#another level discussion

[siriuslysatorusimping]

Okaeri (a scrapped 'Another Level' scene)

Hello!! I decided to post this old draft of Rinko and Gojo's reunion after he was released from the Prison Realm to give you guys a lil look at just how much changed from when I originally started writing Another Level to where we are now.

This draft was something I wrote very early on, and by the time we got Gojo out of the Prison Realm, it didn't fit the story at all.

I'll provide a breakdown at the end to give more context and commentary, but the primary thing you'll need to know before reading is that, originally, I had intended for Rinko to stay in hiding and completely isolated throughout almost the entire 19 days. So, that's where she's at in this draft that I eventually scrapped completely 🙃

Happy reading 💕

If you haven't already, you can read Another Level on AO3 😊

*This work contains possible JJK Manga spoilers. Gojo x Original Female Character. Uhhhh. Implied smut?

Okaeri

2018

Twenty days.

It had been twenty days since he’d been sealed. 

Well, technically, it was nineteen and a few hours.

A glance at the clock told her it was still the middle of the night.

Around day eleven, Rinko asked herself when she’d become the kind of person who counted days like this.

She used to go weeks without speaking to him. Months without seeing him. It never bothered her before.

Got somethin’ real important to tell ya.

It was because he was still their win condition. 

Because they couldn’t win this without him.

Got somethin’ real important-

Probably didn’t help that she hadn’t left his damn condo in almost fifteen days now. She’d gone to let Shoko reassess her injuries and get the all-clear afterward because, apparently even Shoko didn’t fucking know where Gojo lived.

Secretive little shit.

Rinko had since learned that the list was shorter than she originally thought, only including her, Yaga, and Nanami.

Well, it only included her now-

Got somethin’ real-

Having gotten enough basic food to last her for a long time when she’d gone to see Shoko, she’d been isolated since.

And going fucking crazy.

At least the dreams had stopped. Mercifully, they’d stopped a few days after her fucking delusional wet dream.

Got somethin’ real important to tell ya.

Releasing a heavy sigh, Rinko forced herself out of the torturous safety of the bed. She needed to shower and get dressed. Wear real clothes and feel like a fucking human instead of a walking corpse just because her- best friend was gone.

She’d received a text earlier telling her to meet Hime, Shoko, and Yoshinobu at the Tokyo Tech campus because they had news, but she’d been asleep. So, she’d texted Shoko to let her know she would head that way soon.

Her body ached from the strain of moving for the first time in what felt like days. But she knew that wasn’t true. She’d forced herself to make food the day prior, staring at the stove as she made herself eggs and toast, wondering how much longer she’d be able to force herself to live like this.

Unable to help. She’d had to learn about Megumi from Shoko, unable to do anything to help. Knowing it was partially because Tsumiki-

The shower drowned her sobs and amplified them at the same time.

Pulling another one of Gojo’s sweaters over her head, she realized she needed to do laundry. She’d quickly run out of her own shirts, which she hadn’t been too worried about. But she drew the line at wearing his pants.

Grumbling to herself, she looked through her bag on the floor of his closet before moving into the bedroom to search through the pile near the hamper. She was not going to wear his pants. Even if she had to wear a dirty, gross pair of her own.

As she rifled through the pile, swearing briefly when she couldn’t find any, she continued mumbling.

“Fucking swear, I know I brought more than one pair. Where the fuck are they?”

She let out a small cry of relief when she finally found a pair at the bottom of his hamper.

“S’legs are too fuckin long anyway,” she said to herself, sticking her right leg in. “Would fuckin trip before I could-”

A quiet chuckle cut her off, halting with her left leg halfway into the pants. She blinked slowly.

She was really fucking losing it.

There was another chuckle, this time causing Rinko to whip around to see him standing in the doorway, smiling at her.

He was wearing the same clothes she’d last seen him in, his jacket ripped to shreds. His hands were in his pockets as he stared at her, blindfold nowhere to be seen.

“Nope,” she said, shaking her head. “Nope. Officially too far. Don’t care who it is on the council. I’ll just fucking- I’ll just kill all of them. I could do it. More than capable. Just a bunch of old fucks. I’ve gotta fucking leave this place.”

