#alternatively: i wish you a very yuri

[anonymocha]

i wish you a very framed-by-lilies

[timemachineyeah]

Takarazuka Revue is so funny because it’s like we are a fine upstanding institution of good family values, like homophobia. Please ignore the lesbians making up the majority of people both on stage and in the audience.

Takarazuka Revue is like: we enforce only the strictest gender roles in our troupe as is right and proper, sorting them into the two genders: women who are women, and women who are men. How dare you suggest there’s anything queer about that.

Takarazuka Revue is simultaneously the queerest thing and the least queer thing to ever exist. Takarazuka bucks tradition and is tradition incarnate. Takarazuka is like

and then is like, “no homo”

and maintains itself as one of the most hierarchical artistic organizations in the world with intense control over its performers. This alternate reality where the talented (and lucky, and connected) few can gain the right to openly perform queerness in the one setting comphet capitalism has carved out for them as long as they follow a different even stricter set of rules for dress and behavior. It dissembles traditional gender by its very existence and so must reinforce it at every turn.

And yet despite being the product of a conservative capitalist railroad owner who only really sought to exploit women for entertainment aimed at men (and their hetero families) that remains loyal to those deeply normative puritanical roots, it was and is also one of the most liberating theater and media experiences of queer Japanese people for decades. You can tell from all the queer art about it, by queer people. By the fact that the audience who flocked to it were not (cis) men.

Trying to untangle the mutual influence of shoujo manga to takarazuka is even more difficult that trying to untangle something like the history of modern Broadway and Disney movies. We wouldn’t have The Little Mermaid without Little Shop of Horrors, but we wouldn’t have Wicked without the Disney renaissance, but we wouldn’t have Frozen without Wicked, and going back further to things like Cinderella and Rogers and Hammerstein and they are intertwined but listen to me. Takarazuka and shoujo manga, especially yuri, are more intertwined. And then so much western media has been inspired by shoujo anime. Rose of Versailles the manga was inspired by Takarazuka and then in turn was adapted into their most famous play which then in turn influenced so many more artworks. Uranus and Neptune are an otokoyaku and musumeyaku. Utena and Anthy (and honestly that whole ass show. The stairs?? C’mon). And all the works and creators THOSE works inspired.

We owe so much to Takarazuka but also if we tried to thank them for their role in queer history they’d be like “we’ve never been queer in our lives!!!!!!!!” and then say a slur to your face while taking your money. Incredible. Wish more people knew what the fuck it was and I could get fansubs.

[jaquik]

Hi, I'm writing some Ranma 1/2 fanfiction

I suppose I might as well put this here too.

Hello, my name is Jaqui. I'm a transwoman and I'm a fan of Ranma 1/2 (I suppose that's redundant). I first read fanfiction for Ranma in the early 2000s while I was still firmly an egg. Then, in May 2020, a couple of years after I came out, I got back into it thanks to AO3. I devoured as many fics as I could and started to meet people on twitter and discord that were also into Ranma. Eventually, in early 2021, I finally decided to take a shot at writing my own fics. Now I find myself currently at 10 stories and counting. If you are interested, you can find my fics on AO3.

I also have commissioned several pieces of artwork for my fics, done by the fantastic writer and artist Fern Bedek, some of which are included below. You can find more of her work and commission her for you own stuff at https://beedokart.tumblr.com/

Finding Oneself (https://archiveofourown.org/works/29627430)

Akane is feeling down after the failed wedding, so Ranma (who is currently figuring things out about herself) offers to take her on a girls day out.

My very first fic, a post-canon story inspired by the common yuri staple of the two girls spending the day together on a definitely not date. While trying to figure out how to set up Ranma making the suggestion in the first place, I ended up breaking her egg wide open in the first chapter. Not much of a slow burn there. I still think I did well with the story and am glad my first attempt at writing my own thing was positively received.

Mothers and Daughters (https://archiveofourown.org/series/3412471)

What if Nodoka had some additional information before her first visit to the Tendo household? And what other secrets may she be hiding?

My first attempt at an AU. Basically, I wanted to try my own alternate take at Nodoka's first meeting where she realizes who Ranma is right away and is also completely accepting of her child. While working out the details for why she knew, I came up with a twist that seemed to throw everyone by surprise and let me take some interesting directions with Nodoka's past.

Genderfluid Mechanics (https://archiveofourown.org/series/3285123)

Taking things from the top with an extra twist: What if the youngest Tendo had a little something extra in common with Ranma.

Another AU, this time with Ranma and Akane's first meeting. I decided to explore what it would be like if both of them were actually genderfluid. Also my first time writing a story purely from one person's point of view.

A Butterfly's Wing (https://archiveofourown.org/works/38048443)

Ranma is given a chance to change one event from his past, and now is left wondering what the change actually was. As well as what surprise is in store for her next.

This time, I went a little further with the AU concept by having the character know they are in an alternate universe. This is my own stab at the 'character makes a wish and now things are different' subgenre. This has given me a chance to explore a bit of mystery writing, seeing what hints to give to guide readers as to what actually happened in this alternate universe.

An Honorable Lie (https://archiveofourown.org/works/42611670)

Shortly after her first meeting at the Tendo house, Nodoka has a realization about the girl named Ranko. Now she is ready to reunite with her child …as soon as she can figure out how to honorably deal with the contract hanging over both their heads.

Artwork done by the amazing Mariana Nicoleli

Another retake on Nodoka's first meeting. This time, she realizes who Ranko is a little later after already revealing the whole contract thing. While she's accepting of her trans daughter (as far as she knows), she feels she cannot reveal it out of fear that she would have to enforce that contract. This one is from Nodoka's POV and it's been fun trying to gauge her thought processes.

Musabetsu Kakutō Ryū Tenka'ichi Budōkai (https://archiveofourown.org/works/43678938)

Roshi ends up with a new student along with Goku and Kuririn. How will this strange gender switching martial artist affect things at the upcoming tournament?

First stab at a crossover, this one with Dragonball. A difficult thing with mixing these franchises is how to deal with power gaps. My solution was to go back to the beginning, as in the 21st tournament. At this point Goku, while very strong, was still quite beatable by regular humans. This also gave me the chance to play around some more with gender (Anyone order an agender Goku? Cause you're getting one).

Secrets and Truths (https://archiveofourown.org/works/43993947)

Akane has a secret meeting with a certain rival. Where they can openly discuss things that they cannot divulge to anyone else.

A chance to play around with Kodachi a bit, along with having her interact with Akane. I couldn't help but notice they shared a blind spot around not noticing someone's curse, albeit a different person each, so I decided to make a little twist on it.

Cute As A Pig (https://archiveofourown.org/works/45134467)

Akane makes a comment that Ranma does not take well. Will a certain sumo pig raising farm girl be able to clear everything up?

Inspired by this lovely art piece (https://www.tumblr.com/ylvasart/708079407910223872), I decided to explore what would happen if Akane and Akari were girlfriends before Ranma showed up, and what would happen to Ranma because of this. Being me, it naturally ended up very trans and lesbian.

The Wild Wind And The Scarlet Sea (https://archiveofourown.org/works/48352432)

What exactly did happen in the pasts of Haruka and Michiru? And how are those pasts connected to a certain pigtailed martial artist and their tomboy fiancée? A lot more than you might think it turns out.

Another crossover and my first attempt at a fuku fic. For this one, I set about making Ranma as Sailor Uranus, something I haven't really seen done before, which is very odd to me. Uranus is described as being both a man and a woman and Ranma and Uranus both utilize wind based attacks. So, this is my stab at writing it.

Dear Diary (https://archiveofourown.org/works/50489872)

A secret, hidden away diary, containing a single entry, written by a girl who no longer exists.

Based on the probably most well-known anime episode Am I Pretty, this was a chance for me to play around with formatting by trying to match the style of a teenage girl writing things down in a physical diary to a digital page.

So, if any of these stories have managed to pique your interest, please check them out and I hope you enjoy them.

[screemnch]

The Pathologic Russian and English analysis: Clara Saburova the Changeling Part 2

I am finally free to have a single month of summer vacation, so I'm taking this opportunity to finish up the last of the healer to healer communication analysis. Are you excited? I sure am.

As the Haruspex: I uhhh… Don’t have much to say specifically about the differences between Clara in Russian and English that I haven’t already said. Like yeah, she acts differently with Artemy than she does with Daniil, but that is present in both of the versions - she is much more vulnerable and emotive with Burakh, while she is a lot more deceitful with Dankovsky (which is sorta muddled by the fact that he’s the only one of the two to meet her "twin"). She refers to Artemy using exclusively the informal “you” and has a very stubborn and argumentative way of speaking for most of it. The instances of the “biblical” way of speaking that I pointed out in the Bachelor route are less frequent here, and Clara comes across as, well, just a girl. I uh… Also think that the dialogue website I’m using might be missing the bit of dialogue on day 11 when Clara actually offers to help Artemy? It has the dialogue for when he’s already in the Kaiur, but not beforehand (and the wiki tells me that they do talk in person before that. Correct me if I’m wrong). Sooooo yeah, that’s about it. This analysis is a bit more… Explaining the references and intertextualities within the dialogue rather than discussing what translational differences imply, but I think it’d be a cool insight nonetheless. So let’s get started!

This is… Completely unrelated to any translation stuff, but I did want to provide a little bit of intertextual context for “Suok” to allow all the fans that don’t speak Russian to speculate about this on their own. I tried to look up and see if there were any other potential sources for this name, but haven’t been able to find any alternative ones. So here goes. Suok is a last name, which served as inspiration for a character name from the Russian story book “the Three Fat Men” by Yuri Olesha. Very briefly the story is about a town being held under the oppressive rule of the titular three fat men, who had each taken control of one of the town’s resources (that sure reminds me of someone). Suok in this story is a young circus performer, who pretends to be the previously broken doll of Tutti - the Fat Men’s heir. She does so to free one of the leaders of the revolution that has been captured and sentenced to execution. It is revealed in the story that Suok was actually the twin sister of Tutti, which is why the doll looked so like her - it was made to replace her. It’s not the most well known of Russian stories, but it’s recognizable enough for an expat like me to remember. Thematically I do think it’s funny that there’s a reference to a story where three powerful people attempt to squash a revolution (which is by the way led by two men), and a little girl with a twin ends up saving one of those revolutionaries from certain death. And the doll theming. However, if I’m just ignorant and there’s actually like… A Buryat or Mongolian name or entity that’s also called Suok and it’s actually a reference to that… I shall wear a dunce cap, or something, Idk.

I really wish that I could convey how… Story-like Clara’s way of speaking becomes here? Like, yeah, she does talk somewhat… “biblically” but this is not that. She’s not just reciting the events, the way the story is phrased and the language flows feels like she’s restating it word for word. Especially in the part where Clara talks about how Suok was unkillable by anything - it’s all one continuous sentence. It reminds me of, and this is truly truly obscure Russian stuff, that one cartoon about Kutkh the Raven and the four silly mice that kept annoying the life out of him (it’s on Youtube I believe, so go educate yourself on some fairytales from Kamchatka). Those stories have a way of being both lyrical and conversational at the same time - it uses improper grammar (like starting your sentence with “and”) and feels very casual in its sentence structure, but the words it chooses and the matter it discusses is grandiose and epic (in the literary sense). Also a fun little detail is that rather than saying that the abyss couldn’t claim Suok, Clara says that she “did not wish to return to the abyss.”

Adding to my collection of “Clara and Artemy are a comedic duo, actually” is this moment in which (while the English version makes it sounds a little ironic and cautious) Artemy just casually goes “wow, that’s just like us…” as Clara is telling him the Kin’s creation myth. Though you can’t tell me that he wouldn’t be the kind of person that looks at a Bosch painting and goes “that’s so me.”

More from the “fun Russian idioms” world…While we do have a translation of “a little bird told me” in Russian - it is exactly that - a translation. From English actually. The idiom used here is, as far as I know, an originally Russian one. Namely “a dog barks, the wind carries it” which is essentially just “yeah it’s gossip I heard on the street.” Nothing particularly significant about this difference, just thought y’all would appreciate it.

At this point I’m becoming painfully aware of the fact that calling these an analysis of a specific character is silly, because there’s always two people involved in the conversation, but the format has been set already sooo… I could wax poetic about how much more laconic Russian is in terms of threats (partially due to the fact that we don’t use articles and stuff) but also I can’t help but feel like this was much easily translatable? Like, the line is, essentially “let’s hope you don’t regret this!” which is very much a threat already. But I guess the translating team decided to take the road less travelled.

