#and not quite related

[thursdaylebeau]

Anyone else get some serious Captain Jack Harkness vibes from that Dr Who episode? The suave American with a morally grey job... the samesex dancing in a historical time period...

Like I like Rogue as a character, but that ep was just pinging all sorts of "this would be Captain Jack if John Barrowman had been allowed back" to me.

But I do look forward to them finding Rogue again and giving him more to differentiate him (like the interest in d&d but inability to improv under pressure)

[halorvic]

🤝

[okanra]

Since I grew up in the late 90s, all I can think about teen Trunks and Goten is through the layer of nostalgia, with them wearing the late 90s and early 2000s clothing in something like a US setting, and Trunks using the latest phone technology at the time since he's a tech nepobaby: the legendary flip phone.

I think for Goten who was originally a mountain boy to be so hooked on things like phones and texting and girlfriends and dates when he grows into his adolescence, is because Trunks was his original influence until it wasn't.

Them using the trendiest slangs of 20 years later is pretty on point tho.

[nessa007]

[songtwo]

it's already been said but it's crazy how female artists in the 90s wanted nothing to do w the feminist label and yet the message they sent through their music was actually empowering due to its rawness and authenticity while nowadays everyone tries too hard to be a feminist and an ally and they just come off as fake and bland bc it's all this sugarcoated liberal white feminism #girlboss barbie 2023 and the worst part is ppl actually buy into that but get scared when they see anything sinead oconnor did

[spacerockband]

Legend tells of the carp that leapt over the Dragon Gate at the crest of a river and became a stand up comedian.

[strobbylemonade]

murder on the warp express doodles

[generichoneydew]

Of all the duos I was expecting to get out of II15, this was certainly not one of them 32/52

[yepmimix]

i like to think reapers tend to intimidate people upon first meetings (often unintentionally) its part of that good ol reaper charm. something about their mere presence just makes people's bodies freeze up.

[dailyhatsune]

fun trivia time about neru and haku’s origins:

neru came from a time when a strange incident occurred and miku’s presence was essentially nearly scraped off the internet following a tv feature deriding miku’s existence. this caused people to get super upset (think the 2007 equivalent of something trending on twitter), assuming that the japanese music industry was intentionally trying to suppress miku (they were not). people who said that wasn’t true were associated with the phrase 飽きた、寝る。(akita, neru/‘i’m done, i’m going to bed’), which was memed a lot. the phrase eventually became a character (亜北ネル as opposed to the original reading) used to represent those people who said the rumour wasn’t true (at their expense)

haku’s origin is significantly less touchy. she was made to represent the mikus who worked with producers who couldn’t take criticism, always complained that their work never took off or didn’t know how to use vocaloid and were surprised that it did not sound Great. the name yowane haku (弱音ハク) is based off the phrase 弱音を吐く (yowane o haku/‘to complain’). on that note, honne dell is a ‘version’, so to speak, of haku that is a derivative of len instead of miku. his name (本音デル) is based off a pun much like haku’s name (本音が出る [honne ga deru/‘one’s true feelings came out’]

[rainbow-sunshine-unicorn]

I saw this person point out that it looks like Anthony was sniffing his hand after caressing Kate’s face

And I’d never heard that before so I went to rewatch the scene and HE REALLY DID SMELL THE PALM OF HIS HAND THE MOMENT HE TURNED AWAY FROM KATE

Because of the lack of music in the scene, you can actually HEAR him inhale

Oh Anthony Bridgerton, feral isn’t a word strong enough to describe you

[c-kiddo]

cad and belle are just wee besties to me . and have lots of sensory pressure hugs. (from npc requests but i wanted to draw them together anyway so bonus cad)

[lyinginthesnow]

thinking abt that line in dundee when logan says shiv makes boogie men out of the clothes she dumps on her bedroom floor. always has.

