#it’s happened before with other odd matchups so we can do it again!

[hiorintruther]

And in YET ANOTHER collab it looks like Rin is gazing longingly at Hiori. Bonus point, Hiori’s card has the Eiffel Tower in the background. Is he going to Paris to visit his boyfriend Rin in PXG? 👀🩵

[tiredspacedragon]

I had a quick look in the notes before voting, and I'm kinda surprised by what I saw. Because a lot of people seem to be forgetting a key factor in this matchup: These are all the same person. Which means, as the Doctor gets older, each one of these incarnations remembers being the others, so the younger ones are at a massive disadvantage.

Especially Eccleston. Like don't get me wrong, this is tumblr, we all love Nine here. And yeah, hes angry and bitter and one of the most physically fit out of this bunch. But he is also freshly traumatized, and trying really hard to be Less Violent, Actually. And, this is kinda hugely important, all of the others know all of his tricks. Nine was only 900 years old, he's a baby compared to most of the rest. If it came to a straight grapple, then he has good odds, but he is losing the mental game.

Now Ten is capable of great and twisted violence, and is also spunky and a little unpredictable. However, he also goes down in one punch. Like canonically, it happens more than once. He can take falling from a spaceship, through a glass window, and onto a hard marble floor, but the man has a glass jaw and basically everyone here has a mean punch. So he's out.

Eleven is being criminally underestimated in the notes. Like I get that it's currently trendy to hate on him, but come on. Reducing him to a baby-faced twink is a huge mistake. Eleven was a vicious, cold-blooded, survivor of a bastard, who lived longer than everyone else here put together. He used that baby face as a weapon, underestimating him plays straight into his hands, and Nine and Ten absolutely would underestimate him. He might be hampered by the others though, because again, they'd remember being him and would consider him a high-priority target.

Twelve is an angry chihuahua of a man, and he has a solid hook on him, but he is also physically the oldest here and definitely has a far worse bark than bite. I don't see him winning, but I do see him being a persistent nuisance to all the others, chasing after them, snarling and biting at their heels and just not staying down. He did shoot a guy in the face that one time, but I don't think a fight with his other selves could push him to that level of desperation. In the end, he's sass, not brass.

I don't know much about Thirteen yet, but from what I do know, she's a little deranged and would absolutely fight dirty. I believe she's physically the smallest here, so that could hurt her, but eh... Like I said, fighting dirty. Can solve a lot of problems, that.

Fourteen has no chance. Like actually none, I am sorry. He might not go down as easily as Ten, might stay standing for a while, actually. But he is not going to fight. Absolute heap of a man. Actually, paradoxically, he might not lose, either? Like the others would just look at him and go "Y'know what, I'll leave him alone, he very clearly does not want to be here." Fifteen would probably get him a blanket, sit him down on the sidelines, and periodically go check to see he was alright. So maybe I'm wrong, maybe he actually would win if all the others took each other down.

But I think my bet goes to Fifteen. Yeah he's brand new, so we know basically nothing about him. But he is also the oldest by far, is the only one here with the ability to accurately judge all the others' capabilities, and has one key advantage none of the others do: Mental Health. Fifteen's defining trait so far seems to be that he is Doing Okay, Actually. Fifteen has had therapy. He has had rest and recovery time. He is refreshed. That might take some of the edge off him, but like. It certainly wouldn't make him stupider. And does that edge ever really go away? And would it really matter that much in a straight up brawl? Like plus, have you seen Ncuti Gatwa? This is not your classic skinny Doctor, the man is sculpted. So yeah, we'll see how he turns out, but right now my money's on the new guy.

okay if you were to pit every modern-era Doctor against each other in a fight. no holds barred. they can fight as dirty as they like. physically or mentally. just full on duking it out. who do you think would win. this is not a "who is your favorite" poll it's a "who would beat the shit out of the others most effectively" poll

[colorseeingchick]

Hello, colorseeingchick, I hope you’re having a nice day, and congrats on reaching 200 followers! I wanted to say I really like your Kuroko no Basket posts. I was recently looking for some small fanfics of Kuroko no Basket and I am glad I’ve found yours. I am also looking forward to reading your “Oh! Baby Series” of Tsukishima.

For the 200 Follower event, I would like to request a Kuroko no Basket matchup. I’d prefer to be matched with a male and my pronouns are she/her. I am currently 16 years old, I have brown skin and dark brown eyes. My hair is a dark brown color(almost black), very curly, and it reaches toward my mid-back. I’m 5’2” in height and I am an Aquarius(For Midorima).

I usually like to watch anime and read in my free time. I really love chocolate and exercising. I dislike people that lie a lot, peanuts, peanut butter, pecans, almonds, avocados, and onions. My hobbies are writing, drawing, reading, watching tv, singing, and playing the Piano. I think I’m particularly talented at writing since everyone seems to like my writing very much and right now I’m practicing my creative writing skills.

Personality: When I first meet someone, I tend to be quiet and just observe everyone. If anyone comes up to me, I usually just introduce myself, and depending on who the person is I may strike up a conversation. If I don’t then the person that’s talking to me will usually make conversation and I will quietly listen. I would usually just nod or say things like (yea, right, mhm) to show that I am listening. If I begin to feel comfortable I will give my opinion on the subject or try to strike up my own topic. But once I get really comfortable with that person I can become very goofy. I’ll start randomly dancing in the hallways and make weird sounds when I’m with that person. And depending on the person this can either increase or decrease in weirdness. I’m very good at listening to people especially when it comes to a person talking about their passions. My friends and family tend to laugh at a few things I say. They’re never really jokes there just situations I’ve been in and Apparently, they’re funny. I don’t tend to touch people, the most I really do regularly is either is put my hand/elbow on the person’s shoulder(Doesn’t matter if they’re tall or short) or begin poking them in odd places.

Negative Things: If someone is sad or insecure about something, I don’t know how to react, I usually just stare at them while they cry to themselves. I would not suggest that any of my friends come to me for emotional support. Unless they just want someone to listen to them. I don’t know how to take compliments. Once someone compliments me I usually just stare at the person or say thank you very slowly.

Additional: Since me and my friends were in chorus, we would usually just begin singing our chorus songs very loudly. It didn’t matter where we were, we would just begin singing. There was a time where my friend called me super sweet because I was checking up on them during the pandemic. My friends also said I give the best presents and truthfully I struggle trying to find presents. I want to give my friends something they can use or they really like. For example, I gave my friend a drawing notebook and some art supplies since they like to do art. I’ve been told that I have a mean resting face and that I act more mature for my age. I also asked my friends to describe me and they said, “Beautifully, Creative, Loving, Silly, Writer, Fashionable, Pretty, Innocent, and Nice Hairstyles.”

I swear I don’t where they’re getting these nice compliments. Hopefully, this is not too long.

Hello noodleman!!!! This was perfect do not worry. They compliment you because you're amazing haha. I always see you in my notifications and it makes me so happy :) I’m very excited to do both your matchups! For KNB, I’ve matched you with…

Akashi Seijuro!

We all know Akashi is a powerful man who’s been through a lot. As a girlfriend, you would be the one to both compliment his power and balance out his emotional state, even if you don’t intend to. And that would be the source of the beauty of your relationship with him.

You were a student at Rakuzan who would mind her own business. Akashi was in your class (ranking at the top) for the new school year, and you two sat next to each other. Akashi (this is the OG Akashi- the nice one) would introduce himself to you, and you would do the same. You observed Akashi quietly. The way he was so put together. His calm demeanor. His pretty eyes and how they were keenly watching everything. You didn’t realize he was observing you as well. While you both were just normal acquaintances at that point, things were about to change.

One day, you heard Akashi talking about basketball next to you. You could hear how passionate he was about it from the way he talked. The person he was talking to walked away, but you couldn’t help but ask him about basketball. Watching him talk that way was so enticing.

He looked at you for a second before smiling kindly and asking, “would you like to learn about basketball?” From there, you two would have a very engaged conversation with Akashi fanboying in a way that was as classy as fanboying could get, while you were listening attentively. You had to leave for the end of the day, but you left with a smiling Akashi out the door of the classroom.

The next major interaction between you two happened a few days later. You were doodling in your notebook when you heard him speak. “You’re very talented at drawing.”

You smiled awkwardly at the compliment, unsure of how to respond, so you just looked at him. He didn’t mind though. He just smiled back. “If you draw again, I’d like to see.” He then left soon after.

While you didn’t doodle again, you decided that maybe you were comfortable around Akashi, more than you thought you were.

A major shift in your dynamic happened one day when you were writing down intensely into a journal, stopping only when your hand hurt, taking time to think about your next words when you felt a light tap on your arm.

“Excuse me, if you don’t mind me asking, what are you writing?” He genuinely looked interested, which caught you by surprise.

And so you explained the short story you were writing. Akashi asked questions about the characters, the plot, where you got the idea from- all sorts of things. You both didn’t realize everyone else had already emptied out. “If you would like to share your story with me sometime, I would love to read it. And if you’d like to come by and watch my basketball team play, let me know.”

He was surprisingly easy to talk to. And that was the point where you both got closer. As you got closer, talking and learning more about each other, you both started to fall bit by bit. You both had a long list of hobbies and talents, much of which overlapped. Akashi was mesmerized by your singing, though he knew you wouldn’t like to hear the compliment if he gave it to you. Instead, he just asked you to always sing and gave you his full attention when you did. It went without say he loved your writing. He was a talented musician himself, and you found his game pretty entertaining- the way he dominated on the court.