I think I may have peaked. It doesn’t get better from here, this is the ultimate achievement of this analysis. In the last instalment of the madness project I spent a whole paragraph trying to explain why the Bachelor calling Clara “trash” was actually a scathing, humiliating insult that was translated as “little tramp” for no apparent reason, which made it seem (at least to me) a lot less cutting. I’d ask you to look at that screenshot in the previous analysis to see if you spot anything familiar, but I don’t even have an exclusive tag for this madness project (I totally should tho) and I won’t subject you to the other stuff I’ve written in my ramblings. I’ll just cut the suspense here: In this dialogue Artemy uses the exact same word that was translated as “tramp” for Daniil. The word “дрянь” (dryan’), meaning trash or something too worn out and torn to be useful. I understand this must’ve been done because the Bachelor and the Haruspex are supposed to have very different vibes about them and because, as previously stated, the Bachelor doesn’t get to be nearly as aggressive as he is in Russian but like… Wow. I think I need this in a meme format or something, because it’s just so funny to me. To clarify, too: “дрянь” isn’t an explicit swear word. It’s an insult, but it doesn’t need to be censored or anything. Neither “tramp” nor “bitch” fits the translation more or less. And I think that’s hilarious that they translated it so differently for the two characters.

And we’re back in the realm of “interesting” instead of “baffling” and “confusing”. Instead of “dying” or “letting people die” the two of them specifically talk about “killing”. Artemy asks if Clara wants to kill Taya, making the situation a lot more malicious from Clara’s perspective (this is the whole quest with figuring out how the story that Clara started telling Taya ends). Pretty short for a note, but it’s also just interesting in terms of like… How malice is attributed to Clara in the Russian version, but seems impersonal in the English version.

Just as fascinating (and probably just as short of a note) is this line, where in Russian Artemy calls Clara “daughter” with a diminutive. A lot of Russian words have diminutives, but it doesn’t necessarily make them appear kinder. Actually with words like “daughter”, the non-diminutive version – “дочь” (doch’) – is used a lot less and usually feels colder and more distant. The version with the diminutive – “дочка” (doch’ka) is the one used in everyday conversations. If you want to add endearment to the word, you’d have to put in another diminutive, making the word “доченька” (dochen’ka). That being said, I guess calling someone who isn’t related to you “son” or “daughter” isn’t too uncommon (though I usually picture it being said by like… grandmas on a bench, or helpful fairytale entities), though your everyday person is much more likely to just say “girl”, “boy”, or “kid”.

Not a translation difference, but I’ve already included a bunch of intertextual references in this particular analysis, so why not one more, huh? The story that Clara tells about the crystal flower, while obviously being an allusion to the town and the polyhedron, specifically referring to the utopian ending (cutting down the living flowers instead of the crystal flower -> razing the town and leaving the tower to stand) also reminds me of a specific story within the “Malachite Box” collection of the fairytales by Pavel Bazhov (check them out if you can, it’s a bunch of folk tales from the Ural mountains and they’re fascinating and incredibly dark). Specifically “the Stone Flower” - a story following Danila - an orphan boy that becomes a master-stone carver, but struggles to finish an order that doesn’t fit his own particular standards. He is told of the Stone Flower in the lair of the Mistress of the Copper Mountain (a force of nature entity that’s recurring in the “malachite box”) and how seeing it will allow someone to understand the stone and how to carve it. However he is warned that all who’ve seen it have always remained in the mountain, working for the Mistress of the Copper Mountain. Danila does, indeed, manage to see the stone flower and return to his bride, but what only manages to stay for so long before he destroys almost every single one of his creations and disappears without a trace. It’s left up for debate whether he simply went mad and perished in the woods, or if he returned to the Copper Mountain. I do think there are some parallels to be drawn between this story and Pathologic’s polyhedron – specifically in how it relates to Peter Stamatin. Not a one to one comparison, of course, but there’s something to be said there about the madness that comes with creating or trying to create something bigger than yourself, to the point where it’s less of the human world and more of the world of miracles and myth.

Not a particularly drastic difference here, but just wanted to point out that the whole “your lies are so crafty…” bit of this dialogue isn’t… actually present in the Russian version? I think the translating team kinda got used to the fact that this dialogue is almost the same as when Daniil talks to Clara, so they’ve added in this line even though Artemy just says “I’m fed up with you”.

To sum it up: yeah, I don’t have much. Clara is a fascinating character to me, but I do think that she is fascinating in both English and Russian. She’s a multitude of contradictory things, and she is condemned by those around her for either not fitting into the category they believe her to belong to, or being exactly what they believe her to be. She doesn’t get a break. Most of the differences between English and Russian have been just slightly “vibe altering” ones, and it’s a bit difficult to place a finger on the reasons why those changes I made. Like, with Daniil I could generalise that in an attempt to make him seem cold and detached, he accidentally lost a lot of his emotiveness. I have made the argument that Clara’s Russian dialogue makes her come across as more meta-aware (and there’s something to be said about how I argued that Clara and Aglaya are very idealistically opposed about the exact same belief and how that notion is echoed in Clara’s dialogue with Artemy) but at the end of the day… Yeah, the translators did a pretty good job with this one. I’ve said before that it’s not really a good idea to have every piece of dialogue include a footnote explaining what every word means (at least in a game like Pathologic. A game focused on education would be soooo fun with those. Like Martial Law, for example) but to add to that: I think it’s pretty cool that Ice Pick Lodge managed to create a game that is so distinctly Russian, that even a city boy like me can understand, despite taking place in the steppe. And at the same time, you don’t have to be Russian to understand it. I’ve provided a bit of intertextual context here, but you don’t actually need it to feel and understand what makes it so compelling, as seen by the fact that this game is beloved both in and outside of Russia. And I love that for all of us.

And that is it, folks, at least for the three healers and how they interact with each other. Up next (and hopefully not several months later) I'm gonna examine the shared dialogue that the healers have with the townsfolk. I guess that one will be both comparing the similarities and differences between the languages and between the three of them. Yippeee.

[itsmelilyv]

yuri recommendations for yuri day

Hello!! It is yuri day. Here is a short list of yuri I really love, if you're looking for something good to eat ~

Even Though We're Adults by Takako Shimura A bartender sleeps with a teacher, only to discover she's married. An exploration of the difficulties adults can have discovering and managing relationships.

How Do We Relationship? by Tamifull Two college lesbians start dating on a whim, but run into problems when they try to express their needs. A genuine, heartfelt look at the difficulties of communication.

Young Ladies Don't Play Fighting Games by Eri Ejima Girls at an uptight high school embrace their love of fighting games. Full of gorgeous renders of girls crying and screaming at games. There's a tournament arc. If you like competitive video games at all, please read this.

The Guy She Was Interested In Wasn't A Guy At All by Arai Sumiko An introvert with a love of hard rock makes a new friend. Incredibly stylish, and written clearly by someone with a love of music.

Liar Satsuki Can See Death by Ryouko Yuri-light. A high school girl, cursed to see death before it happens, tries to prevent it. A mix of detective mystery and slice of life, and very dark at times.

Otherside Picnic by Iori Miyazawa Yuri-light. Two college women explore a horrifying alternate universe, full of unknowable monsters, to make money while searching for a lost friend. If you like creepypasta, this might be for you.

---

Bonus Round, for absolute freaks like me who constantly need more to read:

Futari Escape: Two young women do anything they can to avoid work.

A Monster Wants to Eat Me: A high school girl who wants to die meets a mermaid who might grant her wish.

I Don't Know Which One Is Love: A college woman falls ass-backwards into five relationships at once.

She Loves to Cook, She Loves to Eat: Two lonely women befriend each other over their love of food.

Lily (by Yy): A high school love story grows into a college love story. Slowly, deeply explores the growth of a relationship.

Moonlight Garden: A secluded, otherworldly brothel hides the lives of it's mysterious inhabitants. One wants to escape.

And as for yuri games, I really love Ladykiller in a Bind (a bratty woman explores dom/sub relationships) and Heaven Will Be Mine (several women use mech fights as an excuse to make out)

---

I have read so so much yuri in the past couple of years and it's only getting better and better... we really are living in a golden age of yuri. I have at least twice as many I could recommend.

At some point I'll make this into a full, thorough post, like I did with Lily Explores Ten Transgender Manga (which I would super recommend if you want some good trans stuff~)

happy yuri day <3

[zzombiecleo]

what love could get this vicious?

i'm only like 2 hours late technically? whoopsie daisy! here's day 4 of yuri week! obligatory @mcyt-yuri-week, please enjoy this (or not, its not everyones thing)! check it out on ao3 as well!

fandom: life series smp characters: ldshadowlady, zombiecleo, mentioned bigb+ others ship: ldshadowlady/zombiecleo additional tags: major character death, graphic depictions of violence, alternate universe - superheroes/superpowers, superhero ldshadowlady, villain zombiecleo, emotional manipulation, manipulation, manipulative relationship, unhealthy relationships, unrequited love, murder, revenge, grief/mourning, mental instability, brutal murder, theyre both fucked up in this one!, drabble, mcyt yuri week, toxic ass fuckign yuri (affectionate), soemthing something revenge something something two graves summary: a grief-stricken hero hunts an unrepentant villian — mcyt valentines yuri week day 4: grief/revenge

LDShadowlady, superhero extraordinaire, is, according to everything Cleo knows, usually quite a nice and polite hero. Sweet, bubbly, but capable of dealing with threats easily when needed.

Unfortunately, her friend BigB never seemed to have quite perfected that skill.

Probably why it was so easy to kill him, actually.

Look, Cleo is well aware that she’s a horrible person! It’s her whole thing! She’s a villain for a reason, people! Killing someone who betrayed her the way BigB did is really not that big of a deal. She has done domestic terrorism before, murdering one random hero is not her worst crime. Yet, it seems that it’s the one that LDShadowlady has fixated on. Or, rather, the one Lizzie has fixated on.

Maybe she’s just upset about Cleo’s whole ‘tricking you into finding me sympathetic, making you fall in love with me so hard that you start spying on other heroes for me and then murdering your best friend in front of you after I got what I needed’ thing. Actually, not gonna lie, that does sound like the most likely reason Lizzie is currently on a one woman hunt for Cleo’s head. Attached or otherwise. In Cleo’s defence, what kind of hero actually falls in love with a villain. Also, the little shit deserved it. Maybe if he didn’t leave her for dead, they wouldn’t have killed him.

Joe always tells her she’s very vindictive. He also often tells them it’s one of their best traits. So, realistically, this is fine. This is fine.

Okay, so maybe the whole ‘pretending to date her’ thing was a teeny bit mean, even for them. Especially when she did it to one of the top heroes in the country. Cleo is, to be honest, screwed. Completely and utterly screwed. Apparently grieving and vengeful superheroes don’t tend to be very delicate when it comes to dealing with threats like, let’s say, a villain ranked #5 most wanted in the country. A villain like Zombie.

Cleo is standing on the roof of an apartment building, a cool night time breeze blowing her hair back, the only sounds the distant cars far below. It rained earlier so everything’s wet and they’re left to stand. She’s pondering all her life decisions, trying to figure if it was worth it. Just as she’s deciding that yes, revenge was in fact worth them being hunted by a pissed off hero, she hears a faint splash of something stepping in a puddle behind her.

Spinning around, she’s greeted by pink hair and a tear stained face. Lizzie. Fantastic. Just wonderful! Everything is fine!

“You!” Lizzie snarls, “You bloody monster!”

“I mean, I think that’s very subjective.” Cleo says, desperately wishing they actually told her friends where they were going today.

“Oh my gosh, I-” She stops and smiles, something dangerous and just a little unhinged hiding in her expression, “You know what? I really want to see you die!”

She launches herself at Cleo, not even bothering to use her little flower power to attack, going in with her bare hands. They smile and dodge. Despite the lies, fighting with Lizzie always felt like a dance. This will be fun! As long as they don’t die, obviously.

Lizzie swings wildly at them, nailing a solid punch on her jaw. Her eyes are wide with prominent bags and she doesn’t seem to be wearing her comms or the legally required camera that all heroes should have. That’s not good. But it’s fine. It’s all fine.

“I can’t believe I trusted you! You lied to me and I trusted you! I-” Cleo backs up and Lizzie slips in pursuit, grabbing their leg on her way down and dragging them along, “I bloody loved you, do you get that?! How could you?”

Lizzie climbs on top of her, keeping them on the ground and murmurs “The worst part is that I still bloody do! Because I’m stupid. And you’re beautiful. And you knew exactly what to say every time. I can’t believe I fell for you, for all your stupid lies!”

Cleo finally struggles free and throws Lizzie off of her and takes several steps back, wishing they kept comms on them.

“When you- When I saw you k-kill him, it didn’t quite hit and my first thought was about blummin’ heck, it was about helping you cover it up! You charmed that bloody badly, trained me like a blummin’ dog!” She stands, her costume dirty and wet, hands shaking, and they take some more steps back, “Can you even imagine how much I loved you? How much I still do because you know, I told you, that I hate letting go of people? You bloody monster. Did you ever even care?”

“LDShado-”

“Don’t! You know my name. I know you do, Cleo. Don’t be shy now.”

