#i’m this weird amalgamation of how do i exist knowing he exists and i can’t tell him how cool he is to me

[saintofterror]

i saw eden????? in person????? like i was in the same building as him….. i heard my favorite songs live…. i heard balling live and sci fi and drugs…. i cried during forever//over…. i heard eden Actually SING “everything will be alright” live with my own ears……I SAW CRASH LIVE?????????!

[chaosk1ng]

I like the idea of Isaac Clarke constantly being on edge for different crossovers cause there’s no way in hell he would be okay with seeing aliens, military or “magic” in any universe after the whole thing with necromorphs and markers.

I can’t lie and say that I don’t think of this every once in a while. I do and usually it’s because I think of scenarios that are hilarious to envision. One of the most recent ones is a Star Wars one. I can see it at any point in time in Star Wars (I’m ignoring the Sequels because I forget they exist and couldn’t care less about them) and see it as the end of the remake since it was the only one I’ve played so far.

I like the thought that people would assume he’s a Mandalorian Jedi or something. The man only has his suit and weapons that aren’t even meant for combat, and is surrounded by planets and beings that he knows nothing about. Not only does he have this going but he can slow down areas and move objects seemingly with a flick of his wrist to anyone who sees him use the stasis or kinesis modules by chance. He would have to wear his suit whether he likes it or not but would probably prefer it since he would be on edge because of his most recent experience and would want to be protected from any harm.

Anyway, he would likely travel around in confusion, fully suited, and may only take off his helmet when in the ship he used to get away from Aegis VII. Depending on where on the timeline he is placed, people will either think he’s a new type of mandalorian, Jedi, both, or something inspired by them, I’m thinking this one for pre empire. If this is during or after the empire then he could be seen as a new version of mandalorians or someone who is like a weird amalgamation of both, or trying to be both. I don’t think a lot of people really know what qualifies as a mandalorian or Jedi since in the Mandalorian, Din is told to go to Mos Pelgo because there might be a mandalorian but ended up being Cobb and Jedi are pretty much seen as myths and are essentially extinct.

This ties into the post empire line of thought. I know that there are ways to get him to interact with characters from Star Wars but this is one of the only ones that feel kinda natural. For this one I can see him meeting Din because of the reason I mentioned before. He could be seen around enough that people think he might be a mandalorian, Jedi or both. I see it taking place during the first or second season of the Mandalorian when Din is looking for both a Jedi and Mandalorians. Something could happen that leads him to finding a lead to another mandalorian, who might be a Jedi, traveling alone.

He could eventually find Isaac after much difficulty because there is no way in hell Isaac would spend much time around aliens, he would probably only do some jobs here and there to make some money in this new universe to survive. Isaac could get used to the new species over time as he does more jobs which are probably based on engineering or maybe a little bounty hunting but not as much since he wouldn’t be that good at it. The engineering jobs would get him familiar with the technology of this universe, he could probably use some of his skills and use them to adjust certain things to be operated kinda like the tech of his universe.

On the topic of Isaac experiencing his new universe, he would likely still use the tools he uses in Dead Space. He would only have experience using his tools and not any other type of weapon so he likely wouldn’t use weapons of any kind. He would probably get a blaster just in case but never really use it, maybe reverse engineer it or try to understand how tech in this universe worked. Maybe because of his weapons and modules that people start taking note of him, aside from his unique suit.

Anyway, Din would hear about this somehow and would eventually find this dude who is barely seen. Depending on what part of the series this takes place, he can either think Isaac is another type of mandalorian if he’s already met Bo-Katan, or think he’s another person posing as a mandalorian if it’s after Cobb but before Bo-Katan.

Both Din and Isaac would be confused as hell regardless, this is a good way for them to learn about each other and become acquaintances. This could either lead to the two talking every once in a while or become partners of sorts with Isaac joining Din on his mission and using any ties he may have created to try and help. Either way, Isaac would be a good ally for Din to have and could help him a lot in situations like with that spider thing when he’s transporting the frog woman, or something as important as Din fighting Gideon. On the note of the spiders, Isaac by now has a lot of experience shooting off legs and tiny babies that can climb and shoot things at him. Maybe he tells Din about that fact and both confuses and concerns him if Isaac doesn’t really tell him about the Ishimura and the necromorphs.

I think that Din would be interested in Isaac’s weapons and how his suit works since they have nothing like them or the RIG he has. They could learn more about each other this way and about their respective universes. Isaac can learn about things like beskar, blasters, tech, Mandalorians (Mostly, if not completely, about Children of the Watch), and maybe some tips or stories Din has collected during his time bounty hunting. In turn, Din can learn about Earth, RIGs, how Isaac’s weapons work, and eventually things like the Ishimura, Necromorphs, Nicole, Unitology, the Marker and such. Either way, these things would happen as they get closer and more comfortable together.

Sudden thought, Grogu can get two dads by the beginning of the show and gets spoiled like hell by both, can’t convince me otherwise. Both Din and Isaac would probably just co parent rather than see each other in a romantic light in the beginning if anything. Isaac would’ve just come to terms with Nicole’s death and would be grieving or repressing it so it would be too early for that type of relationship. Regardless of where in time the two meet, Din likely wouldn’t feel ready at all for that type of thing since he was mostly occupied bounty hunting before he got Grogu. They don’t have to get together but honestly it would be kinda cute to see now that I think about it. The two would probably get together sometime during or after season two since season one can be used to get them close enough to be comfortable enough to be kinda reluctant to stop traveling together.

Another thought was if the two met right after Din gets Grogu and has the Razor Crest stripped. Isaac is confused but decides to help the man and the weird child out so he can find someplace to get supplies. Once they get to Navarro, the two part and after Din decides to go back for the child, he could run into Isaac and get his help getting the child back or run into him as he’s trying to escape. Either way, Isaac would be stuck with Din cause he would follow him to his ship and help get the child out. Regardless of how and when they meet, I can see Grogu getting two dads.

Instead of a clan of two it would be a clan of three. I can see Isaac being extremely happy about this after everything since he now has people he cares for and will fight for in this new universe. In turn, Din would be happy to have a family, a child he cares for but is willing to give up for the child’s wellbeing but willing to go to great lengths to protect and a partner that is more than willing to go the same lengths for the child and can fight with weapons no one else has. The three of them would be a good family for each other and would be heartbroken to eventually let go of each other when Luke takes the child.

Luke doesn’t have to take the child but if he does then both Din and Isaac would have each other to help ease the pain and would be there for each other. Din can still get the N-1 or they can use Isaac’s ship if they still have it. It would be useful because it’s pretty much untraceable since it’s not from that galaxy and could have parts added at this point to have parts normal ships would have. It has enough space for the two of them and the child when they get him back in bobf.

Speaking of, Boba and Fennec would have some opinions about the two. I see it as mostly judgment, both Din and Isaac would probably think it’s because of their choice in partners or something but in reality be because of their lack of knowledge about a lot of things. Imagine the four of them in Boba’s palace and maybe someone mentions Jabba and Isaac is like, “how did this jabba dude die?” and Din saying something like “not sure, heard he got killed by a slave girl or something. Don’t know, wasn’t really important for my bounty at the time.” But yeah, I think the four would get along but the judgment is real but they care for their idiot friends.

I don’t think Isaac would become a mandalorian, even if he ends up with Din. He would acknowledge that he’s kinda like them but he couldn’t commit to something like that, not even to Din’s way. I think the whole thing with Unitology, his mom, and Nicole kinda ruined any chance he would follow something like that or anything that might resemble a religion, cult, or a certain way of life. I think he would be like Boba, he is kinda like a mando, looks the part and acts it but doesn’t commit himself to it or follow any way, just respects it.

I think the Armorer wouldn’t really care if Din ends up with Isaac if he is already part of his clan but Paz would need convincing and would probably judge Din for getting with an outsider. I can see Paz challenging Isaac in a fight or seeing him do something that might gain his respect. If Isaac helped Din rescue the child and helped get him out of Nevarro then I can see Paz already respecting Isaac and being satisfied with Din ending up with Isaac since he’s already proved himself to him and the others that day. I can see Isaac coming with Din and when he finally finds the two but he doesn’t have to be there.

It’d be funny if at that point they weren’t together and both the Armorer and Paz are both judging and disapproving how long he has been with Isaac but not even trying to get with him. They would already know about how good of a choice Isaac would be as a partner and try to make him realize it. This could be a way that Don realizes he likes Isaac romantically. I know Paz probably wouldn’t be interested in Isaac but he’d probably help by saying or implying that he would go for Isaac if Din didn’t.

Maybe Din doesn’t realize right away, he can get upset at the thought of Isaac ending up with someone else or Paz. He could question why he’s so upset at the idea and thinks that he should be happy for Isaac if that happens. After that Paz can try to hit on Isaac if they meet or send gifts that he knows would upset Din, maybe tell a few childhood stories of the two when they were younger. Din gets upset and starts to think about what would happen if Paz or someone else did succeed in getting with Isaac.

He would lose another presence that he has gotten used to being around, he would lose the last of his clan of three, regardless if Isaac is a part of the clan or unofficially a part of it. If he and Isaac are using Isaac’s ship then he would likely have to get a new one and move out. If Isaac got with someone, he would talk to him less and would eventually stop completely because he no longer has any reason to be around him, Isaac was only with him to help with the child and he’s gone. Even if he didn’t get with anyone, he likely wouldn’t get with Din since he probably would’ve mentioned Nicole at this point and likely wouldn’t be interested in men if he doesn’t really respond to Paz’s courting.

When Din thinks of this, he thinks about how it would affect his future and realizes he wouldn’t know what to do, just like now, because he couldn’t see a future without him or the child anymore. He has grown used to them to the point that losing both of them would tear him apart, he would be listless, a shadow of what he used to be. Din would be even more lost than he already was and didn’t really realize how much he loves Isaac and now thinks he has a chance of losing him forever if he can’t get him to stay. He would probably feel stupid for not realizing it earlier and try his best to woo Isaac, even if he’s not interested in men, not knowing that he already loves him.

He would try his best when it comes to it but he wouldn’t be good at it since he lived in the sewers and doesn’t know how people in Isaac’s world court each other so he’s just fumbling, Isaac thinks it’s charming. Isaac probably realized he loved Din long ago and tried to flirt with Din or express his feelings by giving him little trinkets or weapons and try his best to court him in a way a mandalorian might like but, like Din, he doesn’t know how courting works for them. He probably tried a few times and got no response cause Din didn’t know he was trying to hit on him and thought he was being friendly. Grogu probably knew, he was either told by Isaac or felt it from the force and tried his best to help but Din was dense and didn’t realize. He probably gave up on it and decided to cherish his time with the two of them until Din found someone he would want to settle with. He just hoped that if Din kept the child he would still be able to visit the two.

Isaac would find Din’s new behavior charming but would be saddened because he would think he’s either trying to let him down softly, make him feel better after his attempts, or softening the news of Din possibly leaving. He would probably confront him about it before Din confesses and would think he’s trying to make him feel better but hope it’s true. He would tell Don straight that he stopped going after him because he thought he wasn’t interested when he was trying and didn’t want to pursue something that would lead to nothing.

Din would probably feel like a bigger idiot and lets Isaac know he is more than interested, that he couldn’t see his future with anyone else, he couldn’t see it without him in it and that he didn’t realize it until after Paz and the Armorer let their opinions about it known and when Paz stated he would court him. The two would get together and eventually get the child back. I feel like this would happen but I can see them getting together before the end of season 2 as well.

That aside, Isaac meeting Ahsoka would be interesting. She’d be very confused about why this Mandalorian’s friend can slow people down and move objects despite not being force sensitive. He might give a brief explanation to her about the stasis and kinetic modules but not a lot of details since he tries to keep them hidden. Isaac would probably explain that he has a limited supply that he can use since that universe doesn’t have the shop options there. He would’ve had to make something to replicate the ammo for his weapons and would’ve taken longer for something to replenish the stasis to be made.

Luke and Isaac meeting would be interesting but not even Din really meets him, only sees him when he takes Grogu. Luke learning about Isaac from Ahsoka would be interesting. She only knows a little about Isaac, has seen him fight and knows a little of what he’s capable of but something is off about him. He’s close to the mandalorian and child but the force is off about him, he’s completely null in the force. The force doesn’t touch him, it’s like he isn’t there but they know he is, Ahsoka has seen him kill people, interact with them, she knows he’s there but he just isn’t force-wise. He’s an anomaly, and both Ahsoka and Luke are curious but will leave him be.

I forgot about Cobb, Cara and Greef so imma speed run. If Din meets Isaac before Cobb he would be a big help when it comes to dealing with the Krayt dragon since he defeated things like the Leviathan, the Leviathan Remnant and the Hive Mind. This is to say that Cobb would like Isaac. Cara and Greef would like him since he can handle both the child and the Mandalorian and see him as their wrangler. Maybe when Grogu force chokes Cara he steps in instead of Din and stops him and teaches him a little he knows from his kinetic module and how to tell friend from foe, when something is serious or not. Greef would only really know Isaac from the glimpses of him he sees but likes him since he is close with Din and Grogu and shows how he would go to great lengths for them both. When they do properly meet, he likes him since he helped him against the Imps and chooses to stick with Din despite being offered a place like both Din and Cara. He thinks the two are a couple people should be scared of with how well they work together and how protective they are of each other and their green child. Overall, all three of them like Isaac and all think they're already together at that point and probably laughed their asses off when they did get together.

I can’t do anything past bobf since I stopped watching the Mandalorian after season 3 episode 3. My rant had spilled and now I don’t remember my original thought process and now I’m shipping Din and Isaac. Goddamn it, I need to stop thinking.

[smells-like-mettaton]

Tali’s Alphys-Centric Fic Rec List

I’ve been meaning to make this for a while!! All fics are oneshots unless marked as a series or with a chapter count.  Thanks to everyone who recced several of these to me on my 12am begging-for-alphys-fics post dfdksdl. These aren’t in any particular order. The “notes” section is my commentary about each fic. No fics are based on full AUs (ex. underswap, horrortale, etc). The only endgame Alphys ship included is Alphyne, though most of the fics listed are gen. Hope you can find something you enjoy here!

Extra Credit by FriedCatfish

Rating: G // Word count: 1,206 Summary: Undyne loses track of time watching anime. Set before the events of the game. Notes: Cute Alphyne oneshot! Short and sweet, very nice characterization

world comes pouring through by feralpheonix

Rating: G // Word count: 1,655 Summary: Alphys reunites with some old friends on the way home from taking care of business. Notes: 2nd person Alphys pov but it surprisingly works? A small moment with Alphys, Bratty, and Catty, which I literally NEVER see content for so it was really refreshing!! Takes place at/near the end of the pacifist route.

white lies to the dead by MiniNephthys

Rating: T // Word Count: 580 Summary: Alphys walks through Waterfall, talking to someone who's not there. Notes: Queen Alphys ending; Alphys “talks” to Undyne after she’s been killed. Hits me right in all the emotions ;;

Found Soul by LibraLibrary

Rating: T // Word Count: 1,331 Summary: Self-worth is a slippery, fleeting little devil, and the bastard flower that killed you isn't helping. Takes place during the final fight of the True Pacifist run, following Alphys from one purgatory to the next. Notes: Very angsty, definitely make sure you’re ready to handle Alphys’s suicidal thoughts, but a very good read! I love seeing the Lost Soul battle from her POV.

And I Feel Fine by Masu_Trout

Rating: T // Word Count: 1,685 Summary: The fallen human is human is fast approaching The Core, and Mettaton is ready to finally take the stage. Now, if only Alphys would stop worrying so much. Notes: Alphys & Mettaton friendship in the no mercy route, but manages to be surprisingly not depressing. Mettaton POV but definitely still deserves to be here. This fic does a great job of characterizing them both and it’s always great to see Alphys working in her element.

Experimentation by pickledragon

Rating: G // Word Count: 1,531 Summary: Alphys is, above all, a scientist. She may watch anime with religious fervor and make horrible Undernet shitposts in her free time, but she is good at her job. She knows what they say about her, behind her back. But when she stands there, time open before her, she resolves to collect data. Each experiment, intentional or not, brings new opportunities to change certain variables and observe others. Alphys is a scientist, after all. Notes: THIS FIC. it’s technically part of a series but it stands on its own (it’s the only one i’ve read by this author). EXCELLENT alphys characterization and writing style. Some Sans & Alphys friendship too which is always stellar. If you didn’t gather from the summary, it’s an alphys starts to remember resets fic.

Memory by Ash_yeet

Rating: T // Word Count: 19,962 // Chapters: 5/20 Summary: It's been two years since monsterkind have joined the humans on the surface, and Alphys is happier than she's ever been. But things can't stay great forever. She starts having nightmares, lapses in memory, flashbacks to things that have never happened. She hopes it will pass... sans is doing his best to adjust to life. When Alphys reaches out to him about her nightmares, he doesn't expect much. He quickly changes his tune. Someone is trying to come back. And they aren't what they used to be.sans and Alphys are trying to move on. But there's one thing they forgot: No matter how hard you try, you can't run from your past. Notes: I’ve only read chapter one so far, but it’s been really good! Looks like it’s going to involve Gaster in some way. Says it’s on short hiatus but was updated in April so doesn’t look abandoned.

Hot and Cold Blooded (Alphyne series) by perniciousLizard

Rating: varies by fic, usually G but a few T and one E // Word count: 36,516 // Works: 18/18 Summary: This series is a place to put all my Alphys/Undyne stories that aren't part of another series. Notes: this series has something for everyone; you can pick and choose which works to read. Most are feel-good fluff and humor, some hurt/comfort too. Some connect to the author’s Sansby series (which i also can’t recommend enough)

When Life Hands You Enantiomers by Kaesa

Rating: T // Word Count: 2,739 Summary: Alphys has a half-finished tile maze puzzle, reams of useless data, and a bunch of piranhas that can't tell the difference between lemon and orange scent. Sans has donuts. Notes: ONE OF MY VERY FAVORITES. Fun puns, science, alphys & sans friendship, piranhas, the opportunity to actually understand organic chemistry references,, it’s so good and fun

Friendshipping by AyuOhseki

Rating: G // Word Count: 4,564 Summary: Sans finds Alphys's secret Sans/Grillby RPF. This won't get weird or awkward or anything, we're sure. Notes: Hilarious Alphys narration, great characterization, it’s just so silly and warms my heart. I love terrible fanfic writer Alphys

social links by simplycarryon

Rating: G // Word Count: 2,525 Summary: Friendship's pretty neat, or so your video games and anime dictate. But you are not an anime protagonist, and you're not sure you know what friendship is any more. Notes: more solid sans & alphys friendship :D

See You Another Time by decamarks

Rating: T // Word Count: 18,500 // Chapters: 1/14 Summary: “Have you ever thought of a world where everything is exactly the same... Except you don’t exist? Everything functions perfectly without you.” Alphys spent a lot of time thinking about what it’d be like to start over. It wasn’t fair for someone like her to escape consequences. She knew that, yet the thought never left her mind—the thought that maybe, just maybe, she could get another chance; that she could abandon her life, her failures—everything—and start anew. But that would never happen. Sometimes, Alphys wondered. Would the world be better off without her? When unexplainable anomalies appear and begin to warp the world around her, Alphys discovers something she was never meant to know: the identity of the former Royal Scientist, and how he met his demise. Doctor W.D. Gaster vanished without a trace; he was erased from reality after an experiment ended in disgrace. Forgotten by the world, shattered across time and space—it’s like he never existed in the first place.And Alphys can’t imagine a better fate. Notes: This is a monster of a first chapter but definitely worth the read!! So much good stuff happening already. I’m a total wuss but I still love the cosmic/existential horror bits going on so far. Great Sans & alphys friendship and Undyne & alphys friendship so far.  All the amalgamates also feel incredibly well written. Can’t wait to see more of this one

(And here are a few of my own Alphys-centric fics as well)

Seventh Time’s the Charm by Taliax

Rating: G // Word Count: 1,519 // Chapters: 1/7 Summary: Six bad "dates" Alphys has been on, plus one that is actually pretty good. Notes: Alphys is my favorite and I love giving her a bad time. First chapter is a “date” she has with Sans. Next chapter which I have in progress is going to be Papyrus. (Alphyne is still endgame of course.) Set mostly before the events tof the game. Get ready for lots of second-hand embarrassment sdlfkjds

Support Character by Taliax

Rating: T // Word Count: 1,814 Summary: If Sans is determined to fight the human, Alphys is going to make sure he's prepared. Notes: Sans & Alphys no mercy route friendship, based on the headcanon that Alphys was the one to give Sans the powers/magic he uses to fight the human.

it's your best life (if it's the life that you're living right now) by Taliax

Rating: T // Word Count: 4,046 Summary: Through messages saved to Sans's phone, Queen Alphys gets a glimpse at lives that might have been.  With so many possibilities... how did this timeline go so wrong? Notes: Sans & Alphys friendship, Queen Alphys ending, mostly angst/hurt/comfort. I’m really proud of this one and it uses my main headcanon for how Sans knows about resets.

The Trans-Underground Alphys-Carrying, Match-Making Road Trip by Taliax

Rating: G // Word Count: 5,713 Summary: From her secret security camera, Alphys gets too invested in Sans's relationship with the voice behind the door.  This wouldn't be a problem if Mettaton didn't decide to take her ship into his own hands. Trying to catch up with a battery-powered robot is hard work, but telling the truth is even harder. Notes: This is a really silly fic with some hurt/comfort sprinkled in. Has some Soriel and Papyton in the background. Has some Alphys & Papyrus friendship as well which is always underrated in my opinion.

[angxlyxn]

doll - villain! izuku x f. reader

summary: it’s certainly been a few years since you’ve seen izuku, and he’s planning the make the most out of your time together now that you’re back with each other.

warnings: NONCON, bondage, blood, kidnapping, there is a knife, slight voyeurism(?)

important: all characters are over the age of eighteen.

a/n: wow this piece took me over two months to write, it literally took me forever i’m so unbelievably glad that it’s finished.  i’m not entirely happy with it, especially the beginning part because i wrote it two months ago when i didn’t really know how to write fanfiction? but it’s okay, um the concepts are there so enjoy ig.

word count: ~5.3k

The first thing that you noticed upon waking up was the methodical dripping of water above you.  Each droplet was landing just shy of your face, the cold water splashing up against your features.  Cold.  That seemed to be the word of the day.  Beneath you, there was a slab of freezing cement, its moist chill seeping off of it and onto your shaking frame.  

You raised your heavy head, matted hair falling in front of your face as a sharp, immobilizing pain shot through your skull.  You moved the tangled locks from your vision, your hand landing on the back of your head in the process.  When you brought your fingers back around, they were slick with a sticky crimson substance.  As you stared at your fingers, dumbstruck and utterly confused at the...liquid that was coating them, you grew acutely aware of a dull clinking ringing out with each of your movements, and noticed a pair of shackles that were wrapped around each of your wrists.  You tugged a bit on the chains, lurching your body away from the wall that you were attached to as you tried to decipher the situation that you were in right now, to no avail, of course.  This was far too sudden and much too confusing to understand.  How did you even get...wherever you were in the first place?  Why were you here?

Your ears rang out, an amalgamation of horrible chiming sounds flooding your mind.  You tried, and failed to recall the events that had led up to you finding yourself in this revolting state, much to your chagrin.

“Oh, you’re finally awake!”  A cheery voice rang out, the words disproportionately buoyant in comparison to the bleak environment that surrounded you.  You looked up, vision blurring as you turned your head in the direction of the effervescent voice.  

You nearly gasped as you caught sight of the figure in front of you, your eyes scanning frantically over his disheveled green locks, his pale skin standing out in contrast to the visible blush lining his freckled cheeks.

“M-Midoriya?” You responded, your voice uneven, your horribly shaky pronunciation reflecting your bodily state perfectly.  

“Izuku,” he corrected.  He pushed himself off of the wall he was leaning on, slowly making his way towards your trembling form.  You hadn’t seen the green-haired boy since he had disappeared entirely from your life, on that fateful day back in junior-high.  You had honestly thought he had offed himself or something after Bakugou had told him those horrible things, and you had mourned for days, for months, for years over the loss of your childhood friend.  You and Izuku had always been close, and you assumed that it was your shared weakness that had brought you together.  While he was born quirkless, you were born with a quirk that might as well have been non-existent.  An empathic quirk was what they had called it, one that gave you the ability to absorb others’ emotions and relieve them of their feelings, while you would be able to take on their sensitivities in exchange for the relief that you gave them.  You had always seen it as useless, everyone had.  And a few people, including your own parents, had always found a way to make it clear to you that you were just this.  Useless.  

However, you had still made it into UA, on account of nothing more than your grades, of course.  People had marvelled at your acceptance, talking about how progressive it was of UA to let in someone as weak as you, even though you had only made it into general studies.  It wasn’t like you really wanted to work in heroics anyways, but still, it had hurt a bit when you had to bid farewell to some of your friends from middle school, who were pursuing the hero path.  By friends, of course, you meant Katsuki.  As strange as it was, you, Midoriya, and him had always been together, well, in your own ways.  You really had no idea why Izuku was still latched on to the ill-tempered blonde, and at times wished he would just let go of his hold on the boy.  Countless times you had told him to just stop making contact with Katsuki, as their time together never seemed to end well, but he wouldn’t ever take heed of your advice. You couldn’t help but wonder if there was some sort of unspoken competition between them, besides their constant debate over Izuku’s quirklessness, which admittedly led to most of the dissents.  It was weird.  They were always at each other’s throats, and almost every time they fought you would be there, if only to defend Midoriya.  You were protective over him- anyone would be after witnessing the torment that he so frequently endured from Katsuki and others.  

So when the news had come that he was declared missing, you were in absolute pieces.  When your mother had come into your room to tell you that this, you swore you felt your heart shatter then and there.  Nothing could keep you from blaming yourself.  No matter how much others tried to tell you otherwise, whether it be therapists, friends, parents, or even Katsuki himself, you just couldn’t believe them.  You should’ve done more to help the green-haired boy, you should’ve helped him.  You could’ve stood up to Bakugou more, or done anything at all to aid him.  You always had seen yourself as selfish, which was why it was such a surprise when the king of ego himself told you otherwise.  

You remembered it clearly: You were nearing the end of your first semester at UA, still completely distraught about Izuku’s disappearance.  A stern knocking had rang through your apartment, causing you to look up from your stack of textbooks with weary eyes.  You pushed yourself off of the couch, making your way to the door and flinging it open, squinting as your eyes met the slouching form of the person in front of you.  He wasted no time, just walking into your apartment with a confident, yet defensive stride.  Immediately, the person, who you now recognized to be Katsuki, had made a beeline to your couch, and was sitting upon the charcoal-colored cushions that adorned it.  You just started at him, mouth slightly agape as he looked back at you, gaze perfervid and intense.  

“Well, get over here,” He had spat, gesturing for you to join him on the couch.  You hurriedly did as he asked, his eyes following your form as you made your way over to him.  He had let out a short breath, his eyelids falling slightly downwards as he looked at your unkempt appearance.  After a few moments of silence, he spoke.  “It’s not your fault, you know.  That damn nerd shouldn’t have done this.  It’s his fault, you hear me?”  He had said, voice as gravelly as ever.  However, it seemed that there was a bit of… something else behind his words, like a small piece of his defensive front was crumbling away in front of your very eyes.  

“I- I don’t-”  You responded in a frail voice.  

“Everyone else- they don’t think so either.  I hate to admit it but, you… fuck.  You’re a good person, Y/n.”  Your shoulders jerked upwards a bit at his use of your first name.  “You can’t feel guilty for what that fucking extra did.”

You stayed silent, eyebrows furrowing gently at his conciliatory words.  

“Fuck,” he mumbled, barely audible.  He looked back up to you.  “I just…” You could tell that he was moving to say something, his gaze downcast and contemplative.  He looked back up at you, his eyes landing on your face.  “I…”  You leaned slightly towards him, urging him to speak.  You had never seen Katsuki so… quiet.  He was quite literally speechless, the environment around you two extremely tense due to his wordlessness.  He shifted his eyes, looking over your frame intently.  His gaze caught on the area near your clavicle, and before you could say anything about his strange behavior, he spoke once more.  

