#insane things happened in this event i think i can't get over how his sprite glances at u while everything's happening KALKLDFGFSD

[ikiri]

"...it almost feels like they're drawing you in, doesn't it?"

[lushslug]

(the denki anon with the toshio nap ask) Honestly? I wouldn't mind if you told us your plot or your interpretation on the denki mystery au, i like reading your thoughts. ^^

denki … has so much, and so little going on, simultaneously. the events aren't really in a chronological order, and I feel like everything they reveal just begs more questions.

honestly I don't even know where to start. now that I think about it, I don't know that I really can give a rundown of the events without going all over the place and rambling while making no sense, so I'm going to focus on the characters, I hope that's okay! it will still be rambling and make no sense but at least I won't be misrepresenting the events. this notes page does the best job of telling you who's who, including some details that aren't necessarily spelled out in the events themselves, if you haven't given it a read yet (or if you want a refresher)

take all of this with a big ole grain of salt because these are my interpretations and extrapolations (read: delusions)

ozo, to me, is fascinating - he's osomatsu without his default insane brother complex, but something about him growing up without his otoutos really gives him an almost … hollow, depressed feeling, sometimes. I'm not sure how close he was to his dad before he disappeared, but I think that unsolved mystery and unresolved loss lingers. there's a scene where takashi steps into ozo's apartment and sees it's a mess, sees empty cans and goes to clean them up … and ozo tells him to leave one of them there, which I can only assume was his dad's. I think that having this loss really opens up the potential for him and hajime to bond over hajime's own lack of resolution with his missing father - and I think his own loss must've made it hit that much harder when toshio showed hajime's dad's body to him … he had to have realized, right? that the same thing probably happened to his dad? I also think that he probably works more than you'd expect from an AU osomatsu, even though there can't possibly be that many people asking for rides in and around akashika. he seems worn down in a lot of his sprites, always drinking coffee, like maybe he doesn't get enough sleep, either, insomnia or boredom or depression or whatever it is that's causing it. I imagine he takes late shifts driving for the cab company because what better thing does he have to do - other than maybe hit the bar or drink alone at home. I also like to think that over the course of getting to know his brothers and getting close to them, that there's the potential for him to work through his loss and depression and find support in those relationships

karatsugu is I think the one they explain the least about - iirc, we haven't seen his adoptive dad (outside of the orphan girl events). he's a bright shiny (possibly adhd) reporter who seems to have his heart in the right place even if he's also kind of a sparkly dumbass who can't read the room. the events themselves seem to imply that there might be something mysterious about him, and though I think that's interesting I won't lie I've kind of ignored that potential in favor of just playing with him being a little clueless and having a heart of gold. I think that, from the events, you can kind of read into the idea that he might be more resistant to the weird scary village bullshit than their other brothers. he DOES hallucinate when they eat the mushrooms, but beyond that he doesn't seem that bothered by the odd and unfamiliar. when he sees toshio with a bag on his head he's not startled, just excited! curious! and that's really charming. I like the idea of him commuting to the village often for visiting and for work, and then eventually getting a place closer to the village … my friend and I have also talked about the idea of him moving in with chorosuke after a while (for various reasons, including working on extensive articles regarding the village) - making regular trips back to tokyo for meetings, etc.

chorosuke …………….. chorosuke is everything. chorosuke has become an oc at this point for me lol. my delusions run deep but it's okay because they're good. going off of the events where we meet him, and choro's stiff, FORMAL personality, his father seems like such a strict, stern sort. I know that I'm not alone (judging by other fanworks) in suspecting that he had a rough childhood, and that it's not unthinkable that his dad may have laid a hand on him. choro is an undeniable siscon who adores dayoko above all else, to a borderline obsessive amount, and I like playing with the idea that his father put a lot of pressure on him to look after and take care of her - that he probably basically raised her himself. I don't think it's a long shot to think they were homeschooled, too, so I imagine they're close having grown up alone on the mountain together. dayoko's disappearance (death??) had to have been absolutely world shattering for choro, though I can also imagine that he has done a lot of repressing and denial, regarding all sorts of things with his family. since he and toshio seem to have some of the closest ties to the village (at the very least, it seems like toshio's house is on the same mountain??? or nearby enough to run to??) I like to imagine they knew each other in childhood. I have … more thoughts on their relationship than I think I can reasonably go into at one time, but I'll say that with the vibe I've gotten from his dad, that it wouldn't be unlikely he were discouraged from spending time with toshio when they were young, which makes for an interesting dynamic (and potential with their reunion in the events of denki). I COULD. REALLY KEEP GOING. but I will stop bc I'm only halfway through …