[stellas-and-tonitruses]

Everything we know about Project Apple (and, by extension, Anya's past) thus far

thought i'd compile all of that now while endo's on break Just In Case the next chapter happens to start anya's backstory (i don't Think it will but endo likes surprising us LSDFKLFS)

important disclaimer that project apple and the organization in charge of anya's experiments have not been confirmed to be related! there's evidence that they have things in common, in particular employees, but that's our only real connection between the two thus far. still! worth looking into

more under the cut!

so, starting very strongly with the very first mention of anything related to the project: anya's introduction in chapter 1

despite her being a main character, we know very little about her past at the moment, and this little blurb at the beginning makes up a very big portion of what we know.

things to note here:

as an experiment, her name was "Test Subject 007". important to note that the notation differs between her and bond: she was Test Subject 007, bond was Subject 8, no zeroes in there;

she had been made thus by accident, the phrasing itself implying quite heavily that she was just a normal child before said accident (but this is the translation! i don't know japanese so i can't cross-reference with the raws to clarify if the phrasing changes anything, but the fanbook uses the word "gained" to describe her powers too);

because her mind-reading is an unintended consequence, that means the scientists were presumably not, at least initially, trying to achieve cognitive enhancements in humans, and were instead trying to achieve something else, whatever that might've been;

she escaped from the facility and then moved from institution to institution, looking for a family.

so, crucially, through this little introduction we learn that there is an organization, government-funded or otherwise, that is or was conducting human experiments for unknown purposes. we also learn that whatever family anya had prior to being involved in the experiments is more than likely unreachable, at least as far as she knows, and so she has settled for finding a new family to take care of her instead.

in terms of the facility itself, here we see they clearly drilled it into her that she can't ever reveal her secret (and the darn plush is there too -- in the anime it's even more emphasized, as you can see in the gif i made)

through her reminiscing though, we get our very first look at the scientists that were in charge of her! they're in the gif above but here they are in the manga too. it's so interesting that the anime actually shows their eyes behind the glasses though, fascinating choice.

the insistence on world peace is important, as it explains her own personal obsession with it and shows that it's not just because of twilight's own focus on preserving the peace. i also don't think twilight ever really talks about "world peace," only about "preserving the current peace between westalis and ostania" -- anya seems to be the only one talking about WORLD peace (even in the very first scene where either of them mention it in proximity to each other in ch 1, loid says "understanding the other party is the first step towards peace" and anya's interpretation is "understanding me makes world peace?") but take this with a grain of salt because i might be wrong! going through every single mention of peace in the story just to fact check this one little trivia fact is a bit much i think so i'm not doing it JSDFKLSD

but yes

remember mr hair strand and baldy, we'll see them again. not her though, ig she wasn't in charge of bond

now, fast-forwarding to chapter 19, we finally get a name and a premise for the experiments:

"but oana," you might say, "this is talking about animals only! how do we know it's the same project as anya's, which involved human experimentation?"

i don't think it is, is the thing! i think it's related to the experiments anya was a part of, which is evidenced by the same scientists being featured in project apple too, but there's more going on that we don't know about. there wouldn't be such adamancy on keeping the two separate in every official mention of them if they were just the same thing, imo!

back to the evidence, we learn that the project, conducted and funded by the previous ostanian regime (meaning donovan's related to it one way or another, since he was prime minister), was marked by franticness and desperation -- a prime place for accidents like anya's telepathy and bond's future vision.

we also learn that the project was sacked by the new administration and that the former test subjects ended up on the black market.

(this makes it very important, imo, to learn when anya escaped the facility vs. when the project was sacked. it's clearly no longer in function, but while we've heard nothing from them thus far, i'm willing to bet the shady dealings around the desmond group are NOT related to the war, as W.I.S.E. has been led to believe, but rather to reignite project apple. that is speculation however so i'm going to refrain from theorising much on why the desmond group is focused on acquiring pharmaceutical companies!!)

ok speculation tangent over, back on track

so, that's already a decent amount of info! but moving to chapter 22, when bond is finally home, and we finally see some familiar faces

behold! baldy and mr hair strand!