He asked you out after Rakuzan had taken a big victory before the winter cup. You’d come to watch the game.

���Will you celebrate with me?” He asked you.

“With your team?”

“No, actually.” He’d smile at you and step closer, but had not invaded your personal space. “I’d like to actually get some time with you, on a date.”

He was pleased you said yes. The date went well. He’d learned you were mature, which is what he was looking for in a partner. He already knew you were talented and a good listener. It wasn’t long before he asked you to be his girlfriend officially.

Your dynamic with Akashi was well tailored. Being the captain of Rakuzan, he had an image to maintain- one of power. And having a girlfriend who he knew to be intimidating as well (your resting face was intense) was a fitting situation. He knew you observed and listened well, which is why he could trust that you would be thoughtful- something that was also very important to him. You also cared for efficiency and purpose. But what he didn’t realize he needed so badly was your goofiness. After you two had gotten as close as you were, he learned how funny your stories were and saw you in your most comfortable states. He loved your fun goofy side. It helped him live a little, too. He enjoyed elbowing you back when you did it to him (it was the most innocent playful thing he’d done). It didn’t bother Akashi all that much that you didn’t know how to deal with other people being emotional. He wasn’t one to show negative emotions all that much and didn’t project that expectation onto you, which made it a bit easier. He knew that if he needed to talk it out and have someone listen, he could always go to you.

