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princess-of-the-corner · 1 year ago

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Miraculous Winx

(Please note that I will never do anything with this concept, so if anyone wants to give it a go, feel free!)

So, once I started thinking about it, this shit wouldn’t leave me alone. Let’s start with some basics.

In Winx Club, we have the Dragon Flame … and not much else? Like, why do we only have the Flame, representing concepts and power, but no other similar forces? Well, Miraculous Winx does.

These guardian spirits are everywhere. Representing not just flame, but water, time, illusion, destruction. Some, like the Dragon Flame, are protectors of specific planets and peoples. Some are more isolated, hiding from the world. However, once each generation or so, these spirits will pick a chosen to wield their power, to protect it and others. Some are obvious about their chosen, others hide until they are forced to reveal themselves. A few spirits, like the Domino Dragon Flame, only choose their wielders from the ruling family. Others, like the Fox of Illusion, choose at random. They accompany their chosen in “kwami” form (small and cute) to assist and guide them. The upcoming year at the various schools of Magick is notable for having the most known chosen attending - and the most prominent not.

See, forty or fifty years ago, the ruling family of Creati (yes, it’s a dumb name, Winx names were not much better, I am open to suggestions) lost their ruling family. The king, queen, both children, and the loyal family retainer, were all killed by insurgent rebels. This left a grieving uncle, Su-Han the First, to take the throne. While the kingdom has recovered from this devastating loss, in the time since, their guardian spirit, the Ladybug of Creation, has not chosen another wielder, and there are whispers about Su-Han’s line …

Meanwhile, Marinette Dupain-Cheng is struggling with what she wants to do with her life. While her parents are accomplished bakers, her uncle a master chef, and while Marinette has only ever been supported by her family for her dream to be a fashion designer, she feels like something is missing. Like there’s more out there for her, if she can just find it. When going to visit her grandfather, Fu Cheng, one of the only people she feels understands her sometimes, she encounters a strange kid with … magic powers!? Fighting butterfly monsters!? And she somehow BLASTS THEM WITH ENERGY!?!?!?

Life is about to get far more confusing, interesting, and … Miraculous.

So, some rough Ideas (Again, keep in mind, I will never do anything with this, so if anyone wants to play around with any part of this idea, change shit, or whatever, go ahead):

So, Marinette isn’t a lost Royal - Sabine and her brother Wang are. Fu was their family retainer, and managed to escape with them the night their family was attacked. Fu was pretty sure that whoever attacked the family would track them down, and decided to hide on Earth, which as far as the Magic community is aware, hasn’t been magic for several centuries.

Fu has suspicions that Su-Han (technically his brother by circumstance) was behind the insurgents, in an attempt to steal the throne. He’s … half-right? Like, it was not Su-Han’s idea to try and assassinate anyone, but he was not above taking advantage of the situation after all was said and done.

While Earth’s magic has been “gone” for quite some time, Tom Dupain is Descended from one of Earth’s most prominent magical families.

Creati’s current rulers are Su-Han’s son, Zhao Yuen, and his wife Elizabeth. Their daughter, and heir to the throne, is Bridgette. While she is not chosen by Tikki, Ladybug of Creation, she is quite beloved by the people.

Sabine and Wang were, respectively, six months and three years old - combined with the trauma of watching your parents murdered in front of you, they don’t remember anything of where they came from. They are under the impression that their parents died in an accident (Fu is always vague because he hates lying to them) and that Fu is their uncle/godfather/close family friend.

The one actually in charge of the insurgent force that killed the ruling family of Creati was … well, if you want to get technical, Gabriel and Emilie Agreste. A related the queen of Creati’s sister planet, Destruk, Gabriel and Emilie are notable for being the chosen of Nooro, Butterfly of Metamorphosis, and Duusuu, Bird of Emotion. However, in recent years, both have fallen out of the limelight, and no one was really sure what happened to them. It’s only recently that the spotlight swung back on them when Plagg, Shadow Cat of Destruction, chose their son, Adrien, as his wielder, rather than Adrien’s cousin Felix, the next in line for Destruk’s throne.

It should be noted that, for all they are “sister” planets, Creati and Destruk’s ruling families have gone out of their way to avoid their families “merging”. There is an old legend that if the holders of Creation and Destruction “unite”, they could bring “miracles both wonderful and devastating”.

Many of the current “Guardians” attending Alfea/Cloud Tower/Red Fountain are of the “randomly selected/best fit” variety, rather than “chosen from royalty”. The main exceptions are Domino Princess Kagami, who is chosen by the Longg the Dragon Flame; Lady Chloe, niece of Amberix’s Queen, chosen by Pollen, the Subjugating Stinger; and Prince Adrien, cousin to Destruk’s heir, chosen by Plagg, The Shadow Cat.

Alya, the current chosen of Trixx, Fox of Illusion, is doing everything in her power to hide that she is chosen. That’s because people from her home planet, Miraj, face a lot of stigma from other peoples for being natural illusionists - lots of people assume that they are all natural liars and deceivers. Alya, wanting to be a news reporter, feels that no one would trust her as a news source if they knew she’d been chosen by Trixx. Helping her with her deception is her childhood “friend” Lila Rossi, who revels in the attention being “chosen” gets her, (and might be scheming to become chosen for real …)

Luka and Juleka live in a port town on Melody, in the Harmonic Nebulae. While Luka is pure Melodian, Juleka’s dad was from the planet Umbra, which has caused her to develop several traits that can cause problems for her. She has attended a support group for kids with clashing heritiages, which is where she met Rose, the daughter of a Linphea flower merchant, and a Destruk funerary director.

Chloe is the daughter of a prominent Eraklyon noble, and might have even been next in line for the throne if she played her cards right … until her powers finished properly manifesting, and it became SUPER OBVIOUS that Chloe isn’t exactly, uh, related to the royal family like everyone thought. While before she sneered at the thought of attending Alfea with so many “peasants”, now she can’t wait to attend, so she can get away from the messy divorce that is causing a massive scandal all over Eraklyon.

Chloe’s bio-dad is from a race of insect-bee-wasp-like humanoids from the planet “Amber 6”/“Amberix” (Please note this is the closest translation for the Amberix local dialect). While for the most part she passes as pure Eraklyon, once her fairy form finished settling, it became very obvious she had Amberix heritage. Unbeknownst to Chloe, her bio-dad is sibling to the current matriarch of Amberix, making her actually much closer to royalty than she was before.

Fu used to be chosen of Wayzz, the Impenetrable Shell, but he used a powerful spell to escape Creati, which caused him and Wayzz to be separated. the resulting power surge was so exhausting that Wayzz fell into a dormant state to recover, and stayed that way until he was discovered by someone with potential to become his next chosen.

Nino is vaguely embarrassed about his status as Wayzz chosen, because most of his friends have really cool stories about dream visions and quests to meet their spirits. Wayzz, however, was so dormant that he couldn’t do any of that stuff. Nino meeting Wayzz was a straight up accident. He was on a field trip to the castle, got kind of lost, found a piece neat of jewelry stuck in a crack, picked it up with the intention of giving it to the tour guide, forgot about it, made it all the way home before remembering, and put the bracelet on just cause, which woke up Wayzz. Nino proceeded to freak out, throw things at Wayzz until his parents showed up, and had to be talked out of running back to the palace to give the bracelet back. While Wayzz stands by his decision to keep Nino as his chosen, Nino is fully aware that him finding Wayzz was total coincidence.

Faragonda is still the principal of Alfea. Damocles is the Vice-Principal.

The Miraculous Cast Race Chart (subject to change if anyone has any other ideas

Marinette Dupain-Cheng - Creati-Earth/ magic specializes in creation, usually in “giving life” to creations

Adrien Agreste - Almost pure Destruk native, with 1/8 Solaris on his mother’s side (A previous ruler marries a Solaris royal)

Felix Graham de Vanilly - Almost pure Destruk native, with 1/8 Solaris on his mother’s side (A previous ruler married a Solaris royal)

Bridgette Yuen - Creati

Alya Cesaire - Miraj/ race of people with natural illusionist and camouflage abilities. some are also born with an innate ability to if they are being lied too, but this is so rare that not much is known about it, and those who have it often don’t recognize it.

Nino Lahiffe - Creati-Melody

Alix Kubdel - ????

Chloe Bourgeois - Eraklyon-Amberix

Luka Couffaine - Melody

Juleka Couffaine - Melody-Umbra

Max Kanté - Zenith (Tecna’s planet)

Kagami Tsurugi - Domino, current heir

Lê Chién Kim - Eraklyon (He’s part of the four percent of the population that is basically indestructible, hence his penchant for wild, dangerous dares)

Zoé Lee - Eraklyon-Aves/planet of bird-like people

Myléne Haprèle - ????

Rose Lavillant - Linphea-Destruk

Sabrina Raincomprix - Eraklyon-Lupual/planet of beings with dog/wolf like traits

Marc Anciel - Aves

Nathaniel Kurtzberg - ????

Ivan Bruel - ????

Fei Wu - Domino

Su-Han Yuen - Creati

Sabine Cheng - Creati

Tom Dupain - Earth

Wang Fu Cheng - Creati

Lila Rossi - Miraj

Wang Cheng - Creati

Gina Dupain - Earth

Rolland Dupain - Earth

Emilie Agreste - See Adrien

Amelie Graham de Vanily - See Felix

Colt Fathom - Destruk (deceased; killed for “treason” against the queen and heir)

Gabriel Agreste - Destruk-????

Andre Bourgeois - Eraklyon

Audrey Bourgeois - Eraklyon

Jagged Stone - Melody

Roger Raincomprix - Lupual

Damocles - Aves

(Again, I will never do anything with this, so feel free to sandbox around with it if you want!)

Oh that is a LOT and I may be using some of the ideas let’s fuckin roll!

#submission

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filthforfriends · 1 year ago

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Hello :) I am an avid reader and big admirer of your fics and I have a little question. I have noticed you mostly (maybe even exclusively) write from the reader’s pov. And I really like it that way. I’m curious if you would ever write a bonus chapter or a passage from Damiano’s pov - for example in GA. Maybe that might help you with your writer’s block with chapter 14? Also I’m generally interested if you ever considered something similar or what you think about it. I’d love learning more about the process and thought behind your writing.

Actually the reason I write in second person is because I noticed that was the most common perspective fan fiction is written from. It was actually difficult to get used to. I think a chapter in Alpha!Damiano's perspective could be cool, I think thats been suggested once before. tbh I'd probably do the chapter half in y/n's perspective and half in his. It's not gonna help my writers block though because I'd have to intentionally choose a plot that I feel sorta confident writing about in his perspective, which would mean scraping what I do have. Y/n is a character I make up all on my own, but Damiano, while a fictional character in my stories, does need to share enough traits with the real person for people to recognize him. Whatever they like about him, I want them to like that same thing in my character. So that means I can't just do what I feels right to the story and wing it

Winging it is always how I write here. I've never sat down and drawn a plot out before hand, but I spend a lot of time in my own head. When I imagine a story that feels so compelling I can't not write it, I force myself to stay there and flush it out. With smut I try to find something thats a little gross or weird or intense or not sexy and then make that sexy. Because all the times I've done that and been nervous about the how its received, those are the fics or chapters that do best. When you push things just slightly past the comfort zone its exciting and honest and raw in a way I believe people crave. I try to find a couple points where it isn't ideal but that humanness actually ends up making things more passionate, more intimate. My experience as a smut writer hasn't been that people desire an ideal portrayed in media or porn. Based on reactions I think that, at least in this little corner of the internet people desire sex and connections with other flawed, quirky, and real people.

Sometimes as soon as I come up with a story, I come up with another one based on that, and I really get into the idea of the characters. So without trying, I have a few ideas that are 4k-12k words long with those characters If I can find a thread that attaches them and flush it out, sometimes it turns into a series with those stories being the chapters. Of course, writing this way you have to lay seeds so theres plot points you can circle back to so the whole thing is cohesive. Eventually, like I'm doing right now, I have to go through a whole fic and all my notes on it to list all the possible plot points and make sure I'm coming back to those. Because I think in collections of stories like this, I write my chapters our of order.

honestly my writers block is a combination of can't focus, too depressed to do anything, and a fear of failure so poisonous that it makes me freeze up. Like right now I'm currently writing chapter 19 for TSITCOE which makes my brain go "No point in posting this fic if you can't even finish it. You're never gonna make it in time. Better just pause the upload schedule now." Meanwhile I have the next two week's worth of chapters totally done and another two weeks after that 90% done. My brain is just really fucking mean as hell and lol. My confidence in my own intellect was very much based in external validations and meeting criteria society told me I should be proud to achieve. Being disabled these past few years as really taken a toll and now I have a voice that always insists I'm going to fail.

anyways thank you for reading and being so supportive! I hope some of this was interesting writery inside scoop type stuff

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re-readingcomics · 1 year ago

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Comics Read 09/22- 10/05/2023

I read the first two volumes of BRZKR written by Keanu Reeves and Matt Kindt, art by Ron Garney, and colors by Bill Crabtree. It’s Keanu Reeves’s first foray into writing comics and there is reason to read it as something that relates to his career as an actor/movie star. In some of the art and a lot of the variant covers the lead character is drawn to explicitly evoke Reeves.

The leading character, known alternately as Unute and B, is an immortal fighting machine. He was conceived through the prayers of his mother to help protect their prehistoric village. Then her husband used him as a tool against their enemies and potential enemies. Throughout history he has been used by those who want his awesome violence. The effect is dehumanizing. He is valued as a tool, not a person with agency (an actor). In the present day, he alternates between doing his Berzerking thing and trying to understand who and what he is. The latter involves a combination of cutting edge scientific tests and talk therapy with a Dr. Diana. Diana’s motives may be loving and even altruistic, but her employers are not, which leads to the cliffhanger ending of volume two.

Now I am going to segue into Reeves’s co writer, Matt Kindt, who I have previously written about pretty recently. While I can only speculate about Reeves’s interests, as someone who has read more than a little of Kindt’s creator owned work, I feel I more inclined to say where I see it, or don’t, here. The various organizations that use B are not unlike those in Mind MGMT or Super Spy in the disregard for their employees as people. Kindt also likes plots that jump around in time as the flashback structure here allows it to do. However, Kindt’s interest in memory is more about the subjectivity of experience than anything present here.

I don’t think I have ever read anything with art by Ron Garney before this. Asides from making the lead character look like one of the co-writers, I generally like what he’s done. He has a lot of distinct character designs, handles different time periods well, including have to balance primitive and futuristic technology. I am struggling to say with which other artists I would group his work. Maybe Becky Cloonan? Goran Sudžuka? Michael Lark? I am struggling to think of terms to the define these artists similar styles. Maybe line based and more round than angular. I also have to praise Bill Crabtree for having things be either warm or cold, though sometimes at the same time. It was an effective treatment of this dehumanizing lifestyle.

While reading, I suddenly was reminded of Ales Kot's Zero a comic of which I literally only read one issue many years ago and decided I didn’t like it enough to continue. But that’s where my brain went, mostly because of the early issues structure, where the main male character is engaging in extremely violent actions while a woman and a male (in BRZKR it’s the main male at another moment in time, in Zero it’s someone else) analyze and comment on it. I bring this up near the end to say that while I’d like to read the conclusion of this arc, I am not interested in it as an ongoing franchise, as the current, spinoff series, BRZKR Bloodlines suggests there will be.