“Your collar,” he grunted.  You looked down at yourself, staring at your crumpled uniform that you hadn’t changed out of in days.  You raised your eyes back up to him, sending him a questioning glance.  “It..” he said, clenching his hands a bit as his eyes still stayed trained on your collarbone.  

He reached out two tentative hands, taking your shirt collar between his slender fingers.  You remember your complete state of shock as he had adjusted your shirt, snapping the top few buttons into place and smoothing down the fabric.  After he had finished, it was like he had snapped out of some sort of stupor, jumping away from you and retracting his hand into his chest.  He had left a bit after that, a light blush still coating your cheeks long after he made his departure.

As weird as it sounds, that was the beginning of your relationship with Katsuki.  You grew to like each other, him growing somewhat emotionally dependent on you while you relied on him to keep your more self-destructive tendencies in check.  The two of you really were a sight, though.  The soft, gentle curve of your features in contrast to Bakugou’s angular ones was enough to garner a few stares, and if that weren’t enough, there were the differentiations in mannerisms and personality to set you apart even further.  But you supposed that opposites do in fact attract, at least in your case.

Goodness, before you even had time to register what was happening your thoughts had drifted over to the blonde, which wasn’t really an uncommon occurrence.  You could only hope that he thought about you as much as you thought about him.  Of course you two were dating and all, so it was only natural that he should, but still, you couldn’t help but feel just a bit of anxiety about not actually being wanted or needed by the boy.  As much as he would reassure you that he did need you, that he loved you, part of you just couldn’t believe him.  A bit of you always had a feeling that he would leave you, just as Izuku did.  Maybe you were just insecure, but still.  You wouldn’t be surprised if he wanted someone stronger, or better than yourself.  You hadn’t ever been surprised when others wanted someone else.  

You weren’t ever surprised when you were second choice.  

On that note, you brought yourself back to reality, the sound of water dripping from the ceiling still grating against your ears.  You refocused your eyes, which had glazed over during your train of thought, only for your now active gaze to land on a person who happened to be situated directly in front of you.  You groggily looked up once more, your worried eyes meeting the face of Izuku, who looked oddly infatuated with you.  Why, you did not know.  All you were able to register was how his doting eyes were dancing over your whole frame, making you squirm a bit in your spot.  

“Mi- I mean..Izu-Izuku…” you mumbled as you looked up at him, pushing yourself up so that you were nearly face to face with the green-haired boy.  “Wh-What’s going on, I.. don’t understand…”  

“Oh doll,” he said, the pet name rolling off of his tongue in a sickeningly sweet manner.  “I just helped you do a little relocation, that’s all!  I know you’re probably scared, and confused, but don’t worry!  I’m not here to hurt you, understand?”  He said, reaching a hand out to caress your cheek gently.  You drew away from him sharply at the feeling of his calloused fingers against your skin, instinctively bringing your hands up to your face.

“Hey, don’t flinch away from me now, come on!  We’re friends, aren’t we?”  He said, his tone growing bitter as he spat out the last sentence.  

“I...guess,” you mumbled, still too disoriented to make a coherent sentence.  “But why.. The chains..?”  Izuku looked slightly taken aback at your query, rising up from his kneeled position, and instead settling for standing in front of you.  

“Just a precaution,” he said, his tone infantilizing.  “I can’t have you two running away now,” he finished, smiling.  

“T-two?”  You asked, attempting to search his eyes.  His green orbs were full of adoration towards you, but his pupils seemed to swirl with a bit of malice as he continued to stare at you.  He hummed in response to your question, bringing his hand up to your cold cheek.  He gently pressed his fingers into your skin and manually shifted your head to the left, your eyes drifting towards the other side of the room.

Low and behold, there was indeed another person.  And the venomous look on his face accompanied by a mess of ash blonde hair was enough to tell you who this second person was.  His frame was wrapped in restraints, his arms suspended above his head and his clenching fists encircled by thick shackles.  He kicked and struggled against the chains, the clinking sound of them ringing out across the room like a series of cathedral bells.  

“Katsuki!”  You yelped, the word ripping from your lips as you began to pull against the chains binding your own body, feverishly pushing yourself to try and reach your lover.  Izuku leapt towards you before you could really go anywhere, latching himself onto your shoulder and pulling you backwards.  

“Now puppy, don’t get aggressive!”  He said in a tone that was far too sweet and much too jubilant.  He rubbed his palm against your shoulder as though he were coaxing a child, nestling his chin against your cheek as he did so, all the while looking at Bakugou with hazy eyes.  

“No!” You cried.  “I don’t know what you’re planning right now, but you left us for years and now you-you’re back, and you haven’t explained anything and I just can’t trust you an-and why are we in chains?  And for fuck’s sake get off of me, at least until you explain yourself!”  You punctuated your sentence with a shove to his shoulder, a twinge of guilt pumping through your veins as you did so.

He fell backwards a bit, his gaze downturned and his face darkened.  His eyes swirled with animosity as he stared down at the floor with furrowed brows, his fists clenching a releasing a few times over.  

“Please,” you said, your voice softer.  “Explain.  You just... left.  I need to know why.”

He continued to stare down at the floor with an uncomfortable amount of determination, green eyes scanning the tile before slowly beginning to lift back up to meet your unsteady gaze.  His face was serious as he bored his eyes into yours, his pupils full of pure animosity.  A few moments of silence passed, and then he began to laugh.

He was laughing.

His green eyes glinted with jubilance as he looked at you through the dark shadow clouding his face, his hand coming up to rake through the mop of green tufts on his head.

“Why?”  He said between giggles.  “I think you know the answer to that one, love!”  He said, still chuckling.  You looked at him wildly, gaze skittish and horrified.  

You began to speak, raising your trembling voice over his laughter.  “Izu, you don’t understand, we thought that you ki-”

“Killed myself?”  He said, his laughter dying down.  He clicked his tongue before continuing, nuzzling himself back into your shoulder, the action earning a few muffled screams from the blonde restrained at the other end of the room.  “You’ve got it all wrong puppy!  I would never dare leave you like that, doll.  I just saw an opportunity and took it.  You would’ve done the same darling, I know you would’ve.  Although, I think if you did leave me like that, I would kill myself.”  He remarked, his voice far too exuberant for the weighty contention.  You shivered as you slipped out of his grip, pushing your arms out in front of you to try and hinder the touches of the sensitive boy.  

“No, Izuku this is weird, I don’t understand why you’re acting like this.  Th- This isn’t you.  And we were never t..together, so I don’t understand why you're touching me and calling me these names and I- I still don’t know what you mean by this ‘opportunity’, or why the hell you’ve kidnapped me and Katsu, and I’m bleeding-”

Midoriya hummed, the warm sound cutting you off.  “Ah-ah!  You’re talkative today, huh?  So many questions!”  He said in a lilting voice.  “Why don’t we ask Katsu what he thinks about everything!”  The boy continued, his use of your nickname for the blonde making you cringe.  “He always was more articulate than you.”

He heaved himself off of the floor next to you, making his way over to an erratic Bakugou.  The chains above his head rattled as he kicked against the restraints, the gag shoved into his mouth growing damp as he relentlessly screamed into it.  

As he approached Katsuki, Izuku whipped a knife out of his pocket, the blade flicking out as he continued to walk towards him.  You gasped at this, yelling out as the greenette continued to walk away from you.

“No, Izuku don’t hurt him!  Leave him alone!”  You screamed, tugging on your chains once more and pushing yourself towards the unstable boy.  Much to your terror, Izuku disregarded your words, instead moving to stand behind Bakugou.  He threaded his hand through the taller boy’s locks, grasping onto them and pulling backwards as he pointed his knife at his neck.  

“Izuku, sto- aUGH!”  You yelped in anguish as you reached out towards the pair, only to fall forward and hit your already sensitive head against the unforgiving pavement.  You looked up helplessly as he flicked the knife between his pinky and ring finger, using the digits that were previously holding the blade to untie the cloth that sat in the boy’s mouth.

Immediately, he began to scream, as expected.  “You damn extra!  What the hell are you trying to do!  I always knew you were fucking weird, but you really are an absolute fucking creep!  You know, you shoulda just killed yourself, got it?”

“Katsuki!  No, you’re going to make him mad or-“ You were cut off once again by a shrill laughter, the horrible sound grinding against your ears.

“You always were so straight-forward Kacchan!  Still haven’t lost your fire after all these years have you!”  He said, his speech diluted with giggles.

“Stop laughing and let us go you little fucker!”  He growled in response.

Midoriya hummed before continuing.  “No, no no!  N/n over there has something I want, and I don’t plan on letting you two free until I get it,”  He returned in a crazed voice.  

“Huh?  What the hel-“

“What do you want,” you began, your voice ragged.  “I’ll give you whatever you need just- at least let him go.”  Bakugou looked at you in disbelief, yet he stayed silent as his eyes desperately searched your face.  Izuku made a show of looking over at you, turning his gaze towards your kneeling figure as a nefarious grin spread across his face, his eyes shining dangerously as he looked down at your vulnerable form.  

“Hmm...interesting proposition, but unfortunately Kacchan over here is essential to the whole thing!  But I will take you up on your offer to take whatever I need, although I was going to do that anyways,” He said as he stuffed the cloth back into the blonde’s mouth.  He peeled himself off of Katsuki, and with a flick of his wrist, the blade that he was grasping was closed.  

“Alright then doll, let’s have some fun hm?”  The chartreuse-headed boy had begun to stroll towards you, his leisurely pace matching the speed at which he had begun to unbutton the clasps that held his silken vest together.  Your eyes widened exponentially as you realized what was happening, and you began to scramble backwards, pushing yourself towards the other end of the room as far as you could go.  You knew that your struggles would be in vain, but you still inched away from him, covering your chest in hopes that what you thought was happening wouldn’t be the case.  The cold chains cut into your wrists as you strained against them, the harsh metal not allowing you to move further than a few feet away from the approaching boy.  Yet you still struggled, kicking and yelling as he undid the top two buttons on his shirt, the collar falling open and revealing his delicate clavicle.  You still tried to push away from him, your efforts fruitless.  

A harsh pain shot through your ankle as Izuku clamped his booted foot around it, effectively stilling your leg and keeping you in place.  He hopped down onto you, pressing his thighs into yours as he straddled your waist.  Nimble hands glided over your shirt, easing the buttons out of their holes and pulling the button-up off of your torso.  At this point you had given up on screaming, settling for mumbling out hysterical pleas and whimpers, your palms uselessly pushing against Izuku’s chest.  Bakugou’s screams were white noise to your ears, the horrible ringing in your skull blocking out everything else and making you feel as though you were underwater, eyes glazing over as the world around you grew faded.  

A sharp tug on your hair brought you back from your moment of disassociation, the hand pulling against your locks belonging to none other than Midoriya himself.  

“Come on darling, pay attention to me!  No one likes a dumb, quiet doll!”  He whined as he slipped a hand under the waistband of your skirt, pulling the fabric off of your hips and exposing your lacy undergarments.  From there the green-haired boy wasted no time, running his hands over your soft stomach and marveling at the way his fingers left little indents in the skin whenever he pressed down.  Little mumbles floated from his mouth, the way they used to do when you were kids and he would rant to you about heroes or something of the sort.  It was almost enough to make you nostalgic, if your brain hadn’t caught on to the words that let you know he was talking about you.  His eyes shimmered as they caught onto the terrified expression on your face, his arousal growing as he looked upon the vulnerable state he had managed to put you in.  

You decided to plead with him one last time, hoping that maybe a few tears and stutters would make him stop.  “Izuku, p-please, sto-p,” you said, a few of your salty teardrops rolling down into your mouth as you spoke.  He just grinned at you, eyebrows turning downwards as one of his hands drifted to his visible erection.  The screams of Bakugou and your own cries muddled together in your ears as he slipped his belt off and hurriedly took out his cock, palming it rather roughly as he looked down at your limp form, sadism shining in his green orbs as he did so.  He didn’t do anything to prepare you, instead leaving you to stare up at him through eyes clouded with tears, watching and waiting on the inevitable to happen.  And it happened.  Before you could even register it, he had pulled your panties aside, shoving his length in and eliciting a tearful cry from you.  Katsuki screamed in sync with you, his smothered shouts ragged and uneven as he looked at the scene before him.  Midoriya rutted into you, his thrust holding far too much power as he penetrated your dry insides, your hands clenching and another scream falling out of your mouth as the uncomfortable pain spread through your lower abdomen.  You looked over his shoulder at Katsuki, a fresh batch of tears spilling from your eyes as you looked at him.  The blonde looked utterly desperate, hot tears rolling down his reddened cheeks as muffled screams continued to rip from his throat.  Despite your pleadings and Bakugou’s impotent threats, Midoriya continued to thrust into you, the force of his length pouring on and on and causing choked sobs to gush out of you, the pitiful sounds falling on deaf ears.  

“Agh, doll, you’re so tight~!  Did Kacchan seriously never take care of you?”  He mused.  In truth, he never had.  But that was your fault, really.  You had said you wanted to wait, and that you didn’t want to run the risk of any accidents happening.  Part of that was truthful, but you were also just...scared.  Scared of what could happen.  And every time that you would even begin to consider having the ash blonde take you, the voice of Izuku himself always seemed to take over, and you would always begin to imagine how worried he would be for you, and how he would disapprove.  Of course he wouldn’t have ever told you these things, he never was very assertive, and you really had no reason to believe that he would control you like that, but part of your desperate self just wanted to hold onto him when he was presumed to be dead, and still would allow his voice to run through your mind whenever you made decisions and such.  In truth you shouldn’t have let your perception of him control your life, but you really couldn’t help it.

You just had missed him...that was all.  

Now you regretted all those months that you spent thinking about him, the sleepless nights where you couldn’t get your mind off of the boy.  In any case, it seems that even he didn’t care about whether you stayed pure as he ruthlessly fucked you.  You felt a bit of blood fall from your abused cunt from the friction, a sick glee filling him up as the crimson fluid lubed up his length.  He was your first, he was the first one to ravage you and have a piece of you and you would always remember him as long as you lived.  He was going to make sure of that.  

“Nghh- doll,” he began, his voice lewd and uneven, his sultry tone matching the lust in his half-lidded eyes perfectly.  “You’re just so p-perfect, I don’t- ah! Don’t know w-hy I didn’t take you sooner!”  He said between groans.  You weren’t sure whether he was talking kidnapping you or fucking you, but at this point you didn’t care.  At the moment, you couldn’t bring yourself to think or care about anything.  Your mind was too far gone for that, your body drowning in both ecstasy and pain.  Izuku latched his mouth onto your exposed collarbone, biting and licking at it until dark purple splotches littered your silky skin.  Bakugou’s smothered screams began to die out, fading from your ears as your mind grew fuzzy, your thoughts fixating only on the pressure that was steadily heightening in your core.  A particularly loud howl erupted from his throat, causing the green-haired boy to dig his teeth further into you.  He bit down with a huge force, his sharp canines digging into the skin on your clavicle yet again.  A bit of blood poured from where he had bitten, the fluid dripping down your chest as he raised his head up from your torso.  You didn’t miss the subtle way that his lips quirked upwards, malice swirling in his telling green orbs.  He leaned down once again, a yelp falling from your trembling lips as he swiped his warm tongue against the wound.  He drew his appendage back into his mouth, licking his lips and spreading the blood onto the blush pink area around his maw.  “Agh~ You taste so wonderful, d-doll!”  He groaned, causing you to shutter.  His thrusts grew in pace as he threw his head back, pain shooting through you as they became harder and faster.  He cut into you with each stroke, an involuntary moan leaving your mouth as he heightened his pace.  He smiled down at you as the sound fell from your lips.  The grin was childish, his lips quirking upwards in a way that looked far too innocent compared to your current situation.  

Everything grew dimmer and dimmer as you approached your climax.  Izuku seemed to be nearing his too, if the uneven jolts of his body and loud groans were any indication of such.  The pressure built even more as you tried to keep it down, the continuous stimulation proving to be far too much for your inexperienced body.  With one final stroke you tipped over the edge, cunt growing hot and fluttery as you convulsed around Izuku’s length.  He pulled out of you right before his own climax, settling for releasing himself all over your creamy thighs.  You continued to cry through it all, hot tears pouring down your face and reddening your already flushed cheeks.  

You heard Katsuki scream out roughly from beside you.  The sound was muted.  You felt as though you had been shoved under water, a thick blanket of silence coating your ears as you laid on the rough cement, body heaving and broken.  

You felt so confused and so hopeless, the world felt utterly despaired.  

The only clarity that came to you presented itself in the form of Izuku’s manic laughter, the horribly shrill giggles pouring over your limp frame.  A click of a belt and the green-haired boy was put back together, sweat gleaming on his flushed cheeks and hair splayed about his head like a halo.  Although, he was no angel.  Not in the slightest.  

You coughed as tremors overtook your body.  You just felt so goddamn pathetic.  

That was all that you were.  

You faintly felt the sensation of arms hooking underneath your own, strong hands pulling you towards a wall and propping you up against it.  You were facing Katsuki now, and you were finally given a good look at his face.

He didn’t even look like himself anymore.  You had never seen him show so much raw emotion before in your entire life.  He was despondent, his wrists limp and his mouth quiet.  The gag on his face was damp with tears and spit, his jaw hanging slack as a few stray teardrops fell from his reddened eyes.  Nothing about him even looked human.

And yet still, you could hear Izuku laughing.  He approached the boy with heavy footfalls, boots clicking against the floor until he stood before him.  One of his hands shot out and harshly gripped the blonde’s jaw, the other moving to undo the gag.  The cloth hung loosely around his neck after he had taken it off, but Katsuki did not even spare a word.  His gaze was weathered as he glared into Izuku’s gleeful eyes, crimson hues staying trained on the boy even as Midoriya turned towards you and began to speak.  

“Well that was fun, wasn’t it doll!  I can’t believe that I was your first!”  He said, his voice still enthusiastic, albeit breathy.  “I’m never, ever letting you leave after that!  Ah, you’re just so perfect!”  You just stared at him with as much resentment as you could muster.  “And initially the plan was to kill Kacchan over here, but I think I’ll keep him too!”  You perked up at the mention of the blonde, lips parting and eyes growing more defensive and you stared at the boy.  “I think he’ll be able to help us in the future, hm?  It’ll be fun, I promise!”  He said, voice exhaustingly juvenile.  

“We’ll be just like one big happy family!”

[plokoonsdisapprovingeyebrows]

Frame type headcanon ramble because I’ve had it sitting around for ages and I wanna share it lol. There’ll be a part 2 at some point so I can talk more about the individual frame types cause there’s lots of them.

PART 2 HERE

Notes on Frame Type:

↠   Frametype refers to physical (non-electrical) schematics like skeletal structure, engine type/grade, and armor pattern. Also comes with some base coding, some inherited memory data, and some other weird shit that no-one really knows a whole lot about (because the Primacy only grants study proposals once in a blue moon). Because it's the most visible level of differentiation between Cybertronians, it tends to be the first... sorting system that they categorize themselves by, resulting in stuff like Functionism.

↠   Divided into three 'ancestral types' based on mythological divisions of the Thirteen: 

Warframes claim descent from Prima the Sword, Megatronus the Shield, Liege Maximo the Burning Torch, and the Wanderer. They are distinguished by their thicker armor, more struts and shock absorbers in their skeletal system, more flex joints practically everywhere, and some more fun stuff I'm not sure how to describe as yet. 

Groundframes claim descent from the Record-Keeper, the Muse, Alchemist the Philosopher, and Solus the Smith. They are distinguished by not having most of the stuff listed above. 

Flightframes claim descent from Vector the Timekeeper, Nexus the Sundered, the Guiding Hand, and the Guardian Wall, and are distinguished by being flight-capable (without deliberate modding). 

Over time, these three ancestral types split into several quite different phenotypes — unintentionally due to environmental pressures, such as the case of the minibots during the Cataclysm, or through deliberate engineering, such as the Second Generation military projects that led to the creation of dexters, rotaries, and flighted warbuilds ('Seekers').

↠   Most Cybertronian languages have a pronoun system that is either based around or can be extended into frame types. I’ve been using letter-number codes to describe them — please imagine that they're standing in for sounds I can't possibly transcribe in human orthography lmao.

Coda to the above point — I really fuckin hate the Aligned canon of 'there are 13 different frametypes based on the Thirteen Primes and one of them is Girl', so mech vs. femme is 100% not a thing here. There are no 'girl' frametypes and 'boy' frametypes, there are no girl robots and no boy robots at all, I'm just using she/he/they/etc. pronouns for English-language convenience. 

↠   Shifters have their own system configurations and technically their own frametype, but they have a 'root form' that usually conforms outwardly to one of the standard frametypes. Shifters tend to be smaller (and they're an absolute nightmare for medics, Shifter medical care is its own specialty) and are commonly classed with various minibot subtypes. Jazz, for example, is usually an articulate, but he can make himself as big as a light standard or as small as a sylph.

↠   Triplechangers also have their own system configuration and frametype, but unless they have visibly incongruent kibble (or they're using their pronoun i guess) it's common to mistake them for heavy warbuilds. One way to tell them apart? The warbuilds tend to have narrower waists. It's not foolproof, but triplechangers are generally packing more stuff in their innards. With heavy warbuilds the frametype ideal is to stuff as many important components as possible into their heavily-armored chests. Which is just not possible with the triplechangers.

Notes on System Configuration:

↠   System Configuration refers to processor schematics, (most) computer hardware, (most) software, and electrical system components/layout. It's a lot more important and relevant to your average Cybertronian than frame type is in most cases, but also largely invisible from the outside. Some system configurations are more common in certain frametypes; for example the ferus and efficiens systems are particularly widespread among flightframes as compared to groundframes, but in general any frametype could have any of the five standard configurations.

↠   Shifter configuration is the only one of the special configurations that is 'natural' — it goes back to Amalgamous the Star of Chaos, one of the Thirteen. The others were all the product of deliberate engineering. Although the fracture and gestalt configurations were inspired by the mythical depiction of Nexus Prime as having five component bodies, Nexus did not pass down this trait, and it was left up to daring scientists to recreate.

↠   Literally any transformation-capable frametype can be reformatted into a gestalt configuration, allowing that mech to combine with up to five other mecha. (My combiners tend to look something more like Bayverse Devastator sans wrecking balls, incidentally. Love that alien look.) Theoretically you could even do it with someone like Omega Supreme but nobody has yet because the size difference is Awkward.

↠   Fracture configuration likewise is something someone of any frametype can be reformatted into — it's basically just a matter of getting an extra body or two that matches your existing frametype and creating a spark-deep network. It can be a steep learning curve to pay attention to more than one body at once, though, and that's where the special system configuration comes in. A fracturemech's frametype is whatever frametype their component bodies are — unlike gestalts, a fracturemech's components all match. They do have a combined form, but the form that counts for frametype purposes is the one that can transform — and combined mecha can't transform.

↠   the Sparked Ship Special and Sparked City Special configurations are notable for having more individual variation than any other system configuration — they are tailor-made for the individual ship or city according to their projected needs and environments. 

They are classed as a group rather than as 'Unclassified Configurations' because they do share some basic architecture and also are uniformly ridiculously complex. Most are paired with semi-independent AIs in a permanent network, and they all deliberately add lots of new stuff to their system over the course of their long long lives, in response to external pressures or even just plain curiosity or boredom. (Much like regular Cybertronians, in fact; these guys — sparked cities in particular — just aren't limited to whatever they can stuff into a frame that needs to transform on the regular.)

Notes on Size Class:

↠  the main concern of size class is weight and mass rather than height per se; height classes cross over with each other and the weight classes don't. You get classed to match the weight; so even if you're, say, only 12' tall and massing to match Class 3, if you weigh over 500kg you get classed in Class 4. 

Height does matter in that manufacturers and builders tend to assume that if you weigh and mass a certain amount then you're going to be within a certain height range as well, for ease of standardization. And once you get much beyond Class 12, very few manufacturers and whatnot account for you anyway, so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

[avaritia-apotheosis]

Phantom Children Ch. 6

Hi guys! I'm back <3 (also, I'm currently looking for alpha/beta readers for Phantom Children, so if you're interested, feel free to shoot me a message!)

In Which: Danny Attempts to get Answers, Bruce Learns, and Dick Finally Learns What's Inside the Door that Doesn't Exist

AO3 | Prologue | 5 | [ 6 ] | 7

DANNY IS KNOCKED DOWN three, four, eight times on the ice. Each time made his back ache, his bones bruised and tired, and his mind burning with embarrassment and a drive to lash out. But each time he gets back up. Each time he lasts a little bit longer against Talia.

The ice still shifts, cracks and rumbles with every wrong move. Danny learned to roll with it. Move on light feet but attack with a firm stance, gauge which parts of the ice are stable and which should be avoided. Multi-tasking has never been Danny’s strong suit, but he’s good at learning and learning quickly.

Talia corrected his form as much as she beat him down. Exploited every one of his openings until he learned to defend them and praised him whenever he managed to pull one over her. The League’s martial arts was the holy amalgamation between almost every single fighting style there is, mashed and refined to perfection to become almost unpredictable to the untrained. A vast improvement to Danny’s previous ‘fuck around and see what works’ brawling and had the added benefit of meshing together with his spontaneity.

“You are doing well, Daniel,” Talia said as she sheathed her sword, hand resting just above her hip. “You have improved greatly in such a short time, as I have expected.”

It takes every ounce of Danny’s superhuman energy to not collapse to his knees, his every breath a ragged shudder as he tries to get his breathing under control. “Still can’t beat you, though.”

“Very few can boast that feat.”

“I’m not exactly sure if that’s supposed to make me feel any better or not. Do I get my prize at least?”

Tahlia tossed her braid over one shoulder with a laugh. “Come, then, let us rest in the caves. The sun is to set soon and we must make camp before we freeze to death.”

“Hypothermia is so last season. I’m way too cool for that.”

He didn’t know whether to be disappointed that Tahlia didn’t react to his pun. It was pretty clever, in his opinion.

('Puns are the lowest form of comedy,' said mind-Jazz.

Says the one who named the Box Ghost the ‘Crate Creep.’

'That’s alliteration, not a pun.')

It was kind of pathetic that even his mind-version of Jazz was smarter than him.

“What would you like to know first?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Sarcasm dripped from Danny’s voice. He sheathed his sword and let it hang loose at his side. “Maybe how old this mysterious brother of mine is?” Ancients, his life was weird enough already, it wasn’t supposed to sound like the B-plot to a bad soap opera.

“Damian is younger than you by a little over four years. He will turn eleven this year.”

“Huh. Never been an older brother before.”

“Perhaps you might have been, if circumstances had been different.”

Cryptic. Great. Danny stepped over a particularly large crack in the ice and scampered over to solid ground. “You gotta give me more than that. What’s he like?”

“Prideful,” she said. “But skilled enough to warrant it. He was raised like a prince—as how you should have been.”

“And he lives with…our dad?”

“Yes. In America.” The cave was deep enough to shield them from the worst of the eventual mountain winds. Tahlia had already started building a campfire with equipment from her knapsack, embers eating away and growing into a steady flame. He sat down, legs crossed, beside the fire, hands tucked beneath his armpits.

He bit his lip, a question forming in his mind. “Do…do we have the same dad?”

Tahlia looked up at him. “Of course. Only your father has had the privilege of being called my beloved, and only he is worthy enough to have sired my children.”

Once night fell, it fell quickly. Blanketing as far as Danny could see from the mouth of the cave in a thick darkness. Snow fell from the skies in thick tufts and covered their footsteps.

“Does he—do they know about me?”

“No, they do not.”

“And you probably aren’t going to tell them anything about me, if you could help it.”

“That is very perceptive of you, habeebi.”

“You won’t tell me anything more about them, will you?”

“In due time, I will.”

Danny blew part of his fringe away from his face. Figures.

Despite the ever-present niggling at the back of his mind, Bruce had yet to see what was in the flash drive. The weeks since his strange meeting with Vlad Masters suddenly exploded with criminal activity with the recent breakout in Arkham and the brewings of another gang war in the shadows of Gotham’s paved streets. It was all hands-on deck. And Bruce, whether as Batman or Wayne, had always prioritized Gotham and its citizens over anything else.

The flash drive remained on his person despite the crisis, tucked away in one of the sturdier compartments of his utility belt to prevent the data inside from becoming damaged. Sometimes he found his hands gravitating towards it, fingers brushing against the button that would release the mystery from its confines before he realized what he was doing and steeled himself. Hands fisted to his side and attention forcibly directed elsewhere.