Overall you and Akashi managed to balance out on a lot of your ideologies, world views, hobbies, and life practices. While some were the same, others were different- but in a complimentary way. It’s quite a beautiful dynamic, really.

~~~

Ahhh I really hope you like it! Lemme know what you think hehe. I'm excited to do your MHA one too!

[astro-break]

Quick first thoughts on the first ep of the Hypmic Anime. Spoilers beware (and im writing this as I watch so :p)

Otome’s speech is.... questionable from a persuasive point of view. Manga did a great job of introducing her (which you can read here) but they really cut out the more terrifying parts of her speech and how she uses force to show people that she's not to be messed with

Its cool seeing everyone in their respective environments though. thats cool. Though they could have added Sasara and Kuuko (shhh i know why they didn’t let me dream)

I love how poppy the typography is. Its amazing how the visuals just leap out at you. The OP does a great job of this. The first few seconds before the title really gives me Persona 4 OG OP vibes with the influx of information given. The rest is a clear concise and streamlined way that still gives character. Animation is sparse but still carries across a general idea of each character and shows off each character object. Rendering is really nice and pays a bit of homage to the posing artwork thats done for the MVs. They also do their division hand signals and thats cute

Love how the OP has blatant HifuDoppo and DRB matchup foreshadowing

so far I really like what theyre going for. BB is about brotherly familial bonds and they show the goods and the bads. Jiro and Saburo bickering right out the gate really cements the fact that they get along like cats and dogs but you can still see that they love each other, working together when the situation calls for it

Now the 3d models. Theyre... not great but usable if you don’t look too hard. They serve their purpose and don’t actively detract from the viewing experience.

Visual typography in the rap itself are fun and poppy but they dont.... speak to me? like theyre there yes and I appreciate them but the only ones that got me excited were from Ichiro’s rap

I take my words back the group portion was kickass and I apologize

I love how they interpret the Hypnosis Speakers though. Esp. Saburo’s organs. That was super creative and I love it! If there was one thing that I felt was missing from the franchise was a deeper exploration of the speakers but the anime puts a new and fresh spin on it! Love it, especially with their attack patterns!

If the production team ever feels inclined to, Id love to see those info sheets on Otome’s desk released. There seems to be very interesting info and stats written out about each member (like capabilities, personal status etc.) They all seem unique too so I really really really hope they release images of those sheets

OOOOOOOOKAY MTC. I have such a big biased for them so Im very torn to see what unfolds

Rio striking out on his own is interesting. Out of everyone in MTC hes the biggest team player yet here he trusts his teammates to go ahead. This either displays Rio’s willingness to trust his teammates or it becomes very OOC if the anime wants to set him up as a lone wolf like character

I love how they specify its a drug deal. It means that Jyuto surely will show up and it also shows that Samatoki knows Jyuto’s motives and willingly gives black market info that he knows aligns with Jyuto’s goal. Thats A+ detail writing there and a great establishing characteristic for both of them

OOohhhhhhhhhhhhh man Asunama-san’s voice acting is god tier his work as Samatoki is phenomenal. He pulls of Samatoki’s threatening voice so well with those almost calm words before his voice becomes loud and confrontational. Those rolling syllables in contrast to Komada-san’s almost lyrical and airy speech and Kamio-san’s strict and enunciated words is such a delight to hear. It just speaks to how amazing and great these Seiyuu’s are in order to pull of such amazing work

Im so biased but MTC has such a better rap than BB im so sorry. Just by watching Samatoki’s part, the imagery is amazing. Even the arrival of his Hypnosis Speaker was awesome and sent a shiver down my spine. using the lyrics to form blades and blood was such a great thing to do. Theres so much more variety that just him standing there and shots of his hypnosis speaker. The old fashioned vignette shots, the four panel spread, the nods to old Kurosawa era films are great and I love these small details. Even the typography looks better.

Again, the interpretations with the speakers is fresh and new. Its great and I love the different imagery and attack patterns. Each one is so unique but carries across each different style of rap.

The 3d modles aren’t any better tho lol

(Hi this is Astro who is reading over their assessment again and making a note. Yeah I’m a bit harsh on BB’s rap. I’m not going to change it since I still stand by it and this post is supposed to be a documentation of my first impressions. I think one of the reasons why I’m so harsh on BB is because of their dynamic as a trio of brothers. They Have to have a more uniform approach than the other divisions. Which in of itself isn’t a terrible thing, it just doesn’t catch my eye as much as MTC did. Thats all! I definitely don’t hate BB, they’re maybe my 3rd favorite division out of the current lineup [not including TDD era teams like Kujaku Posse, MCD, and Naughty Busters] its just that their rap was pretty meh)

Samatoki crouching like a real gangstar and the cigarette kiss killed me

sadjkhfjkasdghsadjkcsdjhsdfsjhf im dying i love these trio of dumbasses so uch oh y fod someone save me aaaaaaaa (Astro note here! yeah i died when the jyuto and samatoki’s stomach growled im weak please. Samatoki’s face is just so precious and funny I might set it as a profile pic somewhere)

But also my initial assessment of Rio possibly being characterized as a lone wolf is very much jossed and im very thankful for that. It seems that Rio was simply trusting his teammates to carry out their part of the plan while he carried out his own. I like that, it really shows how much of a team these three are and that they genuinely trust each other. He’s also comfortable enough around them to invite them to dinners after work casually and not just for special occasions.

I really love MTC guys

Oooh! we get Ramuda on his design process which is really cute. the inside of his studio is super cute and retro and i love it. the poppy old music you would hear in a cafe or 90′s resturaunt is also really cute (astro note: yeah i know that in ARB you see the interior of Ramuda’s office but its kinda different seeing it animated)

the translation i have has gentaro speaking in early modern english (Shakespearian english for those who aren’t english nerds like me) but from what I can hear, he doesn’t speak in a particularly old fashioned way? Its more formal than old? and hes speaking without any of his character persona lying thing that he likes to do (as he refers to himself as “Shousei” throughout the segment where hes in Ramuda’s office which is kind of his default pronoun of choice). so its kinda odd for the translation to go in that direction but im not complaining

Gendice banter is gold but it feels... flat? a little? it doesn’t have the same impact as in the drama cds or in the manga? i feel? Also Ramuda using gratuitous english is??? idk how to feel about that

kjshf thats against the rules Ramuda omgggg,,,,,,,, (astro note again: while watching i was under the assumption that using your hypmic for monetary gain such a as buskering [which is what FP is doing] is against the rules. May not be the case but whatever)

FP’s rap might be my favorite in terms of tune and lyrics though. It’s a nice laid back bop and really gives of chill vibes. the integration of 3d and 2d is really nice and i love how they play off each other in the rap. The wordplay is so fun with little nods here and there and the beat is poppy too so it really energizes me.

Ramuda’s rap concerns me slightly since he makes very subtle and small nods towards his past (being created in a laboratory, warfare, and his overall very unpleasant life experiences) but spins it into something cutesy. It could be a coping mechanism, it could be me overthinking it. But it does make me worry a bit. Gentaro and Dice’s rap really play off each other with Gentaro sticking to stories and Dice taking up the baton by carrying on that same imagery but putting his own spin on it.

the self awareness of how scattered they are as a team is interesting though. It doesn’t seem like something you’d speak about in a rap? but i guess since its not really a do or die situation they can afford to be looser on things like this.

Right off the bat, i don’t like how they handled Hifumi and Doppo in relation to Hifumi’s fear of women. Slug made a post once talking about this and I echo many of his sentiments. Hypmic has never been very tactful about tackling this particular issue and while I didn’t have high hopes that the anime would be any better it hurts to see Doppo take away the one thing that allows Hifumi to function within society.

Doppo’s breakdown mirrors a lot of my own mental state when I spiral though its shown a lot quicker than what happens to me oof. that hits close to home. though Jakurai’s advice is. Questionable. Its not the best advice to give to someone but we have no idea what kind of doctor Jakurai is so ill let it slide

Jakurai’s pose looks like hes going to do a mahou shoujou transformation lmao

I don’t have many thoughts about the rap though again. How they visualize the rap is interesting. the different imagery is quite interesting for each of them and the typography is nice a distinct but im still on the fence about the visuals here

The sound is in the same boat. The sound effects either drown out the rap or are too quet but some parts are nice at least. When they talk about Tokyo’s beating heart, the heartbeat sound is a but distracting especially since its only played once. But the imagery is at least nice

I wonder if for the eds they’re going to take a similar approach to what Enstars did and have a four different endings, one for each division. I love the blend of styles here and it really accentuates that although they’re different they mesh well together.

Ramuda’s silhouette though is hilarious. Love it.

:p and thats it. Uh not bad for a first episode. Established all 12 characters really nicely and their dynamics. I had some problems with it but then again nothing is perfect. I look forward to what they show us next week

[ratsoh-writes]

My curiosity got me, so here is my submission for a match up.  Sorry it’s so long!  I look forward to seeing your reasoning.

PERSONALITY TRAITS:

MOM FRIEND:  I’m the friend that is almost over prepared for any situation and is protective, usually keeping others out of too much trouble or danger, but not stopping them from doing that stupid thing.  Some people will only learn from doing it and so long as it won’t seriously injure or kill them, go for it.  And I mean I am seriously prepared for most situations:  I have fluffy throw blankets and pillows in my car for those who get cold, extra towels just in case we somehow get wet, umbrellas/ponchos for those who need one, snacks/water just in case someone gets hungry/thirsty, first aid kit for small injuries, etc. Ironically, I am the only one without a kid so far.  

Extension of this would be my habit to act as the friend “nurse.”  Willing to spend hours taking care of a friend who isn’t feeling well and give platonic cuddles if needed.

Another extension of this is my need to feed anyone who comes over.  I think my love language is acts of service after typing all this. 

I’M LISTENING:  Always willing to offer an ear, even if I don’t believe I can council you.  Plus, for some reason, people just end up splurging life stories or something that is bothering them to me.  My life is mostly spent as that Naruto meme: “I have no clue what is going on, but I’ll pretend that I do.”  But I’m responsible about it, I won’t offer advice I’m not sure about and will usually refer you to someone else I feel is up to the task.

PATIENT:  Earned after years in customer service dealing with toddlers disguised as customers and also with friends who far exceed my energy levels.  It takes a good bit to anger me or very specific things to set me off, such as when I have asked you to please stop bringing up that stressful memory of mine again and again. 

