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terukotime · 2 months ago

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You say you don’t like the killer reveal, why? I actually think dev made some great choices and I’d love to talk to you about your perspective.

i don't want to get too deep into it because, like i mentioned in my previous post, i don't want my criticism to come off as negativity towards the series or discourage anyone involved in the production of the show because it's honestly not a huge deal. like, it in no way ruins the show or makes it less enjoyable for me. and i don't think the choice of who the culprit is is a bad one at all, i'm mostly unsatisfied with the way the chapter handles it.

[spoilers beneath the cut, obvi lol. and please remember this is just my opinion. me having and expressing my opinion is not hate towards the series. i'm nervous enough as it is posting just this and not a bigger essay on all my thoughts because i really don't want to have this be misconstrued, nor do i want any criticism i have to give, regardless of how innocent and respectful my intentions, to make drdtdev or anyone who works on the series feel bad.]

i think Ace being the killer DOES make sense. i have no qualms with him being the blackened, in theory. do i think he could've made for a great survivor, or have really interesting growth throughout the coming chapters? yeah! i would have loved for Ace to be kept around for much longer. but him being the killer this chapter isn’t inherently bad. it's now clear that there's a specific direction Ace's character was meant to go in this story and i think that's fine.

my problem is with what *didn't* happen with Ace's character up to this point.

the chapter hasn't concluded yet so there's still a chance for my thoughts to change, though i don't think it'll make much of a difference. but i'm still waiting to see if it can stick the landing. and even if it doesn't, that's okay. i've already accepted it, i'm just still disappointed by it all the same.

Ace, honestly, hasn't played much of an active role in the story. he's been a source of conflict and comedic relief, and that's okay, not every character has to be as important as Xander or David...but he hasn't really gotten to *do* anything. this series is very character-driven, and thus is very focused on the relationships between other characters. Ace has only had one notable relationship (outside of his feud with Nico, but i'm not really including that as a "relationship" for obvious reasons), and that was with Levi. and that didn't even stay positive for very long. and we also know now that Levi didn't even care about him to begin with because he doesn't care about people in general.

not only did Ace never really get to establish any other relationships, no one ever LIKED him. of course a good portion of the fandom likes him, but in the actual story, no one cares about him. no one will miss him. his death is honestly kind of meaningless character-wise. does it serve as a lesson to some of the other characters? sure. but he's going to be dying here with no one ever liking or caring about him.

Min's story wasn't just a cautionary tale. people did like her, people did care about her. she was friends with a lot of characters, she got to have an impact in the daily lives of others. we got to know her better, the things she liked, her deeper thoughts and opinions on things. she got to do stuff, and we got to learn about her. her death meant more to the characters beyond just being the first culprit. she died as a person, not just as a character.

most of the stuff we know about Ace is surface level or things confirmed in Q&As. he doesn't get to contribute much aside from the aforementioned conflict/comedic relief. i understand where the show is going with that idea, and why him not being liked by anyone is a specific part of what led him to murder, but that's not really what irks me. it's that Ace never got to really be a *person.* he's essentially a plot device, serving the greater "good person" theme going on this chapter, and filling in the smaller roles in the story when needed, like an antagonist in a scene or delivering a gag. yes, his admittance to killing Arei and eventual post-trial trauma dump will give him a bit more humanity and character...but that's not really enough.

we only get to see Ace how the other members of the cast see Ace: his loud, combative, aggressive side. the side that makes people think he's nothing more than an angry meathead who can't do anything right. we never got to see much of his other sides, of a much more somber, melancholic Ace. receiving even a hint of the Ace we see in his confession of guilt beforehand would have given him the depth we needed before this point.

to explain what i mean: imagine how unsatisfying it would have been if we never got to actually see Arei's breakdown in the playground. if Teruko had left before it happened, and we only get to learn what happened from a flashback from David's perspective. we already feel the weight and tragedy of Arei's death when her body is discovered because we knew beforehand why she behaved the way she did, how she never even liked being the way she is, and wishing she could be a good person like Eden. if we didn't get to see that happen beforehand, Arei's death would feel very flat and detached. her character growth would've happened entirely retroactively.

that's how i feel with Ace. it's not like he didn’t get enough spotlight this chapter, he certainly did. but every scene he was in really didn't really add anything new to him. the only thing that "progressed" with him was his hatred and paranoia. we just see him descend with no uplifting moments, no emotional hook to make us feel anything for him. the closest we get is the scene where he's arguing with Nico and Veronika at lunch, ranting about how poorly everyone thinks of him and that they all assume that he's for some reason happy to be the way he is. but it's really the barest of scrapes towards the deeper layers of his character.