#comic books #what i'm reading #boom! studios #brzrkr #boom studios #keaunu reeves #matt kindt #ron garney #bill crabtree #comics

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thetaekookcloset · 2 years ago

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You say you think there are differences in their behavior in the last few months, may I know which or how exactly you meant?

Personally, I have noticed changes in JK since last year. I feel like how he interacts with Tae depends on his mood. If he's not in the mood then he would brushed off Tae or he would seemed cold. Examples are ITS2, concert in Korea last March where he was doing the house dance then when Tae joined him he suddenly just stopped, or even the recent Jhope's party where he seemed to try to avoid Tae whenever Tae would go near him. But when he's in the mood to interact...examples are when he piggyback Tae or when he sat on his lap, or when he was just extra clingy.

And a second anon asking a similar question:

What are the difference in their behaviour in the last few months? Because I also feel like something is different. I can't put my finger on it but it seems so. I am interested in knowing what are the things that caught your eye and how that moulded your perception of taekook and their relationship

I hope you two don’t mind that I’ve combined your asks! They came in right around the same time and are asking basically the same thing.

I’m going to put this below a cut because it’s probably going to get a bit long and I want to use some visuals.

So yeah, I mentioned in a recent post that I’ve noticed what seem to me to be some changes in Taekook’s behavior over the last few months, since around the start of the year. It’s stuff I think we’ve all noticed and talked about at various times. The first anon is pointing to it, though I don’t necessarily agree that it seems like Jungkook was trying to avoid Taehyung at Hobi’s party -- I didn’t get that impression from what we saw.

However, I do feel that for the last several months, Taehyung has been extremely demonstrative of his affection and attachment to Jungkook, and Jungkook hasn’t really been matching him in response. Taehyung has been touching Jungkook at every opportunity (the Festa dinner, for example), mentioning him whenever he can (in his V Live talking about going to get his tattoo), answering general questions with responses about Jungkook (the Proof Live question about his best moment from the last ten years). It’s been almost constant.

Jungkook, on the other hand, has not been doing that -- which isn’t really a surprise, because that sort of thing has never really been his style. What is notable about Jungkook, in my opinion, is that if Taehyung could be said to be pushing toward Jungkook in this behavior, Jungkook is arguably pulling away.

A lot of times when Taehyung interacts with Jungkook, Jungkook doesn’t really respond or react. If Taehyung mentions Jungkook when Jungkook is there, Jungkook sort of tries to temper that -- like in the Proof Live, where Tae answered his question with an answer about Jungkook, Jungkook responded but didn’t even look at him really, like in some ways he was trying to keep the interaction to a minimum or draw less attention to it, or brush it under the rug.

There have been other times, as this first anon and lots of other people have pointed out, where Jungkook has brushed Tae off when he wanted to interact on stage, in particular -- another example is when Taehyung wanted to play boxing and Jungkook shook his head no.

At this point I want to emphasize that none of this is exactly different or surprising in and of itself; the change, for me, comes from how frequently it’s happening.

I think that Tae has nearly always been the more demonstrative one, the one who’s more likely to talk about Jungkook, praise Jungkook, be more openly affectionate and suggestive on stage, and that sort of thing. What seems new to me is the frequency he’s doing it now, and how Jungkook seems to be holding back more in direct response to increase.

All I can really do is make my observations and guess at what they might mean. The observation is that Tae is being more openly affectionate toward Jungkook more often, and Jungkook is pulling back from those shows of affection/attachment a lot of the time.

That could mean any number of things, but ultimately, while I feel that the observation is accurate, it’s only part of the story -- because meanwhile, Jungkook is, for his part, acting in a way that’s consistent with what he’s always done.

When the focus isn’t on him, he’s looking with such adoration at Taehyung:

He’s making random, huge, and pretty suggestive gestures out of nowhere:

He’s clinging and sticking close to Taehyung:

He’s reacting to Taehyung’s silly antics with huge smiles and big laughter:

He’s talking about how handsome Taehyung is to anyone and everyone:

He’s positively lighting up on stage when Taehyung surprises him with interactions:

He’s also surprising Taehyung with some pretty romance-coded interactions of his own:

Also, as I’ve mentioned before, while he doesn’t seem to always want to engage with Taehyung’s demonstrations of affection for him, he equally doesn’t seem to want them to stop. At any point during the Festa dinner, he could have moved away from Taehyung, but he didn’t. We’ve seen him tell Tae no for all sorts of things, so it seems fair to assume that he’s good at setting those boundaries when he wants to.

Finally, I keep thinking of that 70 questions interview, or whatever it was, that the members did while they were in Vegas. It seemed to be when they were recording either Proof Live or the MV for “Yet to Come.” One of the things Jungkook said when he was talking about their upcoming break time, basically, was that he loves the way things are right now.

Obviously he would probably obscure it if he was unhappy in any significant way, but there would be no reason to say something like that, you know? He said that, specifically, unprompted, and it made me think of the way that both he and Taehyung talked about the break during the Festa dinner -- and the way their responses sort of overlapped each other. It really seems to me like this is a time where they feel much freer and maybe even happier. Jungkook seems so at peace.

Ultimately while I do see differences in their behavior from the last few months, those differences can arguably be said to come down to the frequency of these behaviors more than anything else. I still see them both acting and even reacting in ways that are consistent with at least the last couple of years. It’s like Taehyung is just being extra affectionate and Jungkook is making more of an effort to hold back from that affection some of the time, and his holding back is only happening more often because Taehyung is doing it more often.

Why is it that this is happening? We can only guess. My guess is that Tae might just have had fewer fucks to give, basically, over the last few months and Jungkook was trying harder to keep them out of trouble, or keep them from being too obvious. That’s only one possibility, but it’s the one I’ve come up with that seems to fit the facts the best, from my perspective. It could be what the anon above said, about it just depending on Jungkook’s mood. It could be something else too.

One thing that seems clear to me is that they’re both still so sweet for each other, and I’m just really excited to see where they go from here.

#ask #taekook #kookv #recent taekook moments

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chemicallywrit · 3 years ago

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Am a huge fan of Inn Between. Great concept, well written and executed with a great cast. I have actually just started a relisten and it's even comfier than I remembered. Sadly I am still working out where best to put the season logos (you know how it is with stickers).

Do you have any audio drama suggestions for a listener who likes creativity and interesting world-building? I like all kinds of horror, scifi, fantasy, supernatural and things in between (or in combination with other genres not mentioned) but I will listen to almost anything. Both popular or obscure shows are okay (I've heard the really big names, but the rest vary a lot in listener count), I enjoy both wholesome and brutal, and I don't mind much what the audio quality is like. Not fussy about format, pure narration and pure cast acting are both great (and so many people do a mix of the two so well) though sfx are a celebrated bonus to either, and I especially enjoy what people seem to ick about, blood/gore and kiss sounds and angry radio static and other weird and messy noises... All very fun.

Much appreciated, and I hope you are doing well. I hope as well I have not been too vague or specific or both. All my best, and yours incredibly sleepily, 🐛

Thank you for your kind words!! I do know how it is with stickers. Let me tell you, it helps having a bunch of them in your house at all times.

I love the specificity of this ask!! I got six shows for you to try—

Life With Althaar is a scifi found family sitcom turned drama, which is honestly one of my favorite kinds of storyline development. I am obsessed with every character. They are each my blorbo. The sound design of this one is really cool too—you have to listen in stereo because sometimes there are concurrent conversations. The worldbuilding is incredible, and strikes a balance that a lot of far-future scifi misses, how it’s familiar. But not too familiar. But not too not fam

Incarnation Read is a very little known single-narrator horror podcast, written and produced exclusively by one guy. And let me tell you, this guy is a sfx GENIUS. His editing and foley rules. I’m not much of a horror fan, but I listen for his talent.

What’s the Frequency is one I haven’t actually listened to, (it’s next on my list! i have to finish Station Blue!) but it has notoriously interesting sound design. It’s PSYCHEDELIC NOIR. You can’t beat that.

Speaking of the psychedelic, The Great Chameleon War slaps in a major way. It has a similar cadence and style to night vale? But it is WAY weirder.

Omen is another one with that flawless sound design, a rollicking fantasy-adventure. It’s a swashbuckling mystery and i am in love with it. Although they did just kill off my favorite boy, so obviously they will face my wrath, but it is excellent.

And but not least, if you like creative concepts you will enjoy Someone Dies In This Elevator, a spoiler-driven anthology series. Every episode is different, but they have one important thing in common. I bet you can guess what it is.

Enjoy! I’d love to hear what you think!

#audio drama #fiction podcast #audio fiction #life with althaar #the great Chameleon war #omen #incarnation read #sdite

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toomanyf4ndoms7 · 2 years ago

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Champions of the Realm: Liu Kang.

AKA: Liu Kang’s relationships with his fellow heroes.

@bisexualjohnnycage ask and you shall receive.

Missing characters: Kitana, Raiden, and Kung Lao.

Sonya: Liu Kang respects her as a warrior and can see her heart beneath the steel of a soldier, and enjoys whenever she lets the armour down a bit. Despite how he respects her fighting spirit, he can’t help but urge her to rest once in a while. (Ironic, considering his profession requires him to train morning and night.)

Jax: Like Sonya, Liu Kang respects his resilience and commitment to duty. The way Jax combines technique and force makes Liu Kang quite impressed. It’s a habit from his training, able to focus on the way people fight and draw information.

Johnny: Upon their first meeting, Liu Kang had doubts about Johnny’s worth. Not out of a sense of disgust, but more that he didn’t wish for his death. After Johnny proved himself a warrior, they grew a little closer. When he learned about Johnny’s growth over time, he felt even more proud of the actor. He still won’t be in his movies. Sorry.

Kuai: As they are both honourable warriors, they have a respect forged through shared battle. Liu Kang respects him for reforming a clan of assassins into a force of good.

Hanzo: At first, Liu Kang wasn’t sure how to feel about Grandmaster Hasashi. In his time, all he knew was the vengeful spectre. But, after spending time alongside him, he realised that the former spectre had grown from his rage into a honourable warrior and man.

Smoke: Before Smoke’s demise, they didn’t get much of a chance to connect. They respect each other, but that’s all it amounts to.

Stryker: Their relationship is less close than others, but Liu Kang acts as an unofficial “guide” when it comes to the Shaolin. If Stryker has questions like “How do you shoot fire? How does your friend teleport? What am I doing here?” He will try and answer.

Kabal: Like Smoke, they don’t have much to talk about. Kabal often stayed away from others, though Liu Kang tried to make him feel comfortable. It’s the thought that counts?

Nightwolf: As they are both chosen champions, they have a relationship unlike others. They have a quiet understanding of the burdens, and Nightwolf will offer counsel whenever he feels it necessary. Liu Kang will do the same, whenever he thinks about his past. They have sparring matches every once in a while. It’s how they bond.

Jade: Liu Kang respects her loyalty to Kitana and her fighting abilities, but could do without her “suggestions” to woo Kitana.

Cassie: Liu Kang respects her heroic spirit and how she managed to take down Shinnok. They have friendly banter about who’s the better fighter. Liu Kang isn’t really trying to prove anything, but he’s having fun. Hearing about the pain his future self has put her through, he feels guilty. Is that his destiny? To become the villains he fights?

Jacqui: Despite the soldier taking some time to warm up to Liu, they eventually grew to cooperate. He sees something similar to himself and Lao in Cassie and Jacqui.

Takeda: Liu Kang’s meeting with Scorpion’s apprentice was... an interesting one. After a respectful introduction, Liu Kang was flooded with questions. He has told Takeda that, yes, he did beat Hanzo. Not without difficulty.

Jin: After an introduction, where Liu kang felt a little like he was intruding on Lao and Jin, Liu congratulated Jin on how far he’s grown. He is proud that young Jin has grown into such a fine warrior, and even more proud that Lao has someone who looks up to him.

#mortal kombat #revelations and stupidity #Champions of the realm

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meichenxi · 3 years ago

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I just had my first Korean lesson on italki!!

Intelligent Thoughts On The Language As A Whole After One Hour Of Exposure:

- aspiration my beloathed. it really is karma when the aspirated and unaspirated /t/ being allophones in English in the beginning of a word and that being a better cue to whether something is ‘voiced’ or not than actual voicing which helped me so much with learning Chinese (because Chinese operates on a very similar system as English where aspiration is actually more important, hence why wade-giles etc had everything spelt <ch> and <ch’> or <p> and <p’> rather than just <p> and <b> like pinyin) comes back and bites me in the arse whilst learning Korean. but LUCKILY for all parties concerned (me), I spent a summer teaching myself how to unaspirate my /ptk/ series for Hindi and distinguishing them by voice alone, which is not something natural to me as a native English speaker, so I am actually already fairly good at the aspirated/non aspirated distinction. I just need to actually remember to use it. learn languages it’ll be fun they said

- on a similar note. THE FAMOUS KOREAN GLOTTALISED STOPS!!!! guys come on!! the famous - ok maybe it’s just me / other linguists who know that one, but Korean basically has (and forgive me this is all remembered knowledge, I haven’t done any research myself since deciding to learn it) three series of stops. 1) unvoiced and unaspirated, 2) ‘tense’ or ‘fortis’ or ‘hard’ or ‘glottalised’ stops, which yeah as the name suggests nobody has any idea what to do with, they’re the subject of many many angry phoneticians’/phonologists’ drunk midnight duels, and 3) aspirated stops. the last are easy, we do them naturally in English all the time; the first are unideal but I should be ok bc of my time with the TERRIFYING MONSTROSITY that is the Hindi stop series; the second ones....well. well well well. the way the teacher did them in the lesson really was glottalised. (record scratch - quick phonetics lesson - we usually use something called the ‘pulmonic’ system i.e. the lungs to push air up through the voice box and create consonants, but you can also use the ingressive system i.e. breathing in [try it with [b] and [p]] and the epiglottal system which is where you use the glottis to create a little bubble of air way smaller than you’d get with the lungs and under way higher pressure, and when you release it it sounds very spitty and extra and cool. na’vi uses this.) glottalised X = epiglottal but either way it’s cool and I don’t know much about it so maybe expect some posts later?

- I don’t think the guy released how hard I was quietly fangirling about a set of consonants

- oh LOOK batchim they’re unreleased sometimes!! how exciting!! I love a good unreleased consonant. the pressure is killing me. and ANOTHER famous thing!!!!!!! all of the twenty gazillion consonants that all get pronounced as [t] in final position!!!!!!!! if you don’t know this one (very reasonable) this is exciting because it means that when combined with postpositions you get some really really interesting backformations - basically people know that something ends in a [t] but they don’t know whether that is an underlying [t] or [s] or what! and then sometimes a loanword that then ends in a [t] in English gets hyper corrected to an [s]. or....something. again, this is knowledge four years hence. anyway it’s very cool.

- we really did just ‘learn hangul’ in one hour huh. wow. I mean my brain hurts and I need to consolidate but. what a change from chinese.