I am told I am terrifying when I’m actually pissed.  Most times I don’t remember much when I actually snap, just that it happened, but details are fuzzy.  

CHILL:  My counselor once told me if I “Was any more laid back, I’d be on her floor.” And to a point, she is correct.  My house was on fire and my reaction wasn’t panic at the time, it was this odd calm that even when I reported the fire to my sister and authorities, they didn’t believe me until I showed them said fire.  I am reserved with those I don’t know well or are not comfortable around.  Once I trust you or you get me on a topic I love, I’m surprisingly passionate and animated.  

I feel this fits under here, but I also tend to do things at my own pace.  And not much can change that pace, but I will get what I set out to do done.

WHY ME?:  Too many people tell me I’m a natural leader, even got awards for it, but I never volunteer or want to be the leader in anything.  Usually, I just end up in that role somehow, some way.  Most times because I hate disorganized messes and those times the people I am with have trouble making concrete decisions and need some guidance to work out what they really want to do or the pressure to actually make a decision.  I may be an unwilling leader, but I will step up if needed.

WHIMSICAL:  Sarcasm, dry and sometimes cheesy humour, and an attitude to boot, but it’s rarely to be mean.  Most times it is me being playful and if I’m teasing you, that usually is a sign I like you and enjoy your company.  Plus, sometimes people need a little laugh or a spark of different emotion to get them out of a funk.  

INTEGRITY:  I could absolutely despise someone, but like hell I’m going watch them suffer.  In the same sense, if I take a job, I will do it right and not half ass it.  And far too many times I’ve had to step in and explain certain concepts in order to disperse negativity or help others see from another perspective to avoid adversity.  

CUDDLE BUG:  With people I am comfortable with, I am a cuddly person and do not mind a lot of skinship.  I am used to friends hanging all over me.  Plus, sometimes I just want to curl up someone as well.  

  STRENGTHS:  

Observant

Good communication skills & honest

Responsible & reliable

Full Size Human Heater.  I am ridiculously warm and always putting off heat.  Friends and coworkers alike use me as a portable heater.

Surprisingly good at being sly and collecting information if needed, like getting a shoe or ring size without tipping the person off it’s for a gift.  If they manage to call it, I always fess up and playfully make a fuss they ruined the surprise.

  WEAKNESSES:  

Terrible at lying, so I tend to simply keep my mouth shut instead

Willfully oblivious to flirting and absolute flustered mess once I am forced to recognize said flirting

Vast open waters terrify me

Tendency to keep my troubles to myself and try to solve problems on my own (don’t want to be a burden)

Can become despondent if I feel useless at times

  HOBBIES:

ART:  I’ve dabbled in several different medias, but my favorite is just a pencil or pen and any paper I can get my hands on.  I love drawing figures in dynamic poses.  Second favorite is sculptures built from wire.

COSTUMES:  I love Halloween, since it is the perfect excuse to make and wear my homemade costumes.  It also lets me challenge myself by making more complicated pieces like hooves, horns, and even chain mail.

BAKING/COOKING/CANDY MAKING:  I’m the cook in the house and I love it.  Seeing people enjoy my food is my favorite part.  Just don’t ask me for a recipe, I literally don’t have any and I won’t remember what I did.  

ORGANIZING/CLEANING:  I love puzzle games like Tetris and Catherine, and I love a challenge.  Combine the two by having me organize and rearrange a space to make it work and I am in heaven.

STORYTELLING:  When a story needs to be told, I am the one asked to tell it. Specifically I have such an entertaining way of telling it according to others.  Animated and colorful language, plus a few pit stops along the way with some side stories.  

  PET PEEVES:

CONTRARY:  Do not tell me to do something while I am doing it.  That will kill any motivation I had to do it.

BACKHANDED COMPLIMENTS:  It is possible to compliment someone without insulting them or others at the same time.  It just makes the compliment feel empty and negative.  And I tend to just hum and not reward that behaviour.  

TOO MUCH ATTENTION:  I don’t mind attention… from people I trust and are comfortable with.  Feel free to cuddle and coddle away.  But vast amounts of attention from those I feel are strangers or acquaintances will unnerve me (I have literally left functions immediately  where I walked in and was bombarded with shouts and attention aimed at me-sensory overload I guess).

  ODD HABITS:

NESTING:  No, I don’t think I have enough blankets and pillows.  Yes, the giant stuffed animal is needed and his name is Snuffie.  

CRUSH ME:  I’m serious, some days I need one of my friends or my bf to just lay all their dead weight on top of me.  It’s just oddly therapeutic.

NO, I’M NOT PREGNANT:  Just cause I ate that jar of olives in one sitting or suddenly was craving jalapeno juice and crushed ramen noodles.  There are never enough pickles and yes, I am determined to try every kind–I may have a vinegar addiction.

IRONY:  I bake some of the tastiest, sweetest desserts and make pralines and caramels, YET I myself do not favor sweet things. 

HANDS:  One thing I tended to do with nearly every boyfriend and guy friend I had was play with their hands and put their hands on my face/head.  I lived for being pet and having people play with my hair.    

NONVERBAL MOMENTS:  Sometimes words are just too much, so I instead make sounds.  Can be anywhere from a growl to a cat like noise, or the reliable “Nyeh.”

NO NOs:

I think I listed a few as I went through everything else, but ignoring boundaries is the main one.  If I tell you I’m not comfortable with something, do not make me repeat myself.  And usually that something is given a pass the first few times it is done before I say something and explain why I’m not comfortable with it.   

Example:  I have thick, curly hair, a product of my mixed heritage.  Well, sometimes I like to straighten it and I did just that one day.  Well, a coworker decided to make a backhanded compliment, stating I should stick to what works: straight hair over my natural hair.  I had gotten on him about it, but I decided to vent to a friend about what happened as well.  She proceeded to constantly repeat those hurtful words and while I knew she meant it playfully during those times, I had to stop her and sit her down, explain I don’t find it funny cause the words are linked to a hurtful, possibly racist memory that I didn’t want brought up again and again.   Thankfully she understood and stopped.  So, I don’t snap immediately and I understand sometimes a sit down needs to be done.

Ok first of all I gotta say that I absolutely loved reading your matchup!!! It’s so well organized, detailed, and the descriptions are pretty creative!!! Do you do any writing yourself, because you should!!! alright, geek out moment over.

i’ve got three guys you’re perfect for, but let’s go for the obvious one. HONEY!! 

You’ve checked off everything on honey’s list: caring, organized, laid back, and good for cuddling. Now here’s what he has to offer to the table: he will cuddle you back. This guy is the ultimate cuddle slut. You’ll never feel unloved with him. Honey is also a very thoughtful and appreciative guy. He likes caring for his partners. You may be the mom friend, but he’ll do his best to return that love as well.

Honey is a little awkward, but he’s also sensitive and empathetic to how others feel. If he puts his foot in his mouth, just tell him and he’ll never bring it up again. Plus this guy is just so honest and genuine that backhanded compliments aren't really a thing with him. 

Also you like costumes!!! He’s always wanted to try cosplay or theatre. You just might be the person to give him the courage to finally stick to one. 

dating honey includes:

cuddles upon heaps of soft things. He has his own collections of ridiculously soft blankets and pillows that he’ll happily add to your collection. Honey is also a master at pillow forts. 

honey is a good listener. He’ll be happy to just sit back and enjoy the stories you tell. There is start though, who is also the storyteller of the underswap home. Any funny story you give about your time together will be rewarded by star with a funny story from his and honey’s childhood, much to honey’s embarrassment

if you don't really like sweet things but love baking them, then honey and star will happily finish them for you. People are usually surprised about how just how much skeleton monsters can pack away. 

he’s a picky eater and will give you the wtf face when you fufil your weird cravings though lol 

Oh! Also if you’re wondering, the other two would’ve been either oak or coffee

[rexcoatlarchive]

All I want for Christmas

Alternate ending to the Quetzmas event in the RexCoatl au

*not long before the final matchup against Black Quetzal mask*

Martha: master are you sure this is even remotely a good idea?

Me: I am positive, 100% this plan will work

Quetz: I really don't like this idea darling. But I have to admit it makes sense

Bradamante: Quetzal mask you have more confidence in the plan then I think it deserves.

Me: I'll cut you some slack since you're new here Bradamante, but when you think about it, it makes sense

Da Vinci: this plan is reckless and very risky so you better be sure it'll work.

Me: don't worry, it'll be fine. And in case it isn't we do have an emergency protocol.

Jaguar warrior: are you guys ready? It's about time to start the match

Quetz: yes, I'm ready! Are you ready partner?

Bradamante: as ready as I'll ever be!

*the two teams of fighters enter the ring*

Jaguar warrior: alright everyone this is it! The final match! In the red corner we have the champion of this event from team Mexico: Black Quetzal mask and her mysterious partner! And in the blue corner representing the chaldea security organization we have Quetzal mask and Bradaman!

Bradamante: I still never agreed to that ring name!

*Quetz appears wearing one of the cloaks most fighters wore*

Bqm: what's with the cloak? Have you become embarrassed to show yourself

Quetz: no, just decided on a change of pace for the finale!

Bqm: if you think some change of pace is going to help you win you're out of your mind!

Jaguar warrior: alright are the fighters ready?! Then let's... Begin!

Quetz: this plan better work *Quetz removes the cloak and reveals... Rex, tied to her*

Bqm: what?!

Jaguar warrior: what!?

Everyone: WHAT?!

Bqm: what are doing with master tied to you like that?!

Quetz: because now you can't attack me without harming master, and since you're just my aggressive side that means you still love him! And would never want to cause him any harm!

Bqm: you can't do that! You'll be disqualified!

Quetz: don't give me that Bullshit! You let the china team use a small army a 3rd fighter and poison!

Bradamante: yeah! You don't get to enforce rules after that!

Bqm: even so, you can't fight me without hurting him either

Bradamante: helloooo! I'm still here!

Quetz: si! But you're partner can't say the same can they? They've never so much as thrown a punch in any of your matches! And I don't expect that to change for this matchup!

Bqm: damn you! Master! Why would you stoop to such a risky strategy!? Even if it's not a direct attack you still risk getting hurt!

Me: because I want my fucking wife back! She's been split in half to her gentle and aggressive sides! I want my full wife, not a half wife! ...and to save Christmas too I guess.

Da Vinci: priorities much.

Bqm: fine! I'll just have to separate you two! *goes in to get behind Quetz*

Bradamante: I don't think so! *goes after her*

Quetz: *moves out of the way* woo! You'll have to do better then that!

Bradamante: *attacks bqm* take that!

Bqm: *sent back* urgh!

*most of the fight is spent with Bqm attempting to separate Rex and Quetz with Bradamante attacking her, causing her to have to counter*

*after a very long time*

Bradamante: *tired* just give up already!

Bqm: *also tired* never! I need to win!