“Fine. Lizzie, then. What I figure is, I figure you’re real mad right now and- Well. You have the right to be, okay? I messed up, is what I’m saying. But I promise th-” They just wanted to buy some time, spout some of that bullshit Lizzie loves and get out. Clearly they didn’t say the right thing, not this time. No charming their way out now.

“No! No, no, no!” She lurches forward and grabs Cleo by the shoulders. “Oh no, you don’t! If you won’t say anything important. Then- Oh my gosh, then I suppose I can just cut to the chase!”

Lizzie pushes, far harder than they’ve ever felt prior and they land on the ground. Hard. Lizzie flips in her in a smooth move and grabs the back of her hair. They struggle but she won’t let go and the realisation strikes that no, everything is not fine, and that they never said bye to Joe when she left earlier and she left Scott on read and Stress was meant to drop by tomorrow and-

They realise the last thing they’ll ever see is the dirty concrete. The last voice they’ll hear is someone’s who loved them far more than they even thought of her. Will her friends even know what happened? There was so fucking much Cleo wanted to do! They wanted to tear down all this corrupt bullshit and have fun doing it! But now-

“I’m gonna avenge BigB. And myself. And my bloody heart! All in one!”

Nothing will come of any of it now, will it?

Then Lizzie pulls their head back and slams it into the concrete. And then does it again. Again. Again. Again, again, again againagainagainagain-

When the authorities arrive all that is left is a woman wailing and the unrecognisable remains of someone she thought was her forever.

[thecomicsnexus]

THE SHREDDER (FAN MADE)

2024 By Andrew Modeen, Mark Pellegrini, Arseniy Dubakov , Jim Lawson, Dennis Kennedy, Yuri Kochin, Andres Ponce, Rick Arthur, Keith Aiken, Frank Fosco, Dan Berger, and Courtland Brugger.

The Shredder returns once again to give exposition, kill characters that were already dead, and whatever.

SCORE: 3

This was almost a 2, and the reason it isn't is because there is a style already in place with Jim Lawson, and while it became confusing at critical moments of the story, I cannot really say I was expecting anything different. It's definitely not his fault that I got confused when I did.

And it's weird, that a story that completely underestimates the reader of a very targeted fan project, got me confused in the end. Well, more than just the ending... it kind of undid things that I assumed were going to stay the same in this alternate universe.

You may already know how I find epigraphs pointless most of the time, this graphic novel wasn't the exception. But I already know Andrew has some sort of compulsion to add them, so I wasn't really annoyed by them so much, mostly because, like what happened with the art, it is already a part of Andrew's style.

But the dialogues, man, that's where it always hurts. The unnecessary "LET ME SPELL IT OUT FOR YOU" exposition that takes up almost 40% of the dialogues, and sequences in this story, are just too much. And there is something in the way his character talk that just feels artificial.

As I was saying, the reader of a book like this, already knows 75% of the story. It's not cheap to make these puppies, so I feel like that was wasted potential to tell a fresh story. Did we need to bring back Shredder one more time? Did we need a Super Shredder?

There is a segment of this book penciled by Andres Ponce that made me wish the whole thing was done by him (although it wouldn't have really made things clearer). I am not sure what caused this chapter to be done by Andres, but his style, while manga inspired, is just more realistic than Jim's style. This wouldn't be a bad thing, but it is in the middle of the book, and the change of style is just too jarring. Since there is yet another chapter of Raphael fighting with Lucindra in this book (talk about endless cycles!), I think this encounter between Shredder and Karai could have added as a back-up story. I understand why it had to be in the middle of the book, but then the choice of art styles was wrong.

The moment that made me laugh was when Amaya died again. Why does Andrew keep bringing her back only to kill her?

And what is going on with Pimiko? Hear me out...

Pimiko and Amaya were explained to be mother and daughter in that "Image run unofficial conclusion" that Andrew made. Their death scene was one of the things I remember the most about those issues (not for any good reason), but that was there, and it was done. I wasn't expecting that story not to take place in the same universe, because the ending of it implied it led to Volume 4.

So we got a new spin on that story here. Which already took me (literally) out of the story, as I had to go check those issues, just to make sure I wasn't imagining things.

Then the other bit that really confused me and I just gave up was the last page of the main story. I feel I should recognize the characters... but I just couldn't tell what it meant. In a story that spells out who's who all the time, and what their relationship is to everyone around them, this last bit was a mystery.

There are significant changes to the origin of the Shredder as well. Nagi's act of violence is no longer the initial trigger of the cycle of revenge. Instead, it is explained that the Foot Clan... killed Saki's family... and then... kind of pushed Nagi into getting himself killed by Yoshi (okay...), to fuel Saki's rage and make him into their greatest warrior. It also introduced a proto-Shredder figure.

The book also ties ends. It kills April and Casey, because I am not sure why, April had to be at the duel with the Shredder. It is also revealed why Raphael and Shadow stopped seeing each other after this.

Also, female characters in these stories are technically the enemy, no matter what they're doing. Even when they're helping, they manage to betray someone, get themselves killed, or change their motivations every two pages.

There are Turtles in this story as well, but as you can imagine by the title, they are all kind of non-important and indistinguishable (I know Mikey is there because a Turtle has nunchaku).

The story does follow "TMNT: Origin" and namedrops "TMNT: 2030" (a story I thought took place in 2030, therefore the future of this timeline, but I now realize I have to read it again). This means the story is also in the same timeline as Odyssey, but lucky us, that story is not linked to this one explicitly.

So what did I like about this book? Well, it's always nice to see Mirage artists come in and do Turtles and their cast. Even if I feel the whole premise was a story I wasn't interested in reading.

How does it compare to Odyssey, Origin, and the conclusion of volume 3? Probably better than those. It has stiff dialogues with unnecessary swearing, and it's filled with cliches, but I think I either got used to them, or there was an actual improvement, especially in the story itself (not the dialogues). It looks like something Image Comics could have printed in 1993.

I don't know what plans Andrew has for the future, but I think getting more efficient with dialogue and script would really make his stories more entertaining.

Then again, it's clear that I am kind of alone in this line of thinking, as I always get recommendations from fans to read his stories. So what do I know?

[riversimmone]

In the Heat of the Moment

In The Heat of The Moment

RiverOfTheSand

Summary:

AU. This is what happens when the SasuSaku in my head is interrupted by Naruto and this alternate universe version of Team 7 get down and dirty on a hot day. Rated M for a reason. It is NOT REMOTELY YAOI OR YURI. It also has a SasuSaku moment...

Notes:

Cross-posting: I wrote this in 2011 so please forgive the weirdness and naivety of it. I don't think this needs the 'multi' category but if you disagree please let me know. Original fanfiction.net author note: AU one-shot. Okay, so for reference, it says on my profile that lately every time I try to write SasuSaku, Naruto pops into my head, looking for a threesome. Well, this is the result. Don't get confused, I'm not into reading or writing SasuNaru, nor writing NaruSaku, (the storyline has to be good enough for a NaruSaku for me to consider reading it), and this is NOT EVEN REMOTELY YAOI. Also: apologies for any and all OOCness. It is AU after all. This has come out more smut than I intended, but anyway… There's a threesome Sasuke/Sakura/Naruto and a SasuSaku lemon. Read, love, and review! :) Rated M. I hope you all enjoy. :)

Sakura Haruno fanned herself, cursing the sun and the humidity. Why oh why did it have to be so fucking hot? She had just had a cold shower to try to cool down, and was bloody hot again! Not to mention horny! She'd broken up with Sasori a week ago for cheating on her and was currently single. A part of her suddenly wished he would waltz up to her house right now and beg to fuck her one last time. She needed a scratch, so bad.

'Well there's always Sasuke,' she thought, staring over at him across the road; he was mowing his front yard, shirtless.

Sitting on the lounge chair on the front patio of her house, she was shaded, but hot, and very aware of the man hunk across the road.

She bit her bottom lip. 'Yeah right, like he would ever fuck me.'

Sasuke Uchiha was incredibly popular, despite his superiority complex. Hot, gorgeous and right now, very single! Sakura's eyes flickered over his nicely toned body as he worked away. That dark hair, those penetrating eyes, that glistening skin… The sound of a mocking voice drew her attention to the blonde sitting in the shadow of Sasuke's house, on the front patio and barely visible to her around the large tree in the front yard.

"Come on Sasuke!" Naruto Uzumaki cooed. "Put some effort into it!"

He stood and leant over the wooden railing of the patio and Sakura noticed that Sasuke wasn't the only one shirtless. She had to admit, his body was hot; that well toned, but lean body had her feeling as moist as the one that belonged to Sasuke.

'Stop fantasizing!' She snapped at herself. 'He's almost as popular as Sasuke!'

'And just as single,' a second voice in her head pointed out.

Groaning softly, Sakura stood as Sasuke started to berate his best friend, and stalked back into her house. She had only lived in Konoha for six weeks, having dated Sasori for two, and had yet to even speak to the hot, raven haired boy who lived across the road. The day her parents had forced her to move with them into this boring little town, she had been sulking quietly about taking this trip. When they'd arrived, she noticed Sasuke right away, sitting on his front porch and staring at her intently. Then Naruto had driven into the Uchiha driveway, and after a long, inaudible discussion on the patio (not to mention several glances in her direction), the boys had disappeared around the Uchiha house and into the backyard. Apparently, she wasn't worth their time. The oldest Uchiha sibling, Itachi, had come over to say hello, and even helped them move some of the heavier furniture. He was so sweet, so helpful, and soooo hot! But she quickly discovered he already had a girlfriend. Sakura had another cold shower and daydreamed about the air conditioner her parents had been promising for a week now. The holidays were killing her!

She watched television, surfed on the net, and then rang her new friend Ino Yamanaka to see if she was busy, realising too late that she had just interrupted her, mid-coitus.

Having hung up the phone, Sakura groaned. Everyone but her was getting laid. Then she jumped, startled as the cordless phone in her hand suddenly rang. It was her mother, reminding her to water the garden. She always worried about that, and Sakura always needed reminding.

The pinkette rolled her eyes. 'You and your shrubs, mother.'

Her parents were visiting friends for a few days, which at least gave Sakura some freedom for a while. So, she left the house and walked around the side to grab the hose. She was wearing short shorts and a small singlet, showing off her shape. She never tanned easily, just burnt in the sun. In the corner of her eye, she noted that Sasuke and Naruto were still in the Uchiha front yard, now both staring at her. They did this quite often. Naruto leant against the patio railing, while Sasuke stood rigidly in the shadow of the tree – both just watching her. She did not appreciate being turned into a spectacle, especially by two hot guys who didn't have the decency to speak to her instead of ogling!

But despite her annoyance at their stares, she had never once gone over there and berated them for it. Was she scared of them? They were both so popular at school that one bad word out of her mouth would send an army of fan girls to her house with pitchforks and flame torches. She shivered involuntarily.

But they wouldn't stop staring. Sakura hosed down the carnations and sunflowers (or whatever flower that was, that her mother was into this month) and spun around to face her audience. Sasuke's face remained impassive but even from this distance she could see the grin spreading across Naruto's.

'That is it!'

Fuming, Sakura stalked over to them. "What the hell do you two think you're staring at?"

"You," Sasuke said, nonchalantly and Naruto chuckled.

"Well, stop it!"

"No." The raven haired boy did not look intimidated by her, or offended. Naruto continued to grin at her.

She frowned. "Why not?"

Sasuke sighed and the blonde answered for him. "Because you're so fucking hot."

She felt her jaw drop. 'W-what did you say?"

Naruto jumped over the patio railing and landed lithely on the ground next to his friend. "I said you're hot. Only an idiot wouldn't want to fuck you."

That inner voice of hers flared up.

'Oh really, then why have neither of you tried?'

But outside of her head, she didn't know what to say. She was frustrated at their behaviour and a little turned on by the expressions they were both now casting her way, but the strongest sensation was the dancing butterflies forming in her stomach.

Sasuke saved her. "Naruto and I are best friends. We have been since before we could pronounce the words properly. So when we both saw you when you first moved in and both wanted to fuck you, we couldn't. Do you see the dilemma?"

Slowly, she nodded her head, mute and in shock.

'The bonds of friendship are more important to them than a contest to get laid.'

So, he was saying that he and Naruto don't ever compete with each other over girls. Most male friends entered these kinds of contests with each other. Sakura had learnt this the hard way at her old school, having lost her virginity to a guy who just wanted to win a bet with his friends. And even though Sasori hadn't made a bet with his friends to sleep with her (that she knew of), she had fucked him enough times to know that life was just plain cruel. It had just been sex for him, anyway.

But because of her natural tendency toward secrecy and respect for her own private life, people thought she was less experienced than she really was.

"Normally," Naruto said seriously, "teme and I have entirely different tastes in girls. This makes it easier not to ruin our friendship. We've never wanted to fuck the same girl like this before."

Sakura's eyes widened. 'Like what?'