Eventually, the rogues were placed back into Arkham, and Gotham let out a shuddered breath of relief as it remained standing for another day.

Most of the family were out on a light patrol, cleaning up the remains of the breakout and helping where they can. Jason and Dick bickering over the comms whilst Barbara laughed in her clocktower.

(“It’s not that bad.”

"‘It’s not that bad’—shut the fuck up.” Jason spat. Bruce could hear him revving his bike. “You’re a fucking idiot, you know that? Certified Grade A idiot. B’s gonna kill you.”

He could hear Dick roll his eyes. “Sure, pile it all on, Jaybird. Blame the victim.”

"It was your fault.”

“It’s not my fault I didn’t see it there!”

"You tripped and got a concussion. From a stick. A. Stick.”

“Can we please just leave that out of the report?” Dick groaned. Barbara laughed. “Oh god.”

“Richard motherfucking John Grayson. I swear if you vomit on me then—”

“I’m not gonna vomit on you! You just turned the corner a little too fast. It’s nice to see you care though.”

"Fuck no, I just don’t wanna smell like regurgitated cereal.”)

Damian was benched from a patrol. Their last conflict with Poison Ivy ended with Damian sticking a bad landing and twisting his ankle. He dealt with it with as much grace as can be expected. Meaning that he spent the last few days sulking as he caught up on his missed schoolwork and shooting daggers at everyone else who came back from patrol.

Bruce flicked the flash drive open and plugged it into the computer. The flash drive contained only a single folder dated six months ago.

He clicked it, and a news headline popped up.

LOCAL TEEN DIES AFTER DRIVING OFF CLIFF

Beneath it, a picture. Blue eyes. Black hair. A familiar face.

Blood pounded in Bruce’s ears. He could hear nothing except a sharp gasp from Damian behind him.

When Dick and Jason arrived at the batcave, it was to an eerie silence. Not that it was usually loud, only that Bruce spent most of his free time down in the cave and Dick had come to expect hearing some signs of him around. Typing on keys, the clicking of a mouse, the heavy thuds of a fist meeting a punching bag or a training dummy, etcetera, etcetera. Or maybe even Alfred cleaning up around the cave, feeding the bats, or restocking their med bay.

(Dick, it turned out, didn’t have a concussion. Probably. Not a severe one anyway. What mattered most was that he managed to convince Jason to have dinner at the Manor. Alfred was making a tarte tatin for dessert tonight and those were absolutely to die for. )

One of Tim’s cases took him to the other side of Gotham. The only person in the cave was Damian, who was staring agape at the batcomputer.

“Why the hell is the demon spawn looking at old pictures of Bruce? We get it. They look alike.

“Uh, Dami? What’s up?”

Damian snapped his mouth shut. “I believe it might be best if you asked father that, Grayson.” Despite his clipped tone, there seemed to be little anger in his voice. His proud shoulders were hunched over on the chair, eyes trained on his lap.

He looked so small.

Damian clucked his tongue. “He’s upstairs, if you need him. So is Pennyworth.”

Dick shot a glance at Jason who raised his hands in mock surrender. “You’re up golden boy. Whatever the fuck the old man’s problem is this time, I’m not dealing with it.”

Dick sighed. “Fine.”

There was a door in Wayne Manor that didn’t exist.

When Dick was a child and recently adopted by Bruce Wayne, one of the first things he did was explore the manor. It’s the prerogative of every child that somehow found themselves in a large mansion—even more so given the castle-like exteriors of Wayne Manor. All castles have secret passages, and if the Batcave lay in the subterranean depths below, then surely the manor proper must have its own secrets.

Dick would tumble and cartwheel along the hallways, opening any and every single door he came across. A lot of them were just empty bedrooms or unused parlors and sitting rooms; the furniture covered by white sheets to keep the dust away. Alfred was probably magic, but even he can’t keep the entirety of the manor dust free.

The majority of the unused rooms were unlocked.

Except for one.

It was a room in the west wing, on the second floor. A couple doors down from where Bruce’s and Dick’s were. Why it was locked, Dick never found out. But he was curious since it was the only room on that floor that remained shut.

When he asked Alfred about it, the old butler only said that it was an unused storage room they preferred to keep locked just in case. When he asked Bruce about it, he’d be quick to change the subject. Usually something Batman related. Which, well, always worked, because it was Batman related. And Dick, young and spry and itching to fly under Batman’s wings, would quickly forget about that curious little mystery in favor of punching bad guys in the face and flipping over rooftops.

At some point that locked door quietly disappeared, leaving a blank expanse of wallpaper and a decorative vase where it once stood. It was never brought up again. And Dick slowly forgot that it was ever there in the first place.

Until now.

The wooden table and vase were shoved off to the side. Wallpaper sliced away to reveal the lines of a doorway. The door, covered in its faint damask wallpaper, was kicked open, the wood around the bolt splintered and cracked. He could hear voices—Alfred’s and Bruce’s—speaking softly on the other side.

He pressed his back against the wall and kept his breathing quiet.

“Three times, Alfred.” Bruce’s voice was hoarse, barely above a whisper. “Three times she’s done this to me.”

“Master Bruce…”

“I don’t—I don’t understand why—” Bruce choked, swallowing a shuddered breath. “Damian, I can understand. Jason, I can too. But…This? I—” Bruce suddenly quieted. Dick knew the jig was up.

He unlatched himself from the wall and slowly slid through the once-hidden-door, a hand kept on the frame. “Um. Hi, Bruce? Alfred?” The words fell flat, stilted. Dick winced as he said them. “I didn’t mean to eavesdrop but, uh…” He trailed off the second he registered what was in the room.

It was large, as so many rooms in the manor were. The room was covered in peeling green wallpaper with faded pictures of baby deer and owls and other woodland creatures prancing about. There was a dresser on one wall. A shelf filled with little picture books and stuffed animals on the other. A brown teddy bear had fallen on its face on one of the shelves.

In the middle—where Bruce was hunched over—was a crib. The wood streaked and aged with time, the beddings within pristine and untouched, if not dusty. Hanging overhead was a mobile with little animals dangling on a string.

“Worry not Master Dick. It is good that you are here since it will inevitably involve the rest of the family at some point.”

Dick nodded absentmindedly, trying to lock eyes with his guardian. “B? What’s—what’s going on?” Dick took one step deeper into the room. “The pictures in the cave. I thought they were you since they were too old to be Damian—” Bruce’s hands on the crib’s railing flinched.

Dick’s breath hitched.

“They’re…not your photos, are they.”

Bruce took a deep breath in, the lines of his shoulders tense. “No. They’re not.”

In their line of work, the answer could have been anything. Clones, magical doppelgangers, alternate universe counterparts, hell, even just someone’s genetic code being coincidentally similar to another person. But…this room, this nursery, pointed towards only one conclusion.

“Who is he, Bruce?”

Bruce angled his head towards Dick, unshed tears glimmering in his eyes. “He’s my son, Dick.

“He’s my son.”

[entryno17]

Are we sure Gaster worked with Sans and Alphys? Sans seems to be from a different dimension - he talks about how he wants to go home again but gave up on it, there are people he can't see anymore, etc. It might be connected to that weird machine in his basement too. However, it is implied he knew Gaster - so perhaps he knew an alternate Gaster? And it's stated by the Followers that a long time passed between Gaster's death and Alphys's hiring, so they may not have known each other either.

oh boy, this one is tricky. i’m of the belief that gaster worked with sans and alphys for a time, but to answer your first question—no, there’s nothing 100% confirming this, but there’s nothing that outright disproves it either. i’ve been researching this like CRAZY for a fic i’m writing, so i’ll try to explain my reasons for thinking this.

my reason to believe that all three knew each other comes primarily from some obscure dialogue from sans and alphys, some of which many people may not have seen. first of all, we know for a fact that sans knows about the amalgamates as well as the concept of determination (a name alphys came up with in the true lab entries.) he directly refers to determination during his judgement, and besides already being familiar with alphys during the pacifist epilogue, he implies knowledge of the amalgamates through some of papyrus’s phonecalls:

(sorry for poor cropping, i made this in a rush lol)

it’s strange that alphys would trust sans with something like this—sans seems to be the ONLY person other than alphys to know of the amalgamates before she revealed the truth. so they’re obviously way closer than we’re able to see through the events of undertale.

and here's what you get when you say “don’t know” to the crush question on mettaton’s quiz:

alphys says outright that she’s researched alternate universes, which is... very interesting.

if we’re to believe that sans came from an alternate universe, this fits right in. we don’t know the circumstances of sans’s weird alternate dimension stuff, but there’s a chance that alphys is aware of it.

also, she apparently believes that there’s someone out there watching her—she might know WAY more than we’re lead to believe. (right after this, mettaton asks for a sign that this person exists—the game pauses for a few seconds and your input is disabled. hmm.)

she also owns blueprints that were presumably made by gaster—the blueprints for the DT extractor. in entry 5 she says, “Using the blueprints, I’ve extracted it [determination] from the human SOULs.” this wording heavily implies that she didn’t design the DT extractor, and the skull shape of the machine itself doesn’t seem to be her style. sans and alphys both own blueprints made by him, so that’s another connection.

ALSO. GASTER MAY HAVE CONTACTED ALPHYS DIRECTLY DURING THE EVENTS OF UNDERTALE. this one is super cool to me and not enough people talk about it. before you enter the true lab, you can check alphys’s garbage can. there’s something pretty interesting in there.

so... who else has what’s described to be “strange handwriting” and talks in all caps? the only other character said to have poor or strange handwriting is alphys (it’s a royal scientist thing, i guess.) and i don’t think alphys wrote this herself...

the connections between sans and gaster are WAY too huge to ignore—i can’t imagine that they didn’t work together in some way. what we know of sans’s weird alternate dimension stuff is too small to say anything concrete (and i’m not even gonna bring up deltarune in this post because oh-fucking-boy), but it’s without a doubt that he at least KNEW gaster. sans has the gaster blasters first of all, seems to possess knowledge that few other characters have, and during his battle says, “our reports showed a massive anomaly in the timespace continuum.” that “our” could refer to gaster, alphys, or both.

and of course, gaster notably says “WHAT DO YOU TWO THINK” during entry 17. considering all this, i like to think those two people are sans and alphys.

as for the long time passing between hiring another royal scientist, we have no measure of how long this time is. “long” could mean 1 year, or it could mean 50—we don’t know what’s normal for royal scientists. we also don’t know how long ago gaster “shattered”, so the stretch of time between alphys working with gaster and being hired as the royal scientist could still be considerable.

there’s a few other things i think are notable but i won’t bring them up now—i might make a much larger post about this, dunno.

BASICALLY, WE DON’T KNOW. but i really like the idea that alphys and sans worked with gaster, and since there’s nothing outright disproving this, i think it’s fun to speculate.

[crystalelemental]

Since @patchun brought up Hugh as a rival, here’s my personal take on each rival character in Pokemon, because I’m bored.

Blue - I actually do like the guy, and I think that overall he’s a solid rival.  Story-wise, he’s one of the few that is always one step ahead of you, and clears the entire league before you.  His team is solid, and he makes adjustments based on the starter Pokemon he picks.  I also think he’s just kinda fun.  He’ll make excuses about why he lost (”I picked the wrong Pokemon!”) and gives you shit as someone he considered less than him, but there’s still some level at which he’s like “Oh hey, you’re improving!”  He’s a solid rival character.

Silver - I kinda feel like Silver isn’t really your rival, he’s just someone that shows up a lot that you have to deal with.  Like it’s never entirely established that the two of you are competing, he just wants to kick your ass for funsies in all his earlier encounters, and only comes to respect you at all at the end of his entire quest.  Which is cool!  I actually like Silver a lot, I think he’s got a ton going on and is a pretty unique change from Blue.  Blue was super invested in the League and being the best, while Silver’s also about being the best, but seems to have little interest in the League itself.  His motives are outside of the League, and frankly outside of your own.  He grows into the role of rival to the player more as a result of Lance’s comments to him and his own soul-searching.  I think that’s great.

Brendan/May - And then there’s these two.  I’m not entirely sure what the plan was behind these two.  I’ve heard they shifted off of the antagonistic rivals because bullying was a problem, and that’s why every rival since has been your friend rather than an opponent, but these two aren’t even that really.  They barely exist.  As characters, they rarely show up and don’t really do a whole lot at any point, and as a rival trainer, they’re so bad they never fully evolve their starter.  Brendan and May are, to me at least, the worst rivals in the series.  If it was because they thought early rivals were too mean and toned it down, they did so without accounting for any alternative traits to make them interesting, but at least they started getting it right soon after.

Barry - I actually really like Barry.  Initially, he was a bit annoying with the whole “I’m fining you!” gimmick, and being supremely absent-minded half the time, but he grows on you a lot.  Kinda like Blue, Barry spends most of the game ahead of you, and is a pretty competent trainer.  But instead of being aggressive in his rivalry, he is your friend and acknowledges how good you are.  He never seems to even acknowledge his defeat to any extreme degree, he’s just having fun and doing his own journey while using you as a point of comparison, while still taking this really seriously, in part because his father is a renowned trainer that he wants to live up to.  Which is solid.  Also I gotta admit, the situation with the lake guardians was really cute, how Rowan recognizes him and gives him the tougher mission, how into it he gets, and then how hurt he is that he wasn’t able to protect Uxie.  Barry just a sweet kid and a solid rival.

Cheren - Cheren is much like Barry, in that his focus is on battling at its core.  Contrary to Barry though, Cheren is actively irritated that he can’t seem to beat you.  He keeps pace with you, but I don’t think actually gets ahead of you at any point in the story.  If anything, he’s interesting because he’s someone driven by the same journey to be a great trainer that you are, but is coming face to face with the realization that he’s not making the same gains, and may not be able to achieve that initial dream.  He has to adapt, and ultimately settles into the Gym Leader role, and is a bit of a mentor in BW2, which is really cool.  That’s really what makes the BW rivals so good, is that instead of just being another super good trainer who’s ahead of you all the time, they explore the idea of someone who wants to be the best but isn’t, and how he handles that.  I like it a lot.

Bianca - Best rival, fight me.  What makes Bianca interesting is that she’s kinda like Brendan and May, in that she’s not...really here to be a spectacular trainer.  She is but she isn’t.  She starts out on her journey to become a trainer, but isn’t super motivated by competition like Cheren.  In fact, Bianca doesn’t really know what she wants to do at all.  What makes her interesting is that change from being just another trainer to battle, to finding her own path in life that doesn’t involve the competition.  It’s not what she wants to do, and I always really liked that.  She eventually settles on being a professor’s assistant, and I think it’s great seeing her settle into a role that makes her happy.  The series has always posited this idea that people exist with Pokemon in different ways, but this is honestly the first time we really get a rival who comes to engage with Pokemon and battling in a different way from the usual.

Hugh - I don’t like Hugh.  I get the attempt with him, and appreciate it.  A lot of Gen 5 centers around Team Plasma, and in this case, Hugh is a character who was directly impacted by their actions when they stole his sister’s Purrloin.  He was a child and couldn’t do anything, so he’s grown up resentful of Team Plasma and determined to become strong enough to protect his sister and those he cares about.  He’s along on your journey to improve, but never once does he seem all that invested in the League itself.  He’s more invested in taking down Team Plasma and getting his sister’s Purrloin back, and all of that should come together into a really cool rival for this generation’s thematic narrative.  His problem is really just that he talks.  “You’re about to feel my rage!”  Hugh, please.  You’re embarrassing me in front of Zinzolin.  I can’t say I hate Hugh, but I feel like he’s a character who just missed the mark they were aiming for, largely by being more of an edgy nuisance than an interesting character study.

Serena/Calem - I am only talking about these two because fuck the XY friend group.  Honestly, they’re...pretty forgettable.  Like I honestly can’t remember any significant personality traits from them at all.  They’re like Brendan and May, only slightly better because they keep at it even if they’re constantly behind you.  I think by biggest problem is how they never feel like they amount to much thematically.  A big focus in XY is meant to be on scarcity.  Mega Bracelts are rare, and not everyone can own one or utilize mega evolution.  You battle them to get one, which by default means they don’t.  And that sets up some interesting ideas, right?  Like, how does that impact things?  When there’s legitimate scarcity and not everyone can make use of this, are you willing to crush the dream of your childhood friend to make your own come true?  Well actually it doesn’t matter because it’s never really brought up.  The great tragedy of XY was lost potential, and the rival’s a big source of that.

Hau - Hau is...a mixed bag for me.  On the one hand, SuMo.  On the other, USUM.  In SuMo, I like Hau a lot.  He feels a lot like Barry, if Barry didn’t give a shit about competition.  Hau is very laid back as a rival, and challenges you while attempting to keep pace, but ultimately exists to have fun and enjoy his journey.  This is the trait that makes him and Gladion such fun counterparts.  But then USUM rolls around, and makes up this whole subplot about how he’s not actually trying and that this is a betrayal of his Pokemon?  And then it leads to this whole crisis where suddenly he’s super invested in competition and being the best, and ends up as your Champion battle?  And it just doesn’t feel as interesting.  If anything it feels like USUM’s eternal Gen 1 dick sucking coming back to reference your rival as the champion, rather than actually focusing on the character’s development.

Gladion - Okay, I really like Gladion.  He’s a bit more like Silver than anything else, in that I don’t think he ever like...expresses wanting to be your rival?  He just shows up and challenges you because fuck you in particular.  But through interactions, and your eventual assistance with stopping his mother and breaking down those emotional walls, Gladion grows into someone who still wants to be a great trainer, but is no longer driven by the need to be the best to protect his sister and stop his mother.  Rather, he just learns to enjoy competition for its own sake.  And I really like that!  I feel like he’s Silver, but refined to be a more interesting character.

Hop - Okay stop me if you’ve heard this one.  Hop’s a rival who’s invested in the competition, and is largely driven by living up to a family member’s legacy.  He’s generally friendly, but expresses intense dissatisfaction with his performance because he can’t beat you or Bede.  He’s been competitive, but ultimately very laid back until a sudden realization that he needs to try harder and is suddenly super driven to become the best.  His post-game arc is entirely about finding out that maybe he doesn’t want to be a trainer all that much, and finding his own calling, which is a professor’s assistant.  That’s Barry, Cheren, Hau, and Bianca, in that order.  I do not love Hop.  I don’t hate him.  There are definitely worse rivals with less going on.  But Hop feels like an amalgamation of previous rivals rather than his own being.  He goes from laid-back but invested in your rivalry, to super serious and determined to be the best, and ending on maybe not even wanting to be a trainer that much.  It’s a weird shift in his journey that I don’t think meshes as well.  He takes the parts of these previous rivals that made them interesting, but it turns out slapping them all together makes a character that’s less than the sum of its parts.  However, I will give points for one thing I actually love about Hop: when he keeps losing, he completely changes up his team.  That’s something no rival has done.  Minor adjustments, like Blue dropping Raticate, have happened, but we’ve never seen a complete shuffle in who they lead with or what the team composition is.  So I do think there’s merit to Hop, even if he’s not my favorite.  It could be worse.  It could be...

Marnie - A literal nothing.  She does announce that you are her rival, so I guess I have to talk about her.  She’s nothing.  Like, I kinda have to give more points to her than Brandan/May solely because she does at least try, but she never really has anything going for her.  Her brother is more compelling than she is, being a gym leader in charge of an area that is really struggling, and trying to showcase that Dynamaxing isn’t required to be a good trainer.  Marnie...has none of that.  At all.  She just has the freedom to be a challenger for the Champion title, and the town is insistent on her winning to prove...something.  I honestly do not understand the plan.  It wouldn’t change that their territory has no ability to Dynamax, and unlike Piers, Marnie has no qualms about using Dynamax to win.  She has no real convictions, and if memory serves only battles you twice.  And she’s not exactly that good either time.  I never once felt like Marnie mattered.  People just liked her design and decided she was great, but she...she doesn’t do anything.

Bede - I’m hesitant to count Bede, but you battle him more often than you battle Marnie, and he does eventually consider you an obstacle to overcome so I’ll count him.  Honestly, don’t like him that much, but he’s better than nothing.  Bede’s interesting in that he’s kind of a rival that’s ahead of you?  At least implicitly.  I don’t think we get hard confirmation that he’s beaten any of the challenges before you, but a lot of his battles involve him being in a location before you got there.  I do kinda like his arc, in that he’s a bit of an inverted Cheren?  In the sense that his ultimate endpoint is as a Gym Leader, but not because he’s looking at things in terms of adjusting his goal due to always losing, but adjusting his goal because it turns out that’s just really what he wants to do.  At first he hates it, and his final challenge to you is a means of saying he’ll quit forever if he can’t win, but ultimately he settles into an appreciation for being a Gym Leader, and I really like that.  While I dislike him more on a personal level, I will say I think he’s a better rival than Hop.  Has more going on for himself, anyway.

[phykios]

honesty and promise me, part 4 [co-written with @darkmagyk] [read on ao3]

 July twelfth dawns like any other day, Annabeth wrapped up in Percy’s sheets. She’s spent significantly more nights in his bed than she’s spent in her own apartment over the last two months, but who could blame her? This bed is literally to die for. Therapeutic mattress for the fucking win.

 Percy, to her greatest confusion and chagrin, is a morning person. Well, actually, what he is is someone who runs on very little sleep for three weeks at a time, before crashing headfirst into his bed for thirteen hours. It is a decidedly unhealthy way to live, but it means that Annabeth is used to waking up alone. The nights where she gets to wake up with Percy are the nicer ones, sure, but his presence is suffused in every corner of the room, his smell wafting from every piece of sweaty clothing tossed haphazardly about the floor, so much so that she never feels like she is truly waking up alone.

 Gross? A little. But the smell is oddly sexy, too, especially after he’s just come home from a run, all wet and glistening and flushed, panting hard--

 Ahem.

 The point is, when Annabeth rolls out of bed in one of Percy’s shirts (the one that says “Do You Even Lift, Bro?” with an image of a male dancer raising his partner, courtesy of one Jason Grace) and stumbles into the kitchen for one of Percy’s patented brunch specials, it’s a pretty normal morning. What catches her off guard is the spread: eggs and bacon, obviously, with fruit and granola and yogurt, but also an enormous tray of delicious, flaky croissants, perfectly crescent shaped, with little bowls of every condiment imaginable, multiple flavors of jams and preserves and Nutellas.

 “Bounjour, mademoiselle!” Percy says cheerfully from the oven, perfectly accented, bending over to take out a tray. “Ça va bien?”

 “Um… bonjour…” She pokes a croissant experimentally, and is equally delighted and dismayed to find that it is just as flaky as advertised.

 “Take a seat, these ones just need to cool for a bit and then we can get started.”

 Spring in his step, he opens the refrigerator, taking out the most beautiful cake Annabeth has ever seen in her entire life. Perfectly round, paper white, with little blue borders piped around the edge, but it’s got Annabeth feeling like she’s just been doused in cold water. “How the hell did you know it was my birthday?”

 Immediately, she knows it was the exact wrong thing to say. His eyes go wide as the saucers on the table, mouth open in shock. “It’s your birthday?”

 Goddammit. “Um.”

 “Why didn’t you say anything?”

 Because birthdays were inherently a dumb concept? Because her father had to be reminded of her birthday more often than not? Because her mother had stopped sending her birthday cards after she turned thirteen, calling them a waste of money and resources? “I don’t know,” she shrugs, dipping her finger into the strawberry jam. “I guess I just didn’t think it was a big deal. Ooh, does this have rosemary in it?”

 “Annabeeeeth,” he whines, plopping the cake onto the kitchen island. “I can’t believe you! I love birthdays.”

 “Well,” she flounders, attempting to duck his sudden attention, “what were you originally celebrating? I don’t usually think of cake as a brunch option.”

 He raises an eyebrow, not at all impressed with her attempts to change the topic, but he answers dutifully, “Originally, we were celebrating me being one month cig-free--”

 “Percy!” Annabeth gasps, clapping her hands delightedly, and a little exaggeratedly. “That’s great!”

 “But,” he continues, “now we’re definitely celebrating your birthday instead.”

 “Oh, come on!”

 “Nuh uh,” he chides, grabbing his phone and beginning to type something, “I am asking Nico to pick you up a birthday card as we speak.”

 Oh. “Nico’s coming?”

 “Well, this is his apartment. Part of the deal is that I make him breakfast. I think he’s bringing his boyfriend.”

 “Is… anyone else coming?”

 “Just a couple of people, my friends Frank, Grover, Rachel… I invited Hazel and Thalia, too, but I think Hazel told me she was busy, and you know Thalia. If it’s not at a crappy dive bar then the odds of her showing up are virtually none.” Percy pauses in his text, fixing her with an odd look. “You really don’t want anyone to know, do you?”

 How easily he reads her is a little disconcerting, and also a thought that she just can’t handle right now. “I just don’t like people making a big deal out of it. You know, it’s just another day. I’d much rather celebrate you quitting.”

 He holds her gaze for a beat, before smiling, finishing typing out whatever he was doing on his phone. “Yes, I am officially quitting. Cigarettes are terrible for you, and I do not have the money to keep up the habit. So, I swear,” he holds up a hand, “No cigarettes, no weed, no vaping. Not that I ever vaped before.”

 “Oh, never?” Annabeth teases.

 “Not ever.” He leans in, grinning that devastating grin that is seriously detrimental to her health. “You could not pay me enough.”

 “Good.” She goes to meet him, pressing her mouth to his, sweetly and chastely, but swiftly turning deeper, almost against their higher brain functions, like they only exist to be here in this moment, lips against lips, tongue and tongue. She’s always hated the taste of cigarettes, she prefers edibles to blunts, and anyone who vapes is automatically dropped from her list of potential partners… but she’s never minded the taste of ash on Percy’s tongue. It was just another part of him, another facet of the whole sexy package.

 Now, though, she has the full taste of him, unfettered and unfiltered, his morning coffee and his morning breath. It is disgusting, but again, oddly thrilling. This is Percy, stripped down and divested of all the trappings of blue lipstick and tight pants. She wonders what he thinks when he sees her like this, messy haired, face and ears empty of metal, last night’s mascara smudged all around her eyes. Given the way that he deliberately threads her hair through his fingers, winding the frizzy curls around him, pulling her close enough that the pristine cake is in danger from some serious smushing, she thinks he likes it just as much.

 Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on which perspective, either Percy’s, Annabeth’s, Nico’s, or the cake’s, their little impromptu makeout session has cold water dumped on it before they can end up doing it on the kitchen island. The sound of someone unlocking the front door is almost comically loud, and they break apart, equally red and flushing.

 “Gross,” says Nico di Angelo. “No heterosexuality allowed in my kitchen.”

 “Take that back, you biphobic ass,” Percy says. “I have never been heterosexual in my life.”

 “I’m not biphobic, I just don’t want to see you getting it on on my marble countertops.”

 “Speak for yourself,” chimes in Will, setting down a grocery bag right on the spot which would have been ground zero. “Hi, Annabeth.”

 “Hey, Will.”

 “Nice of you to join us today,” he says, as though he doesn’t see her here all the time.

 She offers her assistance in cooking or setting up, knowing full well that she will be firmly rebuffed--domestics are not her strong suit, by any stretch of the imagination--and is sent away with an iced coffee that Will has so thoughtfully bought for her instead of the birthday card she was dreading.

 Soon after, the party is in full swing.

 Well, she uses the term party loosely. It is fairly intimate, even with Nico’s enormous apartment making everything smaller. They have assembled an odd amalgamation of people: “You already know Nico,” Percy says, indicating the goth prince next to, “and Will,” his boyfriend, the perpetually cheery med student, next to, “and this is Frank,” a large, physically imposing man with a shy smile, next to, “Rachel,” a red-headed girl who looked like she just walked out of a paint shower, all making space for, “and my buddy Grover,” the guy in crutches who had immediately dropped into the single, out-of-decor, but extremely comfortable-looking loveseat Nico had placed nearest to the bathroom. All told, they look like the brochure for a community college who really, really wants to publicize how diverse their student body is, but with a kind of natural chemistry and camaraderie that those kids on that brochure could only dream of. “Everyone, this is Annabeth.”

 They greet her, each giving a limp wave.

