#but p4 sticks the fucking landing all the way through

[a-sketchy]

gotta say, the colour coding of the p4 cast is unmatched

[formula-one-thoughts]

What’s going on at Red Bull?

2020 (ignoring the global pandemic) should theoretically be Red Bull’s most comfortable year in F1 for a while. With Ferrari dropping considerably off the pace to the back end of the mid-field, their closest rival of the last few years has effectively been eliminated. Having pushed through the pitfalls of his aggressive driving style and refined his approach to racing, Max Verstappen has barely made a mistake of the kind that hampered his first few years at the team. They have on their hands a man who is widely considered (I believe rightfully so) to be the second best driver on the grid. And the results in part speak for this – they seem to have 2nd in the constructors championship in the bag. But a number of issues are plaguing the team that are making this an increasingly difficult season for them.

Firstly, Alex Albon simply isn’t delivering. It pains me to say this, as I love Alex; he is a genuinely nice guy and a great driver, and wouldn’t have been promoted to F1 and then Red Bull if he weren’t. He has pulled off some of the most exciting overtakes I’ve seen in a while since he landed the seat, braking late enough to make Daniel Riciardo jealous. But he is being majorly let down by his qualifying performance. In Russia for example he could only manage 10th (before a penalty dropped him to 15th), 1.1secs off his teammate in 2nd. Max is beating him 11-0 in the qualifying battle, and whilst Alex did manage to line up alongside him at Mugello and convert that into his first podium, when Max has finished a Grand Prix it has always been above his teammate. Plenty of people have said this isn’t a fair battle, that the team and car is built around Max, and that anyone going up against him will never have a fair chance. Of course the team is going to invest in Max – they would be stupid not to. He has a long-term contract with them and increasingly looks like the only alternate World Champion to Lewis Hamilton whilst the Brit remains in the sport. It doesn’t mater how good the second driver is, top teams have to choose a number one driver and get behind them if they want to have any chance of winning – just look at the mess Ferrari got themselves into last year with Leclerc and Vettel. But the accusations that Red Bull are sabotaging Alex are completely laughable. His success in the car means financial gains for the team, and it would be extremely beneficial for them and Max if Alex was closer to him, allowing for split strategies to attack the Mercedes. We’ve seen plenty of instances where a driver has entered a team built around one personality and managed to succeed: obviously the circumstances are all different but Ricciardo and Vettel, and Hill and Prost come to mind for me.

I think a major factor in this that has been overlooked a little though is the quality of the car, which due to the disappearance of Ferrari from the top has been more difficult to discern this year. Just because the team are second in the constructors championship by quite a way does not mean they have the second best car by quite a way. Even in Max’s hands, the RB16 looks a handful on the track, often more so than the Mclaren or pink Mercedes/Racing Point. Although impossible to tell for sure, I think the gap between the Red Bull drivers is exacerbated by the fact that Max is outperforming the car to quite a degree, whilst Alex is sadly underperforming. The pace of a team’s fastest driver isn’t always a direct indication of the pace of the car (Ferrari are experiencing something similar with their two drivers). The position of P3 that Max so often manages to slot himself into isn’t representative of the strength of the car, but neither is P8 (Albon’s average qualifying position this season). If Alex could consistently qualify and finish around the p4, p5, p6 mark (as he did after joining Red Bull mid way through last season), and on occasion stick together with Max throughout the race, then I think he and Red Bull could be proud of the results. There’s also rookie errors and clashes with other drivers from misjudged moves that end up landing Albon with a time penalty, damaged car, or both. His incident with Daniil Kvyat at the Nurburgring for example was completely avoidable, and reminiscent of the kind of incidents Max was causing in 2017 and 2018 (his clash with Vettel in China comes to mind). But whilst Max was making reckless manoeuvres, he was also getting results for the team, and Albon isn’t.