Quetz: that won't happen! This your own fault for being so flimsy with rules and getting such an odd partner!

Bqm: be quiet! *goes to get behind Quetz again*

Bradamante: not happening! *goes in to counter*

Bqm: not again! *turns to counter*

*they both impact each other, but Bradamante falls*

Bradamante: *falls unconscious*

Bqm: now to handle you! *lunges towards Quetz*

Quetz: not likely *ducks and grabs Bqm by the arms and slams her on the mat*

Bqm: fuck! *attempts to double kick specifically Quetz's face*

Quetz: *moves out of the way* not today!

Bqm: *uses the momentum to get up* I'll still win! Even with you using such a foolish tactic! *lunges again*

Quetz: *attempts to move out of the way*

Bqm: *manages to finally grab the ribbon tieing us together* gotcha now! *undones the ribbon* finally

Me: *falls* oof

Bqm: now your mi-

*but before she could finish Quetz already counters*

Quetz: *delivers a flaming right hook, then grabs Bqm by the arm and slams her to the mat. Finally using the rope to jump and deliver a deadly elbow drop right on her*

Bqm: agh!

*it seems Bqm can't get up*

Jaguar warrior: 1 2 3! She's out! The winner is Quetzal mask!

Quetz: si! We did it master! *picks me up and swings me around*

Me: see, I told you this strategy would work!

Martha: is no one going to say anything about the partner?

Jaguar warrior: well they're not even a proper person. They're like the trues essence of Santa or whatever. So they can't fight without a partner so losing Black Quetzal mask renders them useless.

Da Vinci: well thank goodness for that

*after everything is done*

Quetz: are finally ready to rejoin me?

Bqm: I guess, I still hate how you won though.

Quetz: I didn't like the plan either but it was basically fool proof. But don't worry when we're one again we'll be with master again.

Bqm: *blushing* I guess that's a good point, but before that, let me do one thing.

Quetz: what's that?

Bqm: this *goes over and kisses me* muwaaaah!

Me: wow!

Bqm: just wanted to do it once while I was still separated

Quetz: alright that's enough! *fuses back with bqm*

Quetz: now I'm me again!

Me: yay!

*we embrace*

Me: it's great to have you at 100% again!

Quetz: si mi amor! Now never ever do that again! That was so nerve-wracking! I was so worried you'd get hurt! Never have such a foolish plan again! *she says as she squeezes me and swings me around*

Me: *muffled* sorry

Da Vinci: you realize the worry you're showing right now is exactly the reason he devised such a plan in first place right?

Me: exactly! Besides, it was such a unique circumstance that such a unique plan was needed.

Quetz: still! I was so worried!

Martha: well such a plan will probably never be needed again ...hopefully.

Bradamante: well thankfully it all ended well. Too bad I still couldn't find my dear Ruggiero. But I'll keep looking!

Me: good on you Bradamante! Never give up!

Bradamante: I never will!

And there's the story. Thought it'd be an interesting idea. When you have to fight yourself but you love someone so much you'd never want to cause them any harm, they make a good shield. Kinda weird and still dangerous but I thought it was interesting. Also while not seasonaly appropriate this event probably won't get a rerun so now's a good a time as any

Tag time! @panyum @gxymlky @grievouslyxorvia @hasereshdoneanythingwrong

[bainhardt]

#RibbonQuest2.0 - Part 3: Master Ball Rank or Bust

It’s kind of poetic, in a way. My very first meeting with Jin, and the beginning of our travels together, was commemorated with the chucking of a Master Ball - a guaranteed capture. It’s a one-of-a-kind ball typically reserved only for one-of-a-kind Pokemon (like Jin). When it comes to capturing Pokemon, the Master Ball stands above the rest as the symbol of infallibility, the promise of success overcoming any and all odds.

Well, we’re gonna need to channel that spirit in our latest challenge, because our success is anything but guaranteed: we have to take on the Master Ball rank in online rated battles for Pokemon Sword and Shield! Among our countless trials and triumphs spanning generations, Jin and I have never actually battled online against other real players. The World Ability Ribbon back in Platinum would’ve been our first foray, but the DS Wi-Fi connection had long been shut down in the time before our quest began.

Keeping with the theme of RibbonQuest2.0, this comes as an unexpected surprise. Jin, like all transfer Pokemon, is ineligible for rated battles; the standardized rules only permit Pokemon born and raised in the gen 8 games. Back when our time in Galar first started, I had never even planned on mentioning the Master Rank Ribbon, simply because we weren’t allowed to try and earn it!

But all of that changed with the release of the Isle of Armor DLC and patch version 1.2. By accepting the reset of your Pokemon’s move pool to only moves compliant with its gen 8 iteration, you’re allowed to mark your transfer Pokemon eligible for rated battles online! The icing on the cake is that Jin’s XD-exclusive purification move, Baton Pass (which I bent over backwards to keep even through all the Pokemon Contests), is now a TR which Farfetch’d can learn anytime. All’s well that ends well, I suppose.

It’s like getting your hand stamped at a concert, but with a side of forced amnesia.

With that, preparations were complete. There was nothing left to do but hop to it and get battling! The Master Ball Rank doesn’t earn itself, and if I’ve learned anything from our past, I think that means we’re going to need some help...

However, in the interest of cutting down on superfluous Ribbon Gang members like (sorry to single you out) Speedrun the Talonflame, I’ll only be honoring the final 5 actual contenders accompanying Jin when the ribbon is earned. Numerous grueling battles will be fought on the path to Master Ball tier and those stories will be lost to time, for only the best of the best deserve to call themselves part of Ribbon Gang 2.0.

I got boxfuls of second-stringers here, for real.

When first beginning in earnest with the July season, I mainly played Double battles, my preferred format for fun. I had a couple different teams, but never climbed any higher than Great Ball. Some teams of note included:

self-proc Weakness Policy Stamina Mudsdale with Skill Link support and Psych Up Stored Power follow up

Entrainment Plus Dedenne alongside special attackers with spread moves (coined the “fuck redirects” team)

a strange combo Sandstorm and Round team that was kind of an excuse to see if Refrigerate Aurorus could amount to anything

I was too committed to gimmicks, and at this time still hoped to reach the necessary heights using something built for fun at its core. I convinced myself that whenever I got around to really trying, it’d come together easily enough. In the past I’d do anything and everything to increase my chances of success, and I needed to return to this mentality moving forward.

After burn out from facing VGC competitive teams, several months of distraction with other games, and the arrival of 2021, I changed gears to test out Singles beginning in March. Despite having essentially zero experience with the format, I drafted two main teams during my Singles stint:

a Focus Energy Baton Pass team designed so every other Pokemon is then guaranteed crits with every attack

a Shedinja team with Pokemon like Ditto and Zoroark designed to help determine whether Shedinja can survive the opponents

Still sounds gimmicky, I know. I can’t help it. But a funny thing happened as I continued to chip away at this challenge: the Focus Pass crit team actually kind of... worked. Once you’re critting every attack, you start to notice just how many game mechanics critical hits outright invalidate. Intimidate? Your negative offensive stages are ignored. Bulk stacking opponents? Their positive defensive stages are ignored. Grimmsnarl and Lapras walling you out? Screens don’t apply against crits (although a Shell Armor Lapras did shut me down quite handily once). Honestly, the boosted damage almost feels like an afterthought.

Every team I played required considerable reworking as I’d progress, honing in on specific threats often encountered and dropping low-participation Pokemon who weren’t pulling their weight. There was even a rule set which allowed the use of extremely powerful Legendary Pokemon for a time (a very bad time). But all digression aside, allow me to introduce the team that would eventually carry me higher than ever, swiftly through Ultra Ball tier and directly into Master Ball. They are the new and final members of Ribbon Gang 2.0.

The ones on the left, I mean. This box is just more second-stringers.

First is Gepigop the Togekiss, sporting Super Luck as a core member of the original crit team. Spamming STAB Life Orb boosted Max Airstream is the Singles meta, after all. And he’s from my Y version, same as Speedrun!

Second is PkmnConquest the Kartana, probably the most consistent and useful member I picked up along the way. Give it a Scope Lens and it’ll BEAST BOOST its way to easy sweeps - just pray your opponent isn’t hiding any Fire types in the back...

It goes it goes it goes it goes it goes it goes it goes it goes Guillotine... the Weavile at number three. YUH. She was included as a direct response to the unending hordes of Cinderace and Zapdos I faced. Focus Sash and Counter helped her turn around so many unfavorable matchups, I can’t recommend it enough!

Bringing up fourth is 8008 8008 the Rhyperior. Need an idea of how broken Dynamax Zapdos’ bulk is? Rhyperior is the only Pokemon I found who can one shot it from full HP without needing to Dynamax in return... and even then, only using Rock Wrecker. Seriously.

In our final slot is AZKi the Espeon, because Hololive kept me company through many of my battle sessions, lol. After one too many Focus Passes were blocked by Taunt, I put an end to it with Magic Bounce. You remember that scene in The Incredibles where Syndrome’s robots were revised as they faced off against more and more heroes? She’s basically that.

By the time I was barely breaking into Ultra Ball tier, I found much greater success if I didn’t try to force the crit gimmick every time, but still had it if I wanted it on AZKi, the fourth in the succession of Focus Passers. Yes, after months spent honing my skills in battle, I finally learned that just bringing three Pokemon that can beat your opponent’s is the simplest way to a win. Incredible, I know. And win we did!

The final needed victory in Master Ball tier was secured by PkmnConquest, Guillotine, and 8008 8008, a trio I found myself locking in very frequently.

It’s... it’s beautiful.

With this Master Ball ribbon attached to my Master Ball Farfetch’d, we’ve finally brought our lengthy Galarian story to its conclusion. Having managed to snag this online-exclusive ribbon before these games lost popularity or network support, Jin is once again a tried and true Ribbon Master, and I’ve no unfinished business to worry about any longer.

Until it is time to take up your sword once more,

Rest easy, Jin.

POKEMON SWSH: COMPLETE!

[ships-for-you]

Hello^^ May I request a two black butler ship one romantically and one platonically? I’m average height and I’m my early twenties. I had long curly brown hair, but I cropped it short on a whim and I’m loving it! I’ve got green eyes that tend to change color depending on what I wear. I’m a rather soft spoken individual and I’ve been told my voice is soothing to listen too.(1)

Romantically, I ship you with: Joker!

Now this may seem like a weird matchup but hear me out!

You’ve mentioned that you don’t mind befriending people as long as it’s technically in a forced situation.

Naturally, I perceived this as a perfect way to apply this idea; what if you were working for the Phantomhive manor?

Not only that, but what if you were tasked to be a private eye before they decided to infiltrate the circus?

As someone who is generally soft-spoken, I think Ciel would appreciate it if you were to speak less, so not speaking unless spoken to.

Ciel thought you were both a valuable but disposable asset to his array of pawns on his chessboard so although he appreciates your loyalty, if you were to fail? It would hardly matter to him.

Don’t get me wrong, he appreciates the fact that you’re caring towards him.

And that you’re probably the closest to a motherly figure he’ll ever have. But to an extent.