- Korean appears to have preserved elements of Middle Chinese phonology / non-Mandarin dialects in its loanwords!!!! which I mean makes perfect sense. but there’s loads and loads of [m] going on where you’d expect *mumble mumble maybe w* and that’s more like Cantonese which obviously preserves different features and....yeah I feel like I’m standing on the edge of a cliff about to be thrown into a precipice but as the protagonist, it will only make me stronger

- already seeing lots of Chinese loanwords. that’s cool. that’s very cool. I can get behind that. shame about the tragic loss of the palatalised-retroflex distinction (q/j/x vs ch/zh/sh) but I guess some sacrifices had to be made

- korean. had tone???? and I THINK I read somewhere waaaaay back in first year of my degree that maybe there are dialects in which it is either being reintroduced (naturally, I hasten to add, because that makes it sound deliberate) or it hasn't fully left - YES I JUST CHECKED and the first thing that comes up is ‘tonogenesis in contemporary Seoul Korean’ BROOOOOOO do you understand why that is so exciting?? we essentially have 0 opportunities to study the process of tonogenesis in Real Life, and endless opportunities to see the loss of tone / the drastic consequences after it is lost, and that could potentially be vital in helping map and better understand the histories of languages in the sino-tibetan language family and others....

- next lesson! we are learning subject markers! and getting started! with verbs!!!!! you know I could literally die for verb final languages. I don’t know why. but I just think they are the sexiest thing on the planet

Conclusion:

- Korean seems cool?

- bring it on.

#meichenxi manages #honestly I'm just thrilled to be learning a language that has a writing system that. I can write #(f in the chat)#and has DECLENSIONS #and INTERESTING PHONOLOGY #and the teacher seems really good he is a linguist too which is why I chose him #all of these facts are being recalled via a trembling rope of spider's silk from a fog-covered abyss #(i.e. first year of uni)#so please take what I'm saying with a pinch of salt. it is not researched. I am just excited. any corrections welcome but #this is Not meant to be an informative post #I am just brain dumping #MODERN TONOGENESIS THOUGH #linguistics #korean #langblr #studyblr #fuck

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joaquinwhorres · 4 years ago

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Treacherous Waters (Leonard McCoy x Reader)

SUMMARY ››››› After finals at Starfleet Academy all of the cadets flock to local bars in search of a good time. Which is exactly where you meet Leonard McCoy. And you are more than willing to show him a good time with the understanding that come Saturday morning he'll be gone, and you'll never see him again. Which is exactly what happens...until five years later your starship has a massive failure and the only ship around to save you is the Enterprise.

WORD COUNT ››››› 3,072

WARNINGS ››››› Drinking and mentions of sexy times.

A/N ››››› Sooooo originally this was just supposed to be a “dancing in a bar with Leonard McCoy” fic but then I got an idea and well, it’s this.

Prefer OC’s? Read it on AO3.

Finals Week at Starfleet Academy was a glorious occasion.

Or perhaps, more accurately, the Friday evening after Finals Week at Starfleet Academy was a glorious occasion. Because the Friday night of Finals Week was when the beautiful, young, pent up cadets flooded the local bars in desperate search for some unbridled fun.

Which Y/N was more than happy to provide

"Kirk's here," Kiesh hissed, her fingers digging into Y/N's arm in her excitement. Y/N flinched, and Kiesh released her quickly, but was too distracted to mutter an apology, her gaze fixated on the near mythical figure of San Francisco nightlife.

The tales that followed Jim Kirk were outlandish and obscene and wholly captivating.

There was the story of his birth aboard the USS Kelvin minutes before his father saved the lives of everyone who'd been aboard the ship.

There was the story of how he'd earned his spot in the Academy by taking on three security Lieutenants in a fist fight and walking away with no more than a bloody nose.

And of course there were the stories of his romantic conquests. Although romantic was probably not the right word for it. Carnal, sensual, lustful, and erotic all seemed a bit more descriptive of what transpired between Jim Kirk and the girls of San Francisco.

And like any mythical figure, these tales were enough to warn off a good number of girls from falling into his sheets...while prompting others to search for him to either worship or conquer themselves.

Kiesh fell firmly in the later category. She was no Kirk acolyte, but he had become a point of fixation for her because he was what no other man had been to her--unattainable.

Y/N scanned the crowd for the golden haired casanova, but the bar was too packed. It was an ocean of voices and species and color, all flowing to the electric undercurrent that ran throughout the bar. Y/N's eyes caught on the blood red uniforms of cadets too eager to indulge their youth to waste any time by going home and changing clothes.

Two palms pressed into either side of Y/N's face as her roommate turned her attention away from the cadets, past groups of people wearing the colorful and patterned designs native to their home planet, and to the end of the neon purple bar. There, just visible between the bodies of two friends having a chugging contest, was Jim Kirk with his head thrown back laughing.

"He's gorgeous," Y/N murmured. She'd figured he had to be, but it was one thing to hear about Adonis and another thing completely to see him in person. Kiesh's hands fell from Y/N's head, allowing the other girl to turn back to her. "I'll see you tomorrow then?"

"I might not make it to breakfast." A coy smile curled Kiesh's lips up as she started off through the crowd, disappearing amongst the crowd.

Y/N followed her progress, watching the other girl choose a space at the bar directly in Kirk's line of sight, sliding into the chair and tossing her long purple hair over one shoulder to reveal the expanse of skin from her neck to her chest, and then below the crop top.

And then she waited.

Watching Kiesh work was a sight to behold. Each trap was delicately set, carefully tailored to the man she'd picked on that given night. She planned each movement--the way she walked, the angle of her body against the bar, the look she painted on her face--to snag men like a siren, luring them into her dangerous waters.

As much as she wanted to see this play out, Y/N had other more important things to accomplish. Like finding her own catch for the night. And she wasn't going to do that by standing in one spot all night.

If Kiesh was a siren, then Y/N was a shark, moving constantly throughout the room in search of the perfect prey. She weaved in and out of small groups, eyes scanning the members therein. There were groups of friends laughing together, cadets challenging each other to drinking games, girls who like her and Kiesh came with one purpose in mind, and others who came to have a good time by themselves, cadets be damned.

But it wasn't until her fourth slow, methodical lap that she saw him. Or rather, she saw Kirk slap him on the back with a large grin before making his way over to where Kiesh leaned on her elbows. More than the broadness of his shoulders, the tussle of dark hair, and the deep red color of his uniform, it was the scowl he was shooting at Kirk's back that caught her attention and drew her across the bar to him as if smelling blood in the water.

"You look like a man who doesn't dance," Y/N said, folding her arms on the back of what was once Kirk's chair. It took him almost three seconds to realize that she was talking to him, and when he did, he lifted his eyebrows--the look an interesting combination of amusement and apprehension.

"Well, that's a first," he remarked. There was just a trace of an accent under his words that Y/N couldn't quite place.

"I highly doubt I'm the first person to notice," Y/N said, rocking on the balls of her feet. "Unless of course I'm wrong, and you're constantly barraged with requests to hit the dance floor."

He exhaled a laugh, the sound sailing past his lips, and into the glass he lifted up to his mouth. "You're not wrong," he said, taking a sip of his liquor and then placing it back down on the bar in front of him.

"Didn't think so. I rarely am."

He gave her a cautious look out of the corner of his eye as if still unsure where this conversation was going and why she was talking to him. As if people chatted up strangers in bars just to pass the time.

"So, since you don't dance, that begs the obvious question…what's a man like you doing in a place like this?"

He cracked a smile then, slowly tilting his head to look at her, really look at her, for the first time. "Shouldn't I be asking you that question?"

"Only if you subscribe to archaic 20th century gender norms," Y/N shrugged, smiling back at him. "Besides," she leaned closer, tipping her head towards his conspiratorially, and he shifted closer as well. "I don't think it's much of a mystery for me. I mean, look at our clothes."

His eyes wandered down to her deep V halter before seeming to realize he was still in his reds. "Fair point," he conceded, pulling back a little to take another sip of his drink.

"So?"

"A friend dragged me out," he admitted, eyes sliding back over to her. She raised both of her eyebrows as if she was surprised and didn't see Kirk abandoning him just five minutes ago.

"And left you to fend for yourself in a dive like this?" She shook her head as if scandalized by the idea. "You need better friends."

The cadet snorted and nodded his head. "You've got that right."

"Well, you're very lucky I found you before another girl did," Y/N said, a smirk tugging at the corner of her mouth.

"That so?"

She nodded. "They may try to take advantage of you in such a defenseless state. All alone by the bar nursing a...what is that, whiskey?"

"Bourbon, actually." His eyes sparkled with an intoxicating warmth similar to the liquor he was drinking.

Y/N rolled her eyes lightly. "Same thing."

"Only technically."

"Technicalities are everything," she grinned. "Anyway, I'm willing to offer my protective services as a long time San Francisco resident to navigate these treacherous waters."

"You're from here?" he asked, genuine curiosity overtaking his features for the first time in their conversation. Y/N's smile turned a bit strained, but she nodded.

"Not quite. But I've been here for fifteen years. Just haven't figured out how to drop the accent," she shrugged.

"So are you from England then?" he asked, and she nodded.

"Next round's on me if you can guess where."

"Lon…" he started, and a grin grew across Y/N's face before he switched course. "Birmingham?"

She shook her head. "London."

"You tricked me," he accused lightly, his brow furrowing slightly but into more of mock offense and surprise at her cunning than anything else.

"You're highly suggestible," she shook her head, fighting to keep a smile down. "Which brings me back to the fact that you absolutely cannot remain alone in this bar tonight. It's far too dangerous for you."

"Guess I'll have to take you up on that offer then, darlin'." His smile was more subtle--apparently the fight to keep it off his face was going better for him.

"Y/N," she corrected, lifting her hand to offer it to him.

The man took it, his fingers surprisingly soft for a cadet. "Leonard," he answered.

Y/N let her hand linger in his, not pulling back until his grip loosened and his fingers trailed against hers to go back around his glass. She leaned her elbow on the back of the chair, placing her chin on top of her hand. "So Leonard," she asked. "Are you going to buy me a drink or am I working for free?"

He smirked, lifting a hand to call the bartender over as Y/N slid into the seat next to him, leaning her arms against the smooth chrome bar. The Tellarite bartender made his way over, and Leonard looked at Y/N.

"Well are you going to order or sit there staring at each other?" the bartender snapped. Leonard shot him a dirty look, and Y/N snorted.

"I'll have a Samarian Sunset on his tab," she ordered, pointing a finger at Leonard, and the man grunted. Leonard still looked rather displeased with the exchange but ordered himself another bourbon. The bartender walked away grumbling, and even Leonard looked rather grumpy.

"You know that's just his way of greeting right?" Y/N asked, pushing a lock of hair behind her ear. "Tellarites consider it polite to attempt to start an argument when meeting someone. If he wasn't mildly insulting I would have been majorly insulted."

"And I thought you were kidding about being a guide."

"I would never," Y/N said with mock indignation, placing a hand over her heart. "Leonard, I take my promise to you very seriously. I will be at your side all night."

"All night?" he repeated, raising an eyebrow with a smirk.

"All night," Y/N repeated with a nod, keeping her eyes locked on Leonard. He met her gaze with an intensity that made her stomach twist with delight. And of course it was right then that bartender reappeared.

He placed a martini glass full of clear liquid in front of Y/N, and a rocks glass with amber liquor in front of Leonard before making a derisive noise in his throat and walking away. Leonard didn't seem to mind as much this time.

"Cheers," Y/N said, reaching forward with her glass, and Leonard clinked his against hers, lifting it to his lips. She watched intently as she swirled her own drink so that a luminescent gold wisp spiraled out, turning the clear liquor the color of a burning sun. He pulled the glass from his lips, and she returned her attention to her own drink, taking a slow sip before placing it back down on the bar.

"So, Leonard," Y/N let the name roll off her tongue teasingly. "Tell me about yourself. Where are you from? What are you studying?"

"I'm a medical student," he said, setting his own glass down. "And I'm from Georgia."

"Ooh, a doctor and a southern gentleman," Y/N teased, shimmying her shoulders. "My mother would be so proud of me."

"Who said I'm a gentleman?" he asked with raised eyebrows, leaning closer to her. Y/N's mouth fell open slightly before she caught herself, stopping her body from melting completely right there in the seat.

"Don't threaten me with a good time, Leonard," she quipped, taking a sip of her drink.

"If you didn't want a good time then why did you come over here?" he asked, and Y/N grinned at him.

"Because you look like a man who doesn't dance."

"Well darlin," Leonard started, his eyes sparkling with the slightest bit of mischief and a look on his face that was enough to make something delicious twist in the pit of Y/N's stomach. "The night's still young."

The night grew in both the amount of time passed and the amount of drinks finished. It was hard to state exactly how much of either had slipped away from the two of them as their glasses had been cleared a few times, but the world was just a bit lighter and hazier at the edges than was usual and the crowd slightly thinner than it had been when Y/N entered.

"Well, darlin'," Leonard's accent had grown heavier with the liquor, words dripping like molasses from his lips. "I should be gettin' back before curfew."

Y/N exhaled, the sound somewhere between a laugh and a sigh. "Leonard," she said slowly, dragging out the word. Her own accent adding a richness to her words that had been precise and sharp earlier in the evening. "I thought I made it quite clear that I wasn't leaving your side all night, so you can't go running off to the dorms on me now."

"Need me to walk you home?" he asked, pausing from putting on his coat to settle the tab.

"Such a southern gentleman," the words rolled like waves from her, her voice rising and falling as he lifted an eyebrow at the screen he was signing. "Yes, I require an accompaniment home," she mocked. "And then I need you to pick a side you want me on for the next part of our night: top or bottom."

Leonard's eyes darkened, pupils blown wide before grabbing her hand and leaving the bar behind.

The cab ride to her apartment was...restrained. The two of them sat shoulder to shoulder in the backseat, eyes focused ahead through the windshield. Even as Y/N's hand drifted from her own lap into his, venturing up his thigh, both of them remained focused on the passing San Francisco streets. Leonard's hand came on top of her own. "Just wait, darlin'," he said, his words dripping with the richness of molasses as he folded his hand around hers.

"It's not polite to make a lady wait," Y/N quipped, shooting him a look out of the corner of her eye.

He snorted but made no attempt at a retort, instead patiently holding her hand until the cab stopped. Y/N opened her door, dragging Leonard by the hand and towards her apartment building.

The ride on the elevator was just as restrained as the cab drive, only instead of the beautiful lights of downtown, the pair stared at their distorted reflection in the sleek chrome doors.

There was a hum in the elevator though. Inaudible, but she could feel it singing across her skin, radiating from each part of her body that touched Leonard's. She bit her lip, and could feel Leonard look down at her. She allowed her gaze to slide over to him, drifting up to his face, meeting his eyes, already dark and boring into hers.

He opened his mouth to say something, but the doors slid open, pulling their attention away from each other and out of the elevator.

The pair walked down the hallway, stopping outside of her door so she could punch in the code. It took two tries for her to get it before the door clicked and she pushed it open, revealing her dark apartment. Y/N ventured in first, turning to invite Leonard in, but she'd barely opened her mouth before her face was in his hands, and he was walking her back into the wall.

The light switch jammed into her shoulder blade, and she felt a bit off balance, but his lips moved over hers with such a ferocity, it pushed everything else from her mind. Instead, all she could focus on was the feeling of his lips against hers, the taste of the sharp tang of alcohol he'd been drinking all evening. He invaded her senses, making it impossible to think of anything other than pulling him closer to her.

Y/N wound her fingers into his hair, urging him nearer to her, which he did, stepping forward, and moving a hand from her face to her waist, pulling her flush against him. His other hand wandered down to her chest as his lips began a journey down the curve of her neck. "I don't usually do this type of thing," he murmured against her skin.

"Go home with--ah--a strange woman from the--fu--the bar?" Y/N panted, pushing her hips into his for a taste of the friction she needed.