 Then Percy leaves to attend to his brunch spread, but not before giving her a quick peck on the cheek. She can feel all eyes on them, hot and burning.

 Silence.

 “So,” Annabeth says, as awkward as a freshman in an orientation mixer. “What’s up?”

 “Your hair is amazing,” says Rachel.

 Hers is crusted with paint, a deep red that turns pink against the orange in the light, a close cousin to Annabeth’s, which is in dire need of a touchup, curls thrown in disarray by Percy’s grasping fingers. “Thanks, I--”

 “So how do you two know each other?”

 Annabeth blinks. “Friend of Thalia’s,” she says. “You?”

 “Used to do ballet together,” Rachel says, brusque, efficient. “Frank, too.”

 Frank waves again.

 A beat passes.

 Annabeth looks to Grover, who watches, bemused. “You, too, I take it?”

 Another second. Then he laughs, weird, but hearty, a joyful bleat. “Oh, sure,” he says. “I’m a regular Baryshnikov.”

 She can almost feel the room relaxing, heaving a sigh after holding its breath.

 “Are you with NYCB, too?” she turns to Frank, shoving her hands in her pockets, fingers curling around the fabric there.

 Shaking his head, he swallows his orange juice. “I mostly do modern and hip hop, now, music videos and stuff.”

 Objectively, she knows that you don’t have to be skinny as a rake or bodybuilding champion to dance, but Frank is neither of these, a huge, sweet-faced guy with a healthy layer of fat around his face and torso--a strict counterpart to Percy, who could give the Belvedere Apollo a run for its money. “Have I seen you in anything?” Not that she really watches music videos, but she figures it’s the polite thing to ask.

 “Um, maybe,” he shrugs, embarrassed. “I’ve been lucky enough to work with some really big people.” Though he offers no further details.

 “Working on anything cool?” She asks, doing her best not to cajole.

 He nods. “Percy and I have a thing coming out probably in the next month or so, with--ah, well. Can’t say.”

 “Tease,” Rachel grumbles, tossing back her mimosa. “I’ve been trying to get the secret out of him for months.”

 Frank smiles, secretive and a little smug. “Sorry. You’ll find out along with everyone else.”

 “Do you work together a lot?” Annabeth asks. She had thought that Percy was strictly ballet--though, she supposes dancers do crossover work more often these days, if only for the money.

 “Not as much as we used to, sadly,” he replies. “We actually lived together in Paris for a few years while he was contracted with the opera before I decided to come back home. Vancouver,” he adds at her unspoken question.

 “Bit of a hike, from Vancouver to New York,” says Grover.

 Frank shrugs. “I was in town anyway, and I haven’t seen Percy in about a year.”

 Annabeth frowns, doing some mental math. If Frank hadn’t seen him in two years, then that meant… that Percy had been alone in Paris all that time. The man thrives off of friendship and social interaction; no wonder he was jonesing to come back to America.

 “Remind me again how long you two were together?” Rachel asks, red hair bouncing as she cocks her head. A jolt goes down Annabeth’s spine, appraising Frank in an entirely new light.

 “On and off for about two years,” says Frank, thoughtful. “But I just lived with him to save money. The rent in Paris sucks.”

 “And you were the best roommate I ever had,” Percy says, slinging an arm around his shoulders. “Clean, good cook, better kisser--”

 Frank shoves him away.

 “You’ve only ever had one other roommate, other than Nico or your mom,” Grover points out. “That one guy when you first moved overseas--Frodo? Fedora?”

 “Fyodor,” Percy corrects. “He was terrible. I didn’t know any Russian, he didn’t know any English, and our French wasn’t good enough to actually hash it out, so he just gave me a permanent cold shoulder.”

 “Kind of a low bar, don’t you think?”

 “And there was my roommate in Boston.”

 Sharply, she turns her head. “You lived in Boston?”

 “Yeah, for like a year. I told you I was with Boston Ballet for a little bit, didn’t I?”

 Pretty sure he didn’t. She almost opens her mouth to retort, to ask when and compare notes, to mention that she lived in Boston, too, before remembering who she is with, swallowing her words.

 “Fyodor hated you,” Frank hums, reentering the circle. He’d wandered away and returned with a croissant, dipped in chocolate.

 “Trust, me, the feeling was mutual.”

 “It must have been,” Frank says, “because I saw your new apartment after he kicked you out--that place made a shoebox look luxurious.”

 Something in Percy’s face almost falls when Frank says that. Annabeth is sure there is a story there.

 But Rachel laughs. “Annabeth, you have no idea. It was a      Chambre de bonne    ,” she says, exaggerating the accent, “which might sound super fancy and French and cool, but trust me, it wasn’t at all. It was this size.” She slaps the kitchen island, a little too hard, her third mimosa making her loose-limbed and loud. “When I visited for Thanksgiving that year      I     had to pay for the heating bill, because Percy basically refused.”

 “It was cozy,” Percy mutters, suddenly very preoccupied with the half a croissant on his plate.

 “It was not.” Rachel says. “It was sad and cold and small.”

 Nico looks interested, but not nearly as boisterous as Rachel or Frank, “Was that the place…”

 “Ye,” Percy cuts him off, “Yes it was.” He smiles, Stepford-strained. “But, then Frank came to town, and so did his grandmother’s money.” He slaps Frank on the back. “And I got a bathtub.”

 “I still can’t believe that a ballet dancer lived anywhere for two years without a place to soak,” Frank says, shuddering.

 “I can’t believe you waited until Frank got to Paris to get yourself a sugar daddy,” Grover quips. Percy throws a grape at him. Grover, to her immense surprise, manages to catch it in his mouth.

 Annabeth can’t really be impressed. This is the second time someone has brought up Percy and Frank having a history. Something hot and angry curls in her stomach. But Percy is laughing.

 Rachel laughs too. “Oh, he didn’t wait,” she says. “He had a bevy of sugar mommies for trips to Ibiza and Moscow and Beijing.”

 “It was Tokyo,” Percy says, “and they weren’t my Sugar Mamas.” He turns to Annabeth, sheepish, but not actually shameful. “They weren’t. Honestly.”

 “Uh huh.”

 “They were mostly Kym’s friends, and sometimes we’d go out when they were in town, and if we had fun, they’d invite me wherever they were going next. And if I didn’t have to work, I’d go with.”

 “I have heard rumors,” Will says, popping his head in, Nico attached to his hip, “of Percy Jackson, boy toy of the rich and famous of Europe. Is it true?”

 “Yes,” Grover and Rachel say at once.

 “Do you want to hear about that, Will?” Percy asks, “Or would you rather hear about the summer Nico came to stay with me and Frank before he started college, and slept with every single dancer in Europe except Frank?”

 Nico waves him off. “Only because you were already sleeping with him, cause he was your sugar daddy. Not like I needed the money.”

 “It wasn’t like that.” Frank says.

 “And now that we’ve aired all of my dirty laundry,” says Percy, “I need to borrow Annabeth for a second.” Gently, but with force, he tugs her arm, his other hand around her waist, directing her where to go like she’s one of his dance partners. Usually, she minds--a lot. She’s not about to let anyone, let alone a man, tell her where to go--but, you know, it’s Percy. Alone time with him is never a bad thing.

 He pulls her into the hallway, shoving his hand into his pocket. “What’s up?” she asks.

 “So.” Mouth open, he pauses for a moment, just… looking at her. His eyes are soft, warm like the first day of spring.

 “What?”

 “Uh, nothing,” he shakes himself a little, pulling his hand out. “Sorry, I just--I know you said you didn’t want anyone making a big deal out of your birthday…”

 Oh, no. She braces herself for the worst.

 Uncurling his fingers, he reveals his present for her.

 “It’s… a pin?”

 “Yeah,” he smiles. “Remember when I took my sister to the Met a few weeks ago? They were having that thing on Egyptian jewelry? Well, of course we had to stop in the gift shop, and I saw this and just--you know, thought of you.”

 It is a pin--one of those lapel pins that more often than not are added to a collection usually displayed on a backpack. This pin is a silhouette she recognizes instantly: the Parthenon, its columns and angles rendered in sterling silver, little grooves dug into the metal in an approximation of the fluting.

 “Wow,” she breathes. “Thank you.”

 “It was nothing.” His ears are pink. “Happy birthday.”

 And then he hugs her.

 After a moment, she hugs him back.

 It’s amazing how she can have had sex with someone so many times, but feel so awkward giving them a hug.

 “I didn’t, um, tell anyone else,” he says, pulling back. His hands linger on her shoulders, thumb tapping at the base of her neck. “But, I kept meaning to give this to you, so, you know, now was as good a time as any, yeah?”

 “I love it,” she says, honestly. Which surprises her. “Thank you.”

 She slips it into her own pocket, not even minding the sharp corners.

 When they return, Nico has already cut into the cake. “You were taking too long,” he snips.

 It really is delicious. Much, much later, Percy sends her home with a sweet, soft kiss, and one of the last remaining slices, rather than staying for dinner.

 Percy is the kind of boy who goes to his mother’s for dinner every week. She had been invited, but also threatened with the promise of another cake, and his ten year old sister, who would “love to make you a present.”

 It sounded nice, but Annabeth knew when she wasn’t really wanted, and so she demurred, citing a need for some solo downtime.

 She hasn’t heard from Thalia in, like, four days, which meant she had probably gotten a short-term gig. (“You’re lucky, she’s had Jason paying for her phone the whole time you’ve known her. Before that, she was almost impossible to get ahold of.”) Piper would take her out to dinner tomorrow, “just because.” But they would both know it wasn’t true.

 So, to refresh and relax after a long, harrowing day of socializing, Annabeth goes home.

 Or at least to her apartment.

 It doesn’t have a doorman, or the views, or the room, like Nico’s place. Nor does it have any of the people, the energy, the joy. Her furniture doesn’t fill it up. The most appetizing thing in her kitchen are the granola bars Percy had made the week before, or maybe the brownies he made four days ago. She sets her to-go bag of cake and croissants down next to them, a smorgasboard of Percy’s culinary prowess.

 Despite the long hours, her clothes still smell a little like last night’s bar, and her skin has a faint patina of dried sex sweat, and smudged makeup.

 She doesn’t want to start leaving things at Percy’s place--don’t want him to get the wrong idea--but she also occasionally needs to be able to touch up her eyeliner. She’s either going to have to find a bag that isn’t embarrassing to carry, or surreptitiously shove some eyeliner and lipstick next to the condoms in Percy’s nightstand next time they have a sleepover. Or raid Nico’s bathroom.

 Regardless, she needs a wash something bad.

 As she scrubs down, she does her best to focus on the lemon scent of her body wash, and not Percy’s perfect form, dripping with water. She tries to visualize her last trip to Sephora, not blowing him under the hot water.

 It doesn’t really work, so she gets herself clean and gets herself off and considers just spending the rest of the day naked, in case the mood strikes her again. But it's only 5PM, and she doesn’t have Percy to cook her some dinner tonight, so she sucks it up and puts on some pants.

 When she had visited Boston for work a couple of months back, Alex had insisted on taking her shopping, complaining that her sister and her friend Mallory didn’t understand Versace quite like Annabeth did, and that Blitz sucked all the fun out of fashion, anyway. Then, she had bullied Annabeth into buying a set of sweats, claiming it was because of the Grecian patterns, but probably because she thought Annabeth in that much purple would be funny.

 But eventually, she had wheedled, cajoled, and threatened Annabeth into buying a pair of sweatpants and a hoodie. After deciding to forgo a bra, because that is just one more area she has always fallen short in, she shoves on a School of Architecture underneath them. The crimson clashes terribly with the lavender and seafoam, but she kind of likes it. Piper would call it “artfully nauseating,” or something.

 Besides, no one is going to see her but her delivery guy. And if someone did see her, someone like Thalia or Percy, well, the clashing colors would be the least of her worries.

 She is folded into her couch, wedged into the corner, very much      not     looking up Paris Ballet clips from the past few years, trying to spot Percy in the background, when there is a knock on her door.

 Not for the first time, she curses her lack of doorman--and then frowns. Who even knows where she lives?

 Piper and Leo? Magnus and Alex?

 Has she already ordered food and just forgotten?

 Is memory loss a side effect of a SK-II mask no one had warned her about?

 Tentatively, she creeps towards the door, opening it slowly. If this were a horror movie, the door would creak open, revealing the villain cast in the shadows of the hallway, holding his weapon of choice.

 She sighs.

 The man is only a few inches taller than her, and dressed impeccably in a t-shirt and jeans that probably cost half a year of her rent-- a big critique coming from her, since she wears a month of her own rent as sweats. His blond hair is impeccably combed, his tennis shoes impeccably white, and his smile the most charming thing you can find this side of the Brooklyn Bridge.

 “Happy birthday, girly,” he says, giving her an awkward, one-armed hug, trying to avoid getting any of her facemask on his shirt.

 “What are you doing here?”

 “It's your birthday,” he reminds her, holding up the bag. “I told you I’d stop by last week.”

 Had he? Maybe, and she’d just been too drunk or hung over to really process it. But maybe he’d also meant to, and then failed to follow through. Luke has a bit of a nasty habit of treating his intentions as the same as his actions. His intentions are good, usually, but it means that he often ignored the actual actions. Like how his intention was to support his mother in the best nursing home in the northeast, but his action was to work with Saturn, a very shady hedge fund, to facilitate it. Or how his intention was to have someone at a stuffy party to talk to, but his action was dressing up Annabeth as his arm candy because none of Piper’s models would call him back anymore. He hasn’t asked her to do that since, like, February though, thankfully.

 “Sorry,” Annabeth says. “I just… you know I don’t like my birthday.”

 He also has a bit of a habit of ignoring her distaste in a really blatant way.

 He’s a little like Percy that way, actually.

 She’d only ever told Luke about her birthday back in those embarrassing freshman days, when she’d thought he looked as good on paper as any Harvard MBA student possibly could, with a devastating smile to match. She’d been so convinced that he would be the right boyfriend that might finally get her mother’s approval, and she figured that her future husband should know her birthday.

 “Come in,” she says, reaching for the bag, but he shakes his head and brushes past her, dumping his black back on the coffee table. Graciously, he doesn’t look at her as he starts to empty out its contents, giving her an opportunity to dart back to her bathroom and peel off her facemask. Luke would forgive designer sweats, but they aren't at the “just chilling in a facemask” level of a relationship.

 When she returns, there is a small assembly line arranged on her coffee table: a stack of paper plates, a carton of Haagen Daas, forks and spoons, and a Milk Bar cake, all wrapped in its box.

 “Is Milk Bar still the ‘it’ thing?” she asks. “With locations all over the country, I figured it would be passé by now.”

 “I know it’s your favorite,” Luke says. “I don’t always have to choose the most popular thing.”

 Milk Bar had been her favorite, that is true, right up until she’d started fucking Percy Jackson, and eating his food.

 “Thanks,” she says, cutting herself a slice, and scooping herself some ice cream.

 “That’s all you’re going to get?” he asks, cutting himself a sliver.

 “I have had so much cake today,” she says. Milk Bar really isn’t as good as Percy's, but it reminds her of birthdays in high school, waiting for her mother to visit, sneaking out when she inevitably didn’t, convincing the local bad boy to buy her some alcohol. She eats it, eagerly.

 Luke’s jaw drops. “You had a birthday cake? By choice? On your birthday?”

 She shakes her head, swallowing. “No, I was at a party with some friends. They didn’t even know it was my birthday,” Until she had stupidly revealed it. Whatever. She just has to make sure he’s been excised from her life by this time next year. And maybe freeze some of his baked goods beforehand.

 Luke doesn’t let her go through with her evening plans, which consisted basically of watching      Legally Blonde     for the gazillionth time while she slurped down some pierogies, but he capitulates to      Roman Holiday    , helping her put away the leftover cake and ice cream. “Thanks,” she says, when the movie was done. “I’m glad you came over. “

 No one ever comes over. Thalia is her best friend, but Thalia would have questions about how she could afford the place, Piper never understood why she’d moved out here at all, and Percy… Percy was irrelevant. There is no reason for him to come here.

 “I always like to see my best girl.” He smiles at her, charming and rogueish.

 “If all those models you keep trying to date know that your best girl is an architect who lives in Brooklyn who you actually feed, that’s probably why they don’t want to date you back.”

 Luke laughs, leaning over and knocking his shoulder against her own. “None of those girls could hold a candle to you.”

 “God, you must be a terrible boyfriend.”

 “Probably,” he agrees, sitting up and stretching, before reaching back to the bag he brought the cake in. “After all, you are the one I bring all the nice presents. But I think I’m a pretty good friend.”

 He takes out a box, burnt orange, a black ribbon wrapped around it, because Luke is nothing if not predictable.

 Annabeth sighs internally, quietly reminding herself that money is how Luke shows his love. And that she is wearing Versace sweats.

 “Herm  é  s,” she says, pulling off the ribbon. “This box looks too small for a Birkin.”

 “Do you want a Birkin?” he asks. “I can get you a Birkin.”

 “I probably don’t need a Birkin,” she admits. Though maybe it would be nice to have one in her closet, if her mom ever calls her up for lunch again. She could show up with a Birkin and an eyebrow ring. Sweet revenge.

 Luke waves a hand. “It doesn't matter if you need one, just if you want one.”

 Inside the box is a scarf, the silk soft and smooth between her fingers, a pleasing gradient of oranges and reds and pinks and corals. When she unfolds it, laying it out before her, she finds a sharp, geometric design, columns stacked together like skyscrapers. Luke obviously had her in mind when he picked it out.

 “Thanks,” she says. It’s pretty--perfect for an ambitious young architect with two degrees from Harvard who had moved to New York City with an offer from one of the best architecture firms in the world. And Annabeth has no idea where she could possibly want or need to wear it.

 “Hey,” Luke says, suddenly soft, “don’t cry.”

 Shocked, she reaches her hand up to her face. It’s wet.

 Luke is probably the only person she will let herself cry in front of. She’d spent three years doing that in college. He’d seen her through heartbreak and hangovers, guiding her through it all like an aloof big brother.

 “I’m okay,” she hiccups, wiping her nose.

 He hands her a napkin.

 Annabeth blows her nose, wet and gross. “I’m sorry, I promise I’m alright.”

 “You sure?” He sounds sincere, but she catches him glancing down at his wrist.

 “Do you have a date?”

 “I…” At least he has the decency to look sheepish. “Just some guys at work. You can come, if you want.”

 It could be fun. Hanging out with Luke can be fun. Get a little lit, take a business bro home, screw his brains out, send him on his way. But there’s an unspoken dress code to these things, and Annabeth just doesn’t wear Louboutins anymore. And the idea of fucking a business bro just… doesn’t hold any appeal right now.

 “No thanks,” she nods, using the clean edge of the napkin to wipe her eyes. “I am going to watch      The Search For Elle Woods    , and you're going to strike out with some models, and everyone is going to be happy.”

 “You really are so mean to me.” Luke complains, as she walks him to the door, before giving her another hug. “You sure you’re going to be okay?”

 “I am.” She is different and new, but Luke is still her friend. She had survived. It would be okay.

 “Well, call me if you need something.” He kisses her cheek, sweetly, without any heat. Perfectly platonic. “I love you very much. Happy birthday.”

 “Thanks,” she says, “I’ll see you around.”

 “Always.” And he is gone.

 She folds the scarf, going to put it in the dresser in her room, shoving it among a handful of accessories, gathering dust. She realizes, with a start, that she’s left a week’s worth of clothes all over her room on the way to the shower, and, with a sigh of adulthood, and the knowledge that if she doesn’t follow the ADHD gods and pick them up now, they’ll be there for weeks, languishing on her floor and stinking up the place, she goes to at least move them into her hamper. She rifles through ripped jeans and band t-shirts and black socks as she goes, checking each for anything like discarded change or a bus pass she doesn’t want to wash.

 She shakes out the pants she’d worn out the night before, and therefore the entire day until she’d gotten home. There is a rather unfortunate stain on the knee that she can’t quite parse--ketchup? Chocolate?

 Then she reaches into the pockets, touching metal, and she suddenly remembers her other birthday present for the day.

 Pulling out the pin, she feels strange, hot in the face, funny in the belly, tossing the jeans haphazardly in with the dirty laundry. It's small and shiny, cheap metal for mass market production, and yet, she walks it over to the dresser, laying it down on the silk scarf like it's the diamond broach her aunt gave her for her sixteenth birthday.

 She really is beyond Hermès scarves now. But that pin? Well, you never really can get more Annabeth--the middle school know-it-all, teenage debutante, college perfectionist, New York yuppy, or barfly and punk princess--than one of the greatest architectural achievements in human history.

 She is still a little shocked by how much she loves it. How much it means to her that Percy saw that it was perfect for her.

 And like so many times when she is confronted with an emotion she doesn’t like, she slams the door closed, and goes and watches a favorite movie from high school.

 She does order dinner, eventually, setting out her meal in between texting Piper about brunch tomorrow. It's a whole thing, pretending that they’re not going out for her birthday, but eventually they agree on a time and a place, and she can eat her sausage and watch everyone practice the Bend and Snap in peace.  

 So she is very annoyed when her phone buzzes again.

 Maybe the reservation fell through. Or maybe she doesn’t want Annabeth to show up in ripped fishnets, even though that only happened once.

 Her stomach sinks when she checks her phone. It isn’t Piper.

Hello Dear, Happy Birthday. We miss you. Please call anytime. Love Dad, Mary, and the boys.  

 Below the text is a link, leading to a gift certificate for $200 to Sephora, which has Mary’s name written all over it. Aunt Natalie would have suggested Bergdorf Goodman.

 Her hand clenches, momentarily overcome with the urge to hurl her phone against the wall. But there is no one around, so there wouldn’t be any point to it.

 She stabs at a pierogi with a chopstick, and watches the girls dance on screen, humming along.

 She passes out on the couch after midnight.

 Her mother never called.

[taehyung-rambles]

Who Was the Center for the Most Successful BTS B-Sides? (Up To BTS, the Best)

So, I’m finally deciding to make this post after posting about who I thought were the centers in each BTS era. This post is going to be a little stranger because there aren’t as many materials I can use to make my decisions. As such, a lot of my conclusions are going to be based on how I, personally, perceive these songs.

To start off with, I’m going to explain how I’m using the term “B-side” in this post. I’ve seen some sources say B-sides are bonus tracks, songs recorded at the same time as an album but released later, and the “less important side of a record” (this last one refers to cassette tapes and vinyl). For the purposes of this post, B-sides are any songs that do not come with a music video attached.

Don’t Leave Me, Heartbeat, and Crystal Snow are referred to as singles, so they aren’t strictly B-sides. However, I’m including them in this post because they’ve been promoted in a manner that is more similar to BTS’s B-sides than the title tracks. Heartbeat does have an MV, yes, but the footage used was of live performances--none of which included live performances of Heartbeat itself--and footage that was filmed for BTS World, not Heartbeat specifically. Essentially, I’m including these three songs because they seem more like B-sides than singles. Don’t Leave Me was never performed live and was probably only indicated as a single because it was the soundtrack for Signal. Crystal Snow is listed as a single in conjunction with MIC Drop and DNA (it’s listed like MIC Drop/DNA/Crystal Snow), so at the very least, it doesn’t seem like a solo single. Finally, the BTS World soundtrack album lists each song a member of BTS is in as a single. In the first place, that makes Heartbeat being a single a bit redundant, and secondly, it’s only a single for BTS World--not a BTS studio album or EP.

I know We are Bulletproof: the Eternal has an MV, but it’s animated--which is cool, but it isn’t an MV BTS personally filmed for, and it isn’t considered a BTS era. Also, Map of the Soul: 7 doesn’t even list it as a single in the way Don’t Leave Me or Heartbeat were listed. So, it’s in the B-side post.

The second thing I’m going to mention is that BTS have not performed all of these songs live, so the photos I’m using for them are going to end up coming from random live performances. For instance, I used part of the We are Bulletproof: the Eternal performance for Louder than bombs because they came from the same album and both read as somber songs.

Finally, the way I decided on the centers for these songs was as follows: if the song had choreo, I considered that in addition to the vocal; if the song did not have choreo, I essentially had to go off of the vocal presence within the song. That doesn’t mean the member with the most airtime is always going to have the center position, but it will be the case most of the time. There will be some instances, though, where a certain member had airtime somewhere in the middle of the pack, but the parts they were given were key to how the song was perceived, so they came off feeling like a center; an example of this would be ending two of the choruses or a vocal line member having a part in the verses when other vocal line members only sang on the choruses and pre-choruses. 

The last thing I want to mention with this is that the live performances dictated most of my decisions. There are plenty of BTS songs that are recorded one way, but the live performance switches up the parts the members sing. An example of this would be Hobi singing Namjoon’s opening in Spring Day because Hobi had no parts to sing or rap in the studio version. The live performance is how BTS uses the song the most, obviously, so if one member is a lot more prominent in the live version than the studio version, the live version is more important to my perceptions as BTS clearly wanted to show that member to fans more for a certain song. This doesn’t happen a whole lot, but there definitely are songs in which one member is invisible the studio version but then is central to the live performance.

I did not go through every single B-side that exists within BTS’s discography because that would take absolutely forever. I am talking about a good chunk, though, because I’ve decided to talk about songs that are either really popular with ARMY, really popular with BTS, or both. I’m also only using OT7 songs, not the subunit songs. I may do a post on those later.

The post I did in this format with the BTS eras included an MV center. Obviously, that’s not going to happen with this post, so we’re just gonna use “Center”, “Co-Centers”, “Secondary Center(s)”, and “No Center” as the labels.

DISCLAIMER: I know my conclusions are weird some of the time, but it’s just how I view the performances of these songs, which is what I mainly used to decide (unless there isn’t a live performance to look at). The fun of this is seeing the different opinions of ARMY, so tell me if you think the center for a song is different than what I think.

DISCLAIMER #2: This is not who owned every BTS B-side. That post will, most definitely come later, but this post is strictly me trying to see who was the objective center for each B-side. Trust me, a lot of my opinions would be very different if I was talking about the top 3 members for each B-side. For instance, there’s plenty of songs where I thing a rap line member had the best part, so they would own the era for me; however, objectively speaking, they aren’t actually in the song enough to center for it.

I don’t know how this song was perceived when it first came out, but it has definitely become a staple to both BTS and ARMY. Any time BTS decide to perform older songs--and I mean old songs--I Like It is usually one of them. They’ve done performances of it since it came out, and are still doing it now, in the 2020s. Of course, that’s because it’s a lovely song with pretty melodies that ARMY loves.

Center: Jungkook

I kind of knew who I was gonna pick for this before I reviewed a couple live performances of this song. Actually, though I still agree that Jungkook is the center for this song, it wasn’t as clear in the live performances as it is in the studio recording. That’s mostly down to the choreography, though, because Jungkook’s voice absolutely runs throughout this entire song. Even if you’ve got Jimin in the center and Jungkook on the side during the choreo, Jungkook’s singing adlibs and harmonizing and all these wonderful things that push him to the forefront of people’s attention. He does center in the choreo the most, too, of course, but I Like It doesn’t have super powerful choreography, so that didn’t make as much of a difference.

Secondary Center: Jin

I gotta tell you, with how much Jin was pushed off at the beginning of BTS’s career, I didn’t think I’d find Jin in a central position for a song that came off of their first album. Jin being on every chorus is really what solidified this for me. Jimin is on every chorus, too, but for whatever reason, he doesn’t stick out as much. When Jin comes to center stage, he really feels like he’s carrying the performance. It may be an obvious thing to say, but Jin comes off like he’s the center for BTS when he’s up front in I Like It. It’s just that Jungkook literally envelops the entirety of the song. Jin is a really strong support, though.

So, Attack On Bangtan is weird because the studio version is such an amalgamation of the members that you can’t really separate who is who on the chorus except for one specific person that we’ll talk about in a second. The reason I’ve included it in this list is because it’s gotta one of BTS’s best power songs. If you think of songs like Not Today or ON that scream intensity, Attack on Bangtan is definitely one of those. Aside from the fact that it’s an ARMY favorite, I think it’s such a strong introduction to BTS and what they can do with their music, so it can’t be easily forgotten.