a big problem is that there were a lot of chances for his character to actively be *explored*, but instead, the narrative perspective of him stays completely stagnant. the time we get with him this chapter doesn't give him any greater focus. and sure, you could say that that might be a big giveaway to him being the culprit, but i think if the time between character spotlight is distributed evenly, that would be easily circumvented. there was a lot more time that could've been spent building Ace's character beyond his animosity and self-loathing tendencies. we could have had someone actually attempting to bond with him, even if it doesn't turn out well. even if all the characters distrust each other to varying degrees, there's still a lot of characters that like each other or have unique bonds with each other that make them stand out and feel worth remembering, because those bonds contribute something to their characters. but with Ace? he truly gets the short end of the stick, because this isn't just the characters neglecting him, it's the story itself. if Ace got to have a moment like Arei, maybe someone to confide in, even if he wasn't really friends with them or liked them at all, him being vulnerable just once and having a moment with someone else would have rooted him in more as a person who fell victim to what the killing game wanted from him and not just a fictional character fulfilling the purpose required of them in the story.

honestly, it's a bit of a slap in the face, the way the show goes about it. because in hindsight, Ace's whole character is *meant* to be wasted potential. after all, his related phrase on Mai's bio page is "a girl who had a bright future".

he was set up to have the potential to change, the potential to add more to the story, the potential to show us more than what we were given. and i think the show kind of knows that and specifically perpetuates that. the scene where Teruko tells Levi to give up on trying to apologize to Ace almost reads as the show itself telling you to give up on Ace. that, why should we care about him? he's not going to amount to what we want from him. there's no use in investing our feelings in him.

whether or not any of that actually was intentionally doesn't matter, unfortunately, because rewatching so many scenes having this new context really makes it all seem like Despair Time doesn't want you to care about Ace. that Ace is meant to be a waste, that that's the core of his character. him being the epitome of wasted potential could have been great, actually, if they chose to use even a slight bit of that potential to build him up more before his inevitable demise. instead we watch him eat shit throughout the entire show thus far only for him to get royally fucked at the very end in the worst way possible. Ace's theme of wasted potential is only wasted potential because nothing is ever done with him. not actively, anyways. whatever his post-trial confessional is like won't really give us what we needed from the start. Ace didn't just deserve better in his life. he deserves better as a fictional character. he deserved to be a person and not *just* a character. he deserved to have deeper, emotional character moments outside of the trial, long before his murder confession and rapidly approaching demise. he deserved to be 3-dimensional.

again, this is all just my personal opinion, and there's still a chance the show can stick the landing and make Ace as the culprit feel a lot more natural and deserved. i'm not really confident in that happening, but drdt is full of surprises as well as a lot of great writing. that being said, even though i believe they kinda fumbled the bag with Ace here, i don't hate this turn of events. although he's a big favorite of mine, i still wanted Eden to be innocent over him, because she's also a great character and her killing Arei would not only be pretty huge character assassination, but would also make Arei's death meaningless. and i also think there were other characters who could have been better candidates as the chapter 2 killer (not just Hu, i think Levi, Arturo, and maybe even J also could've made for compelling culprits with the right reasons).

i'm content with this. i'm heartbroken he's going so early and i wish the execution of his guilt had been a lot better, but overall it's not terrible. he just deserved so much more in many different ways.

#i'm still worried i'm not articulating this well enough #and its 2am right now as i'm finishing this up so i'm not writing with the clearest of minds #but i think this at least conveys the way i feel somewhat accurately #again. i want to reiterate that i fucking love this show and that Culprit Ace was not a terrible idea #now that it's canon i can see a lot of the good that comes from the concept #but i don't think it was handled very well unfortunately #culprit Hu would've been super awesome ESPECIALLY for this trial but like. i understand she's not and that's okay #and i'm really excited to see what happens with her going forward!#so yeah. drdt is really good. but it's not perfect. but that's also a part of what makes it so good #you feel me?#drdt #danganronpa despair time #despair time #drdt spoilers #despair time spoilers #danganronpa despair time spoilers #drdt chapter 2 part 2 #ace markey #arei nageishi #thanks for the ask btw i like it when people are interested in my thoughts and i'm not just talking to the bars of my enclosure lmao

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heroictoonz · 6 months ago

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I’m not the biggest Wu enjoyer ever in fact most the time in private friend servers and dms with close pals I joke about hating him and wanting him out the show I’ll admit to that. But like. I do think about the moments that probably were but never shown. I honestly think about Wu a lot

I think about Wu alone in the monastery with Cole, the first Ninja he recruited. A young man who was still grieving his mother even after all this time and in his own way, maybe unknowingly, grieving his father as well. I think about Wu possibly finding Cole constantly training in the main area at all hours of the day and night just to keep his hands busy. Wu sitting with him and maybe even being nervous to say anything to him. His last pupil he drove away. What if he did the same to this one? His last pupil was like a son to him and he screwed it all up and has to live with that on his hands and yet, here he is, trying it all over again, praying to the ghost of his father and anything in the heavens that will listen that he doesn’t make the same mistakes again. Maybe he sits quietly with Cole, not stopping him but letting him silently know that he isn’t alone no matter how long the monastery halls seem to feel. Bringing Cole water or a snack even when they both should be asleep. Finally, at one point, having the courage to tell him that he should sleep more. That if he wanted to talk, about anything at all, that Wu would be an ear to listen. I wonder if Cole would talk to Wu about any of it. Maybe not about it all. But maybe bits and pieces of his frustration and anguish that was clearly haunting him in those early days. I think that Wu’s words might even be enough to calm some of that in him. Maybe not all of it, and maybe Cole still pushes himself to keep away feelings and thoughts he can’t handle, but he sleeps more. He rests more. He takes breaks with Wu and has tea with him.