He pulled himself away from her collarbone to look up at her with hooded eyes. "Exactly."

"You're missing out," Y/N grinned, chest heaving. "Now take off your clothes so I can prove it to you."

The rest of the evening passed in a blur of bare skin and desperate sounds and more pleasure than Y/N had gotten out of a night out in a while.

It almost made her sad to see him go in the morning. Almost.

But him leaving was always a part of her plan for Saturday morning. Whether it was before or after breakfast, he would walk out of her apartment, never to be seen again. Instead, he'd fade into a memory of lips trailing against skin, fingers tangling in hair, bed frame rattling into the wall.

At least that's what was supposed to happen.

She wasn't supposed to see him again.

And she especially wasn't supposed to see him in a starship's transporter room, rushing towards her as she pressed her hand into Kiesh's side, desperate to keep the blood inside of her friend's body and not spilling out onto the transporter pad. He wasn't supposed to be there. And neither was she.

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trutrustories · 3 years ago

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Okay, this will be probably long and with many errors (my english isn´t very good) But I saw several posts here on Lokius tag, talking about this ship as result of gay fetish, and about non existing chemistry and how this ship doesn´t make sense etc… And from what I understood there is tagged Lokius because of genuine interest to understand others point of view, so here is mine: I wil try to explain where my frustration comes from, and how I feel about Lokius, Sylkie, AND representation + some other things which I saw here somewhere. But first of all: I like Sylvie, I don´t hate sylkie shipers, and after so many years reading fan fictions, I don´t mind selfcest – I read weirder things. I have some issues with this ship (the mainlythe fact that it isn´t Lokius), but this is not one of them. Also, I am not about to tell anyone, they shouldn´t ship sylkie.Ship whatever. And I LOVED the show as a whole.

I just want to defend my standpoint, that Lokius does make sense, people shipping it does make sense and whether it will happen or not, (I don´t have my hopes very high, and I learned to be very skeptical in this regard ) it is more than just about crack ship, or fetish. I´m honestly blown away that people are still surprised that this ship became a thing :D First of all, let´s look at some romantic story telling and tropes: I mean the way they introduced them in the first two episodes set the tone for all series and how the heck this isn´t romantic? Somehow there are all these romantic tropes existing in a show. They´re just there. Just chilling between Loki and Mobius and large portion of audience can´t even see them. (and some of those tropes were used for Sylki as well, so you could actually see them side by side)

For example: 1) traveling to the apocalypsis 2) breaking law/rules for the other 3) literally changing for the better thanks to the other 4) arguing like old married couple 5) saying secrets, personal things to the other 6) sharing glances, touches, visibly being happy around each other - in case of Loki happier then we´ve ever seen him before 7) being completely themselfs around each other 8) One knowing everything (even the worst) about other and still accepting him completely 9) teasing, being comfortable and domestic around each other 10) one being literally enthusiastic FAN of the other 11) Mobius defending Loki whenever he has a chance 12) Freaking amnesia trope that they pulled of in the end??? (It could be different Mobius, but point is he suddenly doesn´t know him - and Loki knows more, in contrast with the beggining) 13) the jealousy in ep4 14) Misunderstanding - when Mobius thought Loki betrayed him and Loki (thanks to Ravonna) thought Mobius betrayed him... 15) witnessing death of the other and being absolutely broken afterwards 16) The goodbye hug with romantic music in the backround 17) Saving life of the one (even when it means problems for the other ) - like Mobius saved Loki´s ass at least three times when he was trying to stop others from pruning him. 18) sharing deep conversations about meanings of life, freedom and how it would be fun to make some chaos and ride that fucking jet ski!!! 19) Inspiring the other 20) looking for each other (Mobius didn´t believe for a second, that Loki would die in the Void and the way how in the last minutes of the series Loki run through all places they were together when he was looking for Mobius... and I could go on. Point is, even if they are not planning to make Lokius canon, all these things are used on a daily basis to describe romance in media and they are used here. On top of that it´s just very poetic and cute, that this drama queen and powerful god of Asgard who looked down on people would find his match in someone, who is so quiet, ordinary on the first sight, and basically is just human from 90s, who loves jet skis. Mobius can´t even fight. But is highly inteligent and he also happen to be as good manipulator, such as Loki himself. - That´s why they work together so well. Mobius sees right through him and once Loki understands that, he drops his evil persona. Almost nobody expected to ship it for real. But story itself and chemistry between them just made it probably the most exciting duo in the whole MCU. And I mean it genuinely. Third episode, even though it was beautiful and Sophie was great in it (and is literally dipped in bisexual colors), is the least favorite for a reason. And that reason being, there is no interaction between Loki and Mobius whatsoever. Lot´s of people though that series slowed down a bit. Even when in fact there was more action, then when we watched Loki and Mobius working at the TVA.

(and let´s just talk about evil!Mobius narative for a bit and how some people say he is manipulative and toxic for Loki: show itself explore heavy themes and one of them is in Loki´s line: no one bad is ever truly bad and no one good is ever truly good. And as a theme in a fictional world, it is working as it should, for the story. When Loki and Mobius meet, one of them just killed lots of innocent people and destroyed almost whole city. The other one is a part of fascist organization – and in the beginning of the series they both believe what they´re doing is right. They´re both bad, they´re both good, they´re both broken. And they are changing with the help of the other.) From all reactions I watched - and there was many of them, lots of people actually didn´t see dynamic between Loki and Sylvie as romantic in the third episode. So it´s not like Sylvie and Loki had unequivocally love story right from the start.

The only difference is that lots of people won´t see romantic tropes, when it comes to two men in a mainstream show – show that isn´t primarily about relationships and problems that queer people has to face. Because in super hero story and science fiction we have to warn audience, that they´re about to watch two man in love, right? At this point It´s just frustrating really. There were many M/M dynamics that used similar story line, as for example Lucifer, or X-files, or Bone collectors. - But unlike those M/M pairings, no one was making fun of people for shipping main characters in these shows. But when it comes to two men suddenly you´ll see from all corners of the internet: “why can´t it be just platonic?” “There is not enough platonic relationships” “why can´t two man just be friends?” (They can and they almost ALWAYS are) and “if you think there something romantic between them, you´re delusional” “fetishist“ “And for god´s sake just let them be friends, Loki needs a friend more then....” oh wait, but Sylvie is allowed to kiss him. Sylvie doesn´t have to be just friend. (And I must say, that I love Sylvie, I liked most of the interactions between her and Loki and I think she is a great character ((I hope we learn more about her in the future)) it just doesn´t work for me as well as Loki´s dynamic with Mobius. Maybe partly because of chemistry between actors, partly because combination of characters and they´re personality and also because I had two whole episodes to fall in love with the pair before Sylvie was even introduced.)

First of all: people can be friends and then evolve into lovers. Not only it is common romantic trope, but it is also the most realistic one. And those relationships are usually strongest. second: If people want to see Loki in a platonic friendship so desperately, why can´t it be a woman for a change? They were acting like chaotic siblings for most of the episode three anyway. The age gap aspect is also very funny. Owen is only about 12 years older (That is not that much. But I imagine, some people would get uncomfortable. But If it was man and woman, most of them wouldn´t even blinked. But two men, that has to be somehow automatically son and father figure dynamic) And If you want to dive into age of an actual characters, then good luck with that in a series about gods, variants and time travel. Almost nobody cares about age gap between Lucifer and detective Decker, or Bella and Edward. On top of that, it was heavily implied, that Loki slept with older, silver haired guy in Ragnarok, so it´s not like he would have problem with that.

Different standards are projected in a way how we see romantic dynamics between fictional characters depends on what we are used to, how are we perceiving world around us, what we are expecting to see and ALSO, what we would like to see, that much is true. When people are used to make no differences between heterosexual and homosexual pairing, then everything what happens to the characters is measured with the same meter. (Even though I experienced queerbaiting many times (( Once upon a time, Sherlock, Supernatural, Good Omens – the last one hopefully is not the case, but I guess we´ll see)) I also saw lots of lgbt shows like Queer as folks and Sense8.) And when we are not used to see it the same way, well… then it looks basically like that one comment under Castiel´s “I love you” scene on youtube, that said “what a beautiful friendship”.

If we forget about all that chaotic mess behind the scenes (all those articles and contrary messages) What is happening in a show between Loki and Mobius can be objectively considered romantic and what is happening between Loki and Sylvie in a series can be objectively considered platonic (until the kiss) and vice versa. And then to see comments about how absurd it is to even think they have chemistry, and about gay fetish - it´s hard to swallow. I read posts about absurdity of a ship and how there is absolutely nothing that would suggests romance. Well there is, actually. But whether creators are going to work with it or not, that´s something we can only speculate. They already made Loki officially bisexual. So why should it be so absurd to assume, that there is an actual possibility of romantic subplot between Loki and Mobius? Oh right… it´s Disney and Marvel we are talking about.

So on a subject of bisexuality: Bi people can date whoever they want. But It is a little frustrating, when there is so many heterosexual pairings in the mcu and disney but when there is a promise of lgbt character (speaking of endgame) we get one line about date from a man we´ll never see again. And when there is a promise of lgbt representation you can´t even blink during movie, or you´ll miss it (Star wars, Beauty and the beast). And then Loki said “A bit of both, I suspect the same as you”. And I won´t lie, I was happy. And I think creators made biggest step yet with this one line (which is honestly terrible, that “a bit of both” coming from Loki of all people, is the biggest step forward.) But they played it VERY safe. Obviously, both Loki, and Sylvie are bisexuals, and in three episodes, we had Loki flirting with female flight attendant, Sylvie talking about her relationship with POSTMAN and then they fall for each other. So the only thing that suggests they are really as bi as Lamentis 1 is that little sentence, that can be edited out, or easily overheard. It´s the bare minimum. And I think that frustration with how freaking slowly we´re moving into some progress is understandable. From all those great M/M dynamics I talked about, those, that could make great love story, nothing happened, because too many people “don´t mind gays but don´t need to look at them” or are scared for their children. In 2021.

It is not a fetish to wish for a gay love story in superhero movies/series. (But anyway, I don´t think there is anything bad about it. Some men like to watch lesbian porn, some woman like to read gay porn. AO3 wouldn´t be were it is today, without people reading and writing slash :D – but that has little to do with what we actually see on tv)

I´m not delusional. As much, as I love these two characters together, I know how little chance it has. I´m not delusional. I´m just in the future, old and tired, waiting hundreds of years for at least one of my OTP to finaly become a fucking canon.

#Lokius #loki series #LOKI AND MOBIUS #mobius m mobius #loki

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riversofmars · 3 years ago

Note

Prompt: 13 and River babysit Anthony Williams (Amy and Rory’s adopted son)

This is such a cute prompt! I combined it with a similar one and hope this works for you, enjoy! <3

Rating: G

Word Count: 1800

Read on AO3 or below

All in the Family

“And you’re sure you’re up for this?“ Amy turned to River one more time, halfway out of the door of their flat in 1940s New York.

“Of course, why wouldn’t I be?“ River crossed her arms in front of her chest challengingly.

“You’re not exactly the most responsible adult.“ Rory couldn’t help pointing out and glanced to his wife to find out whether they were going to change their minds at the last minute.

“I'll take that as a compliment.“ River smirked. “Remember this was your idea.“

“Yes but only because we don’t know many people here yet!“ Rory admitted.

“And having your baby stolen once, you don’t want to trust strangers, I get it.“ River gave her parents a kind smile. She was very happy for them. They deserved to have the calm family life that they had missed out on with her. Adopting baby Anthony had been a wonderful idea.

“It’s just been such a long time since we’ve been able to go out.“ Amy explained. “I just didn’t understand how hard raising a child would be!“ She sighed, running her hand through her hair. She was more exhausted than she ever had been while travelling with the Doctor. “We just really need to have an evening just for us.“

“Say no more and get yourself going before I change my mind.“ River ushered them out the door.

“You are a godsend, River.“ Amy kissed her daughter’s cheek. “Don’t get up to anything stupid.“ She wagged her finger at her.

“What, me? Stupid? Perish the thought.“ River feigned hurt but laughed.

“Just make sure Anthony is okay.“ Amy implored her and gave a little wave to the toddler that was just coming up behind River and wrapping his arms around her leg.

“You can count on me. We’ll have a brilliant time, won’t we, brother dearest?“ River smiled down at the child and patted his head.

“Ri-ver.“ The toddler nuzzled into her thigh.

“See, fast friends already.“ River chuckled and lifted him up.

“Does she… do you know anything about toddlers?“ Rory asked, insecure for a moment.

“I am married to the Doctor, does that count?“ River countered and the Ponds laughed:

“Fair point…“

“Relax, we will be fine, it’s just for a few hours.“ River kissed the forehead of her adoptive brother who was giving her a koala bear hug. “Tea, books, bed. I got this.“

“See you both later, look after each other.“ Amy smiled and kissed Anthony’s head, as did Rory.

“This is a bad idea…“ Rory hummed to his wife as they waved their goodbyes and made their way down the corridor.

“It’s a brilliant idea.“ Amy waved off his concerns.

“Right Anthony, there is someone I would like you to meet.“ River smiled at her little brother as she closed the door.

“Meet?“ Anthony echoed as River carried him back into the living room.

“Someone very special: Your brother-in-law. Well, I say brother… sister-in-law? Alien-in-law?“ River grinned,and as if on cue the TARDIS became visible in the lounge.

“I don’t know why you wouldn’t let me see them!“ The Doctor stuck her head out, having waited patiently for the Ponds to depart.

“Because they never would have left and they could do with a break.“ River explained with a chuckle as her wife skipped out of the TARDIS and towards them.

“Hello Anthony Pond!“ She grinned, ruffling the toddler’s curls who just giggled in response. He appeared fascinated by the sudden appearance of the blue box and pulled away from River, seemingly wanting to be set down.

“Williams…“ River corrected the Doctor as she sat her brother down who rushed to the TARDIS, circling around it in wonder.

“What shall we play with, Anthony?“ The Doctor ignored her wife and dropped to her knees in the middle of a pile of toys. “See, we’re gonna have the best time!“ She pulled her screwdriver from her coat and sonic-ed the toys. All of a sudden, cars and toy robots started moving on their own accord. Anthony giggled in delight and rushed over to the Doctor, the TARDIS no longer the most interesting thing around here.

“Guess that means I’m making tea?“ River chuckled as Anthony threw himself at the Doctor.

“Would you want either one of us close to a hob?“ The Doctor retorted, hugging the child tightly.

“Fair point.“ River chuckled.

——

“I don’t know why I asked you here, it’s like babysitting two toddlers.“ River was cleaning up the kitchen after tea had turned into a food fight.

“'Cause this is the closest thing you and I have to a family.“ The Doctor answered with surprising candour. Anthony was jawing, leaning against her.

“As much as I try to, I don’t really feel like part of them…“ River answered thoughtfully.

“Our lives are more complicated than that…“ The Doctor couldn’t help but agree. Neither one of them was suited to regular family dynamics.

“Would it be so bad though? Settling down for a time?“ River mused, looking from Anthony to her wife.

“Maybe at some point.“ The Doctor gave her a soft smile. This River hadn’t done Darillium yet. She had all of that to come and the Doctor missed their time there more than she would care to admit.

“Bed time?“ She asked, seeing as Anthony was virtually falling asleep next to her.