Center: Namjoon

Like, if I’m being honest, this song doesn’t have much of a center. However, if you’re looking at the studio, it’s almost like Namjoon is the only one there. I mean, the rap line and Jungkook have prominent parts, obviously, because the rap verses are central to this song. Both Jimin and Jungkook are actually noticeable on the chorus, despite what I said above, but in reality, everything in between is Namjoon. Namjoon’s got the supporting pieces of the song for the entirety of it. All those short phrases and background pieces are done by Namjoon, so it reads like a Namjoon song; it sounds like a Namjoon song. If you watch the live performance of Attack On Bangtan--the performances with the choreo, especially--Namjoon seems like he’s leading this troupe of guys on stage. I’ve said this somewhere before, I think about No More Dream, but Attack On Bangtan is another one of those songs that says, “Hello, I’m Kim Namjoon, and I’m going to introduce you to BTS.” It’s a unique flavor of BTS that doesn’t exist anymore, so going back to this older stuff is really interesting. Still, though Namjoon is a definite center, he’s not a super-standout-ish one. Mostly because this song is absolute chaos.

I wasn’t originally gonna do this B-side because I didn’t think it had that much support as an individual song, but rather as a piece of BTS’s older stuff. However, I think this song is banger, and BTS have performed it as recently as 2019, so it’s going in the list.

Co-Centers: Yoongi, Hobi, & Namjoon

This is true rap line dominated song. Namjoon completely dominates the chorus and the end of the song, and Hobi and Yoongi are almost the only other members that stick out the rest of the time. Watching this live, it feels like the rap line is trading places with each other at the center of the song, and the effect is really cool. I will say Yoongi isn’t as prominent as Hobi and Namjoon are, but he still stands out more than the secondary center I’ll talk about in a second. I really don’t think there’s another B-side this banger that so heavily leans on the rap line. There’s eras of BTS’s music that do (like MIC Drop and Not Today), but the B-sides don’t usually. Maybe that’s why I love this song so much.

Secondary Center: Jimin

I’ll concede that Jimin doesn’t actually have a lot to do with this song, but because he’s got such an effective hook during the chorus, he does seem like one of the central members. Jimin does have pretty central moments in the choreo, as well. Not just during his parts, but his character--if you want to call it that--that he portrays on stage is central, as well. Also, he’s got that one part where the backup dancers make him fly across the stage. So, Jimin was hard to miss.

I’m not the biggest fan of Tomorrow, and I don’t know why, because it’s insanely popular within ARMY. The story behind the song is one thing because I find it extremely interesting and meaningful, but the sound of Tomorrow isn’t my thing. In any case, I think it’s pretty clear why I’ve decided to talk about it. The breakdown of Tomorrow is pretty predictable, and it follows what BTS’s centers are probably “supposed” to be (if BTS was like a standard K-pop group), but let’s talk about it anyway.

Center: Jungkook

As I don’t like this song, I can’t say for certain, but if ARMY are talking about Tomorrow, they’re talking about Jungkook, right? He’s got such a strong presence in both the choreo and the vocal, plus the style of both fit him really well. I don’t know if it’s the body rolls people love or the fact that this genre does amazing things for Jungkook’s voice or both, but the stage for Tomorrow 100% intended for Jungkook to be at its center.

Secondary Center: Jimin

This is what I meant by this breakdown being how it’s “supposed” to be. With Jungkook being the main vocalist, it makes sense for him to center. So, if Jimin’s the lead vocalist, then he should co-center. Obviously, BTS are amazing at letting each individual member have a chance to center plenty of times, but Tomorrow was pretty straightforward. Jimin is just, quite obviously, on stage as a support to Jungkook. He isn’t exactly as standout--which is why he’s a secondary center--but Jimin is, without a doubt, a face of Tomorrow.

Y’all, this song was so hard to decide on because the face of this song basically has no parts in the studio version. However, when I think of Spine Breaker, I think of one member first and foremost. I kind of had to call this one based on that and the choreo alone because the member that feels like the center made the choreo for it--you see where I’m going with this, right? As an aside, I know this has an MV that BTS filmed for this song specifically, but no one talks about a Spine Breaker era because they made the MV years later. So, it’s a B-side. Anyway, this song is an absolutely iconic part of BTS’s discography, and BTS and ARMY both love it to bits. Let’s talk about centers.

Center: Jin

If you listen to the song, without watching the live, you can’t justify Jin as the center of Spine Breaker. The thing is, though, he’s made this song his bitch just by being the legend he is. Jin made it his business to own this song despite not having many parts in the original version. I don’t think Spine Breaker is a crackhead song on its own, but if you combine it with the live performance of it, as well as the MV and the choreo, it is absolutely a crackhead song. It only ended up like that because of Kim Seokjin, so how can he not be the center?

Secondary Center: Taehyung

That being said, I do have to pay tribute to who I believe is the vocal center of Spine Breaker. I fully understand that the rap verses are fire, but the essence of Spine Breaker is in the chorus, and that’s Taehyung’s territory. Jungkook bridges the space between Taehyung’s lines in the chorus, but that deep, rich, full voice Taehyung has in Spine Breaker is what gives it its iconic sound. Honestly, for how much Taehyung’s unique vocal tone contributes to the sound of Spine Breaker, he should probably be a co-center, but Seokjin’s presence is too strong. Still, this is close to being a Taehyung song.

This is another B-side that I’m unsure of how it was received when it came out, but it’s iconic as of the 2020s, and I don’t think that’s gonna change. From what I’ve seen circulate about the song, I kind of think it’s only as iconic as it is because of a specific member, but I think it would’ve been popular regardless because it’s an amazing song with a great beat. I just think the reason it became mainstream was because of a certain person. I can say for sure that the reason this song is iconic to BTS is because of one person, but we’ll talk.

No Center

Does that surprise you after I blabbed about Taehyung for a whole paragraph? Here’s the thing: Taehyung made this song a meme because of how he delivers his verse and how badass it is. However, if you watch an entire performance of JUMP, Taehyung doesn’t ultimately stick out more than any other member. Now, I will say that Taehyung having such a long part is really rare for a vocal line member. Legit, the only thing I can liken it to is Jungkook’s bridge in ON. Maybe it’s not that dramatic, but still. Like, Taehyung is 100% the face of JUMP, but it just isn’t as prominent as Jin in Spine Breaker. All the members seemed to appear equally overall (even though Taehyung just appeared once, but for a long time), so JUMP has no center.

This B-side has got to be in the top 10 list of “BTS Songs That Could’ve Been A Single” because it’s that good. I feel like it represents the boys really well and acts as a song that says “fun” without saying “we’re all still babies.” Basically, it feels like the professional--or grown-up--version of songs like Paldogangsan and JUMP. I think there’s a good bit of love ARMY pays to this song for different reasons, so let’s talk about it a little more in detail.

No Center

It depends where you are in the song, honestly. And if there’s a different member that feels like the center at different times, then there is no center. Like, in the beginning, Boyz With Fun definitely feels like it’s being led by the rap line, but then Jimin gets this really slow, long pre-chorus, and Jungkook gets the chorus. But then, you look at the choreo and the middle of the song, and Taehyung’s all over the place. He’s got that kind-of-rap-verse, the bit where he talks and Hobi tells him to stop, and he’s got a super central part in the choreo at the end where the boys watch him do a move and then copy it. So, I think Boyz With Fun did what it should’ve done, which is highlight everybody’s charms.

I think the center for this song is so obvious I don’t even need to rewatch a performance of it to talk about it. I don’t know that this song is insanely popular with ARMY; I think it’s a song ARMY is fond of, but I don’t think it’s got I Like It status yet. I put it on the list because the old RUN BTS and Bon Voyage episodes played this song, like, all the time. That’s why I ended up liking it because I didn’t initially. Because of that, Converse High reads like that BTS B-side that’s promoted almost as much as the title track of the time. Other examples of this would be Mikrokosmos or Dionysus.

Center: Jungkook

It’s really just because Jungkook’s voice is everywhere in Converse High that he’s got to be the center. Airtime usually predicts how often a member will be in the center of the choreo, and Converse High is no different. I imagine Jungkook’s voice just sounded the best to BigHit since this genre is where a clean vocal will shine, but maybe they used Jungkook to juxtapose the meaning of Converse High. Sort of like “oh, doesn’t this song sound like a cute love song?” but it’s actually about what they want their girlfriend’s to wear, you know? I know there’s a lot of theories behind this song, including sexual ones or “fuck this shiny K-pop shit” ones or whatever, but still. Something to think about. Anyway, that was a tangent, and Jungkook is the center for Converse High.

Moving On is such a beautiful song, but up until Sowoozoo, I didn’t think it was considered one of BTS’s most popular B-sides. The fact that the boys performed it at Sowoozoo in 2021, though, made me think it meant a lot to them. I know it tells a piece of their history as young artists, but I hadn’t seen any performances of it past 2015, so the fact that they performed it in 2021 was really awesome.

No Center

This is a song that’s kind of like Life Goes On or Permission to Dance. Those songs were messages to ARMY that didn’t have the need to pick out one member or another to be the face of it, and Moving On is a message to the younger versions of BTS; every member has an equal opportunity to send that message, and that’s what makes the message all the more special.

Butterfly was used as a song to promote The Most Beautiful Moment in Life, Part 2, so clearly, it was deemed pretty important among BTS’s discography. Also, ARMY loves it. There’s always at least one B-side per album that is used like a title track in every other way but by having an MV. Butterfly is definitely one of those.

Co-Centers: Jimin, Taehyung, & Jungkook

I sort of feel like Taehyung could’ve been down as a secondary center, but he also feels like he fills the song more in the end where Jungkook fills it in the beginning and Jimin fills the middle and the end, so putting all three down seemed like the best option. There’s not really a reason to explain this beyond that it makes sense that these three are the most standout since they have the most parts. The maknae line really support this song with their various vocal tones since all three blend into the melody of Butterfly in a unique way. 

Of the B-sides that came out around this time, Whalien 52 is probably the least sensationalized, besides Moving On. I was conflicted about putting this one down, but I still feel like it’s reasonably popular among ARMY, and I kind of associate it with Butterfly, for whatever reason, so I had to include it.

Co-Centers: Namjoon & Jungkook

The best way to explain Whalien 52 is that you’ve got Namjoon leading the rap line and Jungkook leading the vocal line. Both of them are very present within the song, so it comes off almost like the other members are featured artists. That’s not really a bad thing for Whalien 52, though, since the story is told really well through Jungkook and Namjoon. The rest of the members offer great things to the tone of this song, but if we’re talking centers, Jungkook and Namjoon feel like they’re taking the lead.

Personally, I don’t think Ma City is one of my favorite B-sides, but from what I’ve seen in various videos across the internet, this song is comparable to Dionysus. That’s not something I necessarily agree with, but if it means enough to BTS to perform all the way up to 2019, and if ARMY love it, then I’ve got to talk about it. Ma City isn’t easy to choose a center for, because there definitely is one, but it depends on if you’re talking about the studio version or the live version. As I said already, I’ll be going with the live for the purposes of this post, so bear with me for this weird decision.

Co-Centers: Namjoon, Jimin, & Taehyung

Originally, Taehyung wasn’t a part of this line-up, and Jimin was a secondary center, but watching the live performance is what made me go with this. Taehyung doesn’t always sing the chorus in the live performances since it’s really hard to maintain a growl like he does in Ma City, but the fact that the chorus is his part is pretty significant. For Jimin, his part on the pre-chorus is, more or less, the most standout-ish part of Ma City. At least, for me. Maybe it’s the way Jimin does it, maybe it’s the melody, I don’t know. Namjoon, though, supports the song completely. He’s the absolute bones of Ma City, and that really comes through in the studio version. Each of these three contribute a lot to the sound of Ma City, so we’re looking at three co-centers.

BAEPSAE is a stronger song than so many other BTS songs, including the singles, and you can take that to the bank. Do I think it cracks the top 10? No. But I do think BAEPSAE is as good as nearly every other big BTS song. Of course, this is one that ARMY also thinks is amazing, and I’d say BTS do, too considering the fun they have with it on stage. If I ever decide to make a post about my favorite B-sides, BAEPSAE will be on it.

No Center

I don’t think I can justify a center for BAEPSAE because it’s almost like the song itself overtakes everything else. Like, yeah Jungkook’s rap verse is one of the best he’s ever done, yeah the rap line kill it, but BAEPSAE is also just that good, you know? Not that it doesn’t matter who’s singing it, but it makes the members shine rather than a singular member making it a wow song.

I’m more or less putting Wishing on a Star on here because I assume it’s a song the boys love. There’s a good handful of Japanese songs BTS hasn’t performed live or have only done so a few times; Wishing on a Star is one that keeps reappearing at Musters, so I figure I’d add it on here, despite it not being my favorite song in the world.

No Center

The reasoning for this is, more or less, because the vocal line (who are the predominant members in this song) all felt fairly represented in the line distribution. A lot of the time, you’ll get a B-side that’s really supported by one member or another while the remaining members fill in the gaps, but Wishing on a Star is feels evenly divided, so each member only stands out when their part comes up. There’s also no choreography, so that nixes that part of the equation. This is the case for some future B-sides, too, but Wishing on a Star only has a center so far as an ARMY feels like one member sticks out more than the rest to them.

I really didn’t like this song when I first heard it because I thought the composition of it was too confused and strange, but now that’s a reason that I love it. It’s one of those iconic BTS B-sides, which may have to do with the dance practice or the message of it or both, but I don’t feel like it’s talked about much anymore. I’m bringing attention back to it here because the centers for this song are so weird considering a pairing like this hasn’t ever happened in BTS’s discography before or since. Well, maybe with one exception. 

Co-Centers: Yoongi & Taehyung

I know that everyone calls this a Yoongi song, but to me, it really feels like Taehyung and Yoongi were meant to be partners for this song. The only other song I could liken it to is FIRE because these two are the most prominent in that era, but in 21st Century Girls, it’s like they’re side by side the whole time, while FIRE felt like they were independently central. Both Taehyung and Yoongi have central pieces in other places besides the chorus, but of course, the chorus is the main reason they come off as centers. The vocal and the choreo support it, and I think it’s really fun to have a song with Taegi at the center. I think Yoongi and Taehyung are very similar in their approach to music, so it’s cool to have them partnered in a song. I’m still waiting for a Taegi subunit, though.

This is, I believe, BTS’s first song intended as a message for ARMY, and because of that, it’s become very special to the fanbase. I don’t believe they’ve performed this recently, and I don’t believe they performed it a whole bunch to begin with, but it’s still such a special song that provides a harsh and hopeful view into these boys’ lives. I adore it for that reason, and so does the rest of ARMY.

No Center

This was probably an obvious answer, but like Moving On, 2! 3! doesn’t want to have a center because it’s supposed to a message that the members of BTS are telling ARMY in equal measure. What it did was allow each member to speak at the forefront of the song, rather than having a member at the center of it all. That’s what this song needed, and that’s why it’s so special.

This is another song that I didn’t really like that much because I’m not a fan of straight EDM songs, but I came to find it catchy and--weirdly enough--powerful. I’ve seen a lot of people say that Wings is an underrated song, but I feel like the love it gets from BTS and ARMY plants it firmly in the “iconic BTS B-sides” category. It’s certainly become a fan favorite, as is evidenced by BTS’s usage of it on the Speak Yourself tour and return to it in 2021.

No Center

I will say that Jungkook did feel like center for this B-side initially, but the way the boys perform it live makes it clear that a.) there’s a equal part for everyone and b.) the song is mostly about the beat, not the vocals. It’s a dance track, so it’d be hard to have a vocal stand out when the point of the song is to jam to melody of the music. Jungkook’s voice does sound the most fitting for this type of song, but Wings isn’t dominated by one member or another.

I don’t actually think this song is super popular among ARMY; I think the message of the song has been talked about a lot, but song itself isn’t circulated that much. That being said, I’m gonna talk about it because it was clearly meant as a song for ARMY, much like 2! 3! Since it’s got that kind of meaning attached to it for BTS, it should have that meaning among ARMY.

No Center

There’s a lot of “No Center” B-sides coming around now. I feel like I’m gonna repeat myself by explaining why there’s no center, so I won’t mention it again here. Especially since I’ll probably mention it again later. I will say that Yoongi and Hobi almost felt like centers because their verses stand out the most, but the fact of the matter is, the back half of the song is almost entirely the vocal line. Within the vocal line, Taehyung feels like he has a significant part, but it’s just in the last half. Basically, no center was the only conclusion I could come to.

I don’t think it’s a secret or a stretch to say that Best Of Me is a pretty basic song. However, that being said, it’s one of the handful of BTS B-sides that could’ve been a single. I mean, for BTS, it couldn’t have been, but for pop music in general, Best Of Me is the exact kind of thing that would be played over and over again on the radio. That would probably be why it was a song chosen for their comeback show--or it could be because of Andrew Taggart. Who knows?

Co-Centers: Jimin & Jungkook

Okay, this deduction is true, but like, barely. Genuinely, in the live performance, it doesn’t seem too much like Jikook are the centers; it’s mostly the vocal that makes me see it that way. Once you get past the first chorus, there’s a lot of Jikook in the vocal, and that does mean there’s a lot of Jikook in the choreo, but since Best Of Me has a lot to do with the beat--rather than the vocal--it still doesn’t feel like it has a secure center. I will admit, though, that Jikook do have a stronger presence in the song than the other members, choreo included. They’re almost like the silent centers of Best Of Me.

In the echelon of BTS B-sides, Pied Piper has got sit in the top 10, at the very least, along with the next B-side we’re gonna look at. ARMY absolutely love this song, and it’s become a mainstay in everyone’s favorite BTS songs list. Whether it’s the lyrics, the smoky sound, the way members perform it, or all of the above, Pied Piper is absolutely one of the best songs BTS has produced in their career. Iconic almost seems too small a word for it. It’s definitely gonna be a classic one day.

Co-Centers: Jimin & Jungkook

Yeah, the Jikook center in Pied Piper is just a skosh stronger than it was in Best Of Me. If you couldn’t tell, I was being sarcastic, because it’s really obvious that those two were meant to center this song. I’m almost 100% sure it’s because of their vocals, but it could also be because they were thinking about which members would project the tone of this song the best, and Jimin and Jungkook were the answer. You know, since they are the lead vocalist/dancer and center, respectively. I really do think it was because their voices matched the tone the nicest, though. I’ll keep my opinions reserved about who I, personally, like to hear in this song the most, but it’s no secret that songs that play on head voice and falsetto are always going to fall to Jungkook and Jimin because they’re the most developed members in those registers. Even if Jin and Taehyung have the potential to sound more interesting, at times. Jimin and Jungkook’s voices just fit Pied Piper, no doubt about it, so of course they were going to vocally center the song.

Here’s another one in the same class as Pied Piper, and honestly, Go Go is definitely treated as the more iconic BTS B-side. I mean, the sound of Go Go practically makes it a given that it’s going to be iconic, so I suppose there’s no surprise there. This is another BTS B-side that I didn’t really like when I was just casually listening to BTS’s music, but the deeper I got, the more I realized that Go Go is an example of how high-quality BTS can get with their music. Especially since Go Go doesn’t read like a standard pop song. I think Pied Piper, Go Go, and a handful of other B-sides are clear testaments to how incredibly talented and unprecedented BTS are as a group.

No Center

This was kind of a tough call to make, but the end of the day, no member feels like a true center for Go Go. Maybe it’s because the whole song is unique, so no matter who you’re focusing on, it all seems special. Jimin and Jungkook appear the most in the vocal, and Jungkook centers the choreo the most often, but honestly, if I was gonna peg a center for this era, it’d be Taehyung. I’d liken this B-side to JUMP in that way because a.) Taehyung’s got a pretty long rap-esque part and b.) his part is one of the highlights of the song. For me, it’s the highlight. Taehyung’s part in the second verse, and the fact that he starts the choruses, makes it feel like you’re waiting the whole song just to get to Taehyung. However, that being said, given that the frequency of Jikook is equal to the heavy presence of Taehyung--at least, in my opinion--there can’t really be a center. Plus, there’s the fact that Jikook, while having the most parts, don’t have all of the most impactful parts. A lot of that is the rap line and Taehyung. Bottom line, everyone feels just about equal in Go Go in terms of stand-out moments.

Don’t Leave Me is not it for me, I’m not gonna lie, friends. I still listen to it all the time when I’m going through my BTS playlist, but it doesn’t have the same magic a lot of other BTS B-sides do, in my opinion. I do think there’s some incredible vocal moments in here, though, and I think they all fall on the same two people, so I can’t really imagine any other members centering in this era but them. In fact, when I listen to this song, it’s kind of got a FAKE LOVE effect, where the main thing you notice are the two members jumping up to those high belts in the chorus--well, in FAKE LOVE, it’s actually the refrain, but you get where I’m going with this by now. Anyway, I listed Don’t Leave Me since BTS calls it a single, despite it not having an MV or any big promotion.

Co-Centers: Jin & Jimin

I’m not saying this to be rude, but Don’t Leave Me, deadass, reads as a song where everything is filler besides Jin and Jimin on the chorus. I’m not saying the other members don’t sound good; I’m just saying Jin and Jimin’s voices were definitely meant to be the part people focused on. And, to be honest, I think that’s fair, given the vocal prowess they demonstrate in Don’t Leave Me. Like, is it impossible for tenors to belt as high as they do in this song? No. Is it impressive that they’re able to do it so often? Hell yeah. I’ve always been amazed by Jimin and Jin in Don’t Leave Me, and with the way they stand out, it doesn’t leave room for any other member to center this song. But that’s okay. Every once in a while, it’s nice to have a song with super stand-out members. Every member has a song or two where that’s the case for them, and it’s cool to see the different combinations that pop up in those instances. Jin and Jimin are one such case, and I find the result really interesting.

Japanese Spring Day is one of the most powerful BTS songs, and you can quote me on that. It’s in the same league as Korean Spring Day, Life Goes On, Blue & Grey, Let Go, Mikrokosmos, and Magic Shop. I would venture that many other fans agree with me. Honestly, though, Crystal Snow is one of those BTS songs that just fills you up completely. It’s almost an overwhelming song to listen to, given all the emotion pouring out of it. I’ve gotta say, this is another B-side that really leans on the strong, power vocals coming from one specific member, just like with Don’t Leave Me, and I feel like it’s probably someone you won’t expect--unless you’re expecting it because you know my opinions already. I’m about to write an essay, so prepare yourselves.

Center: Taehyung

Taehyung is such a vocal athlete, and he’s got nothing but opportunities in Crystal Snow to demonstrate that. Crystal Snow marks a really big shift for Taehyung into these higher registers that he’s constantly singing in today. It’s not like he wasn’t hitting notes like this before now, and it isn’t like he still wasn’t singing outside of his vocal range before now, but Crystal Snow really pushed his limits, and he ended up surpassing them--by a good margin. Not to get on my shit again, but the notes Jinminkook are hitting in this song are within their vocal ranges. However, not only are they out of Taehyung’s, they’re way out of Taehyung’s. A baritone doing this with his voice shouldn’t happen as often as it does, and Taehyung’s now comfortable doing it. Absolutely amazing.

But it isn’t only the stunning vocals he’s producing that make Taehyung the center of Crystal Snow--it’s the parts he was given. Taehyung was prominent in Spring Day, as well, but Crystal Snow really pushed him to the forefront. It’s got the same feel as Butter, where you’re expecting the members to switch off more often, but instead, it’s Taehyung. Especially since Taehyung’s got the end of the chorus, the entire build of song is structured so it’s satisfied with Taehyung’s part. I imagine that has to do with the desire for his soulful voice to carry Crystal Snow, and it worked. I know there’s the triple high note, and Jungkook almost has as much airtime as Taehyung, and Jimin sounds incredible, but Taehyung has always felt like the point of Crystal Snow.

Secondary Center: Jungkook

Even though Taehyung was given the most central sections of Crystal Snow, there’s no doubt that Jungkook’s voice is supporting the song, as well. He’s got the foundational pieces of the song, and even though Jinmin are handling the adlibs at the end, if you’re listen to the whole piece, Jungkook is the one with the claim to frequency. It’s not because he had a lot of parts that I consider Jungkook the secondary center--it’s because Jungkook is the thread holding Crystal Snow together. Jinmin are nearly there in terms of being centers, but in the same way a single stand-out verse for Taehyung in Go Go wasn’t enough to center him, neither are adlibs. Even though the adlibs are absolutely stunning.

Knowing the truth behind this song makes me sad to this day, but there’s no doubt that it’s a beautiful song with a great performance. An unusual performance for BTS, to be sure, but still amazing. Oddly enough, Let Go is difficult to pin down a center for because the vocal and the choreo are so disproportionate, which never happens in BTS’s performances. There are songs where Hobi will step out to the center while Jungkook or Jimin are singing for a chorus, or a different member will center for a short dance break than the one who had just finished singing in the center, but Let Go so strongly features one member in the choreo that it makes that member feel like the overall center when, vocally, they’re obviously not.

No Center

Again, like, looking at the choreo only, Taehyung’s the clear center, but vocally, there isn’t a center at all. I imagine they centered Taehyung for the Let Go performance because this was supposed to be a goodbye song, and BTS have said Taehyung is what really drew people in initially, so maybe they wanted Taehyung to be the face of the goodbye. I know I said I was using the live performances to dictate my decisions, but Taehyung really wasn’t all the present in the vocal, at least, not more than anyone else. The choreo does make him closer to a center than the other members, but I think saying there’s no center feels better than giving it Taehyung for the choreo.

We’re getting into the Love Yourself: Tear B-sides, which, I think, are some of the best BTS B-sides yet. 134340 may be on the lower end of that list, but it’s still a better song than a good chunk of the B-sides we’ve look at so far. I feel like this and the following few songs are examples of BTS songs where every member gets to showcase their unique styles because each of their parts feels different, even if they’re singing the same line. 134340 is no different, which is probably why it’s a favorite among ARMYs.

No Center

I can tell you that the rap line and Taehyung definitely aren’t the centers, but I don’t think I can say Jinminkook are the centers. Airtime aside, 134340 is almost perfectly set up so that the members will all have equal parts. Granted, Taehyung fell through the cracks on the vocal end, but he usually does in the middle or at the end of songs. Jin wasn’t present in the beginning, so I suppose Taehyung and Jin balanced each other out. Either way, this isn’t the type of song that’s going to have a center, anyway.

Ah, the infamous “Why hasn’t BTS performed this live?!” B-side. Paradise made this list because of that reason. Prior to 2021, I hadn’t heard much about Paradise, but I’ve quickly learned that this is the single most popular BTS song that ARMY want to see performed live. And I agree. It’s a brilliantly catchy song, and I’d love to see how the members handle the melodies live, since there’s some fun vocal embellishments in the studio version. It’s also a crowd vocal song, which means it’d be super fun to sing with ARMY in the audience. Hopefully we’ll get to hear Paradise the next time a Muster can take place in a live venue.

No Center

Like, Jimin’s got the most airtime, right, but he doesn’t feel like the center of the song. Paradise is the type of sound that really fits Jimin, but with just the vocal to go off of, I can’t really say that makes him a center. Actually, Jungkook and Taehyung sort of feel more central than Jimin, despite Jimin having both pre-choruses. Anyway, I think Paradise it one in a long list of BTS B-sides that don’t actually have centers because the B-sides are typically more well-balanced than the eras are.

Why is it that BTS had all these great B-sides, but like, didn’t perform them until 2019, when they came out in 2018? Were they waiting for the entire Love Yourself album series to release? Either way, it’s a crime we don’t have more Love Maze performances because this song is vibey as hell, just like everything else that came from this album, and MOTS: Persona. ARMY definitely agree with this opinion, which is why it’s become one of the most successful fan-favorites.

Center: Jimin

You know, with the way Love Maze is structured, especially in the last half, it’s really hard for one member to center--and yet, somehow, Jimin managed to do it. Love Maze has got super short lines that feel evenly spread between the members, but if you’re really listening to it, Jimin is sewn into every piece of this song. It’s sort of like Taehyung in Crystal Snow. In retrospect, this makes a lot of sense because everything from Love Yourself: Tear to MOTS: Persona was really Jimin-heavy. I imagine that’s because BTS were produced a lot of groovy-sounding, R&B-esque music during that time, like Love Maze, and Jimin’s tone compliments that vibe really well. Love Maze ended up sounding like a song that Jimin was leading from beginning to end.