I think about Jay joining and being probably really skeptical about the whole thing. Probably distant with Cole cause he doesn’t know this guy. I think about Wu bringing in this second pupil, knowing by now that he was building a team that he would have to train not just in the ways of spinjitsu and their elements but also train them to be one with each other in battle. An anxious Wu trying desperately to get the two to talk and just hang out if even just for a meal or two. Wu bringing them together and having them build not just their strength and skills but their trust in each other too. Wu probably asks Jay about his parents. Seeing how Morro and Cole’s family backgrounds were he probably feared a trend settling in. Maybe Wu is plesently surprised when Jay tells him about his loving, though kinda embarrassing and smothering, parents. His parents who, even after moving out, he still writes to and stays in contact with as much as possible cause he doesn’t want them to worry. Maybe Wu smiles when Jay tells him that he’ll probably meet them someday.

I think it was very soon after that Wu found Zane. I think about Wu asking the people of that village about the strange boy who wondered their town alone, memoryless. With nothing to him but a name and a kind heart. Wu finding him and giving him a funny surprise in that lake. Pulling Zane out and offering him and permanent home. Maybe even catches the words in his throat as he feels the similarities between Zane and Morro. Strange orphaned children with nothing but their names and the clothes on their backs. Promising them a forever home. He hopped this one he could keep that promise. He’d do anything to keep that promise. Wu bringing Zane to the others, a little worried at first knowing that Zane was already very different from most people. Cole and Jay, where getting along better now, were still full of bite and fight. If he weren’t careful he would be putting this poor boy into the lions den. It goes better than he expects. Zane fits in easily with the other two. Wu is almost surprised by it, but thankful nonetheless. But this is where his real challenges begin. Training the three together, coaxing them to be more than just teammates. Knowing that it wouldn’t be enough. That they needed to trust each other implicitly. Maybe he was thinking about the tornado of creation, knowing that unless these three (and the fourth that he was still searching for) would need to be in near perfect harmony to pull off such a feat. But that they would need it in their coming battles.

I think about Wu holding back tears when he walks in to see the three goofing off. Yes they were meant to be working (maybe chores or training) but they were goofing off. They were getting along. Acting as friends and companions. And both Cole and Jay continued to argue but it was less like strangers and more like family. (They occasionally would remind Wu of him and his own brother from a long, long time ago.) I wonder how much pride Wu felt when he noticed that Cole and Jay were attempting to help Zane when he didn’t seem to catch up or understand something in a social or emotional situation. Even if they did throw in a few friendly insults at the poor boy here and there. Wu probably got a good laugh of the three pulling pranks on each other. Cole and Jay coming up with some to try and ease Zane into the concepts of practical jokes and being rightfully surprised when the future ice ninja got them back just as good.

I especially think about Wu when he meets Kai. Young and angry and a spark just waiting to ignite and explode. Violent and uncontrollable. And a spitting image of Ray. I wonder if Wu thought of his old friend when he saw Kai. The soft way he mentions the man in their conversation about the golden weapons. I wonder how much Wu misses his old friends and if he mourned them at the same time Kai and Nya did seemingly worlds apart and still shedding twin tears under one moon. I think about Wu feeling a frustration with Kai he’d probably never felt before. He sighs when he’s alone in his room. His head is his hands. “Father, how would you teach someone who seems so unreachable?” He would ask to no one. He would run his hands over his face and try to remember if Morro was this stubborn. But Morro had only become stubborn later in his trainings when his arrogance and drive for power blinded him. Kai was born stubborn and arrogant it seemed. Wu might even smile with exasperation and wonder to himself ‘how did Ray and Maya raise such a child?’

I think about Kai distancing himself from the rest like how Jay once did. Throwing himself into his training like how Cole once did. A young man alone and lost in the world as how Zane once was. Seeing so clearly how he clung to his sister and had a drive like no other to get her back. Maybe Wu even worried that after they rescued Nya that Kai would leave. That he would see no use in sticking around. Wu doubted that this soon encounter with his brother would be the last. Maybe Wu saw much of Morro in Kai and felt something almost like fear. Fear of losing Kai to a similar fate? Fear of Kai being pushed away when all Wu wanted to do was bring him close to the rest of them? Maybe even a fear that the shadows of his past would keep him from meaningfully connecting with Kai like he tried to do with the other three.