She swallowed heavily, struggling to control her breathing under the intense glare of them both. They looked so collected, yet ravenous at the same time.

"And me?" She asked, only half-heartedly wanting to know the answer.

Sasuke smiled. She had yet to see him do that. It was always boredom, irritation or a smirk on his face. "It seems we've reached an impasse," he stated. "And there's only one option left, other than pretending from here on out, that you don't exist."

"Which is very difficult," Naruto added, his eyes raking her body. "Especially when you're dressed like that." He indicated to her skimpy clothes and she narrowed her eyes at him warningly.

He grinned. "All we're saying is this needs an immediate resolution."

Sakura felt suddenly wary. "What kind of resolution?"

"A three-way," Sasuke said matter-of-factly, making the pinkette blush profusely.

"Or one at a time," Naruto interjected, "if the idea of a threesome creeps you out."

Sakura was having trouble breathing. The two hottest guys in school were both attracted to her, and wanted her AT THE SAME TIME! She forced herself to calm down, not wanting to give herself a stroke. It was hot enough already, even though she was shaded under the large tree that stood in Sasuke's front yard.

While Sasuke looked his usual, aloof self, Naruto's face conveyed hope and just a hint of concern. It was incredibly cute.

'Oh my god girl, they both want to fuck you! Calm the fuck down and just jump them already!'

She knew she wanted to, and that just the thought of sliding naked between them was getting her hot, but she worried all the same. What would happen after? Would they just go back to staring at her from across the road anyway? Or would they revert to their first option and decide to pretend she didn't exist? She really didn't want to be used again. It was an old song for her.

Sakura inhaled deeply, and they waited patiently, noting her concern. But neither attempted to alleviate her worries – they wanted her to make this decision herself, no pressure. Still, in some small, twisted way, that inner voice of hers was right. And with that thought, she decided, holding herself straight and taking a deep breath before speaking.

"I've had a threesome before. They don't scare me."

Both boys were surprised by her audacity, but Sasuke hid it well.

Naruto grinned at her. "So you're all for it?"

She nodded and both of them inhaled softly, as if in anticipation.

"Sure," she said, "as long as this isn't some trick to humiliate me."

"Why would we do that?"

She pulled a face at the blonde and he chuckled. Sasuke stood straight; he had been leaning against the tree. He smirked.

"Your place or mine?"

Naruto burst out laughing and Sakura giggled. "Do you have air-conditioning?"

The Uchiha nodded.

"You don't?" Naruto asked. "In this heat?"

She sighed. "My parents are lazy asses."

"Come on," Naruto took her hand, "let's get you inside."

Sakura was nervous yes, considering whose house this was and what they were about to do. That threesome she had had was with Sasori and a girl who lived down the road from him, called Karin. Sakura knew her from Sasuke's fan club, but had had no idea that she'd had her eyes on Sasori as well.

'That should've been my first hint,' she thought.

Sakura noted how much nicer the Uchiha house was compared to hers – not just the sweet cool air from the air con, but the more expensive furniture, the uncluttered wall cabinets that hinted they had a professional cleaner, but also the glass back patio doors and the bone white walls and fixtures. She was glad she hadn't invited the boys back to her place.

"Teme's room is upstairs," Naruto said, after Sakura declined their offer of 'nourishments' in the kitchen.

He led the way, with the pinkette in the middle. She smirked at that. Sasuke's room was a surprise to Sakura. There were no posters of naked or half naked women, and he had an adjoining bathroom. But the bed covers were a dark blue and he had his own entertainment system – a HD TV, surround sound, desktop computer (and a laptop sitting next to it), and with stereo system hooked up that could shake the furniture.

Sasuke noticed her approval and smirked. "You should see Itachi's room."

Sakura turned toward the bed. It was king sized. Naruto and Sasuke were already shirtless, and she sighed at their intrigued expressions. They were waiting for her to even the playing field. This gave her a boost of confidence.

She giggled. "You two are so typical."

She lifted her singlet over her head, revealing the white, lacy bra underneath, and dumped it on the floor. Sakura then sat on the edge of the bed, undid her shorts, and slipped them off. The boys were clearly every excited, by both her barely covered breasts and the slight shape under her white and pink knickers.

Sakura giggled again. "Come on, don't leave a girl hanging."

They undid their respective pants, pulling down their underwear and climbed onto the bed – Sasuke on the right, Naruto on the left. She realised suddenly that they'd had threesomes with girls before – well perhaps with four of them. There was this rumour shortly after Sakura had arrived in Konoha, that Sasuke and Naruto had been caught on school grounds having sex with two girls. It had been a very erotic rumour.

She wondered briefly if it had had less to do with their friendship, and more to do with actual girlfriends, or something like that. The rumours never did say for sure, but it was implied.

Sakura licked her lips, eyeing them off. They were both well endowed, though Sasuke looked about half an inch longer. She tore her eyes away from their limp organs and pushed herself backwards on the bed. She wanted a little foreplay first. They both grinned at her – though Sasuke's was more like a smirk – clearly seeing who she would choose first. A little teasing was in order. She wanted to fuck Sasuke more than Naruto, but didn't want the blonde to realise this, so she summoned him over to her with a wiggle of her finger. She gave him permission to remove her bra, and then as Naruto lowered his lips to her hardened nipples, she shifted her right leg to indicate without words for Sasuke to move. He repositioned himself and slid his fingers under her panties, pulling them off of her in one swift movement.

Sakura moaned, her left hand playing with Naruto's hair as Sasuke spread her legs. She was already wet from the attention so far. He noticed this and ran his fingers along the inside of her thighs before dipping his head between them. Sasuke's tongue played with her clitoris and she sighed with contentment. He nibbled it softly for a moment and then moved his exploration to her wet sex, parting her folds with his fingers.

Sasuke tongue fucked her roughly, and she arched her back, her body shuddering uncontrollably. At the sound of her cries, Naruto moved his mouth off of her breasts (his left hand continued to squeeze them alternatively) and travelled up to her throat, her jaw line, her cheek and then finally, she parted her lips to let him in. His kiss was tantalising, his tongue on fire as she wrapped an arm around the back of his head, pulling him to her to deepen the kiss. And boy did Naruto know how to kiss!

She was on sensory overdrive; Sasuke's thrusting sending involuntary shivers of warmth upward through her body, as Naruto occupied her nipples and mouth in a wave of groans emanating from them both.

She bit Naruto's bottom lip as Sasuke grinded her pussy. It was all too much to bear, and letting the shudder of her body take control, she came into Sasuke's mouth. Sakura tried to control her breathing as both boys pulled away. She was so blissful right then, not quite recovered when they switched places. After Naruto made her come again, she realised that he was better at the kissing, while Sasuke was better at getting the juices flowing.

She sat up with great effort, and noticed that both boys were almost erect. Just the sight of her, flustered, flushed and naked was enough to give their dicks a 'leg up', but turning her on had taken them so much higher. It was her turn. She grabbed both their dicks gently, Naruto's in her left hand, Sasuke's in her right, and started to rub them softly, making both of their faces glaze over as the pleasure took hold.

She sucked on Naruto first, giving him throbbing, before moving onto Sasuke's. Sakura was enjoying herself. For the first time since she had walked in on Sasori and Karin fucking in his living room, the pinkette was actually having fun. She licked, caressed, and sucked their dicks, letting the full lengths of their shafts enter her mouth, but once they were both sufficiently hard, the muscles aching to release, she pulled away.

So far, Sakura had played nice, giving them equal attention. But her urge to fuck Sasuke was the strongest and she no longer intended on ignoring this. Still, the deal had been that she fucked them both, at the same time, and if she was going to let Naruto fuck her arse, she was going to do it right. The walls inside there were easier to tear, as there was no cum to moisten it.

She cleared her throat. "Sasuke, do you have any kind of lubricant?"

"Hn."

The boys realised what she was up to when she squirted the lubricant Sasuke had handed her onto her hands and started to lather Naruto's penis. He was quite enjoying it, she could tell. He didn't seem to mind that she wanted Sasuke at the front. His endearing smile and pleasant temperament had her bedazzled. If she was up to it after, she would let him in the front after, but Sakura had never had a three-way like this before, and wasn't about to make a promise to herself that she would not be too exhausted to keep.

Sasuke had also collected a box of condoms from his bedside drawer and Sakura waited as he put one on. He and Naruto sat on their calves – facing each other – with Sakura between them, facing Sasuke. With Sasuke sheathed and Naruto lubricated, Sakura lifted herself over the best friends, using Sasuke for support as Naruto held his hands to her hips to steady her balance. The bulbous tips of their lengths lifted up to meet her wet sex as the boys rose to their knees and Sakura let out an involuntary half-scream as they both entered her.

'Kami, that is good…'

It was so different as well. With her legs apart as far as they could go in this position, Sasuke and Naruto both helped to support her. She moved with them, moaning in delight with every thrust, every grind that sent her senses into overdrive once more. Her body trembled without permission and she barely noticed that Naruto was using his left hands to fondle her breasts from behind while Sasuke had taken to fiddling with her clitoris, his fingers rubbing circles around the bud. Kami, this was heaven!

While Naruto pressed up against her and kissed her left earlobe every time his dick dug deeper, she held tightly to Sasuke's shoulders as he stared intently into her eyes, their foreheads pressed together. He seemed unable to speak, only exhaling deep moans that coincided with his own, thrusts.

Sakura barely had to move her own hips, being pounded so deeply from both ends, but she kept the momentum going nonetheless, not wanting to let the boys do all the work. The look on Sasuke's face showed that he appreciated it, and Naruto started to whisper his dirty thoughts to her, his warm breath tickling her ear.

Sakura could feel herself starting to climax.

"I'm… almost… there.."

She mewled, the words erupting out of her in between half-screaming groans, and the boys moaned their agreement. They pushed harder, grinding faster and her breasts were bouncing up and down now, her body rising and falling with greater speed. After a few minutes, they pressed themselves tightly to her, so much so that Sasuke's chest was now inhibiting the bobbing of her breasts. His head rested on her right shoulder, Naruto's on her left.

Three… two… one…

Sakura cried out as she came, and then groaned with a tremble of her body as both boys let looses inside of her. Except that Naruto's cum filled the passage in her arse, while Sasuke leaked into the condom he was still wearing. God, she was buggered. She didn't move, trying to regain some energy before separating herself from the boys. They didn't seem to want to move either, both still resting inside of her. Sakura closed her heavy eyelids, intending on just resting for a moment.

Sasuke realised she was falling asleep from the exhaustion and lifted her head up. "Naruto, we better move before she passes out."

Sakura made a soft, mewl of complaint as they pulled out of her that was greeted by satisfied smirks as they laid her back against the pillows on Sasuke's bed.

"I think we wore her out, teme."

"Fuck Naruto, what was your first clue?"

"No need to get snappy… is she asleep?"

Sasuke looked down at the pinkette, whose eyes were now tightly shut. "Yeah, I think so."

"Damn, she was good."

Sasuke smiled at that. "Yeah, I was surprised too."

"But…" The blonde trailed off.

Sasuke knew his friend too well. "You want a frontal fuck."

It wasn't a question.

Naruto sighed, his eyes trailed down Sakura's body, from those full, glistening breasts, down to that delicious pussy of hers. He was an unusual creature, one moment wanting to push his raw shaft into her sex hard and fast, the next satisfied with the arse fuck and ready to leave. Sasuke smirked at him, knowing he had no intention of asking any more of the pinkette.

"Where are you going, teme?"

"To have a shower, dobe. Stay with her in case she wakes up."

Sakura didn't feel Naruto lay down next to her, or his fingers brushing the hair out of her eyes. He continued to rape her with his eyes however, sighing as he knew also that nothing more was going to happen here. She also didn't hear the ring tone on his mobile or his cussing as he jumped off the bed and answered his phone. It was his mother and he was expected home.

"Yeah, I'm at teme's place, alright, I'm coming home."

He hung up on her. Naruto dressed and shook Sakura softly. She was under deep, so he let her be and exited the house. Sasuke knew him well enough to know he'd have left under protest, so he didn't concern himself. Teme wouldn't be rousing on him anytime soon.

Sakura woke up a little while later, alone in Sasuke's bed, naked but under the covers. Someone had made sure she felt comfortable when she woke up. She waited for a minute, then realised that she was indeed alone. Annoyed, she got out of the bed and found her clothes, dressing absentmindedly. But more than annoyed, she was embarrassed. She still couldn't believe she had just had sex with both Sasuke and Naruto at the same time. She heard a sound coming from the kitchen when her feet touched the bottom of the internal staircase a few minutes later. She was torn between her desire to just run for it, and the scent in the air of food cooking. The overwhelming smell of sex lingering in Sasuke's bedroom had driven her out of there as she'd hurriedly dressed, and even though she was now decent and had recovered from her 'encounter', she was suddenly wary about facing Sasuke again.