In terms of what Magic Shop could be categorized as, it almost feels like this song belongs outside the realm of both BTS eras and BTS B-sides. It’s more like a personal letter to ARMY, so it feels odd talking about in any type of technical terms. Besides that, I don’t think it’s any wonder how Magic Shop made the list of the most successful BTS B-sides. It’s one of those pieces that makes ARMY feel connected to BTS, and it may even be the most connective song we’ve got between us. A warm hug. That’s what Magic Shop is. Not a B-side. Anyway, enough gushing. Let’s get to the good stuff.

No Center

I was really counting on this one having a center, and I honestly thought it was gonna Vmin because I think of them as being super prominent in Magic Shop. I think my personal opinions clouded my perceptions of Magic Shop, though, because Jin is actually the one I feel like I hear the most throughout the song. That being said, Jin does read as a center. In fact, the individuality of the members kind of disappears for me, except in the beginning and the bridge--which is, maybe, why I thought Vmin would be the centers. Magic Shop feels more like BTS, as a whole, singing to us, not the individual members. So, ergo, no center. Sort of an interesting thing to notice.

I’d put Anpanman in the same arena as Go Go. Like, it’s got that party vibe that has made it a more popular BTS song than some of their singles and title tracks. It’s got a bit of childlike vibe, just like Go Go, but where Go Go feels mischievous, Anpanman feels uplifting. It’s definitely one of my most-listened-to B-sides because it’s fun, and it weirdly, it’s sort of another “Message from BTS” song. It’s got some of the best choreography, too, but that’s for another post. 

No Center

Lots of “No Center” B-sides piling up. Okay, there’s no center, but if there was gonna be, it’d be the rap line. Even though the vocal line have the chorus and the bridge, the punch in the song comes from the rap line. That being said, Taehyung’s opening of the song feels very central. It’s just that Taehyung barely shows up the rest of the time. Jikook have a lot of airtime at the end, but it feels like they’re barely in the first part of the song. You see why there’s no center? It was close for the rap line, but Anpanman just doesn’t end up having a center.

BTS and ARMY alike adore SO WHAT because it’s the hype song that’s perfect for the end of any concert. I’m not personally a huge fan of EDM songs, but I can’t deny the magic this performance has on stage. It’s like going to a huge house party with BTS as the hosts. It is a dance track, though, and those don’t typically have centers to them. Will it be the same for SO WHAT? Stay tuned on “This post is way too long; I’m just reading the headings at this point.”

Center: Jimin

SO WHAT is 1000 degrees of chaotic, so in a live performances, it’s kind of hard to pick out who’s sticking out, but Jimin is still a definite center for the song. He and Jungkook fit the best with EDM music, and they really utilized Jimin for So WHAT. It’s hard to explain, but it’s like it’s Jimin’s song, and he’s passing off some of his lines to other members to sing. I don’t mean that in a rude way, and, no, I did not forget the iconic Taejin bridge, but Jimin is still the most central member.

Secondary Center: Jungkook

I can’t really deny that Jungkook was all over SO WHAT, too, and I was gonna put him down as a co-center, but Jungkook still didn’t stick out as much as Jimin did. He was, without a doubt, the second most present, though. SO WHAT is sort of focused more on making a beat out of the members’ parts, rather than actually having those parts stand out, because it’s a dance track. So, you get a lot of repeating parts that are dependent on the beat to shine, but Jungkook still managed to stand out beyond that. I had to give him the secondary center position for that reason.

I’m not actually sure how popular I’m Fine is to ARMY, but to me, it looks like BTS presents it, almost, like a single. It’s reminiscent of the way Best Of Me was promoted, which makes sense, because they’re very similar songs. I don’t know if it’s the intricate performance or what, but I’m Fine definitely feels like an important song in the BTS discography, to me. Let me know if you don’t think it should be on this list, but I thought it was meant to be seen as the BTS single that never was.

Center: Taehyung

To be honest with you, Taehyung already felt like the center in my head, even before reviewing the live performance again. I will say, he doesn’t feel like a super established center, as the vocals were pretty evenly divided--actually, they were a bit Jikook dominant--but if you include the live performance, Taehyung does still read as a center. It’s especially true because of the choreo since Taehyung ended up being the central piece for the beginning and the end, plus the bridge had a central piece for him, as well, but the parts he was given were also key to him feeling like a center. Of course, he begins and ends the song, but it’s also the way the song ends. It’s got that reiteration of the “I’m fine” lyric that’s meant to bolster the feeling and purpose of the song, and since Taehyung got that part, it made him seem more central than the other members.

Answer: Love Myself is kind of like Magic Shop. Like, how can you talk about this song in technical terms when it’s just meant as a personal conversation between ARMY and BTS? We’re gonna talk about it anyway. I don’t think this song has gotten the same type of popularity that songs like Go Go or Anpanman have, but Answer: Love Myself is definitely a fan-favorite. There’s no doubt about that. And BTS love it a lot, too. It became sort of an anthem, more than anything.

No Center

I don’t know about you, but when I think of Answer: Love Myself, I think of Vmin’s high note. And, while it’s true that Jimin’s voice runs through the whole song, and Taehyung has some key parts, neither of them could be the center based on that since the other members were prominent, too. And since Vmin was, more or less, the only two contenders, there’s no center. Answer: Love Myself is one of those songs that doesn’t have to have one, though. Or rather, it isn’t supposed to have one. So, this is probably how it was gonna be, high note or not.

Depending on the day, this BTS B-side is my personal favorite. I do have a B-side that’s always my favorite, but many days, Mikrokosmos ties with that one. I feel like Mikrokosmos has become the face of BTS x ARMY in a lot of ways. It seems like it’s always going to be that one, special song that’s meant to tell the world about how important ARMY and BTS are to each other. Though Magic Shop may feel the most connective, I think Mikrokosmos does the job of making ARMY and BTS feel like one being. It really feels like a song that could’ve been a letter to BTS or BTS’s letter to us, and that’s why I adore it so much.

No Center

As this falls under the same category that 2! 3! and Magic Shop do, it’s probably self-explanatory as to why Mikrokosmos wouldn’t have a center. I mean, besides the whole “it’s a message from all of BTS” thing, Mikrokosmos is also really well divided between each member in terms of airtime. Well, between the vocalists, at least. If you couldn’t tell, the vocalists have more of an opportunity to center than the rap line does. Even if the rap line has the best parts in a song, the vocalists usually have the most, and that’s where the centers often come from. Back to Mikrokosmos: there’s no center. The end.

I didn’t really like HOME all that much to begin with, either, if I’m being honest, but now I think it’s one of the most fun songs to listen to from BTS’s discography. Again, I’m not sure if HOME is super popular among ARMY, and I know BTS kind of only performed it a handful of times, but since the quality of it is so high, I figured it belonged on this list.

Co-Centers: Jimin & Taehyung

Ah, ha! We’ve finally got our Vmin co-centered song. I think the way I feel this works is that Jimin is the one who’s all over HOME, Taehyung is the one with the important parts, and they both pop out. Jimin is, without a doubt, a center for HOME, even just based on the sheer amount of airtime he has. Not because it’s a lot, but because the airtime he has feels vital to the sound of the song. Taehyung, on the other hand, has a part in the first verse that’s become iconic, his part in the final chorus was built up to be more noticeable than the other members’ parts in that chorus because he belted, and he belted hard--in the studio version, that is, though he’s done it live once or twice, too--and he ends the song. So, yeah. I mean, I’ve always felt that Vmin were the most stand-out in HOME, and I still think they were meant to be the central members of it.

Okay, I know what I said about Mikrokosmos, and my ultimate favorite B-side is coming up, but don’t touch me when it comes to Dionysus. It’s such a damn good song. Like, it’s almost on par with ON, and I think that’s BTS best song of all time. They 100% promoted this song like it was a title track. Everywhere BTS went during this time, they were performing Dionysus, and often, it was a bigger performance than they were giving for Boy With Luv, which was their title track at the time. Dionysus is a king of a BTS song, and that’s not changing any time soon.

No Center

Considering all the aspects of Dionysus, no, there isn’t a center. If we’re talking about stage presence alone, though, it’s Namjoon and Taehyung, for me. They’re essence on stage is so damn strong during every Dionysus performance that it almost makes them eligible to be co-centers. Really, though, since the parts are allotted fairly equally, so it’s a toss up on who you consider to be the center. Honestly, depending on the energy, any of these member have the potential to be the center. It’s just that, overall, there isn’t one.

Here’s another song, like Paradise, that I hope we get to hear live one day. I mean, the way Jungkook reacted on his 24th birthday VLIVE tells me they kind of forgot it exists, but I can hope. I’d say the desire for BTS to perform this live is pretty high among ARMY, at least at the moment, so I’ve put Heartbeat on this list for that reason. I thought it was a little bit basic when I first heard it, but I still think it’s a beautiful song that the members did wonderful with.

No Center

As strong as my opinions are about who owned this era, I don’t think any of those opinions apply to a center for Heartbeat. Jimin and Jungkook seem like they’re very present throughout certain sections of the song, but then, Jin seems like he’s dominant after the bridge. I do, more or less, feel like the melodies in Heartbeat don’t actually lend themselves to members shining individually, but rather, as a whole. So, I’m gonna go ahead and say Heartbeat is almost a Jinminkook centered song, but not quite.

So, I personally wouldn’t have put Louder than bombs on this list, but RUN BTS told me that this song is one that ARMY really want a live performance of. I’m not exactly sure why--maybe because of Troye Sivan--but if ARMY want to see it badly, then it’s reason enough to put it on this list. I really liked the uniqueness of Louder than bombs initially, and I still commend BTS for always trying new genres and tones. It’s one of the many things that makes BTS amazing.

Center: Jimin

Okay, so this isn’t a very strong central focus Jimin has, but I do definitely see Jimin as more central than the other members. Well, I mean, barely, but still. Usually, Jungkook is the one that’s on every chorus, and the other members rotate, but this time, it was Jimin, and it was really noticeable. I mean, depending on the part, the other members did feel stand-outish. It’s just that Jimin’s presence was that strong. It makes sense, given the tone of this song, that Jimin would center for it, but I do think of this song as more Jimin-centric than it actually is.

I don’t know that We are Bulletproof: the Eternal is actually that popular among ARMY, but I wanted to discuss it out of respect for the message behind it. I think it’s a song that BTS meant to be very special, and it almost seems like more of a goodbye song than Let Go does. On certain days, I find this song really beautiful, on others I find it sad. I don’t listen to it often, but I always experience powerful emotions when I do.

Center: Jungkook

This is another instance where the center isn’t that clearly defined, but whether I’m watching it live or simply listening to it, it’s always felt like We are Bulletproof: the Eternal is being led by Jungkook. I imagine his parts at the beginning and end of the song make it feel like that, but I think giving him those parts was intentional. It’s sort of like Jungkook, the center of BTS, became responsible for presenting this song of gratitude to ARMY on behalf of all the members. It really isn’t something that comes across strongly when you’re considering the entire piece, but nonetheless, Jungkook still reads as a center.

I’m not gonna front and say I love this song as much as other ARMY do, or as much as BTS does, but I cannot deny that Your eyes tell has made quite the impact since it was released. Jungkook’s work usually does receive lots of love from ARMY, but I would venture that they get more love from BTS because they praised him for this song as much as they did for the rest of his music. That’s the main reason I put it on this list. If BTS really love this song, then it deserves to be recognized.

No Center

So, to be honest, in a live performance, Jimin is the member that sticks out the most, to me. However, in this case, I don’t think that equates to him being the center. It doesn’t feel as though Jimin is leading the song or that he’s sticking out because he was meant to be the center; the allotment of the airtime is fairly even, so Jimin only seemed to stand out because his vocals stood out--not because he was the face of Your eyes tell. That being said, it may seem odd that Jungkook wasn’t the center for Your eyes tell, but actually, when Jungkook writes for BTS, his presence isn’t all that strong. I wonder if that’s because he writes for others, rather than from his own experiences. Or, at least, that’s what he’s said. This was a long tangent, but Your eyes tell doesn’t seem to have a center.

This is the BTS B-side that, no matter what songs I may be in love with on a given day, will always be my number one. Blue & Grey absolutely blew me away the first time I heard it, even more so once I learned of the story behind it. Unlike Jungkook and his way of writing music, Taehyung wrote this piece from a hole he had in his heart, in an effort to heal it; that sincerity bleeds through Blue & Grey, and I haven’t heard a song before or since that has felt so utterly real. This is such a unique sound for BTS because it’s quintessentially Taehyung, and BTS being a part of the final product turned a beautiful piece, meant for a mixtape, into a masterpiece.

Center: Taehyung

Again, unlike Jungkook, since Taehyung initially wrote this for himself, his presence is very strong in Blue & Grey. To me, it feels very much like he’s given BTS permission to tell his story while he steers it, dictating only the beginning and the end. More than any other B-side, Blue & Grey feels like it’s being led by one member. I think, though, that was a necessary choice for the emotion behind Blue & Grey to be properly conveyed. I meant it when I said that BTS, as a whole, made Blue & Grey a masterpiece, but Taehyung had to be the main voice because this song is so personal for him. That’s what brings Blue & Grey to life. I would love to see Taehyung shine through more music in the future because he has the capability to create magic.

I knew this song was gonna remain a popular song for ARMY the second I heard it, but I didn’t know BTS themselves really loved Telepathy. In the same way Dionysus was performed a lot alongside Boy With Luv, for a while, it felt like Telepathy was Dynamite’s partner. It’s a song that mimics the style of Dynamite while feeling more like a BTS song. It was exciting to listen to something completely new from BTS, and I think that’s why ARMY responded to it so intensely. That might be why BTS did, too.

No Center

I had to watch three performances of Telepathy before figuring out that there is not, in fact, an intended center. At first you think it’s Jungkook because he has so many parts in the beginning, but in the middle, he’s not really there; then you think it’s Taehyung because he’s got a bunch of back-to-back parts, but I didn’t think it was quite enough for him to be the center; then you think it’s Jimin because Jimin dominates the end. If I had to choose, it’d probably be Vmin because those two really do dominate the last half of the song--plus they’ve got that cute little moment at the end where they’re both humming the melody. Taehyung definitely stands out the most performance-wise, but I don’t think any one member was intentionally put forth as a center. No matter how bubbly Taehyung is while they perform Telepathy.

We’ve come to Dis-ease, the last B-side from the BE album, and the image I have is crap. What can I say? I really wanted to use a photo from the live performance, and the boys weren’t together on stage until the end, so this is all I could grab. Anyway, when the boys released their BE-hind stories on YouTube, I found out from Hobi’s interview that he and Taehyung really love Dis-ease, and Jimin was really proud of the work he did on it. I’m unsure of how much ARMY love Dis-ease compared to the other B-sides on this list, but I’m in the same camp as Taehyung and Hobi when it comes to adoring it.

No Center

I wanted to say Jimin was the center, but I don’t think he really is. He is at the end, but then, Hobi feels like the leader of the song during his verse, yet not for the rest of the song. I will say that, oddly, Jungkook felt sort of absent in Dis-ease. Not because he doesn’t sound amazing--he always sounds amazing--but because his presence in the song was a lot weaker than it usually is. Just like every member has a song or two that they stand out the most in, every member has a song where they don’t stand out a lot. Though, Jungkook did still have key parts to sing in Dis-ease. Nobody really had central parts, though.

Alright, we’ve finally gotten to the end of the road with this post. I hope to add more in the future--hopefully soon. I know I skimmed over a lot of the early B-sides that a lot of fans adore, like COFFEE, Look Here, Blanket Kick, etc., but I didn’t feel like those B-sides stacked up to the reputation songs like Pied Piper and Go Go have. I also didn’t really feel like they’ve had longstanding love for them from BTS like Like It or BAEPSAE have, either. Not that BTS and ARMY don’t love those B-sides, but certain ones have fallen through the cracks where others haven’t. 

That’s why this post is a good jumping off point for ARMY to discuss other B-sides they love, because this is, by no means, and exhaustive list. I didn’t intend to name a center for each and every BTS B-side, as there are simply too many, but I think I covered all of the prominent ones. Let me know if you disagree with me--or if you agree, tell me why. There will be more to come in the future, so check back for updates once we’ve got new music to gush over!

[ms-demeanor]

SOMEONE HAS ASKED ME FOR HELP TRANSLATING OLD ENGLISH (OE). WE ARE GOING TO TALK ABOUT LANGUAGES AND I’M EXCITED.

I CAN’T TRANSLATE INTO OLD ENGLISH BUT I’M STILL EXCITED.

Okay, so, this was partially based on my recent, completely hilarious, translation of the first verse of Baby Got Back into Middle English.

I did that because I’m a complete slut for Middle English (ME). I am, in fact, such a slut for ME that I decided to make a free translation of the Canterbury Tales for people who were more advanced readers than most high-school level translations could help but who had trouble reading ME because its grammar is WEIRD and FUCKED. (I only got through the general prologue and six tales and my analytical asides are insufferable but good job baby Alli I’m so proud of you for wanting to make a free translation you little punk fucking shit up you; now fucking finish it you ADHD gremlin)

SO ANYWAY. Chaucer is Middle English. What you’re currently reading if you’re reading this blog post is Modern English (ModE). POP QUIZ!

What language did Shakespeare write in?

*Final Jeopardy countdown tune*

Wrong! (probably, statistically speaking, you were wrong about that. I’m sorry, I set you up)

Shakespeare wrote in Modern English! It’s Early Modern English, sure, but it is nonetheless the same language that you are reading and speaking and writing today.

BASICALLY

What I’m trying to say is that Lizzo (2019) has more linguistic overlap with Shakespeare (1616) than Shakespeare did with Chaucer (1400) in spite of the fact that Shakespeare and Chaucer were only about 200 years apart and Shakespeare and Lizzo are 400 years apart. That’s because Samuel Johnson was an Absolute Lad in 1755.

(THE PRINTED WORD IS FUCKIGN AMAZING; DICTIONARIES ARE THE SHIT)

Anyway when I was first on tumblr I made a VERY embarrassing mistake and insisted I knew something about OE grammar that I extremely did not (I think this had to do with possession confusion when writing about two people of the same gender and I jumped in with a very bad take) because being a slut for ME doesn’t mean you know shit about OE.

Because Old English is OLD. Like. Really Old.

Like it probably came to England in around 450CE. OLD.

OE is basically Old German. (The development of Modern German is as weird or weirder as the development of Modern English and is no-shit heavily built on work of the Grimm Brothers. The Fairytale dudes.) But also kind of Old Scandinavian? And Frisian. Oh the Frisian. (English speakers: break your brain and listen to this video. Frisian is really closely related to ModE and spoken Frisian sounds infuriatingly close to comprehensible for most English speakers) and basically it’s a messy amalgam of the tribal languages of the various vikings who were continually taking the place over plus all the Brittonic languages plus Latin because of the Romans.

Anyway part of what I’m getting at is that OE was kind of a giant mess (just like ModE!) and translating into OE is also a mess.

Also because OE wasn’t just one language, it was four major dialects and constant moving goalposts as various groups gained and lost power. England didn’t even have a single monarch until almost 200 years after Beowulf was (maybe, probably) written.

So 1066 a somewhat-French dude fought a war with the King of Norway and a bunch of English dudes and long story short that’s how Norman French (which is French with a heavy salting of Scandinavian languages and a soupcon of Celtic) started beating up Old English and eventually turned into ME. (In the General Prologue of the Canterbury tales Chaucer makes a joke that the Prioress’s French is more of Normandy than Paris which is a joke because she’s claiming to be educated in Fancy French but she’s really educated in the form of French that’s like hootin’ and hollerin’ down by the crick can I get a yeehaw).

The deal is that we’re now approximately 4000 permutations away from whatever resembled a lingua franca in England before the Norman Conquest. Our surviving stock of Old English manuscripts is minuscule. Tolkein probably wrote more words in the languages he constructed than exist in OE.

OE is dead. We’ve reconstructed it as best we can and have an okay idea of how the language worked but our understanding of the vocabulary is. A little weird. There are some extremely specific words that kind of just don’t translate to the modern world (“bag specifically for carrying stolen goods” is a decent example). There are some words for which the context is kind of fucked (so if you wanted to translate a proposal it’s hard to ask someone to be your wife if “wife” and “woman” are the same word and “wif” is added to a lot of words to make them apply to women (we retain this in “housewife,” but generally don’t use things like “fishwife” anymore))

But, say you want to learn and translate anyway, what do you do? You make friends with a bunch of nerds and we’ll share our hoarded dictionaries with you. Even the really old ones.

REALLY old.

Actually I don’t have my 1820s Old English dictionary handy so have this one from 1916 instead.

Here’s a site that will translate ModE to OE or OE to ModE as you choose.

The University of Texas at Austen Linguistics Research Center has an online course for learning OE.

Here’s a whole-ass OE textbook.

Some nerds made a podcast about learning OE.

And here’s a very, very short look at the language if you’re thinking of looking into it more.

But if you don’t have time to study a whole new language and want to get something translated fast I recommend finding someone on their way to Kalamazoo and offering them twenty bucks because it’s a hard economy out there for Medieval Studies grad students.

Uh.

Anyway.

[cursewoodrecap]

Session 23: Medical Ethics

Y’all ever been to college?

Our new friend Vigdor has just pulled a pale, twitching human leg out of a poster tube, sheepishly admitting to Valeria that it’s his own.

Valeria blinks at it. “Well, it doesn’t appear to be bleeding demons, so that’s good?”

Shoshana sticks her head in the door, and has to pause to take in the sight. “Uh, bruh? Bruh? I have questions. Is that yours? I mean, like, yes, you HAVE it, but was it attached to-“

“That’s a bit tricky? It was amputated twice.”

“Twice?!”

“Once from me, and then, well, um. Once from an amalgam of sewn together body parts?”

(Gral and Shoshana pile into the room, because Oh, Lore?)

“When I was in the swamp, we were fighting a bunch of zombies led by this particularly nasty undead guy. We called it the Wailing Wight. At first it was just the usual undead hordes, but then a local leatherworker was found, torn apart and harpooned every which way, half his limbs torn off and stolen. After that, we started getting attacked by stitched together abominations cobbled together from human and animal pieces. I was there just trying to help the villagers, being a doctor and all. But that’s when I lost my actual limbs.”

“They got stolen, like the leatherworker’s?”

“I had to chop them off. Which, for the record, is not a fun time? The Wight’s harpoon has a kind of poison that rots everything it touches. So I had to amputate or, like, die. So I cut them off and his zombies, uh, stole them. And I managed to get one back? Kind of a long story. I don’t know how I recognized it, but – I guess I know my own leg like the back of my hand? Now I’m taking it back to Sturmhearst. There’s a weird fluid inside it; I want to study what’s going on with that so we can take care of the nastyboy in the swamp.”

“Well, I am generally against nastyboys,” says Shoshana, poking his foot in the ticklish bit. It squirms at her.

We’re headed to Sturmhearst anyway, so traveling together seems reasonable. We think about taking Fun Key Shortcuts, but that could backfire spectacularly, so we’ll play it safe and go the normal, boring way.

In the morning, we head downstairs. The inn is trashed. The stalwart barkeep Rene is not there; instead there’s a young elf sweeping out what debris he can. As we grab breakfast and the young fellow thanks us over and over for saving his friend’s life, Vigdor awkwardly wanders around casting Mending on chairs and tables that got a little too close to the tentacles and chainsaws. Shoshana doesn’t really do non-destructive magic, but she slips the barkeep some gold for repairs.

Vigdor’s too lopsided for a horse, so he’s gonna hop on in our cart. He’s very taken with the Eyegis, poking at it with fascination. “You can see the blood vessels in the eyes, despite no source for a blood supply! Do they have tear ducts? Have you ever seen the shield produce tears? Can you make it cry?”

Valeria gets very uncomfortable with this line of questioning and turns the eyes back into painted ones, put off by a Weird Stranger gettin’ all up in her business. Gral distracts him by asking about his fancy metal limbs.

Vigdor goes full technobabble on how the runes and machinery work. “Well, there’s three different kind of magical actuators on each joint, and they act as conduits for the dilithium crystals-” He knows the details secondhand from Bjork and none of us speak robotics, so if he ever needs serious repairs he’ll have to bring them back to Sturmhearst for the engineers to take a look at.

Valeria knows a bit about Jotunn runesmithing, but she’s never heard of it working to this degree of precision; before, she’d only heard of stuff like boats that row themselves, or a peg leg that has a little extra articulation. These are fully actuated limbs!

Val checks if the limbs are the same metal as our space wrench, but nope, they look like completely normal everyday metals. She’s not gonna inspect further, because she has RESPECT, unlike SOME people.

(“Hey, I didn’t try to pry the eyes open or anything!” Vigdor protests.)

She does notice one thing, though: Valeria recognizes runes from most magic systems even though she doesn’t know them well enough to use; her sister studied magic for a long time, so she knows what they look like. There’s one elaborate rune that appears on both Vigdor’s forearm and leg that is of no origin she’s ever seen.  

“How long’d it take Bjork to build this thing?” Shoshana asks, squinting at Vigdor’s kneecap.

“Well, I was unconscious for a good bit of it so…between a week and 2 months? He was already working on it when I, uh, had to amputate.”

“…did you KNOW you were gonna wake up with those things on?”

“Oh! Yeah, yeah. It took a while ‘cause the original blueprints they found were for somebody, like…really short for a human or really tall for a halfling? Something in between. Bjork had to resize the whole model to fit a human.”

“He, uh, FOUND blueprints?

“I can’t imagine he’d have made blueprints for a person who didn’t exist? It was all proportioned very strangely. I don’t know too much about it, you’d have to ask Professor Bjork.”

(One of the players asks if the strange rune, perhaps, says ISTC in a language the characters don’t know. It DOES, and we’re all very pleased with ourselves for previous-campaign references.)

The long road stretches on before us, and we have plenty of time to talk as we spend a week or two heading north toward the coast. We fill Vigdor in on the four flavors of Curse and the concept of the Prisoners, and that we suspect there’s major Key nonsense going on up at the university. (Heh heh, “major key.”)

Vigdor and Shoshana bond over being locals. Why are foreigners so weird about trolls?

Vigdor really, really wants to look at Twombly’s glasses. We explain to him that the Key could take his desire for knowledge and turn him into a cackling, dimension-hopping madman with a few extra eyeballs. He still wants to play with the glasses. Valeria protectively hides the Key map, just in case, flashing her Hunt fangs at anyone who asks about it.

After like a week of pestering everybody, Vigdor gets to look at the glasses. Disappointingly, when not looking at the Key map, the colorful lenses just make everything look slightly more those colors. Maybe Gral’s lutestrings look weird, but that could be the placebo effect. He tries flipping around the many lenses in different combinations, and finds that all of them make him look absolutely ridiculous.

Eventually after many days of travel, we can smell the ocean and the distinctive stench of a large number of humans living in one place. Vigdor takes in the familiar sight of his college hometown. Shoshana is dumbfounded that this many people can live on top of each other, while Valeria thinks it’s a quaint little town.

Up to the west, Sturm Castle squats on a cliff above the city, like a big hippo of knowledge. It looks like it was once a reasonable castle shape, but it’s had new wings and towers built onto it haphazardly until it’s a weird sprawling network of jammed-together architecture. By the edge of the cliff, in one of the more sensibly-built sections, a majestic lighthouse beams out over the bay. In the city below, the largest building appears to be a grand temple, with its roof carved in the shape of an open book. The perimeter of the city is outlined by strange wooden and metal towers, two or three stories tall with conical brass roofs.

Eh. It’s only got one castle, so it can’t be that good of a city compared to Aurentium.

Our cart is briefly stopped for a quick examination at the gate by a friendly city guardsman. He’s flanked by two of the same enormous owl-masked guards we saw accompanying Quercus and Ulmus. “Hi, welcome to Sturmhearst, folks! What brings you here?”

We all awkwardly try not to look at Vigdor’s leg bag.

“I’m, uh, here to visit Dr. Emily Thorpe?” he tries.

“Oh, visiting the university. Don’t need yer life story. Where you stayin’? I can recommend some inns. Oh, and check out the Scholar’s Temple while yer here!” He hands us a brochure from the Sturmhearst Tourism Board and steps back. “ALL RIGHT BIG GUYS, LET EM THROUGH!”

The owl guards don’t move.