I think abut Wu bringing Kai tea. Wu pulling Kai in to eat and train with the other three. Wu trying to take the lessons he had learned from all this time and help Kai transition into the team. And similarly, help the rest of the team transition into including Kai. Kai was full of just as much bite and fight as Cole and Jay when they first met, maybe more. Definitely more. But Wu wasn’t going to give up on him. I think about Wu catching quiet moments of Kai’s sorrow. What he normally covered up in anger but sometimes was too weak to do so. Wu sitting next to him and telling him stories about when he and his brother were growing up. About how the loss of their father affected them. About how the loss of his brother affected him. Maybe Kai would snap at him. Telling him that they were nothing alike. That Wu couldn’t understand. Maybe Kai says something harsher. Says that at least Nya wasn’t trying to destroy the world. That he would get Nya back. That Nya wasn’t some evil freak. And Wu would let every word slide off him like water. Because he knew Kai was just angry. He knew Kai would be angry for a while.

I think about when they get Nya back. When Wu officially introduces himself to her. I wonder if he knew she was the water element right then and there. Did he know that she would one day show signs. I wonder if he has his suspicions but decided to wait and see. The elements are tricky things. They do not always do as expected. I think about Wu noticing just how equally as stubborn Nya is as Kai but how much better she tried to mask it.

I wonder if Kai ever apologized to Wu for how he acted. I think about Wu stopping him and reassuring him that it was nothing to worry about. Wu knew he was just upset for the fate of his sister. Wu was just thankful all turned out well in the end.

I think abut Kai and Cole both seeing a father figure in Wu that the other two probably don’t connect with as much. Maybe Cole is a bit more open about it than Kai. I wonder if, when Wu realizes this, if it worries him. Morro haunts him like a ghost. His greatest regret. In a life of mistakes the one he mourns the most. I’ll always wonder how much Morro’s impact on Wu’s life haunts his days with his new students. Maybe the ninja see Wu have his own silent moments. Days he can’t hide his own sadness. Whether for Morro or his brother. Maybe even both. Maybe even days when he remembers Aspheera or the other elemental masters. So many friends that he lost along the way.

Maybe the ninja try to cheer him up and be with him the same way Wu would for them. They bring him tea, offer to take him with them out to the city for their weekly run, ask him to tell them stories about the first spinjitsu master or about Wu’s old travels and adventures. Wu knows what they’re doing, but he lets them do it all the same.

I think about how Wu was probably constantly worried about Lloyd’s safety and health. He knew his mother had left him at that school. I wonder if Wu was against it or not. I wonder how often Wu would think about Lloyd, alone, festering in what would only become feelings of abandonment. Would Wu realize that? Or would he be just as blind to it as Lloyd’s well meaning (yet still wrong) parents? I think about Wu grabbing his dear nephew into a hug when they first reunited. Tucking him in and reading him that story. I think about Wu maybe even sitting Lloyd down and trying to talk to him about his parents. Especially his father. I don’t think it’d go over that well but I think he might try.

I think about Wu maybe feeling nostalgic when Garmadon was with them to rescue Lloyd. It must have been so, so long since the two were on a quest or adventure of some kind. Maybe he regrets the joy he feels or even hardly has the time to feel it knowing that Lloyd is in so much danger.

I wonder how much guilt Wu holds. I think about him regretting so much before the ninja and then even more so regretting being so closed off about it all and not saying anything before it’s all too late. “There was something I never told you.” “I should have told you all this long ago.” Keeping his past a secret probably out of shame or a fear of history repeating itself, only for it to cause his new family such distress and trouble. Learning the hard way that his past would always come back for him. From Morro to the Hands of Time all the way to Aspheera. I wonder if Wu regrets not being the one to tell Lloyd the truth about his heritage. Maybe he assumed Garmadon would have. Maybe he thought it was best for the young leader to not have to worry abut such things until once again it was far too late.

I think about Wu mourning his bother over and over and over again. Sometimes with Lloyd, sometime with Misako, but many, many, many times completely alone. In the silence of his own grief and regrets. I wonder if he ever sees himself and Garmadon in Nya and Kai. Or even just in the ninja as a whole. Not an exact one to one but seeing them be a family, watching them go on quests together, I wonder how often he thinks of his brother in those moments.

I think about Wu rebuilding a family and maybe not even immediately recognizing he did just that.