hajime is perfect. he's clever and bookish and shy and cute and he cracks JOKES with a straight face and makes takashi laugh??? and if I think ozo is depressed, well, hajime is a full meltdown waiting to happen - my boy is NOT having a good time. he hallucinates multiple times in canon, he's looking for his lost father, who we KNOW is dead, he's getting wrapped up in all of this craziness with the village, he's one of the only brothers without a job?? like what does he do when he's not there with them? go home to his empty house in tokyo? does he try and look after his father's affairs at the university? does he have a degree? a bachelors wouldn't be enough to take over his father's position anyway! I feel like he probably graduated high school and then ended up just kind of … hanging out and assisting his dad with research. I bet the whole history department at the university adores him, but that doesn't make him any less alone in terms of close familial relationships … I'm desperate for him to move to akashika. the chemistry he and takashi have is so sweet and so immediate, and that he canonically went and hung out in the second floor of the cafe with takashi makes me insane. he needs to move in with his otouto and stop being alone! I think when he finds out the truth about his father it's going to be pretty devastating, and … I uh … god my friend and I have talked about all of this at length but it's gotta get written out as a fic or something probably because it's really involved. hajime seems like he's going to rapidly get sucked into his brothers lives and make them his whole world without even realizing it. I think the same goes for ozo (for all of them)

toshio is another character that I'm absolutely obsessed with speculating about. I know I've talked about it before but he's FASCINATING. he's so, SO very different from canon jyushi. almost every sprite of him he's clenching his fists, he has those insane eyebags and that tight smile (when he DOES smile), he knows so much about the village but he holds it so close to his chest … he's mystery upon mystery!! talk about someone who probably never fucking sleeps! he's also the only one with a living (adoptive) dad?! and it's ori-san! the one orchestrating all this shit! ori-san is TERRIFYING. he completely lacks humanity, he's treating all of this like some sort of bizarre experiment, and it feels like toshio is at the center of all of it. especially when you think about the "jyushimatsu festival" (using kanji that can be read as 'ritual' iirc) … I have some darker headcanons about what that might entail, and I would not be surprised at all if he's mistreated or abused by ori-san (neglect at the very least seems likely), especially with his grandmother gone. I imagine that as they get deeper into the dangers of the village, despite his best efforts to protect them, should any of them get hurt, toshio must feel a lot of guilt and responsibility for bringing them all together. ESPECIALLY with hajime. he obviously already does in canon! the part about hajime's dad worrying about him eating enough and toshio trying to respect those wishes by giving him extra food??? AHHH??????? TOSHIO BABY ARE YOU OKAY (he's not) … the way he runs through the village and the forest all alone in the rain … refuses rides from ozo … hangs out in his shack with a dayon body … I'm so worried about him and I'm SO obsessed!!!

takashi … takashi is such a sweetheart, he's still got totty's spunkiness and sass but he's toned down and soft and it's so so so endearing. I love his and hajime's interactions, I love that he's the first to start calling them all 'niisan,' that he doesn't hesitate to call toshio 'jyushimatsu,' that he fusses over his brothers and hangs out with ozo and invites hajime over and generally openly cares about all of them! he also looks after the cafe all alone … he's still seeing his father's ghost, too, you know that he must be feeling pretty alone. I get the feeling he's really enjoying getting to suddenly have all these older brothers in his life, especially by how there's NO resistance to the idea from him (vs. ozo's surprise at being eldest, choro's disdain at NOT being eldest … lol). I need him to drag hajime's ass from the city so they can live together and hajime can have his books spread all over his apartment, and hajime can help him out at the cafe when he needs … among other endless headcanons. including one where takashi calls ozo every night (that they're not spending together) and they talk about their days on speakerphone while he makes dinner with hajime. I need it all.