“I think so.“ River agreed with a smile and walked over to them. “Come here Anthony…“ She scooped him up. “Let’s get you into your PJs…“

Both the Doctor and River had presumed bedtime would be easy, considering how tired Anthony was, but they had thought wrong.

“Stop turning the light on and off!“ River pleaded, picking him up again to finally put him in his bed. Anthony appeared to have saved up his energy just for this.

“Still want kids?“ The Doctor tried her best to keep a straight face as she watched her wife struggle with the toddler.

“You know all of a sudden, being a big sister seems perfectly adequate.“ River retorted.

“I’ll get him a bottle of milk.“ The Doctor suggested, just as Anthony got up again and raced past River to the light switch.

“Stop it with the light switch!“ River groaned and scooped him up again. “Please, will you just stay in bed now?“ She tugged him in.

“Well well well, isn’t this a lovely sight.“ A voice sounded from the doorway that made River’s blood run cold. She whipped around, standing protectively in front of the bed.

“Madame Kovarian, how did you…“ She stared at the woman in the doorway.

“I knew I would find you eventually.“ Madame Kovarian smirked, walking further into the room. “And who is this little man? Tell me, am I a grandmother?“

“How dare you show your face here!“ River growled, regretting immediately that she left her gun in the TARDIS. She hadn’t anticipated needing it for babysitting duties.

“I believe you and I have some unfinished business.“ Kovarian retorted. “How is motherhood treating you, Melody? Where is the husband? Leaving you to do all the child care?“

“Right behind you!“ The Doctor called from the doorway, armed with nothing but a bottle of milk. She quickly accessed the situation in front of her, glaring at the unwelcome guest.

“Oh well, not your child then, is it?“ Kovarian retorted with a cruel smirk. “Now then, I think it’s time for some good old fashioned revenge…“ She pulled a gun on them.

Suddenly the light flicked off! Anthony had snuck out from behind River and gone for his favourite game again. River jumped at the opportunity. She flung herself at Kovarian and disarmed her quickly. The moment the light came back on, Kovarian was on the floor and River held her gun to her head.

“Never underestimate a Pond!“ The Doctor grinned and scooped up the child into a tight hug.

“You little monster!“ Kovarian spat.

“If anyone is a monster here, Madame Kovarian, it’s you.“ River retorted icily.

“Surprisingly quiet in here… maybe River managed to get him to sleep alright after all…“ Rory mused as he opened the door to the flat and they walked inside. It had been a lovely evening, just what they needed.

“What the…“ Amy stopped dead in her tracks as they stepped into the living room.

“Amelia Pond! And Rory the Roman!“ The Doctor exclaimed and ran towards them, pulling them into bone crushing hugs.

“River?!“ Amy exclaimed, needing an explanation. Who was this woman? What was she doing in their flat? Why did she know who they were? And why was Madame Kovarian tied to a chair in the middle of their lounge?!

“What can I say… Mum, Dad… when my husband regenerated into a hot blonde I started batting for the other team, hope that’s alright with you.“ River answered, gesturing to the Doctor who grinned widely, barely able to contain her excitement.

“What?!“ Amy and Rory exclaimed in unison.

“She didn’t want to tell you I was here cause she thought you’d be worried we’d set the place on fire…“ River explained a little bit more apologetically.

“Instead you have a tied up Madame Kovarian in our living room?!“ Amy gestured to the unwelcome guest.

“Ouch!“ Kovarian groaned when Anthony chucked a building block at her.

“Good shot, mate!“ The Doctor grinned and gave him a high five. Of course, Anthony had refused to go to bed after the excitement.

“Sorry, just got to finish building this transdimensional teleport. Teaching Anthony the basics of temporal engineering as we go. One way trip to Stormcage.“ River explained, gesturing to a circle of electrical components that had been erected around Kovarian. Long cables connected it to the TARDIS. “Unless I get the coordinates wrong… might end up in a sun instead…“ She mused.

“Melody, don’t do it, I…“ Kovarian pleaded.

“You have threatened my family for the last time. This is goodbye, Madame Kovarian, for the last time.“ River finished attaching the cables.

“Good riddance!“ Rory mumbled in agreement.

“Anthony!“ Amy called when the toddler skipped forward and hit a big red button on the contraption. Something no child would be able to resist. Kovarian disappeared in a flash of light!

“Was the teleport even calibrated?!“ The Doctor looked to River who gave a little shrug.

“I’ll check up on her when I’m in Stormcage next… she may have ended up in the cantina rather than an actual cell… but never mind.“ She looked to her parents. “So, how was your date?“

“Certainly less eventful than this.“ Amy shook her head in disbelief.

“Come on, mate, let’s get you to bed.“ The Doctor scooped Anthony up who nuzzled into her neck.

“Doc-tor.“

#Doctor who #thirteen #thirteenth doctor #river song #spaces wives #amy pond #rory williams #madame kovarian #fluff #femslash #family #river x the doctor #river x thirteen #thirteen/river #yowzah #fanfiction #prompt #dw #anthony williams

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shihalyfie · 4 years ago

Text

An Adventure/02 pseudo-honorifics chart

I’ve mentioned a few times that I maintain an Adventure/02 honorifics chart for the sake of fanfic writing (it’s generally a pretty vital thing to have on hand if you intend to use honorifics in fanwork, or even in fiction at all), and I’ve even mentioned that I’d like to release it someday, but one thing that was always holding me back about it was my constant checks for accuracy -- an acquaintance was also keeping one, and when we compared them we found some minor inconsistencies that would require us to rewatch the entire series with a notepad to get the right references.

After a fashion, I realized that I was scrutinizing this way too closely. The important part is not the specific honorifics themselves but rather the pattern in which they’re used -- especially because they would often alternate in-series, partially intentionally, and partially because they would flip-flop depending on writer. On top of that, most people who would be interested in this are likely writing post-2002 fanfic, where it could be reasonable for certain honorifics to change based on certain relationships.

As such, I’ve decided to just throw out the minutiae, forget about making an organized “chart”, and simply write a general overview of how the twelve Adventure/02 kids use honorifics for each other. Hopefully this can be an interesting resource/meta for those who are considering writing fanfic with these (or even simply due to general interest).

Before we begin, a few notes:

Overall, I am mostly omitting “obvious outlier cases” where a character called someone else something different from usual, but context made it clear why that particular instance was different. (For instance, Miyako trying to butter Daisuke up by calling him “Dai-chan” in 02 episode 8; she very much would not have done this in most circumstances.) I am also not looking too deeply into one-off outlier cases that seem to wildly fall outside the pattern, and seem to merely be the result of whoever was writing that episode/piece of media not checking the chart.

The tri. anime series and tri. stage play actually contradict each other, and given that they’re supposed to take place in around the same period, you basically have to commit to one or the other here. Between the two, the anime series has a number of incursions that go against patterns in ways that make it difficult to form a consistent analysis about it, whereas the stage play is much easier to make a consistent case between 02 and Kizuna (with comparatively much fewer outliers), so in terms of providing actual analysis, I will be prioritizing the latter’s take.

Due to similarly having too many obviously contradictory incursions, 02′s first drama CD (Armor Evolution to the Unknown) is also mostly removed from consideration, with the exception of instances when it’s a factor in an already ambiguous situation.

All twelve Adventure/02 characters are consistently respectful with elders and strangers (with some exceptions; Taichi really wasn’t very amused with Gennai when they first met). The following analysis is important mainly in regards to the kids’ relationships with each other.

I’ll be marking down the first-person pronouns for Digimon partners as well, but for the sake of brevity I’ll be sticking with the “base” forms (Child for everyone except Tailmon, who’s Adult) and not the higher ones.

General overview

A quick crash course on honorifics and how they’re used!

Firstly, there’s first-person pronouns, which, in the scope of fiction, generally are used to indicate a character’s disposition. Note that “one character consistently using one first-person pronoun for nearly every situation” is very endemic to fiction in particular; in real life, one may change their pronoun depending on whom they’re talking to or the context in which they’re speaking, but Japanese fiction is generally much more consistent about using these as consistent points for characterization, even to the point of bringing out pronouns that aren’t practically in use anymore in real life.

The ones generally of importance to the Adventure kids:

ore: Masculine and assertive. Note assertive instead of aggressive; it simply implies being very self-assured, and you can still have a stoic character who uses ore. Since it’s a very casual and somewhat brash pronoun, a character who uses this might still default to something like boku depending on the surrounding circumstances (for instance, Taichi, who normally uses ore, will still use boku when speaking to adults on the phone).

boku: Masculine and deferential/polite.

watashi: Gender-neutral and somewhat deferential/polite. When used by male characters, usually it’s to imply that they’re particularly mature or polite (since otherwise you’d probably expect boku).

atashi: Feminine and casual. The “casual” connotation means that it’s often employed by aggressive or assertive girls in a sort of feminine equivalent to ore, but it can also simply mean that they’re just very girly (see: Mimi).

When referring to each other, honorifics come into play. Honorifics are generally used based on a combination of “comparative level of station” (i.e. whether someone is in a “higher societal position” than you or not -- yes, even a single school grade can matter here!) and “sense of distance” (i.e. whether you are a close friend to the person in question or not). And, of course, there’s also the question of how polite the speaker is in general. These factors do weigh against each other, so that’s why it’d still make sense for two very close friends to use honorifics on each other, if said friends are portrayed as particularly polite in general.

No honorific: Referred to as yobisute in Japanese, this is actually something that merits a category on its own, because it’s something you should only be whipping out when you’re particularly close to the person. This is especially in the case of elders; unless you really do have a close relationship to the elder in question that they can forgive it, you’re being a bit in-your-face and rude for acting like you’re on their level.

-san: The most common honorific, because it’s the one you can generally rely on to default to if you’re not sure and want to be polite. Upward-facing and polite.

-senpai: Similar to -san in that it’s upward-facing and polite, but it has a stronger connotation of “someone who has been in a certain field longer than you have”. Depending on the characters in question and the relevant situation, it and -san can be interchangeable (this happens with the 02 kids and their Adventure seniors, who are both people the 02 kids look up to as people in general and people who are in higher school grade levels and further experience in Digimon-related issues).

-kun: Downward-facing and polite. In this case “downward-facing” simply means that the person you’re addressing is either on the same “societal level” as you or lower on the social ladder; it’s not meant to be used in a condescending sense! (Well, at least, not by default, anyway.) Its use is still considered respectful, especially moreso than dropping the honorific altogether, but it simply means that you’re also not necessarily deferring to the other person being higher than you. On very rare occasions, you could theoretically use it for a senior you consider yourself particularly close with, but this kind of usage never comes into play with the twelve kids in the Adventure universe (its most notable Digimon usage is Appmon’s Haru using it for Rei, who’s one year older than him).

-chan: Endearing and somewhat casual. Often used for younger girls. Because of it having a “cute” implication, it’s the one honorific here that may be advisable to avoid if you want to avoid that implication; it’s not rude per se to be using it, but it’s definitely possible to want to avoid the implications and go for “-san” (despite that normally being upward-facing) or “-kun” (despite that being a bit more formal) instead.

On top of that, it should be noted that there is a difference between calling someone by their surname vs. their given name, mainly in terms of sense of distance -- formality usually dictates prioritizing surname first by default, someone really close with a particular friend can go as far as given name with no honorific, with the other extreme being using surname and adding an honorific. Likewise, “surname with no honorific” can imply a bit of bluntness yet mutual level of comfort in a relationship, while “given name with honorific” can imply politeness but still with a sense of tight friendship and familiarity -- basically, it’s a grey area. Fortunately, in the case of Adventure/02, this only really matters in the case of Ken (and, in one instance, Koushirou).

And finally, note that if two characters call each other a certain way long enough, honorifics can “stick” and even start taking on an “endearing nickname” sentiment -- which is why you might see a phenomenon of people still using honorifics on each other even when their closeness to each other might suggest otherwise. This is pertinent mainly in the case of certain characters who continue calling each other a certain way even after their relationship should suggest that they’ve gotten a lot closer -- the implication being that they’ve called each other that for so long that it feels weird to change now. (Yes, that even includes between dating and/or married couples.)

Incidentally, all Digimon partners (with the exception of Tentomon and Hawkmon, who use -han and -san respectively, and Wormmon, whose single-minded dedication to “Ken-chan” means he really doesn’t talk about anyone else other than a reference to “Izumi Koushirou-san on the phone” in 02 episode 26) simply refer to the humans by given name and no honorific (including humans who aren’t their partners); presumably they’re allowed this due to not being members of Japanese society per se, and therefore not being beholden to its standards.

To wrap this up, here’s a reminder of everyone’s school grade levels in relation to each other, from highest to lowest (note that we don’t actually know anyone’s specific birthdays, so we have to go by school years):

Jou

Taichi, Yamato, Sora

Koushirou, Mimi

Miyako

Takeru, Hikari, Daisuke, Ken

(empty space here)

Iori

Taichi

First-person pronoun: ore (assertive)

General honorifics pattern: Given name, no honorific for the boys (”Yamato”, “Jou”, “Daisuke”, etc.). Uses given name with “-chan” with most younger girls (”Mimi-chan”, “Miyako-chan”), the implication being that he simply treats them casually without being extra blunt or extra polite.

Parents: tou-san and kaa-san (still roughly respectful, but casual enough to drop the respectful o-).

Sora: As he’s known Sora for a while even before the events of Adventure, Taichi simply calls her “Sora” with no honorific.

Mimi: Taichi was known to call Mimi “Mimi-chan” in Adventure, which was consistent with how he called Miyako in 02, but in Kizuna it seems to be just “Mimi”. There are multiple potential interpretations, one being that something may have happened to make the two more intimately close between Adventure and Kizuna, one being that something happened to make Taichi feel that Mimi shouldn’t have a “diminutively endearing” honorific, one being that the scene in question was rather serious and he felt it wasn’t the right time...and one being that the writers simply just forgot.

Jou: Notably, Taichi’s lack of using honorifics for the boys also extends to Jou, who’s a year older than him, either because he’s fine being casual enough with Jou that he doesn’t mind violating propriety, or he made the same mistake as Yamato (see below) and initially mistook him for being in the same school year due to Jou not initially coming off as very senior-esque (unlike with Mimi, Jou wasn’t explicitly designated as the leader of the others’ camp groups).

Hikari: Hikari is Taichi’s sister, so he simply calls her “Hikari” with no honorific.

Other notes: Amusingly, while everyone calls Gennai “Gennai-san” for the most part, Taichi isn’t very patient with him at first and calls him “jiji” (old man) during Adventure, but seems to have gotten over himself and calls him “Gennai-san” in Kizuna. (Well, he’s not an old man anymore by then.) Unlike Taichi, Agumon uses boku (polite), despite the two characters otherwise being very like-minded. Agumon is a little more easygoing than Taichi in general, so it can be said that Agumon represents Taichi’s nature of not being altogether aggressive when it really comes down to it.

Yamato

First-person pronoun: ore (assertive)

General honorifics pattern: Given name, no honorific for the boys (”Taichi”, “Jou”, “Daisuke”, etc.). Like Taichi, he uses given name with “-chan” with most younger girls (“Hikari-chan”, “Miyako-chan”).

Parents: oyaji (think roughly in the sense of “my old man”) for his father, kaa-san (again, a bit more respectful but still rough enough to drop the o-) for his mother (whom he doesn’t live with).

Sora: Yamato omits the honorific for Sora, implying he considered her a close friend even during the time of Adventure.