#holy shit thi sgot really long but ive been thinking about this stuff for a whil also its 2am #ninjago #master wu #lord garmadon #lloyd garmadon #kai jiang #kai smith #cole brookstone #nya jiang #nya smith #zane julien #jay walker #morro #i have so much to say about ninjago always and forever #even the characters i dont really like all that much I still could write essays about them #toonz talks

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guardian-angle22 · 2 years ago

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911: Lone Star | S4E17

#911 lone star #911 lone star spoilers #911lsedit #tk strand #owen strand #this was too fuckin cute #I love it when these two get to rib each other #i also highkey loved the tarlos outfits in this scene #my gifs #its past 2am why am i still awake i have work #episode: s04e17 best of men

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akiraal · 10 months ago

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he got arrested :/

#reemerging a month later to post another random fanart of my 90s au that builds slower than my skills in drawing #which is saying a lot because I still have no idea what I'm doing but hey. now it's colored!#brought to you by: my stubbornness. its 2am rn and I have a night shift tomorrow so I have to get used to staying up til dawn #I know the lines are messy and its /a lot/ but I just cant do simplified anything. hopefully I'll learn later on #btw this scene is supposed to be in the very beginning. right as he comes back from being drafted - he gets into a fight. as one does #he's not gonna get charges though. it's the post-soviet-type chaos we're talking about. that's also why the jacket is too big on him #I think the colors are weird but thats what you get when you dont learn color theory ig #voltron #vld #keith kogane #voltron legendary defender #keith vld #my art #brother 1997 #gonna hide under a rock now. bye

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the-ace-with-spades · 2 years ago

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I have the urge to write a seven-season-long medical drama, so here is a concept for Top Gun Hospital AU with ER hate-to-love hangster AU that no one asked for.

as a warning: this is a bit incohesive and silly

All the aviators are doctors and all the WSOs are nurses. With the exception of Bradley (but there’s an explanation for it).

Mav — cardiothoracic surgeon; Ice — former neurosurgeon and Chief of Surgery, current Head of Patient and Medical Services (so, entirely admin). I imagine they have the same kind of relationship as House and Cuddy in this, including Ice keeping an entire legal team for Mav’s unconventional practice methods. They've met during med school and had been rivals up until they both finished general surgery residency. Slider is an OR nurse turned anesthesia nurse. Goose was an ER nurse and met Mav during his rotation as a med student and died after an incident in the ER during Mav’s residency (that was the moment he switched from emergency medicine to surgery).

Phoenix — emergency, but she managed the impossible (like Mav) and switched from obgyn residency after the first year (only chose obgyn in the first place because of her mom, a renowned obgyn in Oregon), she's still really passionate about the obgyn field but didn't enjoy the work enough to do it for the rest of her life; Javy — general surgery; Payback — emergency with sub-spec in pediatrics; Friz — respiratory medicine; Omaha — oncology; Yale — ortho surgery.

Bob — a former OBGYN nurse, left because of a toxic work environment, working in the ER six months now, Phoenix's favorite nurse now, duh; Fanboy — started in peds oncology, had to switch because it was too hard on him mentally and is now peds emergency; Halo — started as a palliative care nurse, switched to oncology after a few years; Harvard — OR nurse, switched from general team to ortho

Hangman is the new trauma surgeon starting in their ER. Born and raised on a ranch, was expected to take over the ranch but never wanted to. Thankfully, he had too perfect grades to not send him to college — his parents wanted him to be a vet, which obviously didn’t happen, so he could stay close to the family business. He moved to California for his MD. He has terrible bedside manners with patients and patients’ family, but is surprisingly decent with kids, has lost respect for nurses sometime during his first residency year, and had a terrible case of Ego hit him during his trauma surg fellowship.

Now, about Rooster:

Bradley got into a pre-med program, Mav (who had set up Bradley’s college fund) said he’s not going to pay for it since he doesn’t want Bradley to be a doctor (long hours, lack of work-life balance, burnout, high stress, etc. It was more complicated because Mav still has the Goose trauma). So they had the fallout, Bradley moved out and deferred college to find a way to pay for it and, wanting to gather hospital experience, started working as a CNA in Peds ICU at a children’s hospital which accidentally was having a new CNA intake at the time. He liked it, actually loved it, and started hesitating whether he should continue with pre-med and be like Mav or go for nursing, like his dad. Year after, he got an offer from the hospital that said hey, we’ll fund some of your BSN as long as you work for us while you study and then work for us for another four years after getting your license. So he became a nurse, got certified as peds nurse after working two years in PICU and after another three, switched to the Pediatric Rapid Response Team, where he stayed for another two years before getting a spot as a senior nurse in adult/peds ER in a different hospital.

His relation to Mav and Ice only came to light a few months after the hiring process, as Bradley didn’t even know they worked there when he applied and it’s still a hash-hash topic in the ER. He’s been in the ER for almost three years now and has become an unofficial second-in-command as one of the few with substantial experience.

I imagine he’s definitely one the best nurses you could have as a patient — he’s honest but in an empathetic way, he’s worked in the most demanding environments with the most complex patients (ICU and RRT), he’s skilled and experienced in most procedures. Because he is one of the few male nurses, he’s the one dealing with inappropriate patients, aggressive patients, patients that need restraint, frequent flyers, etc. and he genuinely doesn’t mind — he is the perfect mix of calm and firm that makes him very reliable in most difficult situations. He is absolutely most reassuring and guiding with new stuff, be it new nurses or med students that don’t know what’s happening, and he doesn’t judge. It does help, too, that he was partially raised by two very cocksure surgeons and therefore knows how to deal with doctors that turned a bit too arrogant.