Yanking her pants the rest of the way on, she kept mumbling to herself as she refused to look at the specter in the doorway.

“Fucking hallucinating, great. Oh, Hime’s gonna fucking love this. Never let me fucking live it down. Know exactly what she’s gonna say, too: ‘I told you so, Rinko. I knew he’d drive you crazy someday.’ Fucking-”

Rinko cut off when she tried to walk through the door, ignoring the stupid apparition of her damned delusional, fucked up mind, only to find that this apparition was solid.

She blinked for a moment, staring straight at the hallucination’s chest.

Did she- was the door closed, and she just forgot? Had her crazy dumbass just fucking run into the door?

“Rinko,” it whispered, arms going around her waist as she stumbled. “Rinko-chan-”

“I have fucking lost it,” she breathed, tears in her eyes as it grasped her chin, forcing her to look up.

Bright blue eyes from her fucking nightmares at this point.

She closed her eyes immediately, squeezing them shut and willing herself to make it go away. To stop torturing herself.

“Rinko,” he repeated quietly. “I’m here. You might be crazy, sweetheart, but not that crazy-”

“Exactly what an insane person’s hallucination would say,” she stated.

Gojo laughed, the sound ripping her chest open. And she felt that void blow wide open with it as she realized she’d truly gone insane.

Completely broken and unhinged, and honestly, maybe Shoko would understand if she just crawled back into bed. Because, at this point, she couldn’t do it. Fully and truly, honestly couldn’t do it anymore.

“I always knew you liked me more than you admitted,” he teased, his voice sounding too real. “Open your eyes, baby.”

“You’re not fucking real,” she whispered, her voice cracking on the last word. “I-”

“Rinko,” he cut her off, his breath against her lips. “Rinko, baby, look at me.”

When she still didn’t open her eyes, he hummed quietly, pressing a kiss to her cheek.

“Baby,” his voice was amused now. “Don’t make me spank you-”

Her eyes shot open, irritation flooding her as she met his bright blue, glowing eyes as he grinned.

Only this asshole would-

“Thought that might get you to open them,” he murmured, chuckling when she scowled. “Baby, I’m here.”

Her face scrunched as he leaned even closer, nudging his nose against hers teasingly.

“Rinko-chan,” he breathed, his lips brushing hers. “I’m home.”

Not waiting for a reply, he pressed his lips to hers gently before moving his hand from her chin to tangle in her hair. His other arm stayed around her waist, pulling her so she was flush against him.

“Missed you,” he said, sucking her tongue into his mouth. “Missed you so much, baby.”

Tears were running down her cheeks, her mind still not believing what was in front of her was real. He ground his hips into her, moving to lick her neck and groaning when she whimpered quietly.

Giving in slowly, her hands grasped his shirt, fingers clenching the fabric as she sobbed.

“I- you were- I thought-”

“Couldn’t stay away from you,” he teased, sucking her pulse harshly, moaning as one of her hands went to his hair, tugging the strands lightly. “Had somethin’ important to tell you, remember?”

“You’re a fucking asshole,” she whined, feeling Gojo’s laugh rumble through her. “You can’t just-”

He silenced her by leaning back up, capturing her lips again, and slowly walking her backward.

“Shh, baby,” he hummed, biting her lip. “Just let me make you feel good. Been a bit, yeah? You miss me?”

-

Commentary

Obviously, this is very different from what we had in Something Important.

As I said before, I wrote this early on. So by the time we got to Shibuya, this draft no longer fit. It just didn't fit who Rinko was as a person anymore. With the growth she experienced, especially in the few months leading up to Shibuya, she wouldn't react this way.

I've mentioned a few times that I hadn't intended to really include the Culling Game arc. And I still didn't, not really. But having Rinko hiding away and being scared of the higher-ups just isn't who she is. Especially when it comes to her kids' safety. Like hell would Rinko have just sat in isolation with no updates on the kids. Hell no. If they'd tried to get her to, she'd have stormed one of the barriers herself and killed anyone who got in between her and her kids.