…

wow uh

THAT'S A LOT OF RAMBLING … that doesn't clarify shit about the story I'm so sorry. but also it was fun to ramble about how much I love them and all these little things I like to read into about their characters based on canon. denki is so good. denki is god.

[simmonsized]

hi tell me about transversal trickshot please and what your thoughts are on which dave you chose to have that conversation thank you very much

omg okay i'd love to!!!

this is probably long so i will kindly put it under a cut!

it's probably not related to what you are asking but the name is also a joke specifically relating to the fact that bro was stabbed with his own sword crossways, lmfao (thus, transversal)

anyway!

basically, i picked Dave (god) for two reasons to start, and then it spiraled from there:

ONE, the last Actual Conversation he had with Bro from his point of view was a kind of fraught, awkward conversation in chapter 12, which was written to reflect the last time Dave remembers Bro treating him like a little kid (which is to say, with kindness) (and then does, in this scene, treat him like a little kid). that's some deep deserts lore bullshit, but there's a, waves hand, scene in katabasis that is being directly referenced here. not terribly important.

BUT u know his last interactions with him were like -> watch him almost die -> go back into time using powers he said he never wanted to use again and talk to Bro in this strange gentle way that was completely alien to him because neither of them know what to do or how to talk to each other -> watch him almost die but from future dave's perspective -> watch jane bring him back to live -> see him again and the first thing out of his mouth is "i'm glad you're not dead again"

Basically, he didn't get to have a conversation on the roof like Dave(sprite) did, and so i needed something, i suppose, that would let him connect with Bro, and Dave already had that, so it was his turn.

TWO: Rose lmfao. I had mad crazy plans early on for Rose and Bro, but it also involved tackling something i consider to be a problem in canon; once Rose started drinking, Dave started to retreat away from her, and he certainly didn't do shit to help. Dave is a coward. That's pretty much canon. He doesn't like confrontation, he's not any good at working out his friends’ problems, and he's selfish. But because he doesn't understand Rose, it leads to conflict, and because he can't talk to anyone else about it, it became easier, in that way, to talk to Bro, who he knew at this point, had at least some kind of past with Mom, who he knew is a (recovering) alcoholic.

This then led to The Sword, and a moment in time where Bro gets to see a peek at Dave, and his shame, and the thing that, at that moment in time, is quite literally weighing on him. if that makes sense???

also got to make a funny joke about bro and dirk a la lancelot vs galahad (arthurian legend jokes, caledfwlch, etc)

I wish I could explain how i tend to write conversations between characters but i guess just like. most of the time i do dialogue first and fill everything in later. this usually lets me kind of make sure we stay on track, or at least meander naturally, and then i can fill in what's going on in between, especially if there is a big pause!

So while it starts about Rose, it ends up involving the sword, and thus, the Nasty Death Scar, as it is so lovingly called in my household.

Part of the reason i would not think Dave(sprite) suitable for this is that while he is Dave, and is morbid, his current preoccupation with playing a hand in Bro's death would probably do nothing more than make him feel worse. also he's got his own scar, bro ain't special.

And also Dave, at this point specifically, still has all his crazy unresolved feelings relating to the sword, the fact that Bro doesn't seem bothered too badly by his own death (though we find out later this is not true) and he just. Is gross. LOL i love him but Dave is gross.

I think by seeing Bro's scar, he can kind of like. confirm in a weird way that the event Actually Happened, and that it's over, and that Bro is here, and is alive. That there isn't just a huge fucking hole punched through his abdomen and that Dave isn't insane?? you know??

also references to signs at sundown, my beloved <3

and then of course at the end we see Bro offer a little piece of himself that Dave has never known, although rng is intentionally littered with these, one of my big things with the Strangeness between bro and the daves is that they don't Really Know him as a person. they know bro as BRO the guardian, BRO the person who "trained" (yikes) them, but they don't know anything else about him. This is common with kids as they grow up, as we learn that our parents used to be kids, too. So that one little nametag, handed over begrudgingly, maybe a little embarrassingly, is Bro giving Dave a little piece of himself at that age, something that at this point, this Dave needs desperately. He's already jealous of DS, though it'll take him time to realize it, and so it was important for him to have this conversation with Bro, and to see him as human.

I hope any of this was anything!!! and also sorry it's so long!