Before I go to the hangster part of this shit, I want y’all to know it all started because I found this Rooster-coded scrubs:

I imagine that he buys most of his scrubs since the work-issued scrubs don’t fit well on men (most unisex ones are very much just female fit stamped with unisex label) and peds nurses can have lots of cute ones so the kids feel less nervous around them

Also, this is a warning that yes, Bradley is trans in this scenario, too, because I said so. It's relevant to a few scenes, I think?? and there's tw for transphobic OC

Now, a bunch of scenarios I can see for this AU:

On the first day at his new workplace, Jake makes a reputation for himself. He confuses Nat, in her hospital-issued scrubs and with her doctor tag clearly on display, for a nurse and literally talks over her in front of a patient. Same thing happens with Billy because he’s Filipino and there is a large number of Filipino nurses everywhere and he’s stereotyping. Then he makes another patient’s parents agitated. This is when he meets Bradley — he takes over to talk to the parents and calm them down before it can escalate, basically shushing Jake out of the room. Jake doesn’t clock he’s a nurse at first — he’s a big, very fit, very well-built, very handsome dude with a questionable mustache who looks comical in a pastel pink scrub top with a teddy bear pattern and a matching headband on his forehead, but also the sheer shock of how different to all the nurses he looks gives Jake a pause — so he doesn’t say anything even if it pisses him off a nurse just forced him out of the room.

It starts innocently with Bradley though — Bradley comes up and asks, “Jake, can you put the narcotics order into the system for Lily?” and Jake scoffs and corrects, “Doctor,” tapping his full tag with Dr. Jacob Seresin.

Bradley, as the nurse’s tag says, raises an eyebrow and says, “Doctor Jake, can you put the narcotics order for Lily?” Natasha, standing behind him, snorts. Jake doesn’t even have the time to tell him off because he’s already gone when his brain processes.

Natasha drops off a patient on him — a taxi driver who had a stroke while driving and had been in a car accident, that had been thrombolysed but might need emergency surgery because of a suspected GI bleed. He’s stable, so they're going to check if he can be admitted to neurosurg and wait for his turn there or if Jake will need to take over before that.

Bradley hands him a tablet the minute he walks into the room.

“What’s that?”

“Results,” he supplies before going back to setting up an oxygen cylinder at the bottom of the bed.

“I didn’t order that,” he notes. The blood and urine panels are what he would order with suspected operable GI bleed but he’s barely looked at the patient’s case before he walked in there.

“I did,” Bradley tells him as he switches the oxygen from the wall socket to the tank supply. “Faster this way.”

“No,” Jake says, blood boiling. “You do exactly what I tell you to do and only that.”

Natasha raises her eyebrows, high on her forehead. Bradley doesn’t hesitate — waves on Bob from behind the glass wall and they both grab each side of the bed.

“I supposed you want to put the CT order yourself then,” Bradley says as Bob takes the small back monitor and attaches it to the frame. He steps on the bed brake and rolls out the bed, straight into Jake and Nat, fast enough that he moves out of the way on instinct. “Better do it fast because it’s free now and I’m going.” *

“Did you see that? Who the heck does he think he is?” Jake asks Nat.

“Better put that CT scan order,” is all Natasha replies as she walks away.

It’s Reuben’s patient, an eleven years old boy with blunt trauma, and Jake makes a verbal order to Bradshaw, who is the boy’s nurse. “I understand but I think that—” and Jake goes, “If I want your opinion, I’ll ask for it.”

The whole room gets quiet and everyone looks to him — Reuben, Mickey, and the technician are wide-eyed.

Bradley just says, “Alright,” in a perfectly leveled voice and leaves the room.

Mickey is not making eye contact as he quips under his nose, on his way out of the room, “You do realize he basically runs this ER, right? You’re making your life a lot harder.”

Jake orders IV fluids for one of his patients which is also in Rooster’s section that day and he bleeps the order info to Rooster. Fifteen minutes later he sees that it hasn’t been filled and is like, hah, I knew there is a reason I hate that guy. Finds him when he passes Jake in the corridor and is like, “I want you to start the IV for room 7. Now,” and Rooster just tells him, “No, do it yourself or find someone else.”

They have a little back and forth as Jake follows him down the corridor which ends with another, “No.”

There’s still no charge nurse in the ER (she’s on medical leave that will most likely end with her leaving employment, from what Jake gathers) so he makes a datix and the ER nurse manager (Warlock) following up is apprehensive because obviously, he knows Bradley, and hears about what actually happened — Bradley was getting an igel for a toddler from the peds side and deemed it more important than starting a bag of saline to bust someone's blood pressure.

Jake feels like an idiot.