I don’t think there’s any chance at this point in the season of Red Bull swapping him out a la Gasly or Kvyat, but if things don’t improve his seat for next year is very much at risk. If they do decide to replace him though, who do they choose? For so long Red Bull were at the front of the pack when it came to their driver development programme, reflected in the fact that nearly half (7/16) of the podium sitters on the current grid are from the Red Bull Junior Team. But their talent pool seems to have dried up recently. The shuffling around of drivers between Alpha Tauri and themselves has left them in quite an awkward position, where the sister team they should be able to pick up-and-coming talent from consists of two demoted Red Bull drivers. Moving one of them back up to the number one team would be something of an admission that they fucked up their driver choices. I can’t see Gasly having any more success than Albon is having now, or he had during his first stint at Red Bull, if he makes the move back up (despite his strong form so far this season) and Kvyat definitely hasn't proved himself deserving of a promotion. Out of the nine Red Bull juniors, Yuki Tsunoda is the only driver with a realistic chance of gaining enough super licence points to move to F1 next season (I believe he needs to maintain his P3 in the F2 drivers standings for this), but he would only ever begin at Alfa Tauri. If they want to fill a seat at Red Bull with a new driver, they'll have to look to someone older and more experienced, creating a sort of Mark Webber Sebastian Vettel dynamic. Nico Hulkenberg and Sergio Perez’s names have been thrown around a lot, but a departure from their home grown talent again shows a weakness and a failure in how the entire Red Bull outfit is being managed.

The troubles don’t stop there though. Whilst certainly better than during the 2017 and 2018 seasons, the RB16 is suffering far more reliability issues than its immediate predecessor. In last year’s 21 races, the Red Bull cars only suffered one reliability-based retirement (Gasly in Baku). In the 11 races so far this year they have had four, five if you consider Verstappen’s PU issue in Mugello that dropped him into his crash and would have ended his race anyway. Add to that Honda’s announcement that they will no longer be working with Red Bull after 2021(more on this another time), and the Austrian team’s situation is not looking at all rosy. For the sake of F1 fans everywhere eager for a close fight for the title, I hope Christian Horner and Helmut Marko sort it out.

What do you think about the situation at Red Bull? What do they need to do to challenge Mercedes? Let me know!

[asian-hero]

Is It Just Me Or Are We Soulmates? -10

this chapter is literally just allura and pidge

p1 - p2 - p3 - p4 - p5 - p6 - p7 - p8 - p9

wanna read it on ao3? here’s the link -> link

The soft ringtone of Pidge’s computer filled the room, causing a small smile to find its way on the girls face. Getting up from her bed she walked over to her desk, accepting the call. A figure appeared on screen, her white hair filling up half of the screen.

“Hey ‘Lura,”

Allura smiled, waving at her. “Hello! It’s not too late there, is it?”

Pidge shook her head, smiling. “It’s only eight, and besides, we both know that I don’t sleep.”

Allura rolled her eyes, sighing. “I wish you wouldn’t pull all-nighters, it can’t be good for your health,”

“If I didn’t do all-nighters then we wouldn’t have met and then we both would’ve died alone,”

“Oh Katie, I wouldn’t die alone.”

Pidge let out an offended gasp, making Allura laugh. She looked away from the camera, pouting slightly.

“Don’t be like that, you know I tolerate you,”

Pidge glared at her, her glasses slipping down her nose bridge slightly. “You know, I’m just gonna turn you off then,”

Allura shook her head, an amused smile playing on her lips. “No, how else will you know about how my trip has been?”

“That’s just another reason of why I should hang up,”

Allura pouted, her bottom lip sticking out slightly. Pidge put a hand to her eyes, shielding her.

“Nope, not getting me with that bullshit.”

She heard Allura snicker before she pulled her hands away from her eyes. When she looked at the computer screen, she smirked.

“So, how’s the trip so far?”

Allura looked at her, an eyebrow raised. “I thought you didn’t care about my trip?”

Pidge stared at her flatly, clearly unamused. “Just start talking about your damn trip.”

Allura smiled before giving the details about her trip. She talked about how her flight was delayed because of the weather conditions, and how she almost freaked out on one of the flight attendants because of it. Then she talked about when she finally got to her hotel, she had to wait about an hour because her “room wasn’t ready”. Pidge had to stifle a laugh when Allura went into detail about how she told the manager about how she was going to actually jump them if her room wasn’t ready soon.

After the whole ordeal with her room, Allura told Pidge about how she barely had four hours of sleep because she had to wake up early for her tour the next day.

“Why didn’t you just skip it?” Pidge asked, yawning slightly.

Allura huffed, crossing her arms. “I already paid a lot of money for the tour, and I wasn’t going to let it go to waste!”

Pidge rolled her eyes, knowing that the other girl was definitely not one to waste money. She listened to Allura ramble on about her trip, hearing about the beautiful temple they went to and the nice lunch they had.

“I met these guys who were on a culinary trip,”

Pidge felt her eyebrows raise slightly. “Yeah?”