I also felt this draft made it seem way too much like Rinko's life revolved around Gojo when it doesn't. So, having her sit around and count the days just felt cheap.

There was no way Rinko would have sat by while her kids were fighting for their lives like this. And there was no way, after the realizations and the growth she'd gone through, that she would crumble like this and allow herself to sink into things like this.

But on top of that, there was no way that Rinko would be able to just welcome Gojo back as her fuck buddy without her heart completely breaking in half after all the loss that she'd experienced at this point.

Personally, this would have ended up feeling far to emotionally detached from all the trauma and loss that the two of them have gone through, and it would have negated any positive character development we'd had up until then as well.

The more I've read this back over to write this lil commentary, the more I fall in love with how Something Important turned out. Because it genuinely felt like the perfect reunion for these two after everything that had happened.

If I remember correctly, I wrote this way back before I wrote I Say "Sayonara." Soooo, that should tell you something about how much had changed 🙃

Also, you'll notice a few small details that I snuck into other installments once I realized that this one was going to have to be scrapped.

One of them being the joke about Gojo's legs being too long for her to wear his pants, which I included in Fragmented Reality instead.

SO. There's that. A small look behind the curtain of one of the original drafts that was completely scrapped in favor of something much better 😂😂

Did I MAKE ANY SENSE?? I FEEL LIKE I DIDN'T BUT HOPEFULLY I DID 🫠🫠

ALSO, I will include a fun lil extra blurb that I was never able to include anywhere, and that made me sad because I found it hilarious:

They lay there comfortably for a few minutes, focusing on each other’s breathing.

“Yoshinobu!” she suddenly gasped out, causing Gojo to scowl down at her when she tried to shove him away. “Hime! I was supposed to meet them-”

“They already knew you weren’t going to make it,” he cut her off, swatting her hands and putting them back into his hair. “I told them I’d update you and get back to them.”

“Oh,” she breathed, settling back once more.

He lifted his head back up to look her in the eye, his gaze serious.

“And don’t you ever yell Gakuganji’s name after I’ve just cum inside you,” he deadpanned, pulling a breathless laugh from her. “I mean it, Rinko. That’s enough to make my dick shrink forever.”

“I’m sorry!” she gasped, the weight in her chest lifting with each giggle.

[lucabyte]

Different standards

[txttletale]

Where does this "Wah wah revolution is impossible in the imperial core" come from anyway ? Are we going to pretend the Russian Czardom was impoverished backwater when it held several nations under imperialist yoke and was embroiled in expansionist wars with its neighbours for the better part of its last century ? Hell it was fighting one DURING the revolution with another imperial power !

the russian tsardom was in fact very notably an impoverished backwater, an agricultural economy in the age of industrialisation, which is one of the reasons why it was losing the eastern front of ww1 very badly. baffling how you would think this extremely documented fact, remarked upon at length by every single bolshevik writer, is self evidently absurd

[skeletalheartattack]

honestly, the most devastating news you could hear about in 2007 while playing roblox was learning that Scatman John passed away in 1999. like, finding that out was the roblox child's equivalent to 9/11.

[harocat]

It's actually really cringe of the anime industry that it's been over eight years since Yuri on Ice, and zero anime that aren't explicitly adapted from a BL manga have managed to be as gay as YOI (let alone outgay YOI). Like you'd think the explosive success would have given companies the motivation to take more chances on original queer stories, but nope. Seven hundred more shitty isekai for you. Over eight years and the industry has learned nothing.

[throes-of-warm-tornadoes]

okay no offense but i’m not a fan of Five finding his “real life” dolores. like, that diva was literally a coping mechanism for him. a tangible reminder that he was so lonely that he made a literal piece of plastic his companion. i think the idea of it is sweet but at the end of the day i think that if Five did find someone romantically it should be someone that makes him feel silly and carefree, not someone that is a fleshy replica of an Apocalyptic Souvenir

[vio1315]

I'm connecting the dots, I'm connecting them

Listen to my theory

Listen

The notion of putting in 0 effort at your job because it sucks? It's a trap. I think the human mind is not actually that good at separating things.... I think when you decide to go to something day after day and put as little effort in as possible.... I think you're teaching yourself to put little effort into Everything in your life

Has anyone tested this already

I think this is another piece of killing your own motivation

[angelsdean]

don't know how people multi-fandom. dipped my toe into another one and immediately backed out bc everyone there was insufferable.