Jake and Reuben are charting next to each other and Reuben gets bleeped his patient’s lab results. Jake, who is also waiting for lab results, complains about how he sent a pod to the lab before Reuben. Reuben just gives him a look and says, “Yeah, that’s because I asked Bradley to put my request in.”

And Jake is like, “What does he have to do with anything?”

Reuben looks at him like he’s dumb and says, “He has more sway with the lab,” and walks away with his tablet.

Javy is doing a consult for Nat and stops to chat to Jake (they know each other from residency days) and Bradley comes by and says, “Maggie’s becoming hypotensive again,” and Javy observes as Jake looks at the nurse that came, gives him a very long, very detailed look and licks his lips.

He manages to think Oh before Jake asks, “Maggie?”

The nurse looks seconds from rolling his eyes. “Mrs. Lawrence? Room 5?”

“That's Margaret.”

“She prefers Maggie.”

And it goes on, with Jake standing there rigid, puffing up his chest and cocking his hip out. “Did you start the fluids?”

“Finshed already.”

“Start another bag.”

The nurse looks unimpressed and instead of confirming says, slowly, like he’s talking to a child, “Her fluid balance is positive. She’s usually on pressors.” Jake’s face gets red and he goes, “Then put an order for her.”

It’s kind of funny to observe and to be fair, the nurse does give Jake a minute to go over what he said, leaning his elbow on the counter, eyebrows raised, before he points out, in that damn slow, unimpressed tone, “I can't put orders for things like pressors."

He hands Jake the closest tablet and starts walking away.

Jake calls after him. "What, you're not even going to draft it for me?"

He doesn't even turn around and Javy is silently shaking from the laughter he's holding in, "I thought I wasn't allowed to do that, doctor."

Mav comes down to the ER to talk to Rooster on a slower day — about how they’re about to sponsor a new CRNA for the cardiothoracic surg unit and maybe he could put a good word for their development team for Bradley and yada yada.

It happens like that: Mav comes down, Bradley is charting next to the monitors station, Jake is going over a scan on the opposite side when The Dr. Mitchell himself comes down and stops next to Bradley. He gives Bradley and his pink Paw Patrol scrubs a look and clears his throat a couple of times before Bradley raises his gaze toward him, turning away a second later and ignoring him again.

Jake is freaking out — this is The Dr. Mitchell and one of the reasons Jake wanted to work in this exact hospital, along with the rumored to-be-announced cardiothoracic surg fellowship under Dr. Mitchell he had his eyes on. He’s been thinking about how to make contact with Dr. Mitchell since he started in the ER and here he is, telling unresponsive Bradshaw, “I heard you’re looking to go back for your Master’s in the near future.” Bradshaw doesn’t say anything and Dr. Mitchell adds, “We have a CRNA development spot for—” and Bradley tells him, not turning away from the screen, “I’m not an OR nurse,” and then taps his card on the computer’s reader to log out and walks away.

Dr. Mitchell is a fucking legend, a VIP of this hospital, so Jake just stands there, contemplating how the heck Bradshaw could do that and hears him mumbling under his breath, “Really slick, Mav,” and jumps on the opportunity to say, “I’ll be talking to his supervisor about this, his attitude is unacceptable, Dr. Mitchell.”

And Dr. Mitchell turns to him, raises an eyebrow and asks, “Excuse me?”

“The nurse you were talking to. He might be senior in here but his attitude’s been horrible and I’ll personally step in. This won’t happen again.”

Dr. Mitchell gives him a look before slowly saying, “I suggest you mind your own business, Dr. Seresin,” and walks away.

Nat is silently laughing a few feet away and Jake asks her what’s so funny. His heart dead-ass stops when she says, “You do know Dr. Mitchell is Bradley’s dad, right? They might not be on the best of terms but that’s still his son.” And Jake has the urge to bang his head on the keyboard in front of him.

TW for transphobia.

There’s a new nurse practitioner to be (graduated, about to get her cert) that's rumored to be a candidate for the charge nurse position. Izzy. She’s quite young for that, younger than Bradley for sure, must have barely worked in the clinical area before going for her Master’s. Jake doesn’t know if it’s on purpose but the nurse manager and Bradley keep on putting her in his section.

She’s—well, she’s a bit too in his face. She agrees with everything Jake says and doesn’t roll his eyes at him, which is boring, and she’s, for an NP, not that knowledgeable. She doesn’t argue with him, which is a change, and Jake starts to hate it after about five hours. Her voice is saccharine sweet, she keeps on standing a bit too close to him at all times, and she’s decent with patients, but she keeps on asking him about the smallest of things.

Jake’s section is less busy, usually, since he deals primarily with trauma in the ER, but she never bounces off to help others when she is free, like Bradley did. She’s clinging to his section, a little bit, and he doesn’t get why. It’s not like he is any nicer to her than to Bradley or any other nurse.

She is busy taking bloods and Bradley finds him when he has a second alone, finally, and enlightens him about why.