Allura nodded her head. “Yeah, and one of the guys found out that his soulmate was the tour guide,” She paused a moment to take a sip of her water, “Oh my god Katie, you should’ve seen this guy. He was a complete mess.”

Pidge laughed, earning an exasperated smile from Allura.

“I had to help him with his soulmate problems,”

Pidge snorted. “Well, you didn’t have to,”

Allura threw her hands up in the air. “What was I supposed to do? Let him flounder? The poor boy was already nervous as is!”

Pidge gave her a look, wanting to make fun of her for how adorable she was being. Looking back at the girl she felt herself smiling.

“You know, the guy you’re talking about kind of reminds me of my friend,”

Allura tilted her head. “How so?”

“Well, he’s always whining about how much he wants to meet his soulmate, almost to the point where I want to strangle him,”

Allura laughed at that, covering her mouth with her hand. Pidge sighed, rubbing her face.

“Yeah, but I know that he’s just nervous about it. He’s never really had a partner, so I’d imagine that he’s extremely nervous,”

Allura nodded her head, an understanding look on her face. She snickered lightly. “Who knows, maybe we’re talking about the same person.”

Pidge shrugged her shoulders. “It’s possible. After all, my friends are also in Japan,”

“What’re their names?”

Pidge yawned before responding: “Lance and Hunk,”

There was a silence that filled the room before Pidge looked at Allura, her head tilted slightly.

“Did you actually—”

Allura’s face lit up in excitement. “I met your friends!”

Pidge felt her jaw drop slightly, her mouth wide open. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

Allura’s eyebrows knit together, confusion written all over her face. “What’s wrong?”

Pidge huffed, pulling out her phone. “That bitch didn’t tell me he found his fucking soulmate!”

Allura sighed, although a smile was forming on her face. “Katie, you know I hate it when you swear,”

Pidge gave her an apologetic look before she scrolled through her phone until she landed on Lance’s number. She pressed his number to call him, but not before waving a small goodbye to Allura, who was currently laughing at the whole scenario. At first her call went to voicemail, causing Pidge to groan in frustration. She hung up and decided to call Hunk next, knowing that he would pick up.

Like she predicted, Hunk picked up her call in a couple of rings.

“Hello?” Hunk’s voice came through in his usual happy tone.

“Give the phone to Lance.” Pidge said, not bothering with formalities.

Hunk snickered, pulling the phone away from his face to give to Lance. Pidge could hear him getting Lance’s attention, then handing the phone to him. If she weren’t so offended, she would laugh at the mini argument that Lance and Hunk were currently having.

“Hello?”

Pidge wasted no time with answering: “Lance you whore you found your soulmate and didn’t tell me?”

“What? How did you—”

“Tell me everything,”

[no-mo-rules]

i really love your writings! If it's not too much to ask, could you do one between kanji meeting an actual delinquent, and he gets way too flustered to even try and intimidate them?

Ok so I know I said no updatesfor a while and this ask was literally sent in like the day before yesterday, but as soon as Iread it, I just fell in love with it lol. Only thing was that Kanji hadactually dealt with real gangs and delinquents multiple times before the P4gang met him, so I don’t think he’d get intimidated just by a couple oftroublemakers. That being said, I really wanted to keep flustered Kanji lol, soI tried to stick it in anyway.

Sukeban (スケバン/女番/スケ番) means delinquent girl or boss girl in Japanese. Sukebanonly refers to the leader of a girl gang, not just any member.

There’s been news of a Sukeban.

Outfitted in ascruffy sailor blouse cut to expose the waist, embroidered kanji littering theback of her uniform, loose socks, groomed, thin eyebrows, permed hair, and an unknotted,yellow scarf at her neck. All boxes ticked, really, even aside from the constant behavioural issues associated with her gang.

Kanji’s had plenty experience with biker gangs before, soit’s nothing new to him at first. He used to break them up left and right backin the day, which is impressive considering he’s been at it alone since MiddleSchool. Never lost a fistfight one-on-one, he used to boast (flashing his fists)and no-body wanted to mess with him after that. At least not for a while, anyway.

He doesn’t have any bones to pick with the new girl gang inschool. Their outfits catch his eye when he sees them in the hallway, sure, butthey don’t go out of their way to cause trouble for anyone he cares about.(Most importantly, they don’t wake his mother up by revving their motorcycleslate at night.) They’re just kind of passive, with their pretty, embroidereduniforms and occasional petty crimes.