[siriuslysatorusimping]

Another Level Author Discussion: Hollow Echoes

I absolutely LOVE that so many of you have so many thoughts about the most recent addition to Another Level! This part was incredibly challenging for me to write and I'm so very proud of how it came out and how the emotions came across.

I decided to post this because I was going to end up writing full-length books in the comments replying, and I thought this might be better lol For those who haven't read it yet, I'm putting the discussion below the cut so you can avoid spoilers!

If you haven't already and want to know more, you can find Another Level on AO3 :)

In all honesty, I struggled to write this part a lot because I already had the outcome planned. I knew from the start that this would be their first big fight and it would test them, but that they would come out stronger. I also knew that I wanted to keep Gojo as close to our real Gojo as possible, meaning that he's likely not going to apologize for hurting her. In his mind, he was justified in being upset, so whatever he did or said was justified as well.

You will see some of this in the upcoming chapter for Hollow Echoes.

Something I want to convey in this story as a whole is that people are messy. Humans are filled with lots of emotions, and pain is one of the hardest to work with because people in pain are typically unpredictable.

Gojo is human. And he is far from perfect. While he shouldn't have lashed out the way he did, it's very human of him to direct that anger at the first person he comes in contact with. It's actually why he had isolated himself in the first place because he knows he's not okay enough to be around people when he's like that even if he doesn't know how to say that. He doesn't want to risk ruining the persona he's built of being carefree and nonchalant by taking his anger out on others, so he shuts himself away for a few days to get a handle on his emotions and then slides his mask back in place. She caught him while he was still trying to find that mask again and it threw him off a lot. Hence his lashing out. 

He's also furious with Nanami. More than he's upset with Rinko, actually. Because Nanami overstepped quite a bit here. Well-intentioned, but he ignored the fact that Gojo clearly wanted to be left alone.

We're going to see that Nanami struggles with letting people handle things alone, he is a fixer. It's a trait that's pretty common in a lot of people even if they don't mean for it to be harmful: Your not being okay is making me not okay or is disrupting my life, so I need you to be okay again so I can be okay too. While many times it's because they care about that person, it rarely has good results, and this is a prime example of that.

Gojo missing jobs is disrupting Nanami's life because he's having to pick up some of the slack, and Yaga is getting angry as well. So, he does what he thinks will fix it: have Rinko talk to him. Because Gojo acts differently with her and is softer with her, Nanami thought that she would show up and things would just fix themselves. He's going to keep thinking that without meaning to.

So, while Rinko and Nanami both meant well, they blatantly disrespected Gojo's wish to be left alone.

Should he have communicated that he wanted to be left alone explicitly? Maybe. But they both should have realized that if he wasn't answering, that was him communicating his desire. Rinko did realize this, but she ignored that instinct in favor of listening to people who had known Gojo longer.

Nanami asking Rinko to cross a boundary by invading Gojo's space without permission - and her doing so - hurt Gojo quite a bit. Because it's what everyone else does and he didn't expect her to be like that. It's why she had a key to his place when literally no one else did. Because he thought he could trust her to not do exactly what she ended up doing.

I also made the purposeful choice to have her not mention in her messages that she was coming over. None of her messages even implied such, so he was truly blindsided by her showing up and entering without his permission.

Honestly, I have been on both ends of similar situations and it's really hard, so I'm happy with how this turned out because it starts to convey that complexity just a bit.

So, while being upset with him is completely understandable - and Rinko will be because she's also human and has emotions and is valid in them - his reaction makes sense from a purely human perspective. She also already knows that what she did was wrong, how she went about trying to check on him, and she'll acknowledge it. She knows he's human. Probably better than anyone else in his life at this point, and she understands what it's like to say and do things just because she's hurting.

He is going to admit to her that it's one of the things he likes most about her, appreciates about her. Because she sees a human with too much being asked of him when she looks at him instead of an untouchable god, like so many others do. He's going to tell her such, too.

