tore itself through several of the creature’s limbs. No blood entered the water, the flare’s heat had instantly cauterized all of the wounds it made. But that didn’t keep it from hurting. The monster screeched, flinging him away from itself.

Deuce was skidded across the surface of the water, and then began to sink.

His goggles were gone, and any attempt to open his eyes to get his bearings only ended with pain and blurry vision. He was helpless. Literally blind and deaf and he was going to die.

But he had to swim. Somewhere. Anywhere. Away.

Hands grabbed him by the shoulders, and within seconds his back was slamming against the sea floor.

The air left his lungs again.

A heavy weight settled atop him, forcing him further into the ground, forcing the surface just that much further away.

He was deep underwater. There was no light poking at the back of his eyelids. No sunlight could reach quite this far beneath the waves. Even if the monsters let him go again to watch him struggle, even if he swam at top speed, he feared he wouldn’t make it to the surface in time.

Nonononono…

He shoved at the monster, broken sobs spilling from his lips, even if all sound had been muted by the currents, kicking and punching even if he knew that the water was weakening his blows.

It was useless. He knew it was useless. But what choice did he have? He couldn’t just let them kill him.

Sharp claws dug into his clothes in return, yanking his wetsuit open, tearing his tools away from him.

Another set of hands joined the first one, digging into the skin of his sides, and he writhed as teeth sunk into his ribs. He couldn’t even scream anymore. There was no oxygen left, simply more water, and if it was cycling in and out with every ‘breath’ then he wouldn’t know.

Until he did. The taste of his own blood filled his nose, his mouth, his lungs.

His tears were lost in the water.

[beekeeperspicnic]

What I've been getting up to without my computer

Since I don't have any game updates at the moment I thought I'd give you a look at my very analogue Sherlock Holmes related project!

As you probably know, the Sherlock Holmes stories were mostly originally published in the Strand Magazine which came out as floppy monthly magazines with hardback collections every six months.

A while ago I spotted a really beaten up copy of the July to December 1893 book on eBay for £8. This book can sometimes go for £200 in good condition because it's the one with...

I immediately decided to make repairing it a Project!

You can see here that the text block has totally come away from the boards.

Along the spine I was really excited to see something a little familiar being used to give some structural support! My initial thought was that this had to be a slice of a cover of one of the floppy Strand magazines.

But when I got it loose and studied it, although the paper and ink colour is the same, it doesn't actually follow the layout format of the Strand covers. It's lots of little ads, and they run off the bottom like this is part of a larger document.

Scrap of paper on left, a Strand Magazine on the right:

So yeah, that's still a bit of a mystery, but it's cool to see this scrap of paper the printers had lying around. I had to remove it, but I'm going to keep it safe.

I did some gentle cleaning of the cover using a putty eraser, just gently pressing and rolling, never rubbing. It picked up a little of the grime.

The cover had got some paint splotches on at some point in the past, and I tried to gently remove these. Part of me wishes I'd left them as I think I was starting to effect the blue colour in the area.

(Original on the right, my attempt at cleaning on the left!)

I also reinforced some of the parts of the bookcloth around the spine that were very worn with Japanese tissue, which is very thin but very, very difficult to tear.

Now here's a fun part, with some help from my cat Miss Malkin!

The spine of the book had a few problems.

The fabric which wraps around it and helps attach it to the cover/boards which is called scrim (or mull, I've seen it called both!) had totally decayed and turned into gross dust, I knew I'd need to replace it.

Although the sewn binding was sound, I could tell that the glue wasn't doing its job anymore. It was old 'animal glue' that had turned hard and brittle. I knew I'd need to replace it with something else, like PVA.

I needed to get that glue off, so I tried out a trick I saw online. I made a paste/gel out of methycellulose, which is a substance that gets used as a thickener in lots of food products. Of course I keep mine in a fancy little jar:

The gel softens the old glue without getting it dangerously damp, allowing you to gently scrape it away. I have a really satisfying video of me doing it, but Tumblr only lets you upload one video per post, boo.

Look at all this gnarly gunk!

But look at how good the text block looks with its new scrim and glue!

I got the black paper from Shepherd's in London which is a specialist Art & Conservation Paper shop (they have a book bindery too but it's closed at the weekends.) Buying it was so fun, I got to look through lots of samples and pick something which matched the original paper.