He assigns you the task of observing the variety of acts that Noah’s Ark Circus offers as soon as he recieved a letter from Her Majesty.

Through this, he expressed the intention of you getting recruited before he watches the show so he knows what to expect while leaving Sebastian to investigate the pattern of disappearance of the children.

Speaking of Sebastian, he’s the one who provided you with the blouse and trousers to make you blend in.

Apparently men are more welcome to be recruited, as they’ve read in an article. Luckily they managed to make you simply look like a charming young lad.

You bought a ticket to the presumably 2 hour show and had decided to keep a keen eye on anything there was to observe.

Too bad, as you made your way to the tent, you bumped into a performer and fell flat on your behind.

That would’ve been alright, had he left you there but instead reached out their “hand” to help you up.

That hand was that of a skinned man’s, naturally you backed away.

“Aw, there ain’t no need to worry! It be only a prosthetic, E'ee needn’t be scared!” The performer tried to console you and chuckled as he watched you try to scramble away clumsily.

You’re not really good with talking if not required to and so you panicked. If you don’t need to talk to him, don’t. Is what you thought.

Turns out he was the ringleader.

Great. Way. To make. An. Impression.

You kept up a facade to make sure you looked over the top interested so as to attract attention from the performers.

He recognized in the crowd halfway through the show and asked you as his volunteer for a, “Dagger’s” performance.

“How about the wee lad in the centre?! E'ee seem to be in good spirits!”

They told you to stay put infornt of the target but right as the blonde boy had thrown his knife, you saw something shiny and thought it was something suspicious.

Needless to say, you turned your head and moved a bit so the knife sliced your nose a bit. The crowd gasped as the boy’s mouth dropped.

“AM INCREDIBLY SORRY MISS!”

They took you to the back after the show to take a look at the cut with their doctor, chatted about, and you brought up your request to join as you expressed your interest in the circus.

“So are ee’ a young lad or lady?”

Form there, they’d be skeptical however would recruit you by the end.

You can’t be a tightrope walker, not with your clumsiness.

Certainly not a trapeze artist either.

That left you with knife throwing, juggler, or beast tamer. Any guesses what you’re best at?

Juggler it is!

From there, you spend a lot of time with Joker when training however not too much time.

You’re usually on cooking duty first thing in the morning ever since you cooked once and they wondered what you did.

You just said it was secret and the younger members and Dagger called it magic lmao. 

He likes your reaction to things that amaze you. The childish light in your eyes that he tried so hard to keep in the performers’ eyes.

He likes to bring you small gifts like small bundles of flowers or tricks that he’d like to use in their next show.

He appreciates your devotion to your friends, the rest of the first and second stringers, and your family. He knows that you write every night to your family to ensure them that you're fine and happy at the circus.

Or at least you told him you were writing to your parents.

Little compliments that seem almost flirtatious, much to Beast’s charging.

You try not to be charmed by his efforts however he just seems so genuine.

But you cannot continue. You have a task and you are falling for a criminal. Is what you tell yourself everytime he does these things.

You constantly writing every night to the Earl Phantomhive of your progress, purposely leaving out your domestic interactions with the ringleader.

The plan continues as you feign ignorance to seeing your master and colleague be recruited. Now, they serve as a constant reminder why you cannot continue as you please.

Of course, you can’t help but seem more at ease with “Black” by your side since you usually work closely together anyway.

Guess who’s jealous but laughs it off anyway? This little Pierrot.

I mean, he has no right to be. It’s not like you have an established relationship with him. He doesn’t ask how you’re close either.

He’s suspicious but he can’t suspect you since he thinks you have nothing to gain. So what if you’re chummy with a butler you’re supposed to have no way of connecting with?

He also, of course, understand that whatever he feels for you, he cannot fulfill for he also has a duty and obligation to the Baron.

It’s a fruitless romance you share with him and so you’ve merely chosen to enjoy whatever you have in the present with him.

You’ve already come to a conclusion what would happen to him in the end.

Platonically, I ship you with Sebastian!

As seen from the earlier situation proposed, you’d be colleagues meaning you’d pass by each other a lot.

I feel like you’d get along with most of the servants and occasionally Elizabeth when she visits but your dynamic with Sebastian is the most interesting and the most intimate amongst all of them.

He appreciates that you care for his master and that you don’t leave too much for him to clean up after, if not at all.

You help him clean after the other servants too and keep them in check.

He likes anyone who’s responsible enough so you’re pretty good in his book.

He’s not really the type to, “enjoy the company of others” since he’s usually too busy taking care of his bratty master’s orders however he does seem to prefer time with you than the other servants.

He appreciates how soft spoken you are therefore he finds the rare times wherein you do speak to him casually somehow precious(?) For lack of a better term.

You find yourself spending time in the young master’s library to read and he occasionally assists you when finding new and interesting material.

When you find something you like, he notices it’s always unavailable in the library.

“(Insert story lmao) again? It seems that you’re quite taken with that book, miss (y/n).”

He finds you to be the complete opposite of the humans he’s served in the past and so he’s naturally interested in your mannerisms.

He likes to observe you and you make him smile uncharacteristically for it simply finds a way to his face.

You like observing him as well as he’s unlike any “human” you’ve ever met. As perfect as a butler and as a man could ever be.

There was one time he caught you late at night outside chasing around fireflies that seemed to illuminate the silver sterlings in the garden.

He didn’t know whether to scold you for acting like a child or laugh at you for acting like a child.

Honestly, what if you tripped?

And then you tripped. Nearly fell sideways had he not done anything.

“Miss (y/n), this is hardly an appropriate time for a lady to be out and about. One could get the flu.” He’d coo but you can see that he’s slightly annoyed.

You’d apologize but would definitely do it again.

You like to be outside so you get along with Finnian as well in that regard.

Speaking of Finnian, he really likes your love for the outdoors and how caring you are for all of the servants.

“Miss (y/n), look what I’ve found near the creek! It’s a pretty narcissus flower!”

Bard appreciates how you’re very patient with him and help him when cooking meals. He’s stubborn since he can’t really let go of his flamethrower but at least he knows to be a little more patient with food now.

“That’s a pretty cool technique but I think we could speed this process up with m-” “Bard, please no.”

Mey-rin and you ofcourse share same clumsiness although hers is more related to her eyesight. She laughs along with you when you accidentally bump your hip along the servants’ tables when setting up.

You’re probably roomed with her as well and end up having nice conversations with her.

She likes your hair a lot and thinks it’s pretty and unique for the era.

“My hair just straight up looks like swine blood, yes it does! How do I have pretty hair as you, miss?”

Your “friendship” with Sebastian is quite odd and may be misplaced but as long as you don’t necessarily get in each other’s way, it’s all good.

Something I noticed very late, your eyes are literally a compliment each other’s.

~|~~|~~~~|~~~~~~|~~~~~~~|~~~~~~~|

Thank you for being patient and I hope you enjoyed your matchup! Requests are open lovelies.

[blake-belladonna-defence-force]

Ember/Shroud

Okay. I decided to try my hand at an au. Does it even exist yet?

It was mostly born from wanting a more serious reason as to why Blake was scared of dogs. I kind of feel bad.

I’m just going to call it “Emotional Support Soul AU” for now. Is this something people would like to see more of? Is it even a good au? Eh, it was a fun writing exercise at any rate.

Things to note:

Adam (abusive ex) is in jail.

Blake has come a long way but has residual trauma and depression

COMMUNICATION ISSUES

Yang does have a moment of being a lil forgetful and maybe a touch insensitive but she tries to make it better

Blake and Yang were roommates in college who decided to move in together

This is mostly because of Blake’s cat

They don’t know why but being too far apart physically hurts

So oblivious

Adam probably ran a dog fight ring or trained them to attack humans because he’s a goat lookin ass

Faunas are a thing

Set in Vale

Apparently soul pets or bonded animals or whatever are things here

The animal you were always meant to own/your guardian

Even more special if it’s your soulmates pet and it adopts you

Having your soulmates bonded animal approve of you is the highest complement

Both animals getting along and approving of each human in the relationship is rare and usually means they’re soulmates or something

They will often act as wingmen

It’s how Blake and Yang truly bonded as friends

Ember is a stray that Blake rescued as a kitten. When she finds out Yang is her cat’s bonded human, she’s surprised because: blonde party girl. She tried to keep Ember; does not go well.

Yang tried to keep Ember; does not go well

She refused to leave Blake but demanded that her bonded human stay

Even the cat ships them

————————————————————

“…Yang. What is that.”

“It’s a dog, Blake. Ya know, canine? Canis Familaris?”

“I know what a dog is, Xiao Long. I want to know why it’s in our fucking apartment.”

Uh oh. This was bad. Very bad. When Blake was mad she yelled. It was a part of her passionate nature; an injustice is done and Blake will have your head. But it was when she got quiet and spoke in that dangerously low tone of voice that you should probably start backing up. And never mention that’s she’s actually really pretty when she’s mad. Additionally, she was swearing and Blake only really swore when she was really pissed off. And apparently bringing home a Newfoundland equaled really pissed off the cat faunus.

“She needed a home. The poor baby was all alone, isn’t that right, Shroud?” Yang cooed adoringly at the friendly giant laying in front of their sofa.

“That is not a baby. That is a monster that I am sure will probably kill my cat.” Shroud whined and laid her head down, the dog almost seemed hurt. What am I supposed to do about Ember, Yang?!” Almost as on cue, a slender ginger tabby slunk her way into the living room. The cat immediately trotted over to Yang, headbutting her ankles fondly, completely ignoring her actual owner altogether. Before Yang could bend down to let the cat sniff her hands, Ember locked onto Shroud. She slowly walked over sniffed the giant nose that was presented to her. What truly surprised the two girls, however, was when Ember butted her head under the giant dog’s jaw before curling up against the dogs stomach and glancing at them as if to say “this is my bed now”.

“Ember, you traiter. I saved you from the streets when you were a kitten. I raised you and loved you like my own and this is how you repay me?!” Yang wished that she could say that Blake was joking but the cat faunus could be quite… extra when she wanted to be. To say the least; she was not pleased.

Yang walked over and scooped Ember up, not without complaint, and held her out to Blake.

“Aw, c’mon mum. Can we keep her? I’ve only just met her and I love her!” She pitched her voice, wiggling Ember around as though the cat were talking. This resulted in a bitten hand and a very disgruntled cat.

“You earned that. I pay half the rent, Yang. Couldn’t you have spoken to me about this first? You know how I feel about dogs.”

“Yeah, well, that’s kind of why I didn’t.”