Because if you'll remember, at this point, there are two people who have worn him down enough to land a hit on him: Toji Fushiguro and Rinko Kurisaki. And they did it days apart from each other, for completely different reasons. Gojo was escorting Riko Amanai less than a week after meeting Rinko. 

This was intentional. And it's a trait that irritates him while drawing him to her more. Her comment to Shoko about him being so different with her because of their first encounter? Not far off. She and Toji are cousins. First cousins. His father and her father were brothers. So, bastard or not, their blood relation is more direct than she ever talks about or wants to admit because it's the same amount of blood they'd have shared were she a legitimate child. And the fact that Toji was actually her first introduction to the Jujutsu world as a kid doesn't help with that.

Rinko has viewed herself as weak for multiple reasons and it's made her rely more on her brain than her cursed energy. After training a bit with Gojo, she's relying on both. 

But think back to their fight in Make a Good Bleed: she knew she couldn't beat him, so she focused on wearing him down and being annoying. And then when she saw an opening, she took it.

After just a few meetings with Toji, without him trying to teach her anything, she realized how useful having no cursed energy could be and learned to mask her own to make herself seem weaker. She is incredibly tactical and it will show even more over time. But what makes it even better is that she doesn't realize just how tactical she really is because she has believed what the main clan has told her since the day they met her: half-breeds are weak.

If you'll remember when she called herself a half-breed to Gojo, he clenched his jaw and narrowed his eyes at her. That wasn't because he didn't like being bested, it was because he didn't like that she called herself that. What did he say to her after?

"Zenin's are strong." He doesn't differentiate that. She has Zenin blood, so she's strong, 'half-breed' or not. He'll hear Naoya call her this once, and he's going to lose his mind.

Does any of this mean he's off the hook? Oh hell no. But, it's one reason she reacted the way she did in how quickly she retreated and blamed herself there at the end.

TLDR: Humans are messy and imperfect, and Gojo is no exception even if he is the strongest Jujutsu Sorcerer in the world.

[bisexualseraphim]

Also, I refuse to entertain the discourse as to whether acespec people are “oppressed” or not, but I will say it’s really fucking lonely — especially if you fall somewhere on the spectrum that’s a little more unconventional.

I’ve discussed many times before how I feel absolutely no attraction whatsoever except towards my lovely partner. I went through the phases queer men tend to: exploring many types of pornography and cruising on Grindr. I really tried, and none of it has ever done anything for me. It wasn’t until I started having sex with my partner that I realised, ohhh, so that’s how most people feel. And even then, enjoying sex with him is far more of an intimacy thing than the actual physical sensations. I do not fantasise about other people or consume porn. There is only him.

And yet when I’ve spoken about this in acespec spaces, I’m still treated as some sort of weirdo who doesn’t belong. I’ve literally been told many times that I can’t be demisexual because demis will still fantasise and consume porn (although that doesn’t line up with my understanding that demis require a close bond to feel sexual attraction, but never mind), and I’ve even been accused of having some weird internalised Christian puritan shit going on because I genuinely cannot comprehend ever looking at or thinking about someone in that way who isn’t my man. As if anything about this is a choice for me and it is offensive to them somehow. As if only feeling attraction to one person is like… “worse” than never feeling any attraction at all. I’ve never once shamed others for how they experience sex and sexual attraction and never would, yet people act like that’s what I’m inherently doing just by speaking about my own experiences.

So no, I won’t say whether acespec people are “oppressed” or not because honestly, when is this shit ever going to come up in conversation and ever be that relevant? But the fact I don’t feel I can talk about it even amongst other queer people, even amongst others in the acespec community, kind of speaks for itself.

Being a queer man who can’t relate to all the stereotypes and anecdotes about enjoying casual sex is one type of loneliness. Being a queer acespec man who can’t even relate to most others in the acespec community is another. I can never win, and either way I do not fit in.

[quietwingsinthesky]

it ever hit you out of nowhere that castiel is living in a dead guy's body and the show just does not care. it does not care. jimmy novak might as well not exist the moment he or claire is out of sight. cas stole a guy's body and his face and his life, and we can't ever talk about it or discuss it in detail because of how fucking horrifying it is that sam and dean's best friend just walks around in a dead guy suit. there's not even a human soul in there anymore. it's just a corpse. stone-cold body snatcher indeed.