and 2 other guys we don't know but will see again in another bond flashback!

that's 2 out of the 3 scientists we've seen thus far from anya's own time as subject 007, confirming that there IS a connection between anya and bond's experiments, regardless of whatever the project anya was a part of might've been named.

this is also the chapter in which we learn that bond himself was subject 8 (or, if we take it from the fanbook, subject #8. still, diff notation from anya!)

in chapter 31, we learn an interesting tiny piece of trivia. we don't get any further info on it, but it IS mentioned as something that is known by W.I.S.E.:

ostania is rumoured to have done human experimentation! and W.I.S.E., and by extension loid, are aware of that.

do i know how them knowing may be important later? not really!

the next droplet of info we get is in chapter 40. we see that project apple had collaborators that are still functioning unhindered.

of course, born industries is only rumoured to have been involved with project apple, but regardless of whether or not they actually were, the rumour itself implies that the project likely pulled scientists from various other companies' R&D departments.

(this makes the desmond group's acquisition of glooman pharmaceuticals shadier, but anyway)

as a side note, twilight is emoting so much at just his wrong assumption that bond is seeking revenge against the scientists. imagine how he's going to react when he finds out about anya JKSDFKLFSD

and now aaaaall the way in chapter 58, we see the bald guy who anya also knows, the two scientists from bond's previous flashback, and one whole new guy!

and thus ends our current knowledge of it all!

the only other thing worth discussing is anya's knowledge of classical language

but plenty people have already discussed these scenes, especially recently, so here are some links: 1 | 2 | 3

the only thing i can add is that i'm fairly certain that classical language is a lot more likely to be latin than old english, because it's a very common language to learn in school (in europe at least, and ostania is based on east germany so it makes sense to me. i learned mandatory latin in school for a few good years too, even if i wasn't that good at it lol) and because one of the most common modern usages of latin are in medicine and science, it would make sense that she'd be better at it due to exposure.

a possibility is also that the scientists would think in latin to conceal their thoughts from her, and that's how she ended up learning so much. she's not fluent in latin, she's just well acquainted and that cicumstance would explain the how.

BUT THAT'S SPECULATIONNN

also i don't think "ANIA" is an acronym, nor do i think anya's been misspelling her own name out of lack of knowledge. "ania" is a polish diminutive of anna and an alternate transcription of Аня, so i think it's far more likely that anya isn't ostanian or westalian than it is that her name comes from an acronym.

now,

TL;DR!

what we know about project apple (and the "mysterious organization"):

project apple was funded and conducted by what appears to have been donovan's regime and, from what W.I.S.E. knows, aimed to create highly intelligent animals for military purposes;

W.I.S.E. is aware that ostania is at the very least rumoured to have dabbled in human experimentation;

the project is presumably no longer on-going, though it is likely there are efforts behind the scenes to revive it;

it is rumoured but not confirmed that project apple had collaborating companies that are still functioning perfectly fine;

the same scientists who were in charge of bond were also in charge of anya, signalling that there is a very significant connection between project apple and the "mysterious organization;"

based on what they were telling anya, they were/are very focused on "world peace";

their experimentation methods include but likely aren't limited to electrocution.

and what we (vaguely) know about anya that relates to this:

she is at the youngest, 4 years old, and at the oldest, 5 nearing 6. we don't know her real age, all we know is she definitely lied about being 6;

she is very fixated on specifically world peace while twilight is focused on peace between ostania and westalis. the scientists are the very first we see talking about this, so it's likely their fault;

she is unreasonably well acquainted with classical language;

she has escaped the facility at LEAST 1 year ago;

and, one tidbit from the fanbook (page 29): "Anya has been reading minds for as long as she can remember," implying that her memory of a life before the lab is muddy at best and absent at worst.

that's all we know that i know of!!

if you got this far, thank you for reading :D hope any of this was interesting or sparked any theories >:] have a good day!

[feykiller]

"There was never a man, like my Johnny.."

[trauma-bot]

sin eater