That was a different kind of threesome, where she had been the centre of attention, so she still felt uneasy about it. She'd felt her insides pressed from both ends to an extreme she couldn't put into words. It made her giddy just thinking about it. Once upon a time, she worried if she ever had a threesome that she'd become some kind of slut, which she now knew had nothing to do with it, but one more time in that position, pressed against two hot and very male bodies and it was likely to push her over the edge. And despite how horny this unusual heatwave in Konoha had made her feel, she still valued relationships more than sex.

'But not by much.'

'Shut up!'

That was so not true.

'I hate you, inner Sakura.'

"Sakura?"

She mentally slapped herself. She'd let out a soft gasp at the strange thoughts going through her head, and now Sasuke's voice was acting like a magnet and she was being pulled into the kitchen.

"You don't have to run off in shame," he said.

She noticed Naruto was nowhere to be seen. "I'm not ashamed of what we did."

He raised his eyebrows at her. "Pickles."

She couldn't help the giggles. "What?"

He looked serious. "I like pickles. What about you? You can help yourself to anything you want."

"Why?"

"Sex makes me hungry," he said blandly.

"I have food at my house I can eat."

"But you don't have air-conditioning."

Sakura frowned at him. "If you want me to stay and eat your food, then just come right out and say it."

"I want you to stay and eat my food."

"Alright, but I hate pickles."

He smirked. "So you'd prefer something a bit more sweet?"

"Yep."

"I can't stand anything too sweet," he said, watching her raid his fridge, expressionless.

His eyes trailed over her body instinctively, but what was taking centre stage in his mind was the fluttering of his heart. Naruto had clearly left, but had sent Sasuke a text that he'd scratched his itch. It meant that he was returning to trying to seduce Hinata Hyuuga. The girl was virginal, beautiful and had favourably sized breasts. The downside? She was high society, and for Naruto, 'untouchable'. Sasuke had never seen Naruto and Hinata in the same room together, so he wasn't sure if the Hyuuga would go for his friend or not. Still, he wished his best mate good luck.

'He's gonna need it.'

And of course, that meant that if he wanted to, Sasuke could have Sakura all to himself. He really wanted to. He couldn't explain his need for her with words. Until now, he'd thought that all it was was that he wanted to fuck her. But he had just done that, and this strange feeling was still there. He wasn't a complete idiot. He knew now that he had feelings for her. But how deep could they possibly run? After all, he didn't actually know her all that well, if at all.

"Are you okay, Sasuke?" Sakura asked realising the Uchiha was deep in thought.

He just nodded, so she ate her meal quietly. He kept his eyes on her the whole time, and she was reminded of how he and Naruto had been staring at her outside this house. She pushed her plate away.

"So, it's back to the whole staring thing again, huh?" She asked, pouting but not actually annoyed.

Sasuke smirked. "Hn. You're still wearing that outfit."

"It's a singlet and shorts Sasuke, it's hardly an outfit."

"Well, it's turning me on, either way."

She rolled her eyes. "I'm not fucking you again."

He sighed, disappointed. "While sleeping with you again, is definitely on my mind, there's something else I wanted to ask you."

"What is it?"

"My father's hosting the policeman's ball this weekend –"

"And what, you want me to be your date?"

He shook his head. "No."

"Then what –"

"I never go to those stupid dances," he said matter-of-factly. "Itachi does. I wanted to know if you'll go out with me, somewhere far, far away from the ridiculous ball."

Sakura stood up, walked over to him, and stopped only a few inches away. "You want me to be your girlfriend?"

"Forget it!" He snapped. "If you're going to be sarcastic about it –"

She cut him off with a kiss, throwing her arms around his neck and hesitating only for a moment, Sasuke returned the kiss, his hands falling to her waist. She tantalized him with her tongue, sending shivers down his spine. Okay, he was falling for her, but these emotions were still confusing to him. He had never been in love before….

Sakura pulled out of the kiss and rested her forehead on his. "What about that speech you and Naruto gave me about how friends come first?"

"Well, Naruto's gone back to trying to seduce Hinata Hyuuga."

"Really?"

"Hn."

"Who's Hinata Hyuuga?"

Sasuke laughed softly. "I forgot you're new in town. You haven't heard about the Hyuuga family?"

"The family yes, but not Hinata. None of their names are familiar to me."

"Well anyway," he said, not wanting to dwell on that. "Will you go out with me?"

"Oh yes Sasuke-kun, most definitely, yes."

He leant in to kiss her again and lifted her up to sit on the kitchen table. Despite her earlier comment, Sasuke was suddenly hard, and lowered his hand to caress her clothed breasts. She moaned into his mouth, her lips parted to let him in. He really wanted it, right now, so to coax her he rubbed her nipples with both thumbs, in circular motions. This elicited a soft mewl of appreciation from her mouth. He pressed his erection against her and her eyes widened, realising how much he wanted from her.

But before she could stop him, he unzipped his jeans to release his readied flesh. He pulled her shorts down to her ankles, spread her legs, parted her knickers at her wet sex, and slammed into her core without a moment's hesitation. She half-screamed, both shocked, and excited by the sudden penetration. He groaned as her hands flew out, knocking kitchen utensils onto the floor.

Sakura rolled her eyes. Okay, so she was fucking him again after all. He was incorrigible. It had to be that Uchiha dominating streak she'd heard so much about. She leant backward against the table with her hands for support and cried out, moving her hips down to meet his.

"S-Sasuke-kun! Harder! Aah!"

He groaned. "Fucking hell."

His hands lifted her singlet and pulled the straps of her bra down to expose her breasts without removing any articles of clothing. He cupped her breasts, thrusting harder now, and biting her bottom lip softly. He hadn't given her time to moisten, but she was already partway there, feeling his erection and his hands on her. Sakura called out Sasuke's name, swearing and moaning her pleasure at the top of her lungs, writhing under his grasp.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!" He grunted in time with every plunge.

Sasuke grabbed her ass cheeks and pulled her toward him with every thrust heightening the sensation. The table shook dangerously underneath them but they ignored it. He continued to grind her, and a few minutes later, they both came together. Sasuke rested his head on her shoulders, still nestled inside of her, and she ran her hands through his dark hair lovingly. It was so exhausting; he couldn't believe he'd gotten it all out so easily. He knew from experience that he couldn't handle too much sex in one day. But this was close to the last time and he planned to take the rest of the day to recuperate.

Sakura lifted his head to look in his eyes. "That's what you get for not asking for permission first."

She'd noted his extreme fatigue and laced her words with sarcasm, but her mouth twitched into a seductive smile and he returned the affection.

"Come on," he said, kissing her swiftly and pulling away. "Let's go up to my room."

Sakura narrowed her eyes at him, trying to figure out what he was planning, as she slid off the table and fixed her clothes.

Sasuke smirked. "Don't worry, I won't be trying that again for today. But my house has air-conditioning, and better yet, my bed still smells of sex."

She rolled her eyes. "Alright, but just keep her hands and… other things where they should be."

He grinned at her wickedly and having turned away from him, she didn't notice the mischievous glint in his eyes.

X X X

[prairiesongserial]

24.6

Vanya took his mascarpone and almond pastries from the cafe attendant and considered how difficult it would be to kill the two cardinals. He wondered if it was even possible. He didn’t have a weapon, which was a problem. Vanya was better when he had artillery. Without, he was just very short.

Vanya had to assume the cardinals had spotted him. Maybe he was lucky, and they hadn’t. But they were cardinals. You didn’t get to be a cardinal unless you were very, very good.

Vanya sighed quietly. He wanted it to be possible, but the odds were against him.

The mascarpone and almond pastries were unexpectedly heavy. Vanya unwrapped the paper on one of them and took a bite, loitering without sitting down. He had hoped for a good pastry, and to his surprise, he’d gotten it. The mascarpone filling wasn’t too sweet, the pastry was flaky but not dry, the almond present but mild under the more overpowering cheese filling.

Vanya wandered down the aisle between the tables. He was headed towards the cardinals, rather than back the way he’d come. Vanya took another bite of pastry. He stepped to the side to let another passenger pass. One of the cardinals drummed her fingers on the top of one of those red, wide-brimmed hats that they all wore. Hers sat on the table next to an empty cup of coffee.

The body language cinched it. The cardinals knew who he was and what he was doing here. They’d probably known the second he walked in. Vanya now considered the odds of getting out of this scrape alive. He took a third bite of pastry, already lamenting that it would be his last. He hated wasting food.

Vanya had counted the train cars as he’d made his way through the empty sleeper cars to the dining car. The dining car was directly above Car 10. He and Yuri had passed between Cars 10 and 11 on their way to their seats; there had been stairs to the upper level at that junction. Those stairs had led up to the dining car, and now Vanya would take those stairs down to Car 10. If Vanya could make it to Car 9, he would be very inconvenient to kill. Taking for granted that the business travelers looked up from their newspapers, of course.

Vanya’s alternative was to go back the way he’d come, but that wasn’t an option. If he did that, he’d have to cross three empty sleeper cars before making it back down the other set of stairs. Even if he made it that far, it would only be to surprise Yuri from behind with the cardinals on his tail. The far more likely outcome, of course, was that the cardinals would catch him before he made it to the far stairs, kill him, and stash the body in one of the empty sleeper compartments.

It all came down to this: no matter what he did, Vanya wasn’t going to get to finish his pastry, and he might as well choose to live regardless.

Vanya handed the one he hadn’t unwrapped to a little girl coming up the stairs ahead of her mother. He smiled at the mother as the girl attempted to show her the pastry, bouncing in place. Vanya told the mother in German that he hadn’t realized the pastries were cheese-filled when he’d bought them.

“I can’t stand mascarpone,” Vanya said. “Maybe she will enjoy?”

An interpersonal exchange with a stranger would delay the cardinals by about twenty seconds, as they would not wish to appear as if they were rushing after Vanya to murder him. Usually people didn’t notice if you got up and followed someone out of a restaurant to murder them, and Vanya himself had relied on that fact many times. However, if your target stopped a stranger to talk to them, bystanders tended to give a few seconds of interest, concerned that someone might try to talk to them next. A few seconds of interest would get Vanya out the door and down the stairs while the cardinals put on a show of slowly getting to their feet and commenting to one another on something ordinary and unmemorable before finally exiting after him.

“Tschüss, arrivederci,” Vanya said to the girl and mother with a smile. He gave the girl a little wave.

The hardest part was turning his back on two rival operatives as he opened the door to leave the dining car. It raised the hair on the back of his neck.

Vanya let the dining car door slide closed behind him, then booked it down the stairs, running full-tilt. He heard, as he opened the door into Car 10, an echo of the same exact clattering sound from the door upstairs. Alright, so it hadn’t worked. The cardinals were ten seconds behind instead of twenty. Vanya had forgotten to factor in that nobody ever thought agents of the Vatican were rushing to murder anybody.

Now the question was whether Vanya entered Car 10 or Car 11. Car 10 would put him closer to Yuri, the mark, and his gun. Car 11 was unknown, but might have a couple witnesses in it, if Vanya was lucky. Could he reach Car 9 before the cardinals reached him? Maybe. Not if he wasted seconds trying to make up his mind.

Vanya rushed across Car 10. His rings coasted along the metal overhead racks, making a sound like a sword being drawn.

The sound of a door sliding open, then closed, came from behind. Vanya’s fingers had just grasped the handle of the door into Car 9.

“Hold your horses, Ivan,” drawled one of the cardinals.

“Frankie,” said a bored voice.

“I know, but he ran. That made me think he was in a hurry.”

Vanya turned around. He gave the cardinals a smile. “Good morning, your–” he cut off. He was about to run up against an unfamiliar plural, and he wasn’t any better at Italian than he was at German. “Your Eminence…s.”

“That was pretty close!” the one called Frankie exclaimed. She gave Vanya a cocky grin, head tipped to one side. She reminded Vanya of a dog about to tear into something. Vanya swallowed.

Realistically, were they going to kill him? They could kill him, no question of that, but Vanya wasn’t sure how the scales would fall in the balance between the inconvenience of competition and the inconvenience of cleaning up.

“What brings you here?” Vanya asked cheerily. He made friendly eye contact with both of them, and was startled by the realization that the other cardinal–not Frankie–had a glass eye. Only he wasn’t sure which eye. “Returning from business in Germany?”

“Oh, business is steady,” Frankie said, answering a question he hadn’t asked. She stretched her arms casually over her head so Vanya could get an eyeful of her shoulder holster. “How about you, Ivan? What brings you to the–what’s this train, again?”

“The Göttingen to Milan Economy Line,” the other cardinal supplied.

“That's the one. What brings you to this particular train at this particular time?” Frankie asked. She was closer now. Vanya saw it happen, how she took advantage of the distraction of the back-and-forth with her partner in order to put him on the back foot, but even as he saw it, Vanya couldn’t do a thing about it. If he opened the door to Car 9 the scales might tip out of his favor. Tricky to tell.