“Oh, uh, I mean –“ He fishes in his pocket and pulls out a whistle. “Lemme see if I can remember how the doc told me to do this.” He blows a few sharp notes on the whistle, and the owl guards promptly step off the road to let us through.

Huh.

Vigdor makes an investigation check on those guards, who definitely weren’t around back when he was in school. They’re pretty bulky for humans – no, honestly, they’d be bulky even for goliaths. He’d heard a story from Professor Bjork that the school was hiring goliath mercs and dressing them in owl masks, but the professor had sounded like he hadn’t believed it much. Supposedly they’re silent because they don’t speak the language, but Vigdor’s pretty sure Bjork speaks Jotunn, so that excuse doesn’t quite hold up.

Once we’re out of the guards’ earshot, Gral pulls a huddle. “Vigdor, the Key’s a more recent influence, so let us know about anything new or significantly more abundant – that’s where we’ll need to search.”

Vigdor hmms. “The big brass towers weren’t here before. And the owl guys didn’t used to be a thing.”

Gral cuts another glance back to the owl guards, considering. “…How much of a faux pas is it to remove a Sturmhearst person’s mask?”

“I mean, if you’re dealing with the plague, it’s kind of a dick move? And dangerous? But most people – it’s like, the same rudeness of grabbing someone’s hat or jacket. For some people it’s badge of honor or superiority, y’know, how amazing they were to get through the gauntlet of Sturmhearst. But mostly it’s a practical tool of the job. We’re not, like, afraid to show our faces.”

Gral nods. “So you wouldn’t have to duel them, then.”

“W-what?”

“Oh, with bards it’s like ‘you are not deserving of your title’ and you have to duel about it. You know, like, how dare you slander my name, I’ll have to fight you for my honor?”

“Oh, uh, no, nothing like that. The mask is proof of office, that’s all.”

Before we get investigating, though, it’s late and we should rest. Vigdor wasn’t a palling-around-town type, but he rolls a nat 20 and knows the best inn in the city – not one of those touristy places on the square; the best-kept-secret on a side street that only the locals and regulars know about.

We have a lovely night around the docks of Sturmhearst. Shoshana spends like fifteen minutes just staring out to sea, because they MAKE boats that big???? This much water even EXISTS????? There’s a dragonborn ship from Aurentium, a goliath ship from Jotunhein, a couple of Galwan freighters, and even a ship crewed by colorful macaw aarakocra. (History check: while the Aquilians mostly died out, some of the ground-based aarakocra cultures survived. Valeria’s met macaw traders before in Aurentium; they tell lots of stories and do GREAT impressions.)

Valeria, meanwhile, holies some ocean water. They say Galwan clerics swear by holy seawater; salt repels demons, right? It’s gross harbor water but, whatever, it’s holy now. She also beats a sea captain at Man-go, presumably dock style. The inn’s equipped for foreign travelers, so it’s got a whole bar of draconic and goblin spices!

Gral, meanwhile, discovers the inn is near a bath house and enjoys finding out what a sauna is.

Morning comes, and Sturmhearst U awaits. Vigdor knows the main campus has the colleges of Engineering, Science, and Medicine, while the satellite campus across the bay houses the college of Ethics, which includes humanities like economics and history.

Valeria rolls for Order of the Rose knowledge. The Order actually has an arrangement with Sturmhearst when they’re working in Valdia – whenever the Order is sent on disaster relief, some Sturmhearst ethicists are sent to help coordinate. Valeria’s never worked with them personally, but the impression she’s gotten from her fellow knights is Not Great. From what she’s heard, they’re supposed to do triage and help direct the knights, but it seems like they spend the whole time sitting around debating absolutely horrible things. “Hey, if we brewed up some necromancy, could we use the skeletons of plague victims to transport supplies without spreading the infection?” Apparently they just sit around in corners debating whether that kind of shit is kosher or not, without ever actually DOING anything.

Also ethicists wear white instead of black like most Sturmhearst scholars, which is just pretentious. We then poke fun at an Order of the Rose knight calling anyone else pretentious.

Vigdor studied at the College of Medicine; he’s a doctor. But that’s not where he’s taking the leg.

“Why not Medicine? I mean, it’s a human body part, innit?” Shoshana asks.

“It’s…I have some concerns…regarding the, um. So, along with this leg, my arm was stolen, right? Not long after the arm was stolen, the sewn-together amalgams got a lot, uh, cleaner.”

We stare at him.

“…as if whatever stitched them together had my medical training.”

…oh.

“I’m a little hesitant taking that info to the College of Medicine,” he admits.

“Why?”

“There’s a lot of ‘for the greater good’ stuff with the College of Medicine sometimes. The College of Ethics keeps them in check. Anyway, there’s actually this thaumochemist I want to take a look at it.”

(We’d know the discipline as alchemy, but she hates that. She’ll go on a whole tirade about it. Somebody yells “Full Metal Thaumochemist” and we accidentally take a commercial break. We’ll never get tired of that joke.)

More of those owl guards are at the door, supervised by a businesslike white-coated member of the College of Ethics. His mask is a bit more abstract than the ones we’re used to; not modeled after a bird face like the regular scholars’. He lets Vigdor in with no problem, though he’s a bit suspicious of the rest of us. We’re with a doctor, though, so he’ll let it slide. “Welcome to Sturmhearst, may your visit be enlightening.” He does the same whistle we heard before and the guards step aside. Gral’s a string guy, he can figure out the notes easily enough but he doesn’t whistle.

“Nothing goes on here without Ethics knowing about it, huh,” Gral observes.

More owl guards are stomping around, some carrying heavy objects. Vigdor knows where he’s going, but asks an owl guard for directions, as an experiment. The owl guard doesn’t even notice him. He steps in front of the guard, who just steps around him very politely.

The castle is a nightmare to navigate, like Hoeska, but we have an expert tour guide. “The old keep, the part that used to be a castle – that’s where all the 101 classes are and the whole working hospital. All the additions are laid out super weird, and then there’s the tunnels underneath. The Chem students had WILD parties down there, they brewed up all SORTS of stuff. The lighthouse is a real lighthouse, but it’s also where admin is, and the dean’s and headmaster’s offices. Oh! DO NOT cross the librarians. Each college has its own library? Like, theoretically they share the whole collection, but which college keeps which books is kind of a blood sport…”

Shoshana and Gral hang back, feeling out of place. “Bards don’t really have a college, exactly?” Gral explains. “It’s more of a pilgrimage. I met the elders of each village and they imparted wisdom upon me?”

Shosh feels like an uneducated hick even by that standard.

We take a hairpin turn in one of the Science buildings and run into Professor Quercus! Or at least someone with a bird mask and a similar voice, chatting with some other masked scholar. “Ah! Yes! We made a lot of excellent discoveries before we started to run into problems – you see, there hadn’t been an event in some time, but if we could get in there to the source, we could really – well, my goodness! These are the people I was telling you about, who gave me such wonderful notes!” Quercus turns to us, sounding rather delighted. “I certainly didn’t expect to see you here. Welcome to the world of knowledge! What brings you here? I thought you were having adventures and derring-do!”

“Well, it turns out our adventures led here!” Gral tells him.

Quercus nods enthusiastically. “I’d show you around, but I rather need to speak to the bursar! If you need anything, I’m sure you can find my offices without too much problem. And please, if you’ve encountered any interesting monsters, I’d love to hear details! Especially if you have samples!” Despite his keen excitement, Professor Quercus rolls a four and fails to notice our Shusva accessories.

“If you ever need a cup of tea and a biscuit, you’re welcome to stop by my office! I’d be more than happy to speak with you! And if you could do me a favor – well, I wouldn’t mind having you with me when I speak to the bursar! See, our expedition to Holzog has hit a bit of a snag. The events with that mist stopped happening, you see. Luckily, we managed to identify which house you were going to, and we were all set to investigate, but then the Baroness put a squadron of those damnable Condotierri to prevent us getting in – “

Gral shrugs, deliberately casual. “I don’t know why you’d go back; there’s not much to see besides what’s already in the notes.”

(Vigdor immediately rolls insight to see if Gral is lying. Unfortunately for him, bards are excellent liars.)

“Anyway. The bursar’s giving me an earful about continuing to fund the expedition. I’m considering withdrawing from Holzog and asking him to redirect the funds into a different project! For example, lots of interesting monsters have been seen around Barroch lately!”

Yes, definitely, we want him to go somewhere that’s not a Tempting Key Portal. Valeria and Gral tag-team Persuasion checks to sell him on interesting cases of monsters we’ve heard of around Barroch. If we’re fuzzy on the details – well, all the more reason to have someone get out there and take a closer look!

Quercus is rather taken by the idea. “If you would, Mr. Duu –“

“Um, actually, Duu is the tribe, my family’s name is-“

“-yes, if you could write me some letters, I might find it useful making the acquaintance of the locals while setting up camp. Sturmhearst hasn’t established an official relationship to your people yet’”

Gral agrees to write up a formal letter explaining the mission of Sturmhearst and the expedition to make introductions a bit smoother; the word of a bard will go a long way in gaining the cooperation of the orcs of Barroch. He’ll do a personal letter of introduction for Quercus, and a general letter to Shieldeater’s administration to explain who the heck these weird bird people are.

“Wonderful! Bring it by my office!” He gives us directions that make NO sense to anyone but Vigdor. We’re pretty sure several of those compass directions aren’t real words?

“Oh, and if you see an angry tall woman stomping around, tell her I’m not here! She’s mad at me for some reason I can’t discern. Good day!”

He scuttles off, presumably to hide.

We definitely want the gossip on that – Ulmus was mad at him about funding, and she definitely dissed his field of study. Is this what academia is like?

Vigdor confirms that the professors have all kind of weird beefs, interdepartmental politics, and personal feuds. “One of my professors gave me a B- in amputation – shows what he knows – purely because I was taking some classes outside the College of Medicine and he got all offended. It’s a lot of politics and bullshit, they’re all more concerned about their careers and publishing than actually important stuff.”

We find a door with a brass plaque: Dr Emily Thorpe, Thaumochemist. There’s a paper list tacked to her door with a list of courses: “Intro to Potion Brewing,” “Principles of Alchemy Thaumochemistry”

Vigdor knocks. “Yes, who’s there? Come in!” a voice calls.

“It’s Vigdor! Vigdor Gavril!”

“Ah, Vigdor!” A halfling woman in the requisite bird mask waves from behind a counter where she’s handling a set of proper Movie Science bubbling beakers and flasks. “Yes, you sent me that letter! You had something ‘interesting’ for me!”

“Yes, and you will see why I couldn’t be more detailed!”

She notices his metal arm as he starts pulling open his heavy waterproofed case. “Oh! I heard that Professor Bjork was giving you his prototype! How’s it working?”

“They’re loud and heavy and uncomfortable sometimes, but I have limbs! Can’t complain! But then I, uh, found one of my limbs again.”

He goes over to an open table and pulls out his entire-ass leg with a flourish, plus vials of hair and blood and strange unidentified liquids. Her eyes widen.

“Ah, this is yours!” She watches his toes wiggle. “Well, you don’t see that every day.”

“Yeah, I found it stitched to some kind of unholy undead abomination.”

“And that explains the Knight of the Rose. Hello, Kyr.”

“Kyr Valeria Argent, at your service!”

“Dr. Emily Thorpe, at your service as well, I guess? Pardon the mess in my lab, it’s not much but it’s home. Hand me that vial?” She pulls out a syringe and takes a sample of not blood, but oily black liquid, from the leg. “It will take some time, but I can write up a thaumaturgical profile without much difficulty. Do you mind if I keep it?”

“You can hang on to it. But I would appreciate discretion.”

“Yes, this will stay between me, your friends, and – oh, this is Hugo, he’s my teaching assistant. He’s been helping since the school was mobilized.” She turns to Vigdor’s clearly uneducated hick friends (not you, Valeria, you’re very fancy) and explains:

“In times of crisis, the University turns from education to innovation. Were this a disease, we’d be researching cures! If demonic, we’d be researching weapons or dimensional banishment. We haven’t really received direct orders this time, so everybody is doing their own thing, which I can’t say I mind. Mostly I’ve been helping other researchers with the practical application of their theorems.”

She scribbles out a hasty list. “Hugo, if you can go to the library and put these books on order? The Vigmar and the Auspelius especially would be useful, but don’t let the librarians kill anyone over them. And the Principles of Advanced Anatomy – tell them I won’t ask. But I do need it.” The grad student nods and hustles out of the room.

(Shoshana insights, out of paranoia. Hugo’s a good egg, though he might refer to thaumochemistry as alchemy.)

“Now, Dr. Gavril, do you want this leg back? How intact-“

“Want it back? Like, in the abstract, or on my body?”

She pulls out a vial of bubbling acid. “I’d like to put some of this on it and I’d like to see what happens.”

He blanches slightly. “Uh. Um. I have some proprietary-“

“Aw, no acid then,” she grumbles, stowing the acid with an audible sigh.

“Only do something you would do to living person’s leg. That they would survive!”

“How would I know? I’m a chemist, this is only, like, my second dead person!” She pauses. “…well, fifth.”

Shoshana starts looking around at all the alchemy equipment curiously. Everything here is clearly labeled with numbers, and letters that feel like numbers, and complex formulae, which hedgewitch potionery doesn’t really account for.

There’s a knock at the door. “Ah, that must be Hugo. Come in!”

Valeria instinctively body-blocks the leg from view.

It is not Hugo. In walk 3 white-clad ethicists. The gentleman at the front is in fancier robes – we suspect he’s the kind of fellow who has tenure – and he wears a powdered judge’s wig atop his mask. We immediately don’t like it. His two companions peer around the lab – one has a jeweler’s loupe built into the lens of his mask, and the other is carrying a big chime with runes carved into it, clearly a magic item of some sort.

“Dr Thorpe,” the leader intones.

“Sorbus,” she replies disdainfully.

“I see you have guests, is now a bad time?”

“Is it ever a good time?” Emily makes a point of tending to her samples and beakers busily.

“I suppose not. We have come to ask a few follow-up questions. Have you been visited at all by Professor Matthias Macker? Has he followed up on the project you were working on together?”

“I told you, no! I had no potions strong or precise enough for what he needed, and he’s never spoken to me since. That was months ago!”

“And no one has seen him since then. You understand why we need to know what you discussed.”

“Yeah, not since you quarantined the whole surgical wing!”

“That is not what I’m asking about. Has Macker’s assistant Greta Ruble visited you?”

“No. She’s a good kid, though, don’t hassle her.”

“We are simply making sure she is not a danger.”

Emily sputters angrily. “A danger to who?!”

“I cannot tell you that.” He turns to Valeria. “Kyr, it is always a pleasure to see a member of the Order here. I suppose if you’re here we can be assured nothing… unethical is happening,” he says, unpleasantly oily. “I am Professor Rigmor Sorbus of the College of Ethics; I lecture on legal and judicial ethics. These are my assistants, Charles and Pippin.”

Valeria bows with the precise degree of politeness required. “Kyr Valeria Argent, at your service.”

“A pleasure to make your acquaintance. In these times of mobilization, it falls to us as ethicists to supervise our colleagues’ noble efforts. Please, I implore you: if you see anything untoward or suspiciously unusual, I request you report it to the nearest representative of the College of Ethics.”

Emily butts in. “What happened to Eric Pelbort, his other assistant?”

“Mr. Pelbort has transferred to the College of Ethics and is assisting us with some research. We will let you know if that changes.” He tells her dismissively. “Kyr Argent, the College of Ethics has always been proud of our long association with the Order, and I would like to extend our deepest condolences for the tragedy of the Crusade. Should you have need of any assistance whatsoever, do not hesitate to ask. Our offices are on the satellite campus across the bay. If you were to visit, I’m sure many would love to speak to a paladin of the Order of the Rose.”

“We have business here, but I might be able to make time to stop by,” she equivocates.

“Very well. I will let you all get back to whatever it is you’re doing with that leg,” Sorbus says, turning neatly on his heel and taking his leave, his toadies hurrying in his wake.

(Yes, you guessed it: That was Professor Rowan, with his Tort Wig and his assistants Pip Loupe and Chime Charles.)

“Those guys give me the creeps,” Emily grumbles. “They used to be fine, but lately they’ve been doing this whole inquisitor act.”

Vigdor’s always known these guys as douchey blowhards. But now they’re douchey blowhards with AUTHORITY.

There’s always been a divide between Ethics and the other three colleges roughly the size of the harbor! The sciences don’t believe in debate, they believe in experimentation! Anyone who can spend an entire week talking without action is wasting time and breath. The College of Medicine thinks even less of them – they just get in the way of progress!

(IRL we all respect medical ethics, but Sturmhearst WAS founded on a fine tradition of graverobbing and leeches.)

Vigdor is primarily a surgeon, or he was, when he had two fully functional hands. (Two players at once: “HE GOT DR STRANGED!”) He had quite a few classes with Macker, the chair of the surgery department. Most people didn’t like the guy, except his surgical grad students who would defend him to the death. A bit of a hardass about proper procedure, but that’s probably not a bad quality for a surgeon. He was a local institution, so it’s pretty alarming he’s somehow gone rogue.

“His whole lab was quarantined?”

“The whole teaching wing, actually,” Emily tells us.

“Are there people in there? Some kind of sickness?”

“Not that I’ve heard. Ethics just put guards outside the labs and blocked everyone from going in. They’ve done it to a couple places around the school recently. The excuse is that someone was doing ‘unsafe experimentation’ that’s ‘poisoned the area’ or something?”

Wack. “How long have these quarantines lasted?”

“They don’t really end? A couple stopped after a few months, but some have been there for a year! Nobody goes in or out. Sometimes the white coats go in, but it’s pretty rare and they don’t stay long.”

“Is that what all the guards are for? Where’d they all come from?” Vigdor asks.

“Medicine used to be the ones, uh, hiring them.” (A quick insight roll notes that she hesitates on the phrase “hiring.”) “Lots of them still answer to whoever they were originally assigned to. But recently Dean Chidor from the College of Ethics took over that whole program, so a lot of the newer ones answer primarily to the ethicists. I mean, they all dress the same, so it’s kinda hard to tell? I haven’t asked a lot of questions, I’ve been trying to keep my head down since the whole thing with Macker.”

“What actually happened with him?”

“He’d been acting weird for a while,” she confides as she starts sticking pins in the leg and wiring them to a voltage generator. “He’d been working on something, some kind of extreme surgery – I think he was looking into a method of surgically removing Curse corruption. He was hitting roadblocks, though; he called in me and Alma Ulmus, who’s a College of Medicine bigwig.”

“Yeah, we met her in Bad Herzfeld!”

“I heard she’s here again, stalking around the halls complaining about funding. She knows more about his project than I do. Anyway, Macker sent me requirements for a healing potion he was gonna administer as part of some surgical procedure. I couldn’t get anything as powerful or precise as he needed. I’m a thaumochemist; I don’t know medicine that well. So it was beyond me to do that amount of gross tissue damage repair as controllably as they wanted it. I mean, I made some pretty nice innovations as far as the theory of potioncrafting, I’m hoping to get published as soon as it goes to peer review.

“But I couldn’t do what he needed, and eventually I got shut out of the project. Then one day he vanished. Alma set off for Bad Herzfeld and Macker stopped coming out of his lab. His assistants were still going in and out, but not long after that, the ethicists quarantined the place.”

“Has anyone else been quarantined?” Valeria asks.

“People from all three colleges got hit. I dunno about other ethicists, I haven’t heard about them quarantining anything of their own. But everyone else has. A group of engineering students were building a defense system to be deployed out to the Scar, and all of them got quarantined. Here in my department, Dr. Vilman – remember him? Stupid goatee, did a lot of stuff with crystals? – got shut down. Sometimes they quarantine the whole lab; sometimes they just shut down a project and everyone working on it gets a ‘guest lecture position’ over in Ethics. Sorbus said they got one of Macker’s assistants, Eric Pelbort. He had another one, Greta Ruble, but I guess she’s given them the slip.”

Emily’s got experiments to do on that leg, so we’ll let her get to it. As we head out, Gral asks one last question. “What’s up with those guards, by the way? Why do they only respond to those whistles?

“Uhhhh,” she says, as we fail our persuasion check. “They, er, don’t speak very good Valdian. Mostly foreigners, goliaths, the like. The whistles get their attention.”

Gral sighs and doesn’t push it. Vigdor’s already making plans to pickpocket a whistle. Valeria, since she has a direct invite to talk to the ethicists, considers the unheard-of paladin approach of Just Asking Them Directly.

First, though, Vigdor wants to check out the quarantine of Macker’s lab; he knew that professor well, and we’re all curious what’s been going down.

We walk on over to the surgical wing to case the joint. There’s a single owl guard blocking the hallway, presiding over a small barricade. A pleasant sandwich board sign states “Area quarantined by College of Ethics, apologies for the inconvenience.”

We try to walk in and the enormous guard holds out a hand to stop us. Shoshana tries to wiggle around him, like a cat trying to get at your dinner, but he impassively blocks her every move.

Gral tries a smoother approach. He begins with small talk; the guard doesn’t even twitch. He starts asking prying questions about the surgical ward. No response. Fine, then: he switches to Orcish, a sinister undertone weaving through his voice as he uses Words of Terror.

An insight roll reveals completely unchanged body language.

“Either they’re immune to fear or not a humanoid,” Gral reports back. “Not a single emotion. Definitely not goliath mercenaries.”

“Tryin’ to talk your way into the surgical wing?” says another chatty passerby. “Good luck. They got all the medical cadavers locked up in there and they won’t let us in.”

(Cadavers? Oh shit, we bet that’s the guard factory, theorize the players.)

“Oh, are you a med student?”

“Yeah. I work with Professor Herberts, or I used to, anyway. We needed a couple cadavers to do this comparison study about spleens; we got some weird ones from out in the wood, we compare spleens to see if place with thing don’t worry about it; need control spleen. And then these BIG DUMB IDIOTS wouldn’t let us in, and Herbert got transferred to the College of Ethics all of a sudden. He’s been gone a couple months.”

“How long do professors usually transfer for?” asks Gral.

“I mean, they usually pop over to give a lecture or two and come back by the end of the day.”

(Vigdor happens to remember that the College of Ethics also runs an asylum. They live in a big spooky castle and do dissections with guts and stuff, it can do a number on your head! Some of the ethicists have branched into the field of psychology. No reason to mention this when people are having extended stays on the ethics campus, of course…)

The student shrugs. “I gotta get to lecture. If you manage to get in there, any chance you can bring me back a couple spleens?”

We wave goodbye noncommittally, though Vigdor insists he can pop a spleen out of a corpse like a yolk from an egg. He’s a good surgeon!

Anyway, Vigdor went to school here, and the dice are on his side; he knows a side path through an old abandoned classroom into the surgical suite. He pops the lock on the door easily; all the undergrads used to go this way when slipping into lecture late, to get past the TA keeping track of tardies.

The guard is in earshot but facing the other direction, and he’s not even blinking, much less scanning around. Gral casts Silence on us and our very clanky party slips by easily.

Shosh sticks her head into the TA’s office. Nothing really stands out, but she swipes some interesting-looking notes from the desk drawers to look at later.

Meanwhile, Gral and Vigdor go into Macker’s office. The desk is an absolute mess, which is very unlike the guy Vigdor used to know. There are wheeled chalkboards crammed into the office, covered in scribbles and anatomical diagrams. Paging through the notes and glancing over the chalkboard, Vigdor makes a decent medicine check and can at least figure out what problem Macker was working on.

Based on what Dr. Emily told us, Macker’s trying to develop a surgical procedure. The issue is that whatever he’s doing would cause so much physical trauma that it’d kill the patient, and he’s looking for some way to prevent that. There are lists of healing options: formulas, spells, potions, nonmagical stabilization methods to keep the patient alive while various tissues are extracted from the body.

Gral’s unimpressed. Healing methods? That’s pretty tame for forbidden knowledge.

To Vigdor’s experienced eyes, this stuff looks mega-advanced and highly experimental, but Gral’s right – it’s not anything you’d scramble to censor.

Weirdly enough, the place doesn’t look ransacked, only disheveled and a little dusty. Macker’s notes haven’t been moved since he was here. Maybe this isn’t what the ethicists were after?

We head to cadaver storage while Valeria keeps watch. Cadaver storage is creepy as hell, but only because it’s, y’know, a room full of cadavers. A lot of the bodies, kept stable with Gentle Repose, appear to be Cursed, but that’s hardly weird. What’s so crazy they’d keep it hidden from everyone?

Vigdor opens the door to the dissection labs, Gral’s Silence deadening any ominous warning he might have had from the room beyond. Yes, the table here’s been recently used, and the bizarre symbols scrawled on the chalkboards have spilled onto the surrounding floor and walls, but Vigdor’s eyes are drawn to where the chalkboard peels away like skin to reveal a strange, multicolored, impossible space. The floor begins to take the shape of a stone hand that projects out into the shimmering void, joining a daisy-chain of enormous hands that form a walkway out to a marble platform floating in space.

Gral takes his Silence spell with him and runs to get Valeria.

Eyes starry, watching entire worlds and impossible shapes spinning through iridescent mists, Vigdor takes his first heady hit of Key taint.

As we cut session, Valeria considers that the ethicists may actually have a point.

[donttellthemangosiwashere]

Guess who watched Frozen2 yesterday and is back on her AU Juice

ok get this, using thomas’s rewrite for Frozen 1 but also 

you know that theory where Hans is like,,,, a chill dude, and the rock trolls are the evil ones and mind-controlled him into fuckin shit up so Christof would become king? also that

Spoilers for Frozen 2 so,,,, be wary

Virgil is Elsa 

Paranoid shut-in, afraid of scary ice powers, convinced himself he’s perfectly comfortable with being alone forever. Distrusts Dee immediately because he can sense the presence of magic in him, but he doesn’t know that’s what it is at first

Patton is Ana 

Emotionally volatile, quick to trust/immediately assumes the best in people, bit of a hopeless romantic

Roman is Christof 

Agrees to help Patton because “ur a prince, I cant let you do this alone it’s not noble of me to leave u hanging like that”

Remus is Roman’s funky twin brother who would rather just continue being a rock troll honestly

Kinda functions as Sven/Olaf/comic relief buddy character but they also DO have an Olaf and a reindeer steed to pull the wagon. He's hanging out with Patton and Roman during most of the movie

Deceit is Hans

Actually a prince from another country who’s like an ok dude and does grow fond of Patton immediately after meeting him, not evil until later

Logan is the head guard/politician guy with the big nose that was their advisor/guardian after their parents died, you know the guy

He's gonna be much more important in the story. He mostly tails Dee and slowly figures out that there’s something weird about him towards the end, and tries to protect Virgil and Patton from him. He cares about them so much, but he’s bad with emotions, so he’s not great at helping Patton with his loneliness or helping Virgil with his anxiety. Even when the rest of the kingdom starts to turn against them, he never doubts that Virgil is good

Character Thomas is Olaf because that’s cute as hell

He’s an embodiment of Virgil’s love for and protectiveness over Patton, but the longer he exists, the more he starts to develop his own personality and traits based on who he spends time with? So eventually Logan, Roman, Remus, Deceit, and Patton all become a part of him too, and he’s their little amalgamation snow son

(plot stuff under the cut. be warned, i put waaaay too much goddamn thought into this)

Ok so most of the first movie happens as normal. Thomas is just a lovable little anxious snow boy who walks around and dotes over and protects Patton, Reindeer is just a regular animal, Virgil runs away after a freakout, Patton goes to find him, etc etc etc

But when Hans is on the road in the first movie (when him and some soldiers have just captured Virgil from his ice castle and are marching back to the kingdom) their caravan is jumped by the rock trolls. Virgil doesn’t know whats going on cause he’s trapped in a carriage with no windows, but the rock trolls lure Dee away and then do the evil magic thing, they puppet him from then on to imprison Virgil and refuse to kiss Patton.