“So you decided to ignore how I felt and go behind my back?” Yang winced. When you put it like that…

“Look, I’m sorry that I didn’t talk to you but my old high school buddy needed her gone ASAP. I couldn’t just leave her.” Yang made sure to look her friend in the eyes. She’d learned a long time ago that eye contact was important to the other woman and Yang always tried to make sure that she knew that she had Yang’s attention.

Blake didn’t say anything for a long while.

“Fine. Whatever.” She muttered, faunus ears pinned against her head, before turning on her heel and heading to her room. Yang cringed as she heard Blake’s door slam. Their uni days had taught her when to push and pull and when to back off. This was very much a back off situation. Even if she found it hard to understand why somebody would be so deadset against a dog.

///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Hours later, she was laying on the floor cuddling with both cat and dog when she heard Blake walk into the kitchen. She immediately headed over and stopped short. She knew Blake. She knew what she looked like when she was ecstatic, what she looked look when she was about to kick somebody’s ass.

Yang also knew what it looked like when one of her friend’s depressive episodes were kicking in. So the sight of a drained, red eyed and shuffling Blake was not new to her. It always broke her heart to see one of the most amazing, incredible people she’s ever met hurt like this. But to know that she was the potential cause…

“Blake?” Yang had never sounded, or felt, so small. Blake breathed deeply for a moment before turning to Yang.

“He used to keep dogs. Trained them to bite and attack. I don’t exactly have pleasant memories of them.” When Blake spoke, carefully holding her hip as it ached, it hit her hard. Of course, that was in the police report when they finally managed to get Blake’s ex away from her for good. Why the hell didn’t she put two and two together?!

“Shit, Blake. I am so sorry. I don’t know why I didn’t- it doesn’t matter. I obviously hurt you and I am so, so sorry.” Yang was close to tears herself at this point. She had seen how that man had broken her friend. Watched as Blake pulled herself from the shadows and stood tall and continued to repeat that process every single time he knocked her down. Now that she was finally free of him, she could be who she was meant to be. But that didn’t mean that he didn’t still haunt her. It hurt to see the pain in the other girl’s eyes but she kept eye contact. “I’ll find her a new home as soon as possible, I swear.”

Maybe that would have been it. Maybe she would have rehomed Shroud and they would have been done with it. But the canine in question suddenly walked into the kitchen and made her way to Blake.

“Just stay still, Blake. It’s okay, I won’t let her hurt you. I promise.” Blake was frozen but before Yang could grab her, Shroud sat at Blake’s feet and stared up at her. Yang paused. It was eerily similar to how Ember had decided that Yang was her bonded person. Blake’s breathing started to even out as she gazed at Shroud, who then proceeded to flip over onto her back and wiggle, tongue and jowls flopping comically.

“Hi?” Blake’s uncertainty would have been adorable had it not been for the situation. As the dog shifted, so too did Blake, her gaze becoming more curious than fearful. There was a patch of white on the dog’s black chest, seeming to form the shape of some kind of flower. “I think the fates are fucking with me.” Blake mumbled. “Because that is a Belladonna plant.”

Yang blinked. Blake met her gaze and before too long, the two women were giggling. Perhaps it was the fact that tensions were running high or perhaps Shroud had somehow known how to break the ice with Blake. Because when Blake spoke next, she left Yang surprised.

“Keep her.” Blake inhales shakily. “But please, for the love of God; train her properly. I can’t live like that again, Yang.” Yang immediately nodded and then, unable to help herself, ran over to hug Blake.

Only to be blocked by a large furry body. Shroud wasn’t growling, merely acting as a barrier. The dog had apparently thought that Yang was going to hurt Blake and was already trying to defend her. Wasn’t there a meme online about that? “I’ve only had Blake for one day but if anything happened to her, I’d kill everyone in this room and then myself.” Evidently, that was what was going on here. Not that Yang could blame the dog. Bonded animals did tend to be extremely protective of their person, if that’s what this was.

“Uh, Blake? I think that you have a body guard now.”

“Oh.” There was a light sniffle as the emotions of the past few hours crashed over Blake. “I think that that’s fair since you stole my cat.” Yang snorted, side stepping around Shroud carefully before wrapping Blake up in a hug.

“Not my fault she’s my soul pet or whatever the hell they’re called.” Yang defended herself. “I can’t believe that I’m going to need to ask a dog for permission to hug you.” Blake giggled weakly, burying her head into Yang’s neck.

“Just… lets take it slow, yeah? I’m not going to become a dog person over night. Even if she is my bonded animal.” Yang hummed. Well, that confirmed it. Most people could tell once eye contact is made. They felt a sort of unspoken promise; the creature would protect their sworn master, so to speak. The bonded animal would then act as a sort of body guard. It was useful many years ago but now it was more about them being glorified emotional support companions. Sometimes the matchups were odd. Yang had honestly beloved hers would be a golden retriever, not her best friend’s cat. And apparently Blake’s bonded animal was her best friend’s dog, despite the fear that she held for them.

Maybe Blake would never love dogs. But Shroud could at least be one dog that Blake could at least be comfortable with. After all, people were usually gifted the animal that they needed the most.

///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

It was a late afternoon when Yang realised she had been right. It had taken weeks, even months worth of training and slow progress between the two but eventually, Yang was forced to admit that Shroud was meant to never hers. Just like Ember was never meant to Blake’s.

She had just come home from work and had called out to Blake when she heard distant singing coming from the kitchen. Rounding the corner revealed a very surprising sight. One that made Yang melt.

Shroud had her paws on Blake’s shoulder as the young woman danced them around the kitchen singing along to the radio. Those gym sessions were really starting to pay off for Blake.

“You could be my Queen, I could be your dream. Oh, let me be your bumblebee.” Blake giggled as Shroud barked at her. It was a sign of how far they had come considering that she used to flinch at such. “Yang loves this song. Now that I mention her...I think that you might be a much better dancer than your mother, Shroud. Even if she doesn’t quite realise that staring is rude.”

Yang blinked. She’d been caught.

“Sorry, I’m just stupidly proud of you. So proud, in fact, that I’m going to ignore that jab at my awesome dancing abilities and my pride.” Yang glanced down at Shroud, who had dropped to all fours. “You going to say hi, girl, or are you just going to abandon me for a pretty lady?” Shroud almost seemed to glare at her before looking up at Blake who nodded solemnly in return. Yang let out more than a few grumbles about traitorous mutts and reached out to pet Shroud. Until she noticed an envelope in the dog’s collar. She rolled her eyes; they had taken to using the poor dog as a messenger, after all. Opening the letter revealed a reservation for one of the new high end restaurants in Vale. She looked up at Blake in confusion.

“It’s that new faunus cuisine place I told you about. You’re free Friday at six, yeah?” Blake was smirking and leaning up against the bench.

“Um, yes, why?”

“Because if you won’t make the first move beyond telling me I’m “feisty” and “pretty when I’m mad”, then I will.” Blake narrowed her eyes. “Don’t think that I haven’t noticed, Yang.”

“Oh. Am I that obvious?” Yang swallowed nervously.

“Yes. Also your sister and her “BFF” talked to me and have me informed to, and I quote, ‘take your pining, queer ass out before Weiss kills somebody.” I’m still not sure if Weiss wants me to date you or snipe you.” Yang felt her eye twitch. Those two...

“I mean, I’m more than happy to go on date with you and all, Blake, but I kind of want to kill them, now.”

“Want to pretend like nothing’s happened and mess with them for a couple of weeks?”

“How the hell are you so perfect?” Blake simply laughed and walked out of the kitchen with Shroud in tow.

“And of course the stupid dog follows her.” Feeling a bump against her ankles, Yang looked down. Seeing Ember, Yang quickly bent to hold her up to her face.

“But as long she keeps smiling, she can keep stealing from me. I mean, your mum already has my heart and soul, what else could I possibly lose?” She asked the cat quietly. Ember purred, apparently content with the results of her meddling from way back when. Yang smiled. It always made it a little more special when your bonded animal approved of your partner. If she was being honest with herself, so she was on cloud nine. Well, up until she heard Blake’s voice float down the hall.

“I heard that. Oh, you are so never living that one down, Yang!”

[downinthedevildom]

Ahh, if matchups are still open, I'd love to know mine! I'm a trans man who really likes science (foresnics), math, and art (though my art is currently buried under Obey me! Memes). I like reading a lot, and favourite genres are sci-fi and horror. I also like cooking, gardening, and knitting. I used to be on a Badminton team, and I'm an Aries! Also, my younger sibling is like 80% of my impulse control, jqksoksod. I'm also horrible with directions of any sort, constantly lost.

You sound like my kind of person, lovely! Science ALL the way 😤 (though struggle street is a REAL thing when it comes to math, I envy your love for it! 😭) That being said, I match you wiithhh;

Lucifer!

Your vast range of hobbies and interests are sure to get his attention. He’ll often find you everywhere and anywhere around the House of Lamentation studying, cooking, gardening, knitting, maybe even challenging his brothers to badminton too; you know they’d want to challenge you after finding that out - you’ve really got it all! 

At first, he’d remain on the outskirts, observing your stay and enjoying the subtle changes and fun you can bring to those around you. Family is very important to him. So when he finds you sitting shoulder to shoulder over a book with Satan or getting into debates and discussions with Leviathan on the best genres; maybe even cooking up a meal with Beel and Belphie or having Asmo chatter away to you while admiring your knitting skills, it’s not going to take too long before Lucifer finds himself joining in on these things too. 

Though your impulsiveness might be disarming and, at times, more work than the demon is cut out for, he finds himself becoming more endeared than disgruntled by your next best thing. He likes your unpredictability, it’s already common in his house and adding you to the fray really brings a life to the halls that he never considered possible until you were there. 

You can be sure that he finds himself becoming more attuned to your whereabouts and thoughts; he’ll always be there to help you out of a mess if you need it or even fondly sigh before berating and teasing you over a silly decision. Nevertheless, you have his support, even if he may not realise or accept it at first! This support most definitely extends to your internal compass. 

Getting lost has never been so interesting with Lucifer somehow knowing through instinct alone that you are somewhere where you shouldn’t be. Expect texts throughout the day checking up on you or even ridiculous texts like “If you find yourself thinking of something, think to yourself; “What would Mammon do?” If it’s something he would do, don’t.” 

You’ll even find yourself with the odd call as he insists on the reason simply being that he wanted to make sure you were actually making it home, to work and to your classes safely. Although… your company is quite nice, perhaps we could talk some more? 