At least until they’re not.

His first real encounter with the gang’s Sukeban, (if herbrightly dyed and permed hair is anything to go by) is when he’s walking homelate on a Monday evening after getting held back, just outside of the school’sback entrance. She’s holding some sort of weird canister, green, with a crossthrough the middle, and standing with her back to him.

For a minute or two, he just watches. He’s positive shehasn’t noticed him yet, and the whole situation seems kind of shady. He can’tfigure out why she’s even here in the first place, because it doesn’t seem likelythat a girl known for spraying graffiti in her lunchtimes would suddenly wantto stay back after school to study, but he hadn’t seen her getting told off atthe principal’s office when he was there, either.

It’s only when he sees her take out a small box, about oneand a half inches in diameter that the thick smell of petrol reaches him.

“What the fuck are you doing?” He yells.

There’s no hesitation in the way he tackles her to theground, grabbing the box of matches before she has the chance to retaliate. Thewhole move scores him a kick in the groin when she finally gets her bearings,but at least he’s got the matches, and she hasn’t set anything on fire. Whichis, probably good, really. Dealing with arson would be kind of a pain.

“Fuck are you?” She responds, as he keels over. Predictably,she he doesn’t look happy.

It takes him a moment to get to grips with the pain, but shedoesn’t seem patient enough to let him just sit there. She makes another movelike she wants to kick at him, and he barely manages to defend his face withhis arm when the sole of her sneaker smashes against it.

“Oy,” she prompts again, voice pitched all the way to fury.“Give me back my matches,”

“In your dreams.” He shoves her foot away, but she doesn’tstumble. He barely has time to stand up by the time she launches a sucker punchright at his abdomen.

It lands, and he grits his teeth in pain. She’s got a goodpunch, he’s got to give her that.

“Hey! Just, just calm down a second!” he yells, and it kindof works. Her next attack is stalled long enough that he can get his breathback and move into a better defensive position.

“Just give them back!”

She leaps at him, trying to aim the next punch straight tohis face.

“Oh hell no.” He shoves her off, and this time it’s gotenough power to it push her back a couple of steps. The two of them stand,roughly two metres apart, braced in fighting positions.

It’s the first time he can really get a good look at herface (without her shoe in the way, anyhow), and catches him a little off guard,admittedly. Her hair’s bleached to hell and back and messed up like nothingelse, and her sparse makeup only serves to make her look more intimidating,shaved eyebrows redrawn to look sharp and thin. There’s nothing pretty aboutit, which is why he’s confused when the first thought that pops into his headis how pretty she is.

It’s hardly the right time, but he feels himself getembarrassed, and that in and of itself is kind of embarrassing.

“You – are you tryin’a fry everyone in there?” He stutters,but it comes enough in time with his panting that he can convince himself it’sjust part of the recoil.

“What you on? No-one’s in there anymore.” She looksgenuinely confused, so he lets his guard drop a little. Honestly, he’s kind ofconfused too. Does she not realise some clubs go on until six? Or that thereare students still doing work in the study area?

“You for real?” He asks, just to make sure she’s notshitting him.

Now she’s the one caught off guard. His blunt way ofspeaking is ripe with all kinds of disrespect that would get him tossed aboutand burned with cigarettes with the kind of people she’s used to, but he showsno signs of caring. What’s worse, is he doesn’t seem to be doing it just topiss her off.

“For real? You saw people in there?”

He nods, once, twice, and then lets his guard fallcompletely.

“There were at least ten kids in the study room, yeah.”

She too, takes a deep breath, and kicks at a plant torelieve her frustration.

“Fuck’s sake.”

Kanji takes the chance to shove the matches into his pocket,down to the bottom where he’s sure she won’t be able to reach them. Honestly,knowing she didn’t realise there were students still in the building makes himfeel a little more at ease. It’s easier to deal with an arsonist than someonewho’s not afraid of literally committing mass murder.

She points a long, painted fingernail at him, and his bodycrouches in reflex.

“You,” she says at first, and he stares at her. “If you tellanyone about this, I’m getting your ass hung on a stick.”

He wants to laugh, wants to look challenge her. Wants toflash his two coiled fists in her face and say ‘Go ahead, I’ve never lost afistfight one-one-one,’ but his throat constricts and he finds he can’t reallyget the words out.

“Depends,” is the best he can do for now, and finds he hasto swallow hard before the next words even reach his tongue. “You plannin’ onsetting fire to the school again?”