Mimi: Notable mainly because of our lack of information about this; Yamato and Mimi never referred to each other over the course of Adventure or 02, and while Mimi’s way of referring to Yamato (”Yamato-san”) was easy to extrapolate even before Kizuna based on existing patterns, the reverse could go either way, depending on whether Yamato would see her as close enough to merit the drop. The Adventure mini dramas have him call her “Mimi-chan”, but this was in unison with everyone else, so it’s hard to tell whether it counts; the tri. stage play and the Kizuna novel has him drop the honorific.

Jou: Like Taichi, he never uses any honorific with the one-year-older Jou, the canonical explanation being that he initially mistook Jou for being in the same year (well, not like Jou was acting as the epitome of a dignified senior...).

Ken: Yamato initially refers to him as “Ichijouji-kun” when discussing Ken’s circumstances with Iori in 02 episode 35, but during 02 episode 42, when Ken is now working directly with him and has integrated himself more as everyone’s friend, Yamato simply calls him “Ichijouji”, being more willing to speak to him on a more blunt/close level (but not quite knowing him as well as the other 02 kids, whom he’s on given name basis with).

Other notes: Yamato is the one Adventure senior who gets a lot of interaction with the 02 group in Kizuna, and interestingly, the four of them all call him “Yamato-senpai”, despite him not going to their school -- given that they’re dealing with a Digimon incident, the implication is that they’re treating him as an experienced senior in that respect. Despite what his shy personality would suggest, Gabumon in fact uses ore, like Yamato. Gabumon can be said to represent Yamato’s emotional core, so it is true that he can be very assertive when it really comes down to it.

Sora

First-person pronoun: Mostly used watashi in Adventure, with fairly uncommon lapses into atashi, fully moving to atashi by 02. This is consistent with her characterization difference between Adventure and 02, the latter of which portrayed her as quite a bit more assertive about what she wanted and rather less deferential (and also a lot more willing to come off as more feminine, at that). The tri. stage play sticks with atashi. Kizuna has her go back to watashi, which can possibly be taken as her deciding to be a bit more mature in her adult years -- basically, Sora is the kind of person where going either way fits her, since she’s capable of being assertive but also likes to carry herself calmly and maturely (and her teenage years are where you could most definitely believe she’d be the most aggressive about it).

General honorifics pattern: Uses “Jou-senpai” for Jou, treating him properly like a school elder. Given the rest of her way of using honorifics, most likely she’d use “-san” or “-senpai” for most elders. Uses given name plus “-kun” for younger boys (”Koushirou-kun”, “Daisuke-kun”) and “-chan” for younger girls (”Mimi-chan”, “Miyako-chan”). In other words, generally diligent about using honorifics, dropping it only with people she’s particularly close with.

Parents: Generally respectful okaa-san and otou-san.

Taichi: Having known Taichi as a peer for quite a long time prior to the events of the series, Sora simply just calls him “Taichi” with no honorific.

Yamato: Initially Sora calls him “Yamato-kun”, and it’s reasonable to extrapolate she probably would call most boys her age with the “-kun” honorific, but early in the series, Sora starts alternating between “-kun” and simply calling him “Yamato”, which allegedly was actually intentional to indicate foreshadowing of their building relationship. This alternation continues all the way into 02, even after they start dating -- Armor Evolution to the Unknown has her calling him “Yamato-kun” even when she refers to him super-endearingly (implying it really has become a nickname of sorts), while DSB has her drop the honorific, and both firmly depict them as dating. For what it’s worth, the tri. stage play and Kizuna also depict her as dropping the honorific.

Daisuke: Sora actually drops honorific for Daisuke, possibly due to knowing him from the soccer club.

Ken: “Ichijouji-kun” in 02 episode 38. This is in the context of her observing how much he’s changed, so, much like with the other seniors, she thinks well of him, she’s just not particularly close with him to merit moving to given name basis.

Other notes: Piyomon, who’s portrayed as clingy and affectionate, uses atashi from day one.

Koushirou

First-person pronoun: boku (polite)

General honorifics pattern: -san for everyone older (”Taichi-san”, “Jou-san”). “-kun” for younger boys (”Takeru-kun”, “Daisuke-kun”).

Parents: Generally respectful okaa-san and otou-san.

Mimi: Mimi is the same age as Koushirou, but Koushirou presumably doesn’t feel comfortable using the “affectionately endearing” “-chan” and would rather use the more respectful “-san” instead.

Hikari: Hikari is an unusual case in that she’s quite a bit younger than Koushirou, but Koushirou still calls her with “-san”. Presumably, he didn’t feel comfortable going with “-chan” like everyone else did (and presumably for the same reasons he won’t use it for Mimi either). This persists even all the way into 02, but interestingly, he calls Miyako differently (see below), so it’s hard to say what his stance would be on younger girls in general, or whether Hikari got special privileges due to the circumstances of how she met the group (as the younger sister of his respected senior Taichi, and as a fellow Chosen who met everyone during some rather personal circumstances detached from school). The tri. stage play floats up the idea that he might have accepted “Hikari-chan” by 2005, but Kizuna takes the stance that he’s still using “Hikari-san” in 2010.

Miyako: Koushirou, having met Miyako during some rather impersonal circumstances and initially only having a computer club senior-junior relationship with her, calls her “Miyako-kun”. Note again the avoidance of the “-chan”; he really doesn’t seem to want to use the “cute” honorific, and would rather treat her a little more formally.

Ken: Koushirou refers to Ken as “Ichijouji-kun” in general, Ken getting the surname basis as he joined the group on the level of him somewhat of a stranger to Koushirou compared to the other 02 kids. That said, this shows up even during their heart-to-heart in 02 episode 33, so other than the surname thing, it’s clear that Koushirou using the honorific is less detachment and him simply wanting to extend the same respect he uses for everyone else.

Other notes: Koushirou is infamous for using polite language (-masu, -desu, etc.) in every circumstance, including even with the Digimon (who are generally treated as being outside societal obligations of honorifics) and younger characters. The implication is that this came from Koushirou being deferential to everyone out of sense of distance and lack of self-esteem after his revelation of being adopted made him lose sense of his place in the world. In Adventure episodes 38 and 54, it’s made apparent that Koushirou wants to learn to speak more casually with others, but has difficulty doing so, and his parents and Tentomon assure him that he doesn’t need to force himself. Koushirou continues speaking this way even into 02 and Kizuna, but the epilogue implies that he at least doesn’t do this with his daughter (and the Character Complete File that he at least broke out of this with Tentomon). Tentomon uses Kansai dialect, which is stereotyped as being associated with easygoing and less book-smart characters (in contrast to Koushirou, and also for the absurd humor of the terrifying-looking Kabuterimon speaking this way), but he also uses the polite form, so he can be said to match Koushirou in this way by simply being polite and deferential to others in general. While most Digimon don’t use honorifics for humans, Tentomon also uses “-han” (the Kansai variant of “-san”) on any human he talks to.

Mimi

First-person pronoun: atashi (casual). Mimi is normally a very polite girl, but she also likes being in-your-face cute, so her usage of the pronoun is in line with this.

General honorifics pattern: -san for any and all elders (”Taichi-san”, “Sora-san”), -kun for younger boys (”Koushirou-kun”, “Daisuke-kun”), and -chan for younger girls (”Hikari-chan”, “Miyako-chan”). Mimi is depicted as having been raised as a sort of “lady of the house” (ojou-sama) personality due to having been spoiled by her parents, so she’s basically a “spoiled sweet” sort of girl who is polite and respectful to pretty much everyone -- hence why her speech pattern is uniformly consistent across everything. Of course, since she’s also very fond of “acting cute” and proud of it, younger girls like Hikari and Miyako get the cute “-chan”. The sole exception to her pattern is “Jou-senpai” (see Jou’s section on why).

Parents: Super-affectionate “Mama” and “Papa”, in line with the over-the-top lovey-dovey-ness of the Tachikawa household. Mimi’s mom goes as far as to endearingly call her “Mimi-chan” (her father is just “Mimi”).

Ken: Referred to Ken as “Ichijouji-kun” starting in 02 episode 25. This was in a context of her wanting to get him in to help, so she clearly has no ill will with him, she just doesn’t know him all that well compared to the other 02 kids.

Other notes: Palmon, who also enjoys acting cute, uses atashi much like the like-minded Mimi.

Jou

First-person pronoun: boku (polite). There’s an incident where he famously slips into ore when trying to intercede in the argument between Taichi and Yamato during Adventure episode 8, so it can be taken that he does have it in him to be more assertive if he lets his emotions take control of him, but otherwise is deferential.

General honorifics pattern: Interestingly, Jou seems to consider himself close enough to the older boys in the Adventure group to use given name with no honorific (”Taichi”, “Yamato”, “Koushirou”), despite what his insistence on societal propriety might make you think. In other words, he can be very casual when he really wants to be. With the girls, he generally uses given name plus “-kun” (”Sora-kun”, “Mimi-kun”), the implication being that he doesn’t like using the affectionate “-chan” on them and wants to keep them at a somewhat respectful and polite distance rather than the more casual manner he treats the boys with. Likewise, boys who are a certain level of younger than Jou are on given name basis plus “-kun” (”Takeru-kun”, “Daisuke-kun”); since this includes Takeru, who was also part of the Adventure group, it seems to have more to do with closeness based on age than anything. It’s unclear what he would do with elders since he’s the oldest depicted of the twelve, but most likely he’d at least be consistent about his -san and -senpai if he’s not particularly close with them.

Parents: Jou was never depicted with his parents in the series proper, but in Armor Evolution to the Unknown he uses “tou-san” for his father and “kaa-san” for his mother (generally respectful but still somewhat casual).

Shin and Shuu: Jou is depicted as calling them “Shin-niisan” and “Shuu-niisan” respectively.

Hikari: Jou’s one major reference to Hikari in Adventure was “Hikari-chan” -- presumably, Hikari being so young that it’s okay in his book to use the endearing honorific. The tri. stage play has him use “Hikari-kun”, so you can maybe presume he now sees her as old enough to be treated with the more formal honorific. Because both cases are somewhat isolated (one showing up really only once in the series and one being from a writer who may not have caught that one time), it’s difficult to make a projection.

Other notes: Jou infamously seems to exude such a “school senior” aura that he’s occasionally called “Jou-senpai” in settings where other characters might use “-san” for others (mainly Mimi, whose initial relationship to him was being under his responsibility in their summer camp group, and the 02 kids, who jump on using “-senpai” for him much faster than they do most of their other Adventure seniors, despite not even going to the same school as him). This has led to the Japanese fanbase often latching onto calling him “Jou-senpai” affectionately. Gomamon infamously uses the first-person pronoun oira, which is basically like the assertive ore but with a more laid-back and almost country bumpkin-esque air to it. It’s much in line with his very laid-back and playful personality, the complete opposite of Jou’s.

Takeru

First-person pronoun: boku (polite). This is actually a plot point; Adventure episode 12 (which is a Takeru focus episode) also uses boku in its title, and the narration for the 02 episode 50 preview suddenly uses boku, culminating in the reveal that the narrator was Takeru the whole time.

General honorifics pattern: Consistently uses given name “-san” for all elders (”Taichi-san”, “Jou-san”, “Miyako-san”, etc.). Uses given name plus “-kun” for boys who are the same age or younger (”Daisuke-kun”, “Iori-kun”). Hikari is “Hikari-chan”, so he’s comfortable enough to use the endearing honorific (although it might just be because it’s Hikari, whom he happens to personally know very well). In general, Takeru is a fairly polite person and adheres reasonably well to honorific propriety.

Parents: Super-affectionate and somewhat childish “Mama” and “Papa” in Adventure; generally respectful “okaa-san” for his mother and ever so slightly more casual “tou-san” for his father in 02.

Yamato: In Adventure, Takeru initially calls Yamato “onii-chan”, the “o-” being respectful, and “-chan” being endearing. He carries this into 02 as well. Given that it’s unlikely for him to continue doing this much longer after 02, different media ended up going in different directions with this; DSB went with “nii-san” (still very respectful, but missing the “o-” and not as “cutesy”), the tri. stage play went with aniki (one of its few holdovers from the tri. anime; somewhat more blunt and less respectful), and Kizuna uses DSB’s “nii-san”.

Ken: Takeru starts off calling him “Ichijouji-kun” when they’re just starting to get to know each other. This does happen to persist even as their relationship gets deeper and Takeru significantly warms up to him, culminating in him still seeming to call him this by Kizuna’s drama CD, but it seems to be more out of politeness/respect (or, most likely, habit, considering how long it took for Ken to get on good terms with everyone in the group) by this point. (Ironically, this is a significant improvement over when Takeru had punched out the Kaiser in 02 episode 17, in which his references had been an extremely passive-aggressive “Ichijouji-san” and a more genuinely angry “Ichijouji” -- once everything had calmed down, Takeru presumably felt that he at least deserved proper respect.)

Other notes: Patamon uses boku, much like Takeru, which is probably meant to accentuate his “childishness” (in Adventure) and general like-mindedness with Takeru and easygoing nature (in 02).

Hikari

First-person pronoun: watashi in Adventure, atashi in 02, watashi in the tri. stage play and Kizuna (specifically the drama CD). This is likely for similar reasons to Sora in that Hikari was portrayed as rather deferential to others in Adventure but got quite a bit more assertive in 02, then, as she got older, went back to carrying herself a bit more maturely (and, if the tri. stage play is to be believed, went back to it at an earlier age, presumably since she’s more on the polite side than Sora), albeit still of course bright and assertive when she wants to be.

Parents: Generally respectful okaa-san and otou-san.

General honorifics pattern: Much like Takeru, she consistently uses given name with “-san” for all elders (”Sora-san”, “Koushirou-san”, “Miyako-san”). Uses given name plus “-kun” for boys of the same age or younger (”Takeru-kun”, “Daisuke-kun”). It’s unclear what she would do with younger girls, but she probably wouldn’t be averse to using “-chan”. All in all, much like Takeru, she’s fairly polite and adheres to honorific propriety.

Taichi: Hikari consistently calls Taichi “onii-chan”. Given Hikari’s personality as a lot more willing to come off as “cute”, this is in line with her.

Ken: Like Takeru, Hikari starts off calling him “Ichijouji-kun” and sticks with it even after the group accepts him; again, Ken took an unusually long time to get on good terms with everyone in the group, by which time the surname basis had likely become habit for her, Takeru, and Iori.

Other notes: Because Hikari is called “Hikari-chan” by so many characters, the Japanese fanbase tends to attach the honorific to her name a lot when discussing her. Tailmon’s first-person pronoun usage mirrors Hikari’s in that she uses watashi in Adventure, atashi in 02, and watashi in the tri. stage play and Kizuna drama CD -- beyond mirroring Hikari, it also exemplifies 02 being the point in time when Tailmon seemed to be keen on making use of her new life and freedom.

Daisuke

First-person pronoun: ore (assertive)

General honorifics pattern: Consistently uses “-san” (”Taichi-san”, “Koushirou-san”) and/or “-senpai” for his elders (mostly “-san”), with the exception of Miyako (see below) -- in general Daisuke is actually quite respectful of his seniors in the Adventure group. For his friends in the 02 group, he eschews honorifics entirely and generally goes to given name basis with no honorific (”Takeru”, “Iori”), with the exception of Hikari (see below), so when it comes to people he’s actually closer with on a personal level, he doesn’t really seem fond of keeping distance with honorifics (much like Taichi and Yamato).