Roman and Remus drop Patton off and return to the woods, right? Roman’s being all reluctant about it, and Remus is like “im sure he still wants to be ur friend bro, it doesnt matter that he’s a prince and we’re common, you KNOW he doesnt care about all that” but Roman is not convinced, says he’ll ‘think about it’. They return to the rock trolls, and Remus sees the shaman in the process of puppeting Dee, in the “if only there was someone who loved you” scene where Patton is clearly dying. Remus runs to tell Roman what’s really happening, and they get caught. Roman stays behind to fight off the other rock trolls, buying Roman time to race towards the castle and save the brothers

The “if only there was someone who loved you” scene is different, tho. First of all, Dee doesn’t say that. He (and the shaman) are too smart to give up the bit until they are SURE they’ve won. Dee refuses to kiss Patton, but in like a soft way. (Got this scene from my friend Nat on discord, one of the reasons i made this au at all, its fucking KILLER) It’s more like a 

“i mean yes im fond of you but I don’t love you??? We just met” “but you proposed!” “We’re princes, looking for love in marriage is an idea I abandoned a long time ago. I figured I could at least make you happy, and an alliance between our kingdoms would be favorable.” “Oh...” “I could see myself falling in love with you, Patton, i mean that. But right now... If I could break the curse, I would. I’m deeply sorry.... Is there anything I can do to keep you warm?“ “No, there’s nothing...” “How dare your bother turn his magic against you? First he freezes the kingdom, then that golem, then he curses his own brother? (he does a whole schpeil where he convinces an emotionally broken and shellshocked Patton that Virgil is actually like evil and bad) ...Sit here, I will get you some blankets.” (Again, quote @glorifiedpigeon! She wrote a whole scene like this with Dee as Hans and Roman as Elsa, its bonkers as hell!! So good!)

While he’s gone “getting blankets” (Dee’s really just gonna leave him to freeze) Thomas sneaks in, and starts up a fire. Patton tells him not to do that cause he’ll melt, and he’s like “some people are worth melting for.” Thomas can tell Patton he’s upset and they talk about Virgil and how Patton doesn’t know what to think anymore. Thomas melts while keeping the fire warm for Patton, his sacrifice breaks the cold-poison-curse-thing and Patton is saved. The conversation Patton has with Thomas while he’s dying is weirdly familiar, and Patton realizes that it’s a 1 to 1 of a conversation him and Virgil had when they found out there parents died, when Virgil promised to “protect you no matter what, i love you.” Patton realizes Thomas was just a representation of Virgil’s brotherly love for him, which is cute as fuck, and then he goes to save his brother.

Virgil is visited by Logan, who busts him out of his cell, telling him he never doubted him for a second, but he’s wary of Dee. They run away together, panning to go out and find Patton and finally talk everything out. Dee reaches them, and calls Logan a traitor to the crown for helping Virgil escape, insisting that the fact that they are running away proves Virgil’s guilt. Logan tells Virgil to stay calm and keep a hold on his powers, and goes to confront Dee alone. Dee twists Logan’s words and just makes them sound more suspicious, eventually whacking Logan with the handle of his sword and knocking him out. Virgil is enraged, and attacks Dee. He almost kills him, but then Roman arrives, and stops Virgil from landing a killing blow. He’s about to explain what’s happening, and that Dee can still be saved and it’s not his fault, but Dee (with the rock troll magic being channeled through him) Silences Roman with a spell, so he cant speak. 

At the moment, Virgil is scared, distressed, and kinda cornered since he refuses to leave Logan’s unconscious body, and Virgil has no reason to trust Roman. All Roman knows about Virgil is that he’s wicked powerful and volatile, and he knows he can’t let Hans kill Virgil. This leads to the three of them all fighting each other 1v1v1, Hans trying to kill Roman and Virgil, Virgil trying to fend off Hans and Roman, and Roman trying to keep ether of the other two from killing each other while protecting himself.

Patton finally reaches them, and sees Roman knocked out and trapped in ice, incapacitated by Virgil, and Virgil is doin some ice magic at Dee, about to kill him, or at least wound him, to escape. Patton protects Dee, and is like “Yo no wait Virgil, you both have the wrong idea! He’s just scared of you, he’s not bad!” And Roman really wants to say “He IS bad but not in the way you think!”, but he’s still silenced. Virgil’s like “uh yeah he IS bad, look at what he did to Logan!” 

Finally, Remus catches up. He runs in from behind Dee and Patton, so they don’t see him approach until he yells to them about the trolls and whats actually going on. While they’re all distracted, Dee attacks Patton, holding him at knife-point and using him as a hostage to get Virgil to stop with the magics.

How is this fight resolved? Fuck if I know, I kinda wrote myself into a corner lmao. They are somehow able to incapacitate/trick dee, and Virgil uses his magic to override the trolls and free him from the mind-control.

And, at the end, there’s this cute little scene, after Patton is explaining everything that happened to Virgil and vice versa, where Patton’s like:

“Wait, wait! Can you resurrect Thomas??” and Virgil’s all snarky about it like “I dont know, wouldn’t that lessen the impact of his sacrifice? He’s like, a part of me, right? I think he’d like to go out all melancholy and poetic like that” “Virgil oh my goodness if you dont bring back my little snowman buddy I will cry here and now” “Okay, okay, jeez”

HERE IS WHERE THE SECOND MOVIE COMES IN

pretty much the only thing that changes is this: you know the voice thing that Elsa just starts hearing out of nowhere as a sign to fix past wrongs and whatnot? Virgil only starts hearing them now BECAUSE the rock trolls were blocking the signal from reaching him. And, Dee comes with them on this adventure and kinda redeems himself over the course of the movie by being a cool dude. And, the grampa who did the betraying was ALSO controlled by the rock trolls way back when; the rock trolls have been trying to destabilize the magic for years so that they could siphon more of it away from the spirits for their own personal use, and they got greedy once they had humans (re and ro) to work with, wanting political power as well. (Dee has been staying with them in their kingdom, as the ambassador from his country or whatever)

And for all you Shippers out there

the ships for this could be literally anything, dude. like literally any combination works, go fucking hogwild. Doesn’t even have to have a romantic ship or anything, it could just be everyone being platonic lovely babies.

[olivia-anderson-gifted]

Story prompt: Video game protagonist develops free will, discovers cheat codes.

People always say that cheating takes all of the fun out of games. ‘If you don’t work for it the ending won’t feel earned!’ they scream from atop their high horses.

Well, she had worked for the ending.

She had spent years of her life working towards it, building up her stats, obtaining the best items, making friends with the best party members. She had narrowly escaped her and her friends’ deaths multiple times. She had finally bested the bad guy! The good times were in sight, in a few years the world would be a utopia!

ESC.

Her vision flickered blinding white for a moment and she brought her hands to her eyes. She gave a quiet whine, a little ‘Not again!’, before opening them again.

She was floating, weightless in a void. In front of her were words in a language she couldn’t comprehend, brilliant white against the nothingness, and an arrow pointing between what seemed to be two options.

She barely even paid it any attention. Why would she? It wasn’t as if she hadn’t seen any of this before. It had been a surprise the first time, and even the second, but now? Ah, it’s just a run of the mill Darkness. A monthly occurrence, really. It would be over in a few minutes anyway.

At first, she didn’t think much of how long she was there. When you’re waiting for something it feels like it takes longer, after all!

Seconds... fade into minutes... fade into hours... fade into days...

What is taking so fucking long?

She found herself staring at the back of the words, struggling to understand the weird text. What language was that in? It certainly wasn’t anything like she’d seen before, the words were so... defined. What kind of weirdos would have thin letters? Didn’t they know blocks were the way to go?

Maybe it was because she was looking at it from behind. Those letters looked so... ghastly, there was no way that they really looked like that.

She started to drift over and she frowned as she pressed a hand to the nearest... whatever that was. She had seen it happen before, the weird way it had shaken before bringing her back to the normal world, maybe if she just...

Fuck that’s heavy! She pushed against it with all her might but it wouldn’t budge.

Eventually, she slumped against the abomination, resting her head against it and closing her eyes (not that closing her eyes changed anything). She opened them again after she had caught her breath and looked around for something, anything, to do.

Her eyes found their way to the arrow. She floated over to it and poked it, expecting it to be just like the text, only to scream as it attached itself to her pointer finger. The sudden weight pulled her down a few feet before she regained enough thought to stop herself.

Her gaze found itself to the immovable object and she hurled the arrow -- and herself along at it -- in its direction. She wasn’t expecting much, maybe a collision to snap herself awake (because this must have been some sort of weird nightmare), so it was a shock when she saw the ‘words’ budge.

She shot out of bed, hitting the cold stone floors beside it. Guess she was right about the nightmare part. She winced and closed her eyes to let them adjust to the new light.

Her right arm throbbed where she had thrown it out to catch herself but it was still useful enough to push her back to a sitting position. She cringed at the hard floors, wondering just where she had managed to fall asleep this time, and she sleepily ran her hands over the cracks in the stone.

Wait, cracked stone?

Her eyes shot open despite the slight pain.

God no.

She was back in a prison cell. The guard she had befriended years ago was scowling at her from the other side, knocking his baton against it like he’d done every day. Had he regressed? Taken a plea deal to get out of charges? Wow, he’d even styled his hair back to what it had been when he’d been working there originally.

“Wake up, 1111.”

“I have a name, yknow!” She hissed. “It’s --.” The world paused around her. The person in the cell opposite hers stopped changing midstep, the guard caught mid-blink, the fly next to her nose hanging.

But even weirder were the white words in front of her face. She wasn’t in the void. Those weren’t supposed to be there.

She opted to ignore the words for now, because she honestly didn’t know what to do, and reached up her hand to catch the fly since she’d actually be able to.

It was here that she noticed her left hand had something attached to it. She stared at the milky white boxes with their weird abominations and narrowed her eyes. Maybe the arrow hadn’t faded from her hand like she’d thought, it had just gotten smaller?

She reached out and tapped a few buttons.

“-- DHSHT0! My name is DHSHT0.”

Wait, what? The world was working again? And why had she said that was her name? Her name is DHSHT0!

Huh?

She couldn’t seem to remember her name anymore, just that weird amalgamation of sounds.

“I don’t care,” her friend sneered. “Just get moving, alright?”

He was gone. She had a strange sense of deja vu.

She looked back at her hands and raised her eyebrows when she saw that the boxes were still hovering there, waiting for use.

Deciding to just accept that as a part of life. Best for her sanity.

She slowly walked over to get a change of clothes and her eyes widened as she saw a familiar set of tally marks on the wall. Sure, this was pretty standard, but...

She counted them out and, with a sudden temptation, reached a hand out to scratch a new line.

129 days and counting, she thought.

She knew that thought. She knew those tallies. And she definitely knew what was going on now.

No.

No no no no no no!

She ran back to the front of the cell, pressing herself flush against the bars to get a good look at her friend. He hadn’t just cut his hair back, no, it was back to being that way. From the perfectly cropped hair to the bleached blond roots.

She was back at the beginning of this whole mess.

Oh, fuck no.

She’d rather be back in the void, thank you very much! She looked down at the pad in her hand and began typing furiously. She’d figured out where the enter key had been when she’d typed out her name, so now she inputted random combinations then pressed enter. She wasn’t sure what would work, or what could happen, but she didn’t care.

She blinked and suddenly she was in red armor. Fear climbed up her throat. Did this mean she worked for Him now? She typed more furiously.

A different friend of hers popped into existence in the cell for half a second before disappearing. Oops. Wish she’d actually paid attention to what she was typing.

She leaned herself against the wall and began typing again, more slowly to actually note what was going on.

The wall disappeared from behind her and she fell through, landing in a meadow. She was walking with the guard, whose mostly brown hair was now past his shoulders. She dropped her hand in surprise.

He looked affronted at something she said. “Oh, DHSHT0, come on! You can’t say that! That’s blasphemy.”

She smirked, reaching up to pinch his cheek. “Really? Okay.” She raised her arms to the heavens. “If that’s blasphemy, then He will strike me dead right now.”

There was a pause and she barely managed to think ‘wait, what were we even talking about? What’s going on? Haven’t I already done this before?’ before she turned to him, her cheeky grin stretching even wider.

“Well? I’m waiting.”

She brought her left hand up and started messing with the keypad again. This was all so weird. She’d done all this before, she recognized what was going on, but everything was off about it. They hadn’t done this in a field, she hadn’t been wearing these clothes, and she certainly hadn’t ever had real-life pauses happen before.

Or, as she was beginning to suspect, not real-life at all.

She kept her hand up to pause time and started walking towards town. She needed to get to a library, she needed to understand what the hell had happened to her hand.

But she couldn’t get further than a few steps ahead of herself before she hit some sort of invisible wall. She leaned all her weight against it but, again, it wasn’t enough to gain any ground.

She slid to the floor and rested her head in her hands.

Suddenly, a friend popped in front of her. She glanced down at the keypad, frowning. Had she accidentally tapped something out with her head?

“Hey, DHSHT0, wanna talk?” They chirped in that same pleasant voice they always had but now their smile felt weird. It was too wide, too teeth-y, and definitely didn’t reach his eyes.

“Not really, Johnny.”

“So, you thought you’d be clever and hack the game, huh?” He said, squatting in front of her and steepling his hands under his chin.

‘Hack’ the ‘game’?

“Bet DHSHT0 isn’t even your real name. Bet your real name is something like...” He tilted his head as if listening to a distant song. “Danny?”

She gasped, though she wasn’t sure why. That sounded right, though, so maybe that was her original name.

“I’m right aren’t I?”

She started to bring her hand up to type, to get out of there because something was seriously wrong with her friend and she didn’t like it one bit, but Johnny pushed it back down.

“Now, now, don’t leave! The fun is just getting started! And you want to have fun, don’t you?”

She knew by his tone that whatever ‘fun’ he had planned, she’d want no part of. She pulled her knees to her chest to get as far away from him as possible.

He grabbed her left hand again, pulling it towards him and drumming his fingers across the keypad.

She fell out of bed again, screaming. Just a bad dream, the worst dream ever. She pressed her hand to the floor, moving to get up, and her eyes widened as they felt stone.

She opened her eyes and looked around the cell. Her guard was there again, yelling, “Wake up, 1111, 1112!”

She blinked at the additional number and turned her head to see him. He looked so innocent, bobbing up and down on the bed, but there was nothing innocent about what was going on.

He smiled. “Hiya, cellmate.”

“Can’t you just call me my name?”

“And what was that again?” He cooed.

She had learned a few times ago that, for things to start, you needed the weird line thing at the beginning, so now she pressed it and inputted a random string of letters.

The last thing she saw before she moved was his annoyed expression.

She stood at the base of the mountain. She knew Johnny wasn’t supposed to be a character here yet, so she breathed a sigh of relief, only to turn and see him standing among the two who were actually part of it.

“You know, you could just enjoy the game for what it is,” he said.

She brought her hand up and he lunged for her. She dodged his swipe by pure luck and started running up the mountain because she knew for a fact that she was able to. She was having trouble doing precision typing on the run but she hardly cared as she reached a for it and...

WWWWWWWWWWWWWW--

Huh? Why was her keyboard typing out that one letter so much?

“Having a little trouble typing and running?” Came his voice and she screamed as she ran into him. She hit the ground and winced as pebbles scraped her hands and legs. She dusted at the debris on her hands.

“You should be behind me!”

“And you should be back in your cell, playing this game as it was intended. Life’s full of disappointments.”

He reached for her hand but she was already gone.

She was standing with all her friends, beaming widely as she lifted the crown onto her head. Wait a minute, a crown? When did this happen? Wasn’t she supposed to get a medal for her service, and wasn’t someone supposed to put it on her?

She turned around and stared at troops upon troops of red-clad soldiers.

No.

Johnny clapped from his spot beside her. There was a loud bing from beside her head, a box with a crown and some more of that weird language, and then it was gone.

She was in a white room with Johnny. She looked down at her hand to plot yet another escape, only to find her keypad was gone.

“Congratulations, Danny. You’ve gotten the secret ending,” he said with unenthusiastic jazz hands. “You’ve gotten the secret, now play the game as it is intended or hit ESC and log out for good.”

There was a long pause. Her keypad was gone. Even then, she didn’t know what ESC was in that language. She didn’t want to risk getting it wrong.

“Well?” He prompted.

She stared at her hand, waiting for it to pop up.

“Well?” He prompted.

“I want my old life back! I want the good ending with everyone happy and on the right side and--!”

“Well?” He prompted.

[eldritchsurveys]

983.

01. Do you believe in dream symbolism? If so, do you ever look up what certain things in your dreams may mean? >> I think the rub with dream symbolism is figuring out which of the symbols in your dreams are just common collective-subconscious sort of elements, and which are intensely personal symbols. At some point, a book of symbols will only get you so far -- you also have to know something about your own system of associations and memory triggers and such. Also, some things are common in my dreams simply because they were common in my waking reality -- like 80% of my dreams happen in weird amalgamations of cities I’ve lived in / been to, and that’s simply because I spent so much time in cities.

02. Is June typically a rainy month for you where you live? Do you tend to get more rainy days or sunny days? >> Not to my knowledge. June has been a predominantly sunny month in the four years I’ve been here.

03. Do you enjoy instrumental music? If so, what kinds (ex. electronic, classical, etc.), and what are some of your favorite instrumental songs? >> I do enjoy some. Clint Mansell and the various groups he works with are always going to be tops for me. I also listen to a fair amount of electronic music that doesn’t have lyrics, and I do like some classical songs as well.

04. Would you ever want to be a groupie? Why or why not? If you selected no, is it because of what people tend to think of them? >> I had a short phase for a while in my early twenties where I was fascinated with the rock scene of the sixties, seventies, and eighties, which included a sub-fascination with groupies. I read a lot about them during that time. I wouldn’t want to be one myself, because I’m just not interested in doing that sort of thing. Plus, I don’t think groupies are really a thing these days?

05. Who was the last person who exploded on you? What was the reason? >> I don’t remember.

06. Is there a certain name that keeps popping up in your life, like a name that many people you know have? >> No.

07. What is something that makes you sad every time you think about it? >> The Emet-Selch confrontation in FFXIV. Well, my envisioning of it.

08. Have you ever read a book, saw a movie, listened to an artist, etc. that everyone raved about but that you saw nothing special about after giving it a try? What was that? >> I read Twilight shortly before it became popular, didn’t find it remarkable in the slightest, and then when it blew up I was real confused, lol. But that’s just how it happens sometimes, whatever.

09. Do you like reading classic literature? If so, which books and authors are your favorite? Do you think any are overrated or shouldn't be praised as much? >> No. The only “classic” writer I have enjoyed is Oscar Wilde. I just don’t find the kinds of books that find themselves on English class curricula to be interesting, 98% of the time. I like what I like.

10. Have any of the members of your favorite band made any solo albums? If so, have you listened to them and do you like any of them? >> I’m going to answer for Zeal & Ardor: I don’t think so.

11. What is something you have a "love / hate relationship" with? What do you hate about it, and what do you love about it? >> I’m not sure.

12. Do you like things that are cliché or not? What kinds of things that are regarded as "cliché" do you like? >> I’m sure I like at least one “clichéd” thing. I mean, things become clichés for a reason, and that reason usually is its comparative universality.

13. What was the last quote you read somewhere, and who said it? >> I don’t remember.

14. When was the last time you were relieved and why? >> Probably yesterday morning after doing two tasks I didn’t feel like doing.

15. Do you believe in having guilty pleasures or not? >> I mean, I believe that other people have them. It’s not a concept that applies to me, though.

16. Have you or would you ever go[ne] to a concert with a giant sign with something written on it for the band? What did you or would you write? >> I used to think that was a more common thing than it actually is, lol. I think it probably was more common in the nineties... I have no idea, though. Anyway, no, I’ve never done this. That’s actually kind of obnoxious, isn’t it? Don’t the signs get in the way of people behind you that are trying to see the band?

17. Have you heard any song mash-ups (when they put two or more different songs together) that you like? If so, which? >> Absolutely, I’ve heard a lot of mashups that I like. One of my all-time favourites is a mashup someone did of Get Back by Ludacris and the battle music from Dragon Age: Origins. I’ve never heard anything so perfect in my life, lmao.

18. Is there anybody you seem to constantly run into somewhere? >> No.

19. What is something you love doing that you usually only get to do once a year? How about a specific event (besides holidays) that only happens once a year that you really enjoy? >> I mean, birthdays? I don’t know what else, especially anything that’s not related to a holiday.

20. How do you stop yourself from thinking about things that make you upset or depressed? Or do you just let yourself get upset about them? >> I can stop myself from spiraling if I catch it in time, but otherwise I can’t just... pretend that thoughts that make me upset don’t exist. And any time I try, it just makes things worse, so I might as well just think the thought and get it over with.

[im-anonymoose]

Puzzle

{Hey! Quick author’s note: this was an excerpt from an abandoned project, so there may be references to people / events / places that may not make sense. But, this was one of my favorite pieces and I really want to share it. If anyone is interested about my old project, I might make a post about it. But for now, here’s a piece that was, and still is, really important to me. Love, Moose.}

     It’s always strange being in a dream and recognizing it was a dream. At least, for Skylar it was. He still wasn’t all into the “lucid dreaming” thing. It felt surreal and most times, he didn’t feel well rested after. He still did it occasionally, and to be honest, he was getting better at it. 

     Only this wasn’t a lucid dream. It felt like it was, but he knew it wasn’t. It was any other night. He crawled into bed, scrolled on his phone for a half hour, then collapsed after tossing and turning a hundred different ways. He drifted off in the quiet of the night.

     No, it was more as if his consciousness had been ripped from his body and taken to another plane of existence. For one, he was in a house. He didn’t know whose, but it was lived in and slightly rustic; like a two story ranch-style house. He woke up in a fluffy bed. The room was barren aside from an empty dresser and some nightstands. He looked out the window next to the bed, only seeing blankness as far as the eye could see. It was like a white tarp was taped over the window.

     He grabbed a fuzzy bathrobe that was hanging on the bedpost and slipped it on as he walked down the stairs. He was greeted with a quaint living room. A fire crackled in the stone fireplace. There was a large oak coffee table. There was a woman sitting on the floor right in front of it, leaning against a couch. She looked up and smiled at him.

     “Skylar! How nice of you to join me. C’mon, come sit.” She said, scooching to make room. He kneeled down with her. 

     “Hey, Seraphina. What brings me here?”

     “Do you like puzzles?”

     He gave her a look. That wasn’t exactly what he was expecting. 

     “Erm, yeah, I suppose I do. Why?”

     “Because you,” she grabbed a box and dumped it on the table, “Are doing a puzzle.”

     “All of these pieces are blue.”

     She gave him a nod, “Right they are. Now, hop to it! I’ll get some hot chocolate.” 

     Before he could protest, she was already out the door. He was left with his impossible puzzle. Each piece was shaped completely different, but were all the same shade of blue. Sky blue. He was able to get at least the border done when Seraphina came back.

     “Huh, good start. Keep it going there, buddy.”

     He sighed in frustration, “What is this for? Why?”

     “Do your puzzle.”

     He sighed again, but obeyed. He knew better than to fight with a Spirit. Anytime he probed for answers or asked for help, she always told him to focus on the puzzle. The only question that was answered was if time was passing. It wasn’t a straight answer but “as much as we need” was reassuring. 

     Finally, he leaned against the couch, seeing his pile of pieces gone, but still some empty spaces. He shook his head angrily, “I can’t believe this. You force me to do a virtually impossible puzzle and there isn’t even all the pieces.” 

     “Yeah,” She mused, leaning over, “I wonder why that is.”

     He whipped towards her, angry. “You should know! You’re the one that made me do this pointless task! What did this even do for me? Nothing!”

     “Here,” She picked up a piece from her pile, completely ignoring his outburst, “Try this one.” 

     He snatched it, inspecting the shape and color. Sky blue. He spotted an empty space where it seemed like it would fit. He smiled triumphantly and set it down. It didn’t just lay in like expected, though. He had to force it in. 

     “It doesn’t fit.” Skylar said flatly. 

     “Yeah, I guess it doesn’t, does it? Here what about… this one?”

     Sky blue, similar shape, try it, fail. Another backhand comment, another sky blue piece. It kept going until her pile had been tried time and time again. 

     “Here, try this one.”

     He was about to lose his mind. He glared at her and snatched the piece. He was about to scowl at the unfinished puzzle too, when the piece caught his eye. 

     “It’s red.”

     “Crimson, actually. But yes. Red.”

     “This… this is a blue puzzle. A sky blue puzzle. It’s not going to fit.”

     “Have you tried it?”

     “Well, no, but-”

     “Go ahead.” She waved her hand to the puzzle. Skylar looked back at it, but obeyed nonetheless. He pressed it in where it looked appropriate and… it slid in effortlessly.

     “It’s… a perfect fit. I… is this some sort of prank?”

     “No. Here,” She pushed a pile of multicolored pieces towards him. Purple, beige, green, turquoise, white, chartreuse, burgundy, indigo. Practically every color was mixed in. And, strangely enough, some of them fit perfectly in his empty spaces. He leaned back, inspecting his almost finished puzzle. A few spots couldn’t be filled. There were big splotches of pure sky blue, but individual color dotted around. A purple mountains majesty corner. A chartreuse centerpiece. A canary yellow border. So on and so on. But sky blue was always the primary color. 

     “I don’t understand. Why? Why do this?” 

     “What did you notice when you began putting together the puzzle? What did you feel?”

     “I don’t know. I felt annoyed that you’d make me do it. I mean, it was ridiculous! They were all the same color. I thought it was impossible. But, because they’re all shaped funny, it made it a bit easier I guess.”

     “Mmhmm, I see. What about those? The miscellaneous sky blue ones?”

     “I…” He furrowed his brow. He felt like crying. Why did this make him so sad? “They look like they’d fit. They-they’re the same color. But, none of them did.”

     “And the colored ones?”

     “They fit perfect. Like they belong there. Do you think there was a printing mishap?”

     She laughed, “No Skylar. What if I told you, this puzzle was perfect at first. All sky blue. But, a few pieces went missing. So, we had to get new ones.”

     “But, then why didn’t you get the same color? That doesn’t make any sense! Now it looks all weird!”

     “These were the only pieces available.”

     “But then why… why? Why couldn’t you just…?” He choked on a sob. Why did this make him so upset?

     “Life is like a puzzle, Skylar. There are so many pieces and they all fit together nice and neat. When you’re a baby, your puzzle is perfect. But as you grow, you learn, when you learn, you lose things. Trivial things, important things, doesn’t matter. You lose parts of yourself. Friends, self-worth, innocence. It all falls away. And you get these empty spots. These empty spots that you just have to fill because you feel so empty. 

     “So you try. You order the exact same pieces. You try to find things identical to what you used to have. The outside is exactly the same. But the inside? The inside is different. It’s not like what you knew. Two faced friends, faking emotions, lying to yourself and others, throwing your life away into pointless endeavors that you know will lead nowhere. Because, yeah, to an outsider, it looks like your life is all together, but if they look closer, everything is forced into one big amalgamation.

     “So, desperate to just get put back together, you buy more pieces. They give you all the left behind ones. The ones found in other boxes, on the side of the road, in drains and gutters, in bushes, in goodwill bins. They give them all to you because they don’t know what to do with them. They don’t fit with theirs, so they’re worthless. But, some fit perfect for you. The outside is different, a color unlike your own, but they give you what you need. All working together, in tandem. Loyalty, respect, empathy, support, laughter, love, exploration, humility. 

     “People are like puzzles. They get torn apart every day. They rebuild themselves over and over, but lose pieces in the process. Some insist on keeping everything the same color, but nothing fitting properly. While others embrace the different parts of themselves. Parts they picked up and found and integrated. Things they learned and experienced. Because, yes, you lost innocence, but from it you gained knowledge. Yes, you lost friends, but from it you gain best friends. And yes, you lost self understanding, but from it you gained introspection. Even gaining bad things is good. It produces balance.”

     She looked at him. He was now crying freely. Tears streamed down his face steadily as he sniffled deeply, panting. 

     “I’m so lost Seraphina. I-I don’t know! I-some of the spaces aren’t…! I just, I don’t-”

     “Hey,” She hugged him close, “We don’t have everything figured out now. I’m still figuring things out, what with being out of the Void and all. See?”

     She pushed a cloth away revealing a puzzle similar to his, but primarily purple with more mismatched pieces. 

     “See? It’s okay. Now, I told you this because, well, you’re going to figure all this out someday. But don’t rush. Puzzles are fun! Enjoy them. And pick up any stray pieces you see. They might not fit for you, but could be perfect for someone else.”

     He nodded, taking a final look at his puzzle. Sky blue. 

     Skylar blue.