“That a problem?”

She’s totally testing him, he can tell. He’s dealt withpeople who don’t know when to stop before, so he regains a little bit of hisconfidence, which is why his voice comes out with no tremors, no hints ofhesitation.

“Yeah.”

She launches herself at him again.

It’s a move intended to surprise. To hurt and intimidate himoff disagreeing with her, but he’s prepared for it. He deftly sidesteps out of theway, grabbing her foot from where she tried to kick at his stomach and spinningher around, only to throw her to the ground.

He has never losta fistfight after all. That’s not a streak he’s about to lose.

The girl tumbles over herself, curses, and there’s asatisfying thump when she finally meets the earth, forehead smashing againstthe grass.

He’s about to tease for her it, tell her to eat shit beforeshe gets herself hurt, but something stops him in his tracks. Her skirt has riddenup to a little bit above her thighs, and barely (just barely), it feels like hecan see a flash of bright pink where her underwear should be.

Pink. Her underwear is pink.

“Y – you -” he stutters about aimlessly, and it’s a little embarrassinghow quickly his entire face flares up.

She tries to twist around to face him. It’s a little messy,given how hard she hit the floor, but there’s still a glare on her face thatlooks undoubtedly intimidating.

“What you want?” She does her best to get up, but her handsmust be twisted or something because they don’t even manage to hold half theweight of her body.

He’s got a good throw, she has to give him that.

When she looks up at him through her gritted teeth, she’sexpecting to see him ready to launch on her and kick her while she’s down (it’swhat she would have done to him, anyway) but he’s cowering, nowhere even nearwhere she is right now. What’s he suddenly so scared of? As if she can do muchmore than kick at his legs from the position she’s in.

“Your – your skirt.”

She looks down at her skirt.

“You scared of my skirt?”

“No! It’s just…” He’s not even brave enough to peer at herfrom beneath his fingers, which feels both as confusing as it is alarming. Shepulls her skirt up further to look inside, in case maybe some snake or spidercrawled into it while she wasn’t looking, but she’s cut off by a strangledgasp.

“Don’t pull it up further!Fix it!”

It’s then that she sees the blush all over his face, and she can’thelp but burst out into a fit of laughter so intense that her head almost slamsagainst the ground again. “You’re taking the piss.”

“H – hey! You want just anybody to see you out here?”

More laughter again. If Kanji wasn’t embarrassed before, hesure would be now.

“Man, how old are you?”

He seems to catch on that she’s not nearly as bothered aboutthe whole thing as he seems to be, so he brings his hand down – although he’sstill not quite meeting her eyes.

“F – Fifteen.”

This time when she laughs, his whole face scrunches up inanger. He’s thoroughly uncomfortable now, and he hates the way she’s making himfeel like a child. She’s the one that’sone the ground right now. She shouldn’t be the one making fun of him.

“There somethin’ wrong with that?” He asks, and it’s clear thathe’s irritated, but she just waves it off.

“Nah. Sorry man.”

The smug smile on her face rubs him the wrong way. She triesto get up without using her hands, and it takes a couple of tries, but itworks in the end.

“You got a good toss for a fifteen-year-old.”

Her skirt falls back down by the time she gets up, so at leasthe doesn’t have to worry about that anymore.

“I’ve had practice.” He still seems half-prepped for anotherbrawl, but she thinks it’s probably just because he’s still embarrassed.

“Yeah. I bet.”

The way she stumbles in his direction is not at all threatening,so he doesn’t feel the need to get into a defensive position. Still, itsurprises him when she holds her hand out, outstretched, in his direction. He finds he can’t really get his thoughts together fast enough to respond before herpatience runs out.

“Come on. Shake it,” she prompts, and the amused smile on her facecrumbles. (Just a little, but he supposes even in defeat she’s impatient.)

When their hands finally meet, she gives him a firm squeeze.

“You won against the Sukeban today.” Her voice is equally asfirm as her handshake. When she withdraws, even though she’s bruised up and herhair is even more all-over-the-place than it was before, she still stands withher back straight and proud, and it’s inevitable, really – the rush of pridethat Kanji feels at knowing that he honestly did defeat the leader of thebiggest gang in school.

(Even if her smile still makes him feel like she’s nottaking him seriously.)

“Turf’s yours,” is the last thing she says, before shesmiles, winks, and stumbles away.

Kanji’s still blushing.