Parents: Doesn’t directly address his parents in the series proper, but the Character Complete File supplies “tou-san” and “kaa-san” (generally respectful but casual).

Jun: Refers to her as “aneki” (blunt and in-your-face).

Taichi: Although Daisuke has used both “-san” and “-senpai” for both Yamato and Jou, Taichi is the one where the interchangeability is most clear, since Daisuke has a particular relation to him as his respected soccer club senior.

Hikari: Consistently calls her “Hikari-chan”. The implication is, of course, that he sees her as cute and endearing, although it’s also completely possible he’d use “-chan” for any other similar age or younger girl he develops a particular rapport with (he does go along with Mimi’s suggestion of “Nat-chan” in The Door to Summer).

Miyako: Omits the honorific with her and simply calls her “Miyako”, despite her being a year older. The implication is that they banter so much and are so like-minded that he feels comfortable being more abrupt with her. She personally doesn’t seem to mind, especially given that, when Daisuke momentarily gets a bit disoriented and calls her “Miyako-san” in 02 episode 30, she complains that it sounds weird (meaning that it sounds weird coming from him, given that everyone else in the group calls her this).

Ken: Initially calls him “Ichijouji” prior to 02 episode 39, having just gotten out of the fights with him as the Kaiser and not quite being on personal friendship levels with him (much less treat him at a “polite distance”), but still wanting to handle him casually in his bid to integrate him into the group and get to know him better. He first drops the idea of switching to given name basis and calling him “Ken” in 02 episode 30, and is depicted as directly switching to it on-screen and committing to it when declaring Ken to be his friend in 02 episode 39. From then on, with Ken as basically his best and most important friend, he sticks with it.

Other notes: Being the very active and playful type, V-mon uses ore, just like Daisuke.

Ken

First-person pronoun: boku (polite); that includes as the Kaiser, implying that he was trying to portray himself as “regal and dignified” during that time.

General honorifics pattern: “-san” for all elders (”Koushirou-san”, “Miyako-san”), although he also uses “Yamato-senpai” in Kizuna (implying a sort of “Digimon senior” relationship with him and potentially other seniors by that point). Given name plus “-kun” for Iori, and presumably all younger boys. Ken generally uses given name basis for everyone, including the seniors; however, because he started off using “Motomiya-kun” and “Izumi-san” for Daisuke and Koushirou respectively before eventually shifting to “Daisuke” and “Koushirou-san”, it’s implied that this wasn’t necessarily the case when he was still initially ashamed of being around everyone.

Parents: Super-affectionate “Mama” and “Papa”, and his mother calls him “Ken-chan” in return (he’s just “Ken” from his father). The history behind this is really complicated, but the point is that the family is very affectionate when it all comes down to it.

Daisuke: Initially alternated between “Motomiya-kun” and “Motomiya” (phasing out the former as the series went on), having been in an awkward position of Daisuke so prominently having opposed him before suddenly getting in his face trying to befriend him. He drops a “Daisuke” (no honorific) in his head in 02 episode 26 and once outwardly in 02 episode 39, and while he never quite commits to given name basis during 02 itself, he uses it in DSB and in most postcanonical material, including Kizuna, indicating that with their relationship having gotten so close, Ken eventually got over himself and started referring to Daisuke as such.

Hikari: Hikari is the same age as Ken, but he calls her “Hikari-san”. Since the circumstances of why Ken wouldn’t use “-chan” with her are apparent (given his relationship to the 02 group at the time, it would have been incredibly inappropriate for him to use an “endearing” honorific with her), it’s hard to tell whether he would have extended this to all other girls his age or younger, or whether his way of referring to Hikari would have changed as he got to know the 02 group better (our latest point in time is Spring 2003, where he still calls her “Hikari-san”, but past that, it’s unknown).

Takeru: Notable mainly in our lack of information about this -- other than Daisuke (see above), Takeru is the only other boy his age that we get to see, and 02 never actually has Ken use his name in the series, so there’s been dispute over whether it would be “Takeru-san” or “Takeru-kun” (with a larger camp going for the latter, since Ken’s not averse to using downward-facing honorifics, he just clearly didn’t want to use “-chan” for Hikari at the time). There have also been interpretations that Ken might have been on surname basis with Takeru for at least a while; this is also ambiguous, given that he was initially on surname basis with Daisuke but went straight to given name basis with Iori (who, at the time, hated him the most out of the 02 kids).

Other notes: Nobody in the Adventure/02 group of kids actually calls him “Ken-chan”, but Wormmon and his family calling him this stuck so much in memory that the fanbase (and, at times, even official staff) constantly defaults to endearingly calling him this. Wormmon himself uses boku, much like Ken (and also in line with his generally polite disposition).

Miyako

First-person pronoun: atashi (casual). Does occasionally use watashi (polite), but this is very, very rare.

General honorifics pattern: Uniformly given name “-san” for all elders and seniors (”Sora-san”, “Mimi-san”), with the exception of Koushirou (see below), and seems to not be averse to using “-senpai” in certain cases. Generally uses given name plus “-kun” for younger boys she’s good friends with (”Takeru-kun”, “Ken-kun”), but will eschew it if she has a particular rapport with them (see below). Uses “-chan” for Hikari, and likely other younger girls as well. In general, Miyako’s neutrally polite to others “by default”, but is a bit more willing to be in-your-face with people when she deems them to be particularly close.

Parents: Uses “kaa-san” for her mother (generally respectful but casual). She’s not seen addressing her father directly within the course of 02. The Character Complete File supplies “okaa-san” and “otou-san” (overall respectful).

Siblings: Miyako isn’t seen addressing Mantarou directly during 02, and her only direct address to her sisters is in Armor Evolution to the Unknown, during which she calls them “onee-chan-tachi”, implying that she may call them “onee-chan” (respectful, endearing) individually.

Koushirou: Having looked up to him as a computer club senior (but not really having known him personally at the time) prior to the events of 02, Miyako starts off the series calling him “Izumi-senpai”. While she is depicted as briefly calling him “Koushirou-san” in 02 episode 33, most portrayals stick with “Izumi-senpai” (even Kizuna), and given that she calls the other Adventure seniors by given name honorific, the implication is that it really has stuck too much with her, given the way she looks up to him.

Mimi: After bonding with Mimi in 02 episode 6 and fantasizing about Mimi being a sister-like figure to her, Miyako starts calling her “Mimi-oneesama” (”older sister Mimi”). While she does carry this into 02 episode 14, this only crops up when Miyako is in a particularly cheerful or playful mood; when things get serious, she goes back to using “Mimi-san” as usual.

Daisuke: Unusually, she only calls him “Daisuke”, with no honorific like she does Takeru. The implication is that, with how they bounce off and bicker with each other, she considers him enough of a peer to just go straight for the name (especially since she’s averse to Daisuke calling her with an honorific in turn; see above).

Ken: Initially called him “Ken-kun” while gushing over him in 02 episode 8 (not knowing he was the Kaiser), basically fantasizing over the idea of being close to him. Once his true nature was revealed and the fight with the Kaiser ended, Miyako initially kept him at distance as “Ichijouji-kun” when contemplating her feelings on him, but immediately started going back to using “Ken-kun” after solidifying her intent to have him on the team in 02 episode 25, committing to it fully in 02 episode 30 after the incident that led to her slapping him. She is the first person on the 02 team to use given name for him; the implication is that she deliberately decided to start calling him this because of how much she wanted to reach out to him and consider him a friend, with no illusions of standoffishness, and the fact she made this kind of conscious change so early into knowing him is likely why she didn’t end up getting habituated into surname basis like Takeru and Iori seem to have.

Iori: Miyako never uses an honorific for him, simply calling him “Iori”; the implication is that this is from her background of having known him as a neighbor and friend prior to the events of 02.

Other notes: Hawkmon uses “watashi”, which is in line with his very formal and polite attitude. He also perpetually uses polite-form Japanese, and is one of the few Digimon to use honorifics, adding “-san” to everyone’s names.

Iori

First-person pronoun: boku (polite)

General honorifics pattern: Consistently “-san” for everyone older than him (”Koushirou-san”, “Daisuke-san”), occasionally “-senpai” if the circumstance is right (very rarely). Since he’s the youngest of this group, we don’t get to see much about how he would address younger people, but it’s likely “-kun” would be in play to at least some degree. In general, he’s extremely adherent to societal propriety.

Family: Generally respectful okaa-san and otou-san in reference to his parents. His grandfather is “ojii-sama”, getting an elevated honorific due to his extra tier of formal respect from Iori.

Ken: Iori calls him “Ichijouji-san”; by the time he fully warms up to Ken (which takes him the longest of any of the 02 kids), he still calls him this, all the way up to the Kizuna drama CD. Presumably, it also got habituated.

Other notes: Like Koushirou, Iori speaks to everyone formally and politely with the -masu/-desu forms, but in Iori’s case, it’s implied to be part of his strict and formal upbringing, and something he consciously has to hold himself to -- unlike Koushirou, who had to actively force himself to try and speak casually, Iori speaks casually on-and-off with the Digimon, and actually has multiple moments of slipping into casual speech whenever he loses control of his emotions or gets sufficiently angry. Because of this, it’s hard to tell if he’d continue to speak formally with younger people, although Kizuna depicts him as at least speaking that way with his peers in school. Armadimon uses the assertive ore and speaks in Nagoya dialect, giving him an image of a very rough-around-the-edges but laid-back type.

#digimon #digimon adventure #digimon adventure 02 #digimon adventure last evolution kizuna #shihameta

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sou-ver-2-0 · 4 years ago

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“Midori is Meister’s son,” and other Sou theories

I’ve had a theory for a while that Original Sou is the son of Meister, the likely Mastermind behind the Death Game. I’ve alluded to this theory before, but I haven’t made a proper post for it until now.

I came up with the theory because it’s the easiest way to put Original Sou under Meister’s power and influence. It’s the simplest explanation I can think of for why Original Sou was both an Asu-Naro member and a planned Death Game participant. That’s a strange combination of things to be, but it’s not that strange if that’s what your father raised you to be…

However, there’s more to this theory than a mere hunch. In the first two chapters of YTTD, we learn the story of the Satous: Gashu the father, Kai the human son, and Rio Ranger the doll son. I believe that the story of the Satous is foreshadowing for the story of Sou’s own family.

Gashu is a villain dedicated to the cause of Asu-Naro. He raised Kai to be an Asu-Naro agent. Part of Kai’s job was to watch over Sara, a planned Death Game candidate; he grew to care for her. Kai becomes a participant himself and is one of the Game’s first victims. After Kai dies, we are introduced to Rio Ranger, a sadistic Floor Master. He is a broken doll who wears smiling masks. Rio Ranger is similarly fated to die, and Gashu is then revealed as the father.

Let’s try changing the names in that story. Meister is the main villain behind Asu-Naro. He raised Sou Hiyori to be a top agent. While on the job, Sou developed a close relationship with Shin, a planned Death Game candidate. Sou himself is the first candidate to die, before the Game even begins. However, we meet him again in the “Graveyard of Broken Dolls” as Midori, a sadistic Floor Master who masks his cruelty behind a smile. Midori instructs the participants to kill him… Perhaps leading to a scenario where Meister will finally reveal himself.

I’ll dig into these parallels deeper beneath the cut. But before I go any further, I want to give credit to @joukester who came up with the “Shin was a replacement candidate for Sou” theory, which has influenced my thinking a lot. I also want to credit @novatoast, who pointed out the important Kai parallels and many other ideas to me! I’m very grateful. While Shin is my favorite character, Sou is the character I enjoy speculating about the most. I’m excited to finally share my thoughts on the ramifications of this theory.

Some words on Meister, and the role of the Man from the Memorandum

I should be clear upfront that I think Meister is the Man from the Memorandum, the winner of the Previous Death Game, who loved and lost a “17-year-old School Girl.” I subscribe to the theory that Meister is recreating the Death Game to mold Sara into his beloved High School Girl by putting her through the same trials, and he is hoping she will win this time.

In order to make the perfect recreation, I think the other Death Game participants are also meant to fill in the previous participants’ roles. I believe that Shin fulfills the role of the “Man” himself, which was likely an antagonistic role. However, I believe that Sou was originally meant to play this antagonist role. I think that Shin’s First Trial is so unusual because it was designed to twist Shin into adopting Sou’s personality. That way, he could better play the part.

The first thing we learn about the Man is his confession, “In the first trial, I killed a person.” If Sou had survived to the Death Game, it’s possible that his First Trial would have been to literally kill Shin. Instead, Shin’s First Trial is only that “Sou” metaphorically kills “Shin.”

I want to bring up another possibility for the Man’s role; it may be a doomed role. It’s possible that even if Sou had survived to the Death Game, he might also have had a zero percent chance of survival. The worst outcome for the Mastermind may be seeing a “repeat win” for his own role. While I love the theory that Shin’s zero percent survival rate is due to his own agency (having a self-sacrificial nature), there’s a poignancy to the idea that both Sous turn to villainy out of desperation in the face of certain death. Knowing that the Game is rigged against them in favor of a teenage girl.

Perhaps, even knowing that your own father favors a strange girl over yourself.

Even if the role isn’t necessarily doomed, I think Sou Hiyori still knew more about Meister and the Death Game than any other planned participant. If Meister was Sou’s father, and Sou was serving him faithfully, wouldn’t it make sense for him to be upset that he isn’t the favored “Chosen One”? Knowing that he will someday participate in a Death Game, with a high chance of death, but his father isn’t even rooting for him?

What would that horrible knowledge do to a person?

Kai Satou and Sou Hiyori: Two Different Kinds of Stalkers

Let’s talk about the Human Sons, Kai and Sou. Kai was raised to work for Asu-Naro and he was trained to become an assassin. However, he could never kill a person, and so his ranking in the organization was low. I’m suggesting that Sou was also raised to work for Asu-Naro, but since he took on so many important jobs of manipulating participants’ lives, he was likely in good standing.

The most interesting parallel between these two agents is that they each developed an attachment to another candidate. Kai was instructed to watch over Sara, the strongest candidate, and he grew fond of her from afar. Sara never even knew his name. Although Kai had noble intentions, Sara feared him, and lived with the anxiety of having a stalker.

In contrast, Sou developed an intense, abusive relationship with Shin, the weakest candidate. Instead of keeping his distance while spying on the boy, Sou seems to have become Shin’s closest friend.

Sara and Shin share a similar trauma of feeling stalked. Watching eyes and grabbing hands haunt them.

Another clear parallel between the two stalkers is that they both left written accounts of their observations. We see Kai’s notes about Sara on his laptop, and we see Sou’s notes about Shin in his “Shin Tsukimi AI Test Data” book, to Sara and Shin’s chagrin.

Kai grew an emotional attachment to Sara in spite of his job to watch her. Now the question is, how much of Sou’s relationship with Shin was “strictly business”?

Was Sou’s interest in Shin really all for Asu-Naro? Was he instructed to form such a close relationship with the boy? Or did he also grow close to his chosen candidate in spite of his job? We can’t say for sure yet. However, the closer parallel to Kai would be that Sou’s feelings for Shin became more “personal” than “professional.” Personally, I find it likely that Sou wanted to exercise control over a vulnerable person because he didn’t feel like he had much control over his own life.