“If you don’t believe me, you can just ask any other nurse. Everyone noticed.”

“If you really think that then why do you keep putting her in my sections?”

“I don’t. She’s senior as an NP, she’s taken over allocation from me now.”

Jake’s mind only focuses on one detail. “You were allocating yourself to my sections?”

“Only because no one wants to work with you and because I’m actually certified in trauma.” That makes sense. It’s not like Bradley would work with him voluntarily. “Look, all I’m saying, you watch out — you fool around with her and then reject her and she’s going to HR. I know the type.”

“The type?”

“You know, the girl that thought she’ll become a nurse, snag a rich doctor and never work again? Well, it’s not always women, there are guys who do that too, but in this case, she’s very much the type.”

“And you think she’s trying to—snag me?”

“She’s certainly not going after the residents that are getting paid twelve bucks an hour or Reuben who is married,” he points out. Which, again, fair, even if he didn’t know Reuben is married prior to this strange conversation.

Jake stares at him, processing, until he blurts out, “I’m gay.”

“Then you’ve got nothing to worry about,” Bradley says after a second, eyes barely noticeably a bit wider, before he walks away.

“Was he bothering you, doctor?”

She calls him doctor, always, and it honestly makes him grit his teeth. Now even more. He’s got a bad feeling about it.

It gets confirmed later when Jake is taking care of a six-year-old girl who had fallen down the stairs. She’s dehydrated and Izzy’s just tried to put a cannula on her three times before Jake told her to grab the bedside ultrasound and not make the girl cry even more.

Bradley passes by the room and Jake’s learned that he can’t leave a distressed child alone, so he comes in and gets the parents and the girl relaxed. He’s about to go in and tell him to leave it alone until Izzy brings the ultrasound when Nat grabs him by the arm and tells him, “He was in a Rapid Response Team, I’m pretty sure he can put a cannula in blind. Just let him do it.”

And he does let him. Watches, expecting the girl to burst into tears at any moment but she never does. Bradley’s literally been in the room for less than ten minutes and it’s all back to calmness.

Izzy comes back with the ultrasound. It should not have taken her so long to grab it. “What is he doing there? That's my patient.”

"He said he can put the IV line without the ultrasound.” Well, Nat said so. Jake can’t believe he’s saying but, “He’s a peds nurse, he’ll be fine.”

“I’m sure the girl's parents wouldn’t want him anywhere near her.”

This sets alarm bells in Jake’s head. “What do you mean?”

"People like him shouldn't be around kids," she says, to his horror. She leans in, way closer than needed, and conspiringly whispers, "Dr. Seresin, haven't you known that he is, you know, a she in disguise?"

He’s dumbstruck. "I'm sorry?"

"He's actually a woman, just pretending to be a man because he's mentally—You're the doctor, I'm sure you know better than I how the brains of people like them work. He shouldn't be around that girl, is what I'm saying. I certainly wouldn't like him around my child, if I had one."

Jake didn’t know this about Bradley but he understands what she means, even with how awful she is about it. This, however, should not be a piece of information thrown around in public if Bradley didn't wish to disclose it, and certainly not in such a manner. "And how do you know that, exactly?"

"Nurses share a locker room, it's not hard to notice how she, you know, mutilated herself."

Jake doesn’t say anything out loud but mentally he is preparing datix report in his head. He catches the ER’s nurse manager before he goes home, too, because that’s some shit he doesn’t stand for. He might be an asshole but he’s not a bigot.

Next time he comes to work, Bradley is back in his section and Izzy is no longer employed.

“Thanks,” Bradley says, when they’re at the station, next to each other, in a relatively slow moment. “If I went on my own, we’d have a weeks-long investigation that would probably end with her or me moving to a different unit.”

“She said this shit to your face?”

“Kept calling me she in front of patients,” Bradley admits after a moment. “I think most of them thought they misheard but—I knew.”

“Well, good riddance then.”

Bradley snorts, but he’s looking down at the tablet in his hands, smiling, and wow, the apples of his cheeks are so round and his eyes so bright and Jake can't breathe for a second.

---

(there might be a second part coming because I meant seven-season-long medical drama literally-- including Jake realizing he's an idiot, Mavdad drama, Jake having his hands inside Bradley (in the literal, surgical sense) and jealousy that could rival the McDreamy/Dr. Grey drama)

#this is unrealistic b/c its a med soap drama-like #not the actual chaos of er-like #as in med nonsense to be precise #also I don't know how american ers work #ive talked to a trauma surgeon twice in my life so sorry #i’ve mostly written it while trying to stay awake in the break room at 2am or to not fall asleep on the bus home #still having cluster headaches btw we're just too short-staffed to not go to work even if I have to sit out for an hour in the break room #bradley rooster bradshaw #jake hangman seresin #hangster #icemav mention #tgm #tgm au #trans bradley rooster bradshaw #<< im going to fill that tag even if it takes me years #op #charlie writes #hangster hospital au

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