I then had to get it home half way across the country on public transport. Yaaaaay.

I was trying to think what I was going to use to replace the Strand Magazine page on the spine. In the end I decided to leave a little note, for some future person who might take the binding apart someday!

So, here it is!

I have to admit that this whole project has been a real challenge, emotionally more than anything! It's required me to be brave about messing with an old book, and to acknowledge that even where I've made mistakes, at least it's better off then it was when It arrived at my house.

[twisted-wonderland-shenanigans]

Twisted Wonderland Worldbuilding Lore: Ancient Monsters

So this is a little something that came to me recently, and I've been working on figuring out how to incorporate it. Hope ya'll enjoy the musings~!

Back when humans still roamed Twisted Wonderland, there was no mistaking that the carnivorous monsters saw them as little more than prey to hunt just like the more herbivore-based monsters. After all, it eventually became the basis of many human myths and legends in Yuu's world. Despite the extra claws and fangs, though, one had to wonder just how and why humans became so afraid of monsters when they were so close to their size. Wouldn't they easily have been able to defend themselves? Sure...

If the monsters actually had been the size of humans in the first place.

Back then, all monsters of every species were considered true beasts of their kind. Ranging from being as small as seven feet to as tall as a mountain, these ancient monsters were a truly frightening sight to behold. Much like how the Megaloceros is the largest deer known to have ever lived, so too did the ancient monsters tower over their current descendants. By comparison, they may as well have been giants to the small, fragile humans!

And yet, over the generations, each monster species grew smaller and smaller--leaner, and more efficient. Could it be due to a lack of resources to maintain their grand sizes? A change in the environment? A lack of magical energy in the world? Or perhaps a change in their DNA? After all, scientists have discovered that some monsters have segments of unknown DNA not found in other monsters. How should this affect them compared to others of the same species?

Turns out, a lot more is affected than anyone realized. Some monsters find themselves more in tune with their surroundings than others, some with more stamina and endurance to run father for far longer. Some are even able to consume things that don't give others of their kind nutrition or may even be considered poisonous without suffering any ill side effects. How is this possible? Is it an evolutionary mutation beginning to form? It's a mystery that has long baffled researchers, a question that has gone unanswered...

Until the arrival of Yuu.

Once blood samples are acquired, it was pure chance that one researcher examining the DNA structure happend to notice a strangely familiar pattern in several of the segments. But where? Where had they seen them before?

Curious, the researchers asked for volunteers amongst NRC's student population to give blood samples. One by one they compared each one to the sample Yuu gave, utilizing computer technology to find any similarities or connections that might explain what this researcher saw. Just as they were beginning to think of moving on...

They found a match.

Hidden in the DNA of a student were several segments that lined up with the very same sections as Yuu. Upon further examination, the student in question appeared to be stronger and faster than others noted of their species, capable of consuming foods that were not a natural part of his diet yet still able to process the very nutrients held within. Soon after this discovery, they got another hit from another student's sample and found similar blocks, followed by another hit.

"What does it mean?" Crowley asked.

"It means that these students have human DNA in their ancestry," one of the researchers explained, though it was quite clear that they were beyond excited by the news. "This is the breakthrough we've been looking for!"

"But...then that means..."

/---/

"Wait...you mean that humans and monsters actually had kids together???"

"Precisely. It's thanks to you that we were able to discern that and uncover a biological mystery that has plagued us for years!"

Glancing at the three students nearby, Yuu couldn't help but note the wide-eyed disbelief and shock on their faces as Yuu turned back and said, "Uh...are...they going to be okay?"

"It might take a while before it sinks in. After all, it's not every day that you find out one of your ancestors was a human." Flipping through their clipboard, the researcher said, "Or at least in Mr. Zigvolt's case, more than one human ancestor."

For once, Sebek was stunned silent while Silver and Deuce stared at them. Before Yuu could even think of waving a hand in front of the quickly paling basilisk's face--

WHUMP!!!

"Oh dear...perhaps the revelation was more of a shock to him than I realized," the researcher commented as he stared at the unconscious Sebek. "Don't worry, I'm sure he'll be fine soon enough."

Narrator voice: "He was not, in fact, fine."