I speculate that a major difference between Kai and Sou is knowledge of their fate. I think that Sou grew up knowing that he would one day be a Death Game candidate, while Kai did not know this until the last minute. In a similar way that Shin only becomes a villain if you tell him his survival rate, I think that Kai’s innocence of his fate informed his nobler personality. Meanwhile, Sou’s knowledge of his fate could have harshened him.

How do these two men behave in the face of death?

Death: An act of resistance?

“This is... resistance. Our lives toyed with to our enemy's whims, we are unable to save even a single person... As we die off, this is... my feeble... resistance. But it is one large step... toward counterattack...! It is a step I was able to take... because you bought me time. It is surely... not futile. I entrust them to you...! Our regrets...!! Our hopes...!! I... am satisfied.”

Kai’s suicide in the First Main Game is framed as one of the most courageous acts in the story. Kai takes his life into his own hands, rather than let himself be abused by Asu-Naro a minute longer. He also uses his final words to give an inspirational speech to Sara and entrust his hopes to her. It is a heavy burden for Sara to carry, but she doesn’t have a choice. Nobody has any “easy” choices in this Game.

How does Kai’s death compare to Sou’s death? While Kai took his own life in resistance of Asu-Naro, Sou was murdered by Alice, presumably in service to Asu-Naro.

That’s certainly how it looks…

But what if? What if Sou’s early death was his own form of resistance? What if he deliberately provoked Alice to kill him, knowing that this would mess up the script? Knowing that this would make things more complicated for Meister? Is that so unthinkable?

Why would he do that?

It’s not like Sou’s life was particularly meaningful. He lived in service of an evil organization, possibly with a father who didn’t love him. His only close friendship we know of was with a helpless teenage boy, and Sou treated him terribly.

But…I’d like to share my most outrageous Sou theory, because I might as well go big or go home.

In the same way that Kai entrusted his regrets and hopes to Sara, it’s possible that Sou was entrusting his own regrets and hopes to Shin.

What I’m saying is that: it’s possible that Sou died thinking that his death would give Shin a fighting chance.

“I gave Sou to Shin. He’s already Sou by now, you see.”

This quote has always stood out to me. From our point of view, it was Shin’s own choice to take Sou’s name! Sou didn’t “give” it to him!

Unless…Sou knew that his own death would force Shin into the Antagonist Role? He might have known that his own First Trial would be to murder Shin, and he wanted to avoid that? He might have wanted Shin’s First Trial to make the young man “stronger”? He may have even liked the idea of Shin carrying on his own name and legacy?

Following this interpretation, it’s possible that Sou rationalized his abuse of Shin was “good” because it would have “prepared” the boy for the upcoming Death Game. Shin ought to learn how cruel people are. From a “friend.” If the story were to actually frame Sou’s abuse of Shin as “teaching Shin,” this would also tie into Shin AI’s line, “Though I learned a lot of things at his house.”

There’s an obvious argument against what I’ve just suggested. It comes from one of Midori’s most memorable lines.

“Since he was going to die anyway, I wanted to kill him with my own hands…”

Midori the doll says cheerfully that he wanted to kill Shin himself. That clearly shows his intentions towards Shin are purely negative. That line is not befitting someone who might have died to “help” a vulnerable person.

However, I have a counterargument for that. It’s that Sou and Midori aren’t the same person. YTTD’s narrative makes it very clear that the dolls and humans can have separate personalities, shown most clearly with Reko and Fake Reko.

And Midori doesn’t parallel Kai. He parallels Rio Ranger.

Rio Ranger and Midori: the sadistic broken dolls

Rio Ranger is an incomplete doll. His father Gashu strongly imbued him with “a strong sense of inferiority, which gave birth to jealousy and hatred.” Gashu also “discarded what [Rio Ranger] originally possessed.” “Kindness… compassion… happiness… / Nearly all of [his] positive emotions.”

I think it is possible that something similar happened to Midori. Sou’s feelings for Shin may have been more complex than simple sadistic pleasure at Shin’s pain. If Sou truly paralleled Kai, he may have had hidden “positive” emotions for Shin as well. Inconvenient, rebellious emotions that Meister would want to “discard.” Leaving Midori as the purely sadistic doll we know now.

I realize that this would be a shockingly positive development for Sou’s character if any of this is true. Original Sou is currently treated as a hate-able joke in the fandom because he is so cartoonishly evil. I feel obligated to say that nothing I’ve written would make Sou’s treatment of Shin “okay.”

And it could be that nothing I just wrote is true! I’m simply drawing parallels with Kai’s death of “resistance” and Rio Ranger’s loss of “positive emotions,” and trying to show the implications of what that could mean for Original Sou and Midori. But it could also be that Nankidai will write Original Sou’s death in an opposite way from Kai, and that Midori is more of a “broken person” instead of a “broken doll.” In fact, my favorite difference between Midori and Rio Ranger is that Ranger only knows what it’s like to be a doll, while Midori has the complex memories of human existence. Honestly, there are many ways Nankidai could approach this. I just don’t know yet.

For example, Original Sou could have even been instructed to allow Alice to kill him. I can’t discount that possibility.

Nankidai could also approach a death of “resistance” in a nuanced way. Perhaps Sou stumbled into conflict with Alice without meaning to take things so far. Like Kai, he didn’t want to die. Perhaps he escalated the tension because he was feeling more emotional than logical. Perhaps he found himself in a fight with a larger man, a fight he couldn’t win, and then he finally started rationalizing to himself that his death could still have meaning. And that meaning could have been a combination of feelings of spite for his job and obsession for his friend.

We do have evidence from Midori’s behavior that he seeks mutually assured destruction, and he even seems masochistic. This could lead to a death of “resistance” which is still very different in tone from Kai’s death.

“But I’ll try my best to make it one shot, one kill… I wanna take at least four people with me…”

“How nice hatred is… It lets me satisfy a person 100%...”

I do think that the only interesting thing to do with Midori’s character is to humanize him. He could get sympathetic traits to make him feel more realistic. I think this could even make him scarier! What’s most frightening about the character isn’t his campy villainous vibe; it’s the fact that he’s an abuser. And abusers use sympathy to get what they want.

Rio Ranger is mostly demonic in the story until we finally learn about his father, Gashu, who “puts Ranger in his place” by killing him. Something similar may happen with Midori.

Conclusions

This is getting long and I’ve already written about the most interesting potential parallels between Sou and the Satou brothers, so I’ll wrap things up.

The reason I find Sou/Midori so fascinating is because he is a man of many contradictions. He is a participant and floor master, alive and dead, aggressor and victim. He could be a victim within the cycle of abuse himself, if they develop his relationship with Meister as much as I’m speculating.

Even if my theories and conclusions are wrong, the parallels between Sou Hiyori and the Satou brothers still exist. We have two Asu-Naro agents who developed an attachment to a candidate before becoming early victims. We have two “broken” sadistic doll floor masters. I feel instinctively that these parallels must mean something. I want to think that the parallels mean that Sou could have a father figure, similar to Gashu, and the most likely candidate is Meister. We can also use these parallels to infer how Sou/Midori could be written to be a more complex character.

Thank you for reading!! @ Nankidai good luck writing this bastard.

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dooandpoo · 4 years ago

Text

Boo’s clown thoughts about Dan

I just re-watched the Heartthrob video from 2018. I have listened to Dan and Phil playing Heartthrob in 2021. I have watched compilations of Dan and Phil’s liveshows and ✨ gay moments ✨ throughout the years. I am officially qualified to make reaching assumptions about Dan’s psyche, and his taste in men 💅. (I am a clown.)

Dan hides many of his feelings under sarcasm. This essay is predicated on a combination of assuming many of his jokes are actually his real feelings, and also taking into account things he has said with sincerity.

First, he wants to fix people. His whole perspective of Bobby changes when the card “never been kissed” is added — Dan gets all soft and literally says “that’s a game changer”. Phil thinks the same, suggests that everything else of Bobby is bravado, to which Dan heartily agrees. Dan loves himself some 💪 meaty men 💪, but gravitates more to the men that seem soft or personable. “Never been kissed” is a big deal for a cool sexy rich guy in high school, and Dan just knows that he could take care of him. It brings Bobby back down to earth, makes him feel real, makes him someone that Dan could relate to. Dan is obsessed with cleaning, takes forever to plan things, gets worked up when things aren’t perfect, must be in control. But he’s drawn to the imperfect, knows that he can do something with it. Someone that’s already perfect isn’t interesting to Dan. But Bobby, who’s rich and sexy but never been kissed? That’s interesting to Dan, that’s someone he can work with.

Dan is a gold-digger 💷💰 (let me explain). Even before the kissing detail is learned about Bobby, Dan chose him to go to the party with just because he’s rich, because his house would be cool, and Dan could pretend to like him for a night of luxury. Dan is a minimalist, he enjoys things to be simple in his life (as stated in the pizza mukbang video), but he loves opulence .... but not for himself. This is fascinating — Dan doesn’t parade his current wealth around, actively works against it. But. He wants to go to a party at a fancy house with a pool, hang off the arm of some cool guy. He wants to have a “team of stylists” for red carpet events to choose his outfits and dress him up all pretty for the world to see. He loves his fancy trips to beautiful places. He gives his Sims elegant and gaudy accessories and furnishings, splurging in a way he never would in real life. This boy loves him some extravagance and attention, wants to parade around looking like a snack, even though most of the time he prefers being low-key.

Dan loves cultivating a specific image for himself. He spent much of his teenage and young adult life trying to fit in, making sure his hair is perfect, making sure his photos are from the perfect MySpace angle, not being “gay”. His Instagram is a wall of black, broken up by only a few things. This is partially because he doesn’t like choice, can’t commit to things when it’s his decision. He can’t choose something “wrong”. See the mukbang video where Phil suggests just picking different clothes from along the line in his closet, and Dan says “that’s how you get ensembles that look like this” indicating Phil’s absurd get-up. Dan can’t imagine just throwing things on willy-nilly, he must present a completely unified vision of himself to the world. In the Attitude shoot, he was devastated that he couldn’t wear the cool boots, that his hair was too long. He secretly wished that it was a nude or horny photoshoot, joking about this during their first Stereo, because he wants to be noticed in that way. He wants to be seen as sexy and cool, he loves it. He wants positive attention. His mid-2020 thirst post on Instagram is a perfect example of this, playing it off as silly when he clearly was really into it. He does this with most of his photos, needing to look a certain way so that the world sees him as cool and sexy even when he’s masking it behind sarcasm. He knows he’s cute, and flaunts it, even though “flaunting it” means he has to be in control of everything all the time.

Let’s go back to the 2018 Heartthrob. One of the boys’ personality traits is revealed to be “can’t wait to have kids”, and Dan is not having it. 🙅‍♂️ Now, Dan would describe that as his fear of commitment. But let’s look closer. Earlier that year, Dan and Phil met Louise’s newborn baby. Both boys go completely gooey the entire time, entranced by her. Dan gets this look in his eye when he hands Pearl to Phil. He watches Phil closely to make sure he’s holding her correctly, hovers and touches her, needing to protect and feel the inherent trust of a baby. He and Phil keep smiling, and then Dan — out of the blue — gets a far away look and comments that there will be phanfiction of him and Phil adopting a baby. Dan was thinking about having a baby with Phil. But he’s scared, because even though Dan would take care of his baby so well, he’d probably worry his ass off making sure the baby has everything. It’s not just the fear of commitment, it’s that he can’t trust himself to do it “correctly”. Even though he’s been with Phil for years, I think Dan second-guesses himself constantly. A baby, or even a dog, for that matter, would send his anxiety into overdrive, because he can’t be in complete control (even though he’d be the best dad and partner ever).

Time to think about thot Dan. In the end, Dan is horny. He visibly reacts to each of the Heartthrob boys that have their “guns out”, and doesn’t easily deny that he’s interested in Bobby for his arms. And Phil knows that. When Dan asks Phil why he thinks Dan chose Bobby ... Phil stalls. Phil does his best to justify his guess that Dan likes Bobby because of his random personality traits, because Dan would like being driven around in a nice car and to ask Bobby about his dream of being a secret agent, but Phil clearly thought Dan would choose Bobby because he knows Dan loves the meaty lads. Phil knows Dan well enough to know that this boy loves him some skin and some muscle showing. (Hmm, interesting that Dan likes his boys meaty 👀, and frequently refers to Phil as such, even at the beginning of this very Heartthrob video …. hmmmm ... says he’d like to receive a lapdance 💋 from Phil “for the spectacle” .... hmmmmmmmmm.)

Back to “commitment” 💍 issues. During a liveshow from the early danisnotonfire days, Dan is asked for relationship advice. Here, he is surprisingly honest and serious. He says to not stay in a relationship where you’re not happy. It seems simple, but Dan really digs deep here. Dan says that if you’re not going to marry a person, don’t stay with them for even a day longer. Dan said that. Dan is scared of trusting others, he is constantly sarcastic and talks about himself disparagingly, but he is self-aware enough to know that he wants commitment. He wants someone to love him forever, to be by his side. That’s why he says there’s no point in remaining in a relationship if you and the other person can’t see yourself together in 50 years. And Dan had been with Phil (in whatever way that means for them) for a few years at that point, completely comfortable with each other. They were already making huge decisions together, like living together and moving to London and starting a radio show and considering moving to New York together. Dan had committed to Phil at this point, knew that he could see himself still with Phil in 50 years. And Phil had committed to Dan, regardless of if Dan felt sure of that or not.

Even earlier than that, Dan had told a fan on formspring that he loves sleeping in the same bed as other people, not even in a sexual way. He loves human contact, sharing space 😌. We know this because he’s so open to hugs with his fans, wants people around to make him feel safe (by people I mean Phil), and is so exasperated by quarantine because he needs more touch and contact. (Tangent — Phil also loves physical touch, as stated in an old liveshow when he said he prefers cuddles to kisses, and is very handsy 👐 with Dan.)

This doesn’t end in physical touch though. He needs other people around. He wants a companion through life. He misses Phil when he’s gone because he’s scared of the house being empty, because Phil makes him feel safe. He wants another person in his bed because it feels nice to be with someone, knowing they’re there. He wants to have someone to work with, to connect with, to make music with, to share moments with. And now this boy has all of that. He has for the last ten-odd years. But this is scary. Dan isolated himself growing up, built barriers between himself and everybody else. He needs to be control of the situation at all times, embarrassed when he’s not. Dan uses self-deprecating language constantly, complains about his inability to connect with people. But he has Phil. Every day they’re together, I think Dan accepts just a little more that he can deserve happiness, that he won’t lose Phil, that Phil is not temporary. Phil shows him that he is worthy of affection, physical and otherwise, that Dan is allowed to reach out and it’s safe to do so. Dan doesn’t have to be alone anymore, he can reach out and Phil is there.

These nonsense ramblings are just to say that Dan has the perfect life partner in Phil. Phil balances him out, lets Dan be himself loudly and quietly, jokes when Dan is too serious. Phil will never leave him, proving that every day, making plans with Dan in mind. Phil is confident and self-assured where Dan is not. They ease each other’s anxieties, approach their fame in similar ways. They genuinely enjoy being together, not just in their personal life, but professionally as well. They are a perfect match, soulmates. 💕

#i refuse to tag this as d*n and ph*l in case those two lurkers see it #this is complete clownery #i know this and accept this #we can't know what's actually going on in these boys' lives and honestly that's a good thing #this is just for fun #and because it makes me feel soft #i relate hardcore to Dan #so I'm projecting sjkhhsdajfl #long post #mine #rambling

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