“A funny coincidence,” said Vanya. “I’m going skiing. I’ve always been curious about the Swiss Alps.” He forced his posture to relax, which was hard with Frankie’s gun at eye level and a mascarpone and almond pastry leaking cream onto his finger. “Did you know the Bernina Express–that’s the other train, the red one on all the travel brochures–it never stopped operation? Apparently the mountains sheltered…”

“I don’t believe in coincidences,” said Frankie. “Divine Providence, maybe. Definitely not your ski trip.”

“The Bernina Express frequently halts operation for the purpose of scheduled maintenance,” said the other one.

“But it didn’t stop for the end of the world,” said Vanya.

Frankie sighed. “Thank you, Salome. You want I should leave you two alone for a minute, or can we get on with this?” A pause, then: “Alright. Who are you here for, and why shouldn’t I kill you?”

The train slowed to a stop. The overhead speakers had announced Baden so long ago that it seemed like that stop must have happened already. But in reality it had only been five minutes.

The exterior doors opened. Passengers were boarding. Vanya, Frankie, and Salome adjusted their posture to that of casual, non-threatening conversation.

The door between Cars 10 and 11 opened, and an improbable number of nuns flooded in. Nuns and luggage. They filled every available crevice of the train car like spilled water–but louder. The nuns at the front called back down the line to instruct the nuns at the back. Frankie and Salome were forced to move out of the aisle. They chose one side, and Vanya chose the other.

The floodwaters changed course; the sudden appearance of two of the Pope’s cardinals had that effect on nuns. In an instant, they were upon the Italians. Frankie and Salome were accosted by a chorus of the appropriate greeting–eminenza revma. Vanya had forgotten the revma. He felt he deserved a pass as his allegiance lay on the Orthodox side of the Great Schism.

Salome looked at Vanya over the heads of the sisters. The nuns wore several styles of habit in black, blue, and brown, the variety probably denoting sect. Vanya smiled at Salome and drummed his rings against the back of the nearest seat. He still couldn’t settle on which eye was glass. It couldn’t be both of them.

24.5 || 24.7

[boygun]

MATCHUP TRADE !!

FANDOM: I would like a romantic MALE MATCHUP for Hazbin Hotel, Helluva Boss, Creepypasta, Homestuck and OHSHC please! The only characters I don’t want is angel dust and husker please (I love them but I do not see myself being romantic partners with them.), Also I’m more focused on HH since it’s my biggest hyperflexation rn :D

ABOUT ME: My name is Jaxrel! People call me "Jax" for short. also use other names like Himawari, Rin, etc, He/Him (They/Them is acceptable), I'm a Trans Man who's pansexual and l've been diagnosed with mental illness and disorders that I do not wish sharing ATM. Here’s my pronouns page if you need it!

Personality(+ Notes): I'm a ENTP Ravenclaw, 5w4, Extroverted. I'm a very chill and intelligent person I'm very polite and sweet! at first awkward, shy and distant when meeting people, extremely independent, when comfortable I talk about a lot of stuff for hours, loud talker, emotions come off as sarcastic or silly (due to autism), confident, straightforward (I have a urge to correct someone of faulty information), uses "big" words, good sense of humor, playful, entertaining, optimistic, mischievous, curious(l'm nosy and I love gossip), i can be a rule breaker(sometimes don't mean to), dad/ tharapist friend, when I go out I bring water bottles, first aid kit, chapstick(s) just in case, chill but some people would say I have some "repressed anger issues, I get a realllyyy overractive Brain, I tend to get deep and philosophical when l'm left on my own for to long, I can be verbally aggressive when prevoked. If this helps more the characters I kin a lot are: Victor Nikiforov (Yuri On Ice), Tei (Nameless), Cutthroat (Akudama Drive, Except the Bloodlust cutthroat has.), Ranpo Edogawa (Bungo Stray Dogs), Dazai Osamu (Bungo Stray Dogs), Space Ishtar (Fate), Okita Souji (Fate), Langa Hasegawa (Sk8 The Infinity), Sherlock Holmes (TGAA), Zack (Final Fantasy 7), Vash The Stampede (Trigun), Roy Mustang (Fullmetal Alchemist), Otonashi Yuzuru (Angel Beats), Karma Akabane (Assassination Classroom), Vanitas (Study Case of Vanitas), Zoe Hange (AOT), Shinoa Hiiragi (Seraph of The End) + more

MORE KINS: hiyori tomoe (enstars), yoosung kim (mystic messenger), jumin han (mystic messenger), hanako (tbhk), felix kranken (twf), albedo (genshin impact), shoya ishida (a silent voice), tom (eddsworld), eridan (homestuck), karkat (homestuck), shu itsuki (enstars),miyamura izumi (horimiya), micheal afton (FNAF), lolbit (FNAF), mangle (FNAF), natsume sakasaki (enstars), sora harukawa (enstars), urumi akamaki (alice in borderland), V (mystic messenger), hagumi kitazawa (bandori), matsubara kanon (bandori), shinji ikari (neon genesis evangelion), minami kotobuki (oshi no ko), lain iwakura (serial experiments lain), hajime hinata (danganronpa), k-angel (needy streamer overdose) and more 😃

Looks: Half Polish and Vietnamese with Some Scottish and Half Middle Eastern(Iraqi) /Filipino with Some Russian, I'm very skinny like just flat, I have hazel eyes and some slight flecks of amber and blue, I have upturned eyes but they seem like they are almond shaped but they aren't too noticeable, I think I have a heart shaped face but from different angles it looks more diamond shaped(?), I'm approximately 5'8, I have a dimple only on my chin, I have dyed black hair, I also have bangs too, my clothing style tends to stretch widely from comfy to... a lot like this! I wear gyaru (hime gal, himekaji, agejo, gyaruo, rokku, manba, banba, kogal, tsuyome, and kigurumi), goth (trad goth, romantic goth, mall goth, cyber goth, and victorian goth), scenemo/emo (ofc), & vkei ouji and lolita, I can also pull off a kpop idol look, i also wear a lot of cool dresses and suits, I also wear Y2K and I also dress in alternative clothing a LOT, I wear a lot of other harajuku styles such as, jirai kei, decora and more so on.

Likes: Chocolate, Strawberries, Iced Coffee and Boba Tea, Anime/ Manga, Music, Food, Winning in arguments online or irl, Reading, Art (Digital Art, Drawing, Painting, Pottery, etc), Cats, Sharks, Cold/or Rainy Weather, Cooking, Cosplaying, Shopping, Playing Tabletop RPG's, Chess Board Games or just Gaming, Dancing, Abstract or Romance movies, Murder Mysterys, Kdrama, Spicy or Sweet Food, Ramen, learning new languages/instruments and much more.

Dislikes: Loud Noises, Slow Walkers, People who don't know when to close their mouths when chewing and hot weather.

Love Languages: physical touch, acts of service & words of affirmation (giving). gift giving, words of affirmation & physical touch (receiving).

Thank you so much! Have a wonderful day (:

I am terribly sorry for the wait. The draft deleted a few times and then life got in the way. I’m back on track amaing and I’m really sorry. But, without further ado, I’d like to give you some matchups. If you want any sort of headcanons about any of those relationships, feel free to sent an ask and I’ll add to the lore!

First, we have HAZBIN HOTEL and it was really a no brainer. I ship you with…

Lucifer. He’s absolutely the type to be intrigued by your reserved nature upon the first meeting and delighted when he gains enough of your trust that you feel comfortable being expressive around him. His curious nature and mind of an inventor work well with your thirst for knowledge. If you take time to look into subjects that fascinate him, he’ll be happy to talk with you for hours. Of course, he’ll look into the things that you like as well, like games or books you enjoy. To be fair, that would be the first obvious sign that he likes you. At times, especially at first, he would try very hard and worry about the way he was coming across. So he would try to think of ways to make a good impression on you and getting into your hobbies is definitely on the list. He’d also make you little gifts, mostly ducks. Kind of like a cat, dropping them off at your hands proudly but anxiously. Only, it’s less gross than a dead mouse haha. Also, any gift you decide to give him will be his biggest treasure. Every time you’re over he’ll have the trinkets from you on display. Honestly, he’s kind of embarrassed by that, maybe you think it’s weird or corny? He overthinks stuff like that a lot. Also, I think it would be a cute parallel to have you as a rule breaker (especially when you do it accidentally) and be with him of all people. Kind of sweet, because he’d feel a stronger bond with you. Needless to say, he’ll have your back no matter the consequences, even if it hurts a little (not because of you, it just reminds him of his past self). And as an immortal, he would be happy to indulge in any sort of passion for music you have. Hey, if you want, he can teach you how to play his instrument as well! He’s just going to be… a bit awkward about it. He just doesn’t want to come off as pushy! But he will absolutely cherish any sort of passion you two might share. I think Charlie would approve of you too (if we’re going full in with the divorced dad!Lucifer) and would try to help her mess of a father get the guy of his dreams. So, it would get pretty silly real quick

Alternative: Vox

In HELLUVA BOSS your match would be…

Moxxie! This was a no-brainer. This man would not think twice or question his feelings because you really seem like his type. Come on, a thoughtful, protective person who also can be an absolute nightmare to your enemies? Sign him up. He wouldn’t be the most confident about you returning those feelings, but he would be sure that he’s in it deep because how could he not? He would also vibe with your interests a lot. Be it discussing books with you or playing his guitar for you (not AT you, don’t worry) to make the evening more romantic. Also, once he starts feeling less nervous around you, his words of affirmation are top-tier. He works well as a balance to your more silly and relaxed nature, but even if he’s less extroverted, you won’t ever be bored with him. He would vibe with your style as well and maybe explore his own if you would like to lend him a helping hand. You two would definitely be like, kind of the parents of the group (which works well because Blitzø is more than reckless, we’ve all seen it) but also have your own silly moments that are still very much in line with the kind of job and place you live in (so, with a little bit of gore on occasion)

In CREEPYPASTA I see you with…

Eyeless Jack! Hear me out, I think this would be silly BUT also incredibly sweet. Like, goals. First of all, he’s a flesh-eating demon but usually, he’s portrayed as a tame (at least during casual encounters) guy with not much passion for socializing. Just imagine going about your day, chatting with friends, being your extroverted self around the people you are close with (since you said it can be different when it comes to acquaintances) and his bad-omen-looking demonic presence is just standing beside you. Absolutely iconic if we’re talking ship dynamics. Also, with him being the designated doctor, he’d appreciate your caring nature, with you being the parent of the group. That could be one of the ways that help you two to grow closer - he patches people up, helping them physically, while you keep their emotions in check. Soon he finds himself feeling lonely when you’re not hanging out with him while he does his whole healer-thing. He enjoys hearing your gossip stories and in a house full of murderers, there’s always something interesting going on. On occasion he even joins in, sharing the stories about your mutual friends. Confidentiality be damned, he will tell you about why Jane gave Jeff two black eyes (it was deserved). Speaking of which, if any of the guys (let’s be honest, this is still about Jeff) decide to be difficult patients and you swoop in to unleash your more aggressive side, he only falls harder. I think you two would get each other because you both have moments of insatiable anger and also sometimes want peace and think about deeper things. He’d definitely enjoy discussing those topics with you when there’s no one around to bother either of you

HOMESTUCK was a tough one, but I settled on…

Dave. I kinda debated that for a bit but I think it fits. There would be no instant love with sparks flying, but you would definitely grow to like each other. At first, it would be somewhat difficult because you’d seem a bit distant upon the first encounter, and let’s be honest, his whole cool-guy thing doesn’t always appear very inviting. But as time goes on, you’ll spend more time chatting one-on-one. Not to mention the events of the plot would help to bring you guys together, I mean, at least you're going through your bizarre experiences together. Rose would be the first one to notice (though the rest would follow soon after) that he seems to care about you more. Every time you’d try to be the mediator, attempting to bring everybody together and be the ‘dad friend’ he’d - in his own chill way - make sure that you’re not burning yourself out. He is the Knight, after all, being protective is a part of his thing. The same goes for your anger. I mean, he kind of likes that vibe, but if you just feel like you're about to burst from frustration, he’ll certainly try to redirect your thoughts. Not afraid to talk back if you end up snapping at him, but at the same time, his aura just seems really calming? And he wouldn’t insult you for real, I just mean that the guy can hold his own. Definitely would support your art and indulge if you want him to play some games with you. Generally, based on your interests I think you would meet through John, which also means that there would be a few times when you and John team up to do some practical jokes on him. Dave acts unamused, but up to a limit, he doesn't even mind. Especially not if it’s you

And lastly for OHSHC I match you with…

Umehito Nekozawa! I feel like he would greatly appreciate your curious mind and it would complement his own pursuit of (occult) knowledge. And as a way to show you his admiration he’d give you the strangest gifts that would be nonetheless endearing. The other thing that would make him fall for you would be how caring and helpful you tend to be. For a while, he struggled to connect to his sister and I feel like you could help him with that, which would be some nice setup for a fun romance arc. With a lot of mishaps because you know how he is, some things are bound to go wrong. But in the best way possible. And his determination plus your creativity would always overcome any obstacles in that classic writing style of OHSHC. I’d totally read that! Also, he would totally love your hair and would ask you to dye his if you know how to do that. Honestly, he would let you even if you lacked experience. Another thing that seems kind of small but works well for this ship is your love for rainy weather. He’s open to dates, though a little nervous, and your preference would make him feel less bad about his aversion to the sun. I mean, if you don’t mind the dark gloomy skies, either way, he can work with that to organize some nice, atmospheric dates for you two. And if you were ever interested in borrowing his clothes for some of your more edgy outfits, he’d be down for it. Nervous as can be (especially at the beginning of the relationship) but still happy to share his clothes with you. Also! He would be so into playing tabletop RPGs with you. Prepare to see him whip out the edgiest warlock every time he has to make a D&D character. And when he finds out about the Call of Cthulhu? You have no idea how into it he’ll be

[timemachineyeah]

Hi, I really appreciate your points on Madoka! Thank you for providing that insight that is so desperately needed! Because I am so sick of dudebros acting like it's better than female-empowering Magical Girl works aimed at girls, or how whenever I or somebody else critiques the storytelling and message we just get told "Madoka is perfectly feminist actually and if you don't think so then you're just too stupid to understand how DEEEEEEEP it is go back to your stupid sweet and fluffy anime that's for GUUUUURLS" or alternatively "oh so female characters can't ever suffer ever and have to be happy all the time ever or it's misogynistic trash?!?!?!?! check and mate bitch" like I am just so tired. I'm glad to see your posts even though some of them are quite old. I have to say thank you once again for your genuine critique of Madoka because at this point I feel like I'm being punked whenever I talk about what's wrong with it.