[dykedvonte]

I keep seeing fanarts of ppl's OC's being on the ship, so do you think that if there was 6st crewmember (specifically, another woman) Anya would've been more safe? Like, someone to actually call Jimmy's begaviour out, someone Anya might wanna trust? Is there a possibility something might have changed (even if a little) or it would not have mattered at all?

-💀

I feel like the game would make it part of the commentary on where she would believe and help Anya but still be sort of dismissive? Like the whole “don’t waste time crying and being scared keep going and move on, don’t let him win”. It’s supposed to be positive and reinforcing but sometimes it does more damage in those times of mourning and grief, it feels patronizing, like you don’t understand what you’re going through but they do. Even if they did call out his behavior it’s still on Curly to act and while another voice would help, it’s still 4 against 2 on guys that don’t get it until they have to vs women who always have to.

I don’t mind mouthwashing OCs but I do get a bit bored as they tend to be borderline saviors or like Jimmy aligned. They are either more complicit than Curly or just Jimmy haters for no reason, outside of what the creators know about what he did to Anya. I am never irked by OCs but in a story like mouthwashing you really need to think about what your character adds to the commentary, especially if they are there during the crash. It’s nice to have like characters on Anya’s side more whole heartedly and interesting to see characters who placate Jimmy but sometimes it’s one note.

I can’t and don’t want to police peoples OCs it’s never my intention when I comment on trends I notice, but I do feel like the way people make their OCs interact with these two characters and especially Curly, really show a grave misunderstanding of the narrative and these characters as people vs roles in the story. Still, I know people just make up characters for fun and that’s fine. Great even, but I guys I’m focusing more on OCs that are supposed to have those serious dynamics. My favs tend to be pretty-Tulpar or post-Tulpar au OCs.

The inevitably of the crash is on Jimmy. He did that not because he wasn’t stopped but because all his means to kill Anya were taken. The gun, the axe. Even if Curly did strip him of his co-pilot privileges and try to keep him contained there’s only so many people. An extra body helps but they have jobs they have to do, he’s the only one steering the whole ship and Jimmy would likely have an out: food, bathroom, etc. He’s not new and if he couldn’t crash the ship directly, who’s to say he wouldn’t sabotage something else? A clunker like the Tulpar wouldn’t take much. An extra person helps but it’s just another thing that prolongs what a person like Jimmy is willing to do to shirk responsibility.

It’s more than just needing someone to stand up to him and think that’s what is missing when it comes to inserting a character into the mouthwashing setting.

[littlefankingdom]

~ Batman: Detective Comics (2016)

Sometimes, I see Jason's fans being annoyed when people say Cass would kick his ass. "Why wouldn't he win?" Well, because Cass would kick even Bruce's ass. And it has been established time and time again that the batboys cannot defeat Bruce in a one on one combat (the real deal). But Cass? Cass would win against Bruce ALONE. And that's something he is admitting here, but I pretty sure it was already implied in 2000.

[diabotsis]

I don't remember where my older post is that talked about it, but I love LOVE the lines from TRR ghetsis and BW2 ghetsis being defeated:

"I couldn't have been defeated by some random Trainer from who knows where!"

Because it is such a good little nod towards him really thinking his status, his class, being attached to the Harmonia (and Gropius) name makes him inherently better........ god its really interesting.

[chaztalk]

THE BEST 2024 ANIME POLL OFFICALLY STARTS NOW!

[yourlocaltrylingual]

insane how it's been 7 (SEVEN) months since arcane ended and it's still nigh-on impossible to have a normal conversation about caitlyn and her arc without some tourists bitching in your ear. like what's the point of trudging through all the exaggerations/misconstructions/straight up malignant lies and vile triple k or h*tler jokes if there's no end in sight and no place for real discussion.

have fandoms gotten worse with time or am i just looking at past experiences with rose-tinted glasses? cuz i simply cannot for the life of me remember a time where liking something felt so draining lmao