Sorry! I saw this earlier and completely forgot to answer!

My few posts have given me a reputation as a Madoka hater (and, fair enough, because I certainly don't blame anyone who is. Please hate Madoka all you like). The truth is I really do like the original show quite a bit, but YEAH.

YEAH.

I think the thing that gets most exhausting for me, over and over, is bringing up these criticisms and being told, "No! Because Madoka fixed all that!" and even ignoring Rebellion (which I am inclined to do anyway), the girls still die.

They die.

The happy ending is a montage of girls dying. Which is a happy ending only because what they were getting before (specifically as a consequence of choosing to be a magical girl) was a fate worse than death.

And it's worth noting how the incubators are portrayed. They aren't portrayed as malicious. They aren't "evil" in that sense. What they are is practical and indifferent. They are taking advantage of inherent factors in the universe, not creating those factors.

Which means that there's something about PMMM that is saying, this is reality. At least in this fiction, this is the reality of femininity. And it is inherent to femininity! Kyubey even explains - it's weird! But only teen girls are like this! That's why we use them!

I think it's fair to be like, hey, that's fucked up. What kind of gender essentialist fatalism? Bro?

And it's also just denial to pretend it isn't about fanservice or a male audience.

As anyone who's been on my blog recently will know, I'm kinda super into Love Live! right now. It's cute. It scratches an itch.

And there's a lot of plausible deniability built into it, and a lot of pushback from English speaking fandom about it, but, uh, Love Live! is an idol game but it's also a waifu collector.

It's also a catalogue of nonthreateningly sexual anime teenage girls specifically designed to appeal first and foremost to lonely awkward Japanese young working men with disposable income.

And, idk, knowing that doesn't impede my ability to find it cute and wholesome and fun and escapist. The fact that it is that does lead to some of creative decisions that make the series less fun for me (it's not very diverse, for example. The yuri elements are subtext for another. And I either wish the girls were less sexualized or older, personally). But I'm not going to deny what it is.

I'm not even particularly interested in shaming the men its aimed at for liking it, or shaming the creators for making it that way per se (well, okay, sometimes I am interested in shaming the creators a lil bit). But I do think most the things about it that read as feminist to me as an American read that way because I am so far outside the original intended subculture. And I think the same is true about Madoka. You can absolutely read feminist messages in it. I certainly do. But placing these works in their original contexts tells a very different much more... regressive? picture. They were not made for women and girls. They are not made to uplift women and girls. They CAN! And they DO! Both in Japan and elsewhere! But that's anywhere from (at best) a secondary market to (at worst) a complete accident.

It's hard for some people to wrap their heads around because in America at least I think the idea of a "cute" (even if that's subverted in Madoka) media starring a large cast of only girls being for men is pretty alien to how we do stories and marketing. Here we understand playboy magazines and swimsuit editions, but we don't understand men collecting merch of a cute fictional girl they like. It would be seen as emasculating.

We understand the reverse. We get that boy bands and anime like Free! can be aimed squarely at women while being comprised entirely of men or male characters. Which is part of why I'm not shaming the male audiences, because... desiring anime tiddy isn't inherently predatory anymore than a lady desiring anime ass. And that's a crass way of putting it anyway. We don't frame hanging a boy band poster up that way, or playing a game like Mystic Messenger. It becomes more complicated because we live in a complicated patriarchal structure that protects and empowers men and women differently and unequally, but that seems like a poor reason to try to tell individual men they aren't allowed to enjoy things in a way that is obviously natural and parallels how... most humans like to enjoy some things sometimes.

But that also doesn't mean we can't look at those broad cultural patterns and... make observations. And have criticisms. And talk about how it affects people, and the back and forth between media and culture.

But, Madoka is for men first. The girls' suffering is a form of male gaze, and pretty unambiguously a kind of very very softcore torture porn for male gamer types. That's not a judgment against it, that's just its literal intended share of the market. It's a pretty easy read if you understand the context in which it was released and the culture it is coming from and catering to. My Little Pony is a little girls toy franchise. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles sells toys to boys. Home & Gardens is for housewives. Top Gear is for car dads. These are true even if other people like them. When an adult fan of children's cartoons (I say, as an adult fan of children's cartoons) tries to say, "But it's not really a kids cartoon!" I feel about the same way I do when a feminist fan of some clearly male-centric media says, "But it's not really!"

And that's - own your shit. Own it. It's fine. It's fine to like it. It's fine to love it. It's fine if it means the world to you. It doesn't mean there's something wrong with you if you like a media that maybe isn't the most mature or progressive masterpiece out there. Just don't pretend there's no validity in obvious criticism. I love some real garbage made by real garbage people. I have survived.

Madoka exists in a fictional universe where the laws of that fictional universe are that 1) girls are uniquely emotional, 2) that emotion and their own aspirations can easily be harnessed against them in such a way that in the best possible universe all it does it kill them. In the normal universe it turns them into evil witches. That's just true. That's the world. I'm allowed to look at that, especially in conversation with magical girl media that came before, and go, "you know what? in that context, that's pretty fucked up" and it doesn't even mean that I stop liking the show, so I don't see why everyone else has to get so defensive about it.

(Y'all have no idea. Those posts are old now, but I got so many asks. I had to block so many people. I'm not trying to take your precious anime away calm down.)

Idk if I completely agree with the tone of my original posts - there's a little bit of offhanded vilifying of "men" as a shorthand for... all the bullshit... and I no longer love that language. I love men. Men are people. Some men can be shitty, but shitty individual men and patriarchy aren't the same. But I do still agree with all my broad points.

Plus, yes, also. The thing of a new (often male) fanbase getting into something you've been into for a long time with some new entry and acting like it both invented and fixed everything about the genre (PMMM and magical girls, Friendship is Magic and girl cartoons, Stardew Valley and farming sims) is frustrating, and to hear many an incurious nerd tell it, magical girls were floundering before Madoka! And I hate that.

Anyway, oops, I went on a little rant. That still makes it look like I don't like Madoka. I actually really do like the original series. I have rewatched it multiple times and probably will again. I even tried to play Magia Record (briefly - I couldn't really get into it). I can't speak to the many many spinoff media - but those have so many different writers and so much different lore that I think it'd probably be hard to try to pin any kind of single ethos to the franchise as a whole any more. But while I couldn't get into Magia Record I'd bet there's a short manga story or something that I'd love at this point. When you make like 200 magical girls or whatever that's bound to happen.

Thanks for the ask. Sorry Madoka fans are still so hyper defensive apparently. I hope you are able to survive them and find some better magical girl series out there. <3

[floatingcatacombs]

The Dogs of War

12 Days of Aniblogging 2022, Day 7

Something is in the air, as this year I ended up reading three separate works that involved doggirls and the military. Either it’s sheer coincidence, or there’s a burgeoning microgenre afoot, so I wanted to talk through each of them here.

A Love Letter for the Marching Puppy

This one’s set in Meiji-era Japan, but an alternate history where women are allowed to serve in the army. #ImperialFeminismFTW ! What follows is a boarding-school drama that plays out similarly to a standard school yuri, but heightened with the structure and procedures of the military. A standard senpai-kouhai romance can be made more interesting if you add rigid hierarchy, making it that of a model older student and the new recruit she’s been assigned to mentor.

Of course, the language being used for this hierarchy is all setting-appropriately homoerotic, with roommates being formally referred to as “bedroom comrades”, while mentees looked upon romantically by their superiors are dubbed “maidens”. There’s a strong sense of possessiveness here which culminates in the cadet love interest referring to the protagonist as a puppy, both endearingly and mockingly.

Owing to its nature as purity-obsessed yuri, there’s a certain romanticism on display here which extends to the institution of the military itself. Our protagonist is a street urchin who enlists so she won’t starve, and her outlook on the academy is firmly rose-tinted from start to finish. The lack of a reliable social safety net is and always will be the number-one factor driving voluntary recruitment, to the point where you have to question if it’s really so voluntary if the only choices are enlisting or poverty. I can’t say I’m surprised that this manga refuses to address the horrors of war and perverse incentives surrounding military recruitment, but it’s definitely a willful blind spot.

If it sounds like I’m being overly harsh on A Love Letter for the Marching Puppy, it’s that it piqued my interest enough to poke. This is a very straightforward high school girl's love story, but the transposition into a military academy setting adds enough flavor to distinguish it from its peers.

On a Leash

Unlike A Love Letter for the Marching Puppy, On a Leash goes all in on the horrors of war. Set in the trenches of Furry World War I, this manhua follows Irene Red, a solider and scrappy butch who keeps ending up in the clutches of the medic captain assigned to her team. Who wants to tie her up and sexually torture her. Also, they can shapeshift into a wolf and a snake, retrospectively. We’re fully in the land of batshit over-the-top lesbian melodrama here, a flavor of yuri I increasingly prefer as time goes on.

There’s a lot going on here, and it’s clear that the author bit off a bit more than they could chew. The characters being able to turn into furries to become more battle-hardened honestly reminds me more of mecha anime than anything else. It frames the soldiers as subhuman, becoming literal animals on the frontline, and with the main character being a dog, the dynamic between Red and Ruce is obviously about petplay and submission. It’s not trying to be subtle in any way. The subjugation of soldiers and the sexual interpretation of military hierarchy are nothing new, between the historic prevalence of homosexuality in the military and the use of these themes in male homosexual art. But since women in the army are a comparatively recent phenomenon, there’s far less work tapping into this stuff but with lesbians. This makes me all the more glad that On a Leash exists and is so self-indulgent.

It's really funny that the author for this is so competent at writing caretaking-as-BDSM but noticeably falters when the characters have to actually talk about sex. At the least, their priorities are correct. Additionally, if you liked my article about yuri where the characters have a death wish, this one’s for you.

Coquette Dragoon

If you’re going to read one thing on this list, make it this one. Coquette Dragoon is one of the smartest, most heartfelt stories I’ve read in the past few years. As a visual novel, it’s got excellent composition and style, likely owing to its origin as a comic. Ivy is light-years ahead in the “writing interesting and fucked-up lesbians” arms race compared to her peers, and even with only the first few parts of the story out now, I know we’re in for something good. Definitely not for everyone, but if you’re not everyone, you will love it.

But that’s enough proselytizing! This is another furries-in-the-military work, but this time in space with mechas that lean real-robot. As in On a Leash, people’s individual species don’t carry wide-ranging societal implications but still matter to the plot and influence how characters see themselves.

Bell is my point of focus here, as well as something of Coquette Dragoon’s breakout character. She is our obvious puppy, thoroughly pathetic and loyal and weak. She’s just as much of an embarrassment in-universe, the bastard child of an aristocratic arms manufacturing family. In a twist, she’s the one doggirl in this article who isn’t actually enlisted in the military. Nothing is expected of her, but she’s looked down upon by all. This would do things to anyone! And on top of this, she’s been ill all of her life with some sort of medical nightmare, and though she’s well enough to leave the house and eat without an IV, it’s clearly a major part of her (looking forward to whatever is going on thematically between Bell’s GI problems and the Lilac pilots using a “GI system” to interface with their mechs).

In spite of everything, or maybe because of, Bell is one of the most self-realized characters in all of Coquette Dragoon. She knows what she wants, even if it’s embarrassing and weird, and she absolutely laps up any real companionship she can get. Her relationship with Honey in Chapter 2 is complex enough that it doesn’t fit cleanly within the lines of friendship or romance or sex. But as girls who are broken in very different ways but both seek to be understood, they’re a delight to see together.

Also, Bell has multiple layers of gender stuff going on, some of it depressing and some of it hilarious. I love and care for her, and you will too.

BONUS: Heaven Will Be Mine

What did you think Mare Crisium’s head was supposed to be.

[yuri-review]

Flip Flappers (2016)

I can add this image, it's from the first episode!

Flip Flappers is a 13-episode long magical girl show from 2016. It follows the adventures of our main characters, Cocona and Papika, as they travel through alternate dimensions known as Pure Illusion, seeking out amorphous shards said to grant wishes.

(Full review under the cut!)

The writing and plot: 3.5/5

The writing and plot of Flip Flappers is charming, and differs from typical magical girl shows in one significant way; they don't fight against monsters or supervillains seeking to wreck havoc on Earth, instead travelling to alternate dimensions, and fighting monsters there. And also fighting against the agents of a secret organization seeking to obtain all the amorphous shards... wait, does that count as supervillainy?

Flip Flappers explores themes such as control various adults have over children, growing into your own and changing as a person, and, as any good magical girl show, love. It also briefly touches on the experience of feeling empty, and the idea of people loving you not for you, but for what you can do for them. The writing is good but rushed due to the short episode count, leaving some plotlines feeling a little unexplored. The show definitely could've benefited from a higher episode count, which is something that goes for almost all shows stuffed into such a small amount of episodes, and I will yell that from the top of my lungs constantly! Limiting episode counts is the death of compelling character writing and overarching plotlines! That brings us to our next point-

The characters: 3/5

I love love love Cocona, but I know more could've been done with her feelings of inadequasy and emptiness. Papika is a good complementing main character to her, especially through the last few episodes, but I can't help but find her lack of boundaries and respect for Cocona's a little too grating at first. Yayaka, our antagonistic-ish figure, is a wonderful add-on to the cast, and she's possibly one of my favorite yuri third wheels- I mean side characters to date. All characters grow during the show, and it's a pleasure to watch!

Side characters are also compelling in this show, even if they aren't all very remarkable! I liked the little plotline with the art club senpai, and Yayaka's sidekicks were good to have around as well. Team Flip Flap was good fun too, I especially enjoyed the mad computer scientist who was gnc af.

The yuri: 2.5/5

Flip Flappers comes across as another one of those anime that was gunning for canon yuri rep, but the higher-ups noticed it halfway through and whacked it with the no-homo hammer. Most standout moments, such as Cocona literally conversing with the manifestation of her repressed sexuality, happen earlier than 8 episodes in, but there's some yuri to be found all throughout the show, in the end with some very emotional moments as well! I will say however that the ending twist was giving slightly When Marnie Was There vibes, but thankfully it wasn't like that.

Various short segments:

The emotional aspect: 4/5. The aforementioned themes were well done, and I can admit I cried once or twice while watching! Not much more I can say without spoilers, so let's get on with it!

The humor: 2/5. Not much to say about it, sometimes it hit well!

The fanservice: 1/5. I didn't need to see panty shots of the girls in their transformation sequence or an episode where they're in their swimsuits the whole time and stuffed into tiny environments, thank you very much.

Overall: 3.5/5

I really enjoyed Flip Flappers! It wasn't anything very remarkable, but I know I'll think about it very fondly from now on! Its willingness to take on themes not often seen in anime was good to see, and the characters carried the good plot well. Go watch it if magical girls are your cup of tea!

[risingshards]

Hello! This is your friendly inquiry to answer this ask with whatever you'd like to talk about right now! Whether that be a story you're working on, something you're excited or worried about, or just something random you happen to know.

All the love,

~ toribookworm ❤️

I got some stuff I wanna talk about so thank you very much for this!! 💖 IN PARTICULAR I HAVE THOUGHTS following up this post I have things to say about my like...Philosophy of Fluff™ writing. This may contain spoilers kinda for overall tone and goals for Rising Shards but I don't think I'll get anything too detailed there. (ramble incoming)

For Rising Shards, I spent a lot of time studying my favorite stories going in, and while I have a lot for fantasy/action/etc., for this I will focus on the romance side. For me I don't see RS as too subversive to the genre, just more in tribute/heavily inspired by the yuri romances I like rather than tradpub stuff.

If I'm subverting tradpub or the tradpub romance genres, it's pretty much all unintended because I hit a wall with Rising Shards and tradpub (there were a lot of things I didn't vibe with for the tradpub system, but the invasive personal "tell us all your personal LGBT secrets so we may market you through them before we even consider your work" made me real uncomfy). Also influential: working for a publisher, seeing what in the publishing system would not mix with what I wanted from Rising Shards, and then layoff from said publisher really made me like "is struggling for an 80k manuscript with forced drama and straining to get lit agents' attention right for Rising Shards?" Fortunately realized RS would be perfect for a web novel and have been rolling that way since.

So for like fluff philosophy! Following up me being more inspired by yuri manga and light novels than western tradpub romance, I also am like. Immensely sensitive and get way too empathetic in stories. So I write stuff to make me feel better. The concept of the iyashikei genre I vibe with so strongly, and I wish I had learned more about it wayyy before I did. TVTropes definition of iyashikei:

Iyashikei (癒し系) is Japanese for "healing", a term used for anime and manga created with the specific purpose of having a healing or soothing effect on the audience. Works of this kind often involve alternative realities with little to no conflict, emphasizing nature, the mundane and the little delights in life.

In my work there's definite iyashikei inspiration in addition to the yuri. Rising Shards isn't fully iyashikei, I still have action-y arcs in there, but I think my absolute best stuff in there is the healing slice of life stuff. So for me I feel like it's less subverting and showing what for to tradpub romances and the like and more just putting my heart and soul out there, the writing of which lines up with different subset of genres than what (from I found) traditional publishers are looking for. Also with a webnovel I can get really gay with it and no one can stop me muahahahha 🏳️‍⚧️

FLUFF WISE for Rising Shards I really like stuff that's healing. I like when characters have had a bad time in the past that they recover from with supportive partners, where the parties involve heal from their past traumas together. I'm less into the "ups and downs of a couple that breaks up and gets back together", like in a sitcom when that main ship breaks up I care significantly less about them even when they get back together. And I'm very empathetic and get very emotionally invested in stories, so calming stories that are hopeful and happy and peaceful help me maintain mental peace.

One of my thoughts for Rising Shards is to have some real stable couples that the story is less about like "ARE THEY REALLY RIGHT FOR EACH OTHER WILL THEY CHEAT SPLIT UP AND EVENTUALLY GET BACK TOGETHER" but rather couples dealing with all the stuff above, growing together and being peaceful and helping with that aforementioned me stability, and I hope I can help readers with that too.

With my web novel I have like a gajillion characters, so at some point I do think some of the side romances will be more tumultuous, but my philosophy is the main stable couples have to stay stable, and that the hurt will always be equal to or less than the healing that follows. I don't wanna make people really stressed, like lure them in with soft fluff romance then pull the rug on them with intense heartrending drama. I want the drama sure but I want it bearable. I see that post going around about like "I need my romances to be toxic to enjoy them" and I'm the opposite. I've dealt with enough toxic romances in my life that I wanna heal from them, not remind myself of past pain unless it's in a way that helps me take steps forward.

Also a closing thought; a vitally important part of my fluffy romance writing relating to the above yuri inspiration: like 99% gay stuff gimme lemsbebians gorls pretety

SO TO SUMMARIZE:

-I feel like my fluffy romance is less intentionally subversive and more me taking inspiration from my favorite stories mixed with the kind of writing I like best

-I have heavy yuri and iyashikei influence on my fluff

-I really like fluffy romance that's healing, I like characters overcoming their pasts together, building new families and finding themselves and helping each other be the best they can be

-I like having stable couples in my stories as pillars even if there are other relationships in the stories that aren't as stable

-I'm very easily emotionally rattled and empathetic with characters and stories so I like the peace that calm stories bring

-woman kimses pretty woman good

[katyspersonal]

I've been tossing characters around and ended up with accidental love square (sort of) between some characters like-

So there are Maria x Adeline and Yurie x Rom implications, but I've been thinking. Rom and Adeline could be really cute too, as they are both pretty much wasted for humanity because of the Great Ones - Rom gets "blessed" by Kos and Adeline craves this blessing (as a rare patient in Research Hall not afraid of the Sea horrors but desperate for them). I think the two could have an interesting conflict where one desires what another resents that becomes too personal, or, alternatively, they could be both far too deep into pursuit for Insight and find strange understanding in one another! Because everyone tells them to hold back... but not themselves.

And then I also have Rom and Maria who do share a lot in common with my interpretation of Rom! Both girls are the best students of a weird old man (in the chair xD) that committed Some Shit and put them on the downfall path - Willem and Gehrman respectively. Both women are emotional, young and naive and end up committing Some Shit as well and regret it too late, and also can't find piece even after death, existing in astral form to protect the secrets that need to be unveiled to stop the vicious cycle. But I think the two do have similarities; and at the same time, Rom seems like Maria's 'type' of a woman (she is similar to Adeline too), but without the awkwardness of being seen as superior, because Rom is bad with subordination.

But also, imagine if Maria struggles with how carried away Adeline gets with the whole Eldrich Truth pursuit and Insight and all alike, to the point of forgetting herself, but she is not even sure how to help, so she asks Yurie for advice since Rom has similar obsessions. Like, she asks Yurie to explain and show her what she does to help to ground Rom back to humanity, and that leads to hugs, very pleasant things being said and Maria seeing Yurie as a bit more 'competent' in such intricate things.. That leads to Maria growing respectful for Yurie but also... maybe wishing that she could have gotten some of that care and intimacy to herself too? Meanwhile Yurie, likewise, would be pleasantly impressed how much Maria cares for her friend and wants to do her best for others. So, basically, the two are attracted to each other's caring, devoted nature.

But also? I like to think that before Research Hall evolved into Choir's base, the whole squad was there, and that includes Micolash. Who, of course, would value Adeline more than any other patient, and possibly expect a lot from her, much to Maria's chagrin. But you know who else I can see disliking Micolash and not trusting him a single second? Right, Yurie! So what if she was one of the doctors in Research Hall like him, but also could not help it but tried to separate Micolash and Adeline as often as she can, acting as her doctor instead? As result, she'd get to know Adeline and what driven her to seek this fate better, and maybe grow to care about her a lot. (Heck, maybe observing how the person loses worth of humanity under Insight upon Adeline's example could be one of the reasons for Yurie to 'fall out' of the Choir's mentality and rejoin Willem who suggested pursuing evolution without forgetting what the worth of humanity is?) My point is, she could have grown protective of Adeline before the "bigger evil" (Micolash) and it could have grown into something bigger?

Basically what I am saying is that I accidentally found a cute ship potential between any combination of these four characters? It can be Cool Girl x Cute Girl (Mariadeline, Yurom, Romaria or Yurine), or Cool Girl x Cool Girl (Mariyurie), or Cute Girl x Cute Girl (Romadeline). It is also really fun because every single combination is doomed by the narrative- I mean it's Bloodborne, what else to expect lol

[touhousecretsanta]

Sidelys’ wishlist

     WISHES: Yuri, please and thank you. My favourite pairing is Yukari/Reimu, but I’d also be very happy to receive Eirin/Kaguya, Yuuka/Alice, Yukari/Yuuka or Renko/Maribel content! If you really don’t want to do ships then some art of Yuuka or Yukari would be lovely.

More generally I like history/folklore and characters’ backstories, Yukari and Maribel theories, and historical and alternative fashion. Angst and cute stuff are both ok.

    PET PEEVES: I’d rather not receive anything Christmas themed! And if you’re making something with Yukari/Reimu or Yuuka/Alice, please don’t represent Reimu or Alice as teenagers/minors. I also really don’t like fics or comics where the main point of tension is that human/youkai couples have differing lifespans.

    ABILITIES: I can draw, paint, and write - I’d also be happy to make a short comic or an illustrated/multimedia fic.

    WON’T DO: I suck at drawing animals and furries. It’s not a hard no, I’m just really not the best person for the job. I’d also rather only draw f/f ships. I’m not that keen on drawing Christmassy stuff either, but winter-themed is ok.

    VOLUNTARY SANTA: Not this time <3

    POST-SCRIPTUM: I’ll post my gift at @sidelys, but I’ll probably respond to/reblog the one I receive on my main (@medoisa) and my Touhou sideblog (@yukareimu) - jsyk!