He enjoys hearing about your day and your opinions on new art and forensic discoveries. He finds himself looking forward to your phone calls, giving his own opinions and sharing his own discoveries over the years, sharing what it was like to watch humanity learn and evolve their understandings; he’s quite knowledgeable once you get him talking, and he certainly finds himself doing so quite freely around you. 

On particularly bad days when you find yourself completely out of sorts with nowhere to go (and definitely spelling trouble!), Lucifer will personally come down to find you and accompany you himself. 

The first few times this happens he’ll probably claim it necessity, but when he wakes you up early to join him, alone, for breakfast and then finds himself the last to leave? You find yourself with a new routine, one where the avatar of pride keeps you at his side. 

Honourable mention : Mammon

Probably an interesting choice you might think but I can see this boy being consistently amazed by you every day. Like Lucifer, he finds your charm in the things you have passion for; you can bet he’s itching to ask you a million questions while you’re gardening or knitting, having no idea the effort that goes into these things at first until he hears it from you, or is royally flustered when he tries to do it himself. He’s absolutely the first to challenge you to a ridiculous match of badminton which ends up more of a show when he manages to ignite that sibling rivalry and turn it into an open battlefield. He brings a lot of silly fun and excitement to your life where, in turn, you provide a bit of an even balance... sometimes. You know the two of you are going to end up in all sorts of shenanigans, the words ‘impulse control’ are not apart of your vocabulary, you have no idea where you are, Leviathan is chasing you and you’re running for your lives; how did you end up in this situation again? Who knows, but Mammon is there and you’re definitely both laughing with exhilaration and a little bit of fear; you thrive in each other’s company!  

[writethehousedown]

get my heart attached to you ( trinity centered, multi ) - Lily

summary: trinity and monique are close teammates who play for the same football team abroad, while training for their next game they can't help but think about other things. [ title from “when I think of you” by janet jackson, for the prompt “heat” ]

author's note: me being a sports gay will never fucking die huh. wallah, had to write a lil something because I have enjoyed reading the various fics that have been churned out! I am also intensely spreading trinity/sports gay propaganda always !! I liked their volleys and personalities together on all stars, hope it's decent <3 trintox, momo and vanique are the ships in this: I barely write monique or vanessa but damn I love monique. worth the shot!

— *.✧

The heatwave in Barcelona was utterly immeasurable.

Monique wanted to gag.

She knew that being a professional athlete especially for a sport so cardio driven as football meant she'd have to dull out the extreme heat in order to play at most locations however, this seemed inhumane.

Football was always going to be riddled with money, complications and referees. It was simply the name of the game and had been since they both began to train at their individual academies at a young age.

Years and years of playing the sport and her absolute least favourite location to play in was Spain.

She'd been contracted to Tottenham for almost five seasons now; she preferred the grey and rainy skies of England to the absolute pit of hell that was the Iberian peninsula.

"You're not even phased by all this?" She asked Trinity who shrugged, her blue and white cleats dribbling her almost deflated football between the points of her feet.

"It's for the Champions League, I don't care if I pass out, I wanna win those points against Barcelona tomorrow."

"Girl you stay determined, I admire that."

The Floridan also felt right as if she was at home. The only difference being the humidity and mugginess.

Orlando is just as awful, it feels like my childhood all over again.

The brunette tied her hair back into a bun as she tossed her fellow teammate a new, cold water bottle.

"Drink before you pass out, you're sweating like a sinner in church."

Monique rolled her eyes though she immediately grabbed the water, barreling down as if they had been stuck in the Sahara.

She laid on the turf, Trinity grabbing her legs as she began to stretch her out.

"God you're tense," she mumbled before she continued on, "You need to stretch more especially since you're a striker and we need them powerful legs of yours."

"Thank you captain!"

Trinity flinched, it felt a bit odd to be singled out as a captain for the team. Monique found it quite odd; she was one of the most humble and determined players in the entire sport.

She had proven time and time again her loyalty, she'd never understand how Trinity didn't think she deserved her current position.

"Be all shy and cute for the cameras but you know deep down that you deserve to be running this team and wearing that armband," she inquired as she heard Trinity mumble something under her breath.

"Girl I don't know, I'm just trying to win, I don't need any extra pressure from any kind of media or fans," the brunette insisted as she juggled the ball, kicking her knees up.

Monique cocked a brow as she realized it would probably be better to say nothing. She quickly joined Trinity and practiced her own dribbling skills with the various balls that laid across the training field.

The forward player prayed that nothing about her behaviour was too off to Monique.

Nothing about playing a game made her nervous, in fact it calmed her down a bit, it was a distraction from her current thoughts.

There was however, an extremely different kind of heat that came to mind when Trinity heard their next bracket matchup for the Champions League was going to be against Barcelona.

Her face must've cracked the moment she heard Barcelona would be one of their three group rivals for the tournament.

She remembered distinctly how their team watched the group drawing happen from their training building in London and aimlessly waved their hands around knowing the draw was in their favour besides FC Barcelona being pulled.

Well shit.

Trinity sighed heavily, loud enough for some of her teammates to question why she felt so downtrodden against playing Barcelona.

She knew that was an entirely different story she couldn't speak on or delve into it; it felt too wrong and far too misplaced.

Monique snapped her back to reality as she asked if Trinity wanted to take a few laps with her around the field.

"Might as well make use of the time we have," the Missouri native hummed, "I know coach is probably gonna make us work with the goalie soon let's be real."

The brunette agreed, a fake and plastered smirk across her face as they headed towards the track.

A distraction was what she needed surely especially the day before the big, first match up of their group stages.

"Anyone in particular you wanna destroy tomorrow, purely for fun?" Monique asked, gently nudging her fellow teammate as Trinity felt her entire head explode at the question.

"Nicky and Detox are both forwards so guess I have to pick between them," Trinity commented as Monique laughed aloud, the two of them both picking up speed.

She felt herself remember everything from almost a month ago—she remembered back in London when they had invited Barcelona for a simple friendly game, nothing too special.

Yet somehow, things managed to gravitate towards the worst.

***

Trinity couldn't remember exactly why and how she had managed to slip in Detox to her hotel room after the game ended but she almost didn't want to know.

The incessant staring after forty five minutes had ceased; the occasional sharp tongued and witty comebacks to each other's insults, the not-so-accidental touching that occurred.

Well—as accidental as it could be still being utterly weary of the dreaded yellow and red cards.

She wasn't sure how it started but she was determined to keep it going. It made her heart feel some kind of way, whether extremely turned on or anxious she couldn't tell you the difference.

The heat was real, it had been for awhile though neither of them knew how to feel about the situation.

Two cups of wine and they both managed to build up liquid courage enough to make a move or some kind of statement.

They kissed passionately, the blonde immediately grabbed the other woman and pulled her towards her lap. Both of them far too lazy to move off the couch.

They made out with nothing but drive, as if they somehow had been begging for each other's company and touch this entire time.

Their lips met, Detox smirked, nothing but a snarky comment about how she could taste the sports drink flavouring that stained Trinity's lip.

"God shut up, we've only been kissing a few minutes and you're already infuriating."

"You're acting like I meant it as a bad thing baby," the blonde commented softly as she cupped both of her hands around her opponent's cheeks.

The moment their skin touched so softly was when Trinity panicked. She didn't know if she could handle a true, genuine connection to her own competition.

"You're my rival you know," Trinity slipped out as Detox blinked, almost impressed that the brunette managed to state the obvious so innocently.

"I know," the Barcelona forward laughed, her lips outlined the other woman's jaw. Her hands gently slid across her waist, a tight grip on her hips as she spoke once again.

"It makes this twice more fun, it's a thrilling experience for the both of us."

How idiotic.

Two competitors and athletes on different ends of the spectrum once again seemed to follow that delusional, charming fantasy.

They both knew the utter amount of backlash that would appear if anyone ever even saw them together in any kind of romantic light.

All of this and yet Trinity let the kissing ensue for longer and longer.

Every passing minute grew into a bigger ball of heat. The two took turns stripping their dirty, sweaty jerseys and uniforms off each other piece by piece. It was one of the most gratifying moments of Trinity's entire life.

If Trinity had known that all she wanted was some blonde to come and destroy her frivolously she would've asked much earlier in their careers.

"Do you actually want this or am I just the lucky one for tonight?"

Trinity dug her nails into Detox's shoulder, angered that she had suggested this entire thing being just a spur, no irony there, of the moment joke.

"I want you, I certainly won't if you keep talking however."

Detox grinned as she licked her lips, eyeing the brunette up and down, she noticed Trinity's cheeks begin to flush.

"That we can accomplish," the blonde whispered as her fingertips traced the football player's bare chest.

"Then get to it."

"Bossy. You're just as controlling here as you are on the field."

Trinity began to grow tired of the small talk, their lips drew together shamelessly; nothing short of fireworks seemed to blow out of the pits of the brunette's stomach.

It felt so wrong and yet, it still seemed like the most right decision she had ever made.

***

Trinity had never been so thankful for such unforgiving heat. She could excuse all the sweat and unforgiving memories as simply effects from the typical Barcelona climate.

"Can I ask you about something?"

Monique's question seemed light-hearted enough though the forward nodded nervously, praying to every religion that her fellow teammate hadn't managed to put together the puzzle pieces.

"Go ahead," she replied nonchalantly, shrugging even if her heart seemed to pace at an irregular beat, her nerves completely heightened.

"Girl, I don't know if it's the heat or what but I'm feeling some type of way about Miss Vanessa."

Oh thank God.

"Mateo? The transfer?"

Vanessa had been their winter loan of the season, she was quite a good defender for someone of her size. She had the most irreplaceable energy and attitude.

"Yeah," Monique said, stretching out the word as long as possible. The brunette could hear her voice go up the octave as she began to speak on how Vanessa had asked her out yesterday.

"Oh damn," Trinity laughed, impressed that the Puerto Rican clearly even after just a week was completely on a mission to take her friend on a date.

"Bitch good for you, she's nice enough and very funny, I feel like you'd enjoy yourselves."

Monique gave a small smile as she sighed, pushing the long hair from her face as she insisted that somehow it wouldn't feel right after her breakup with Monét.

"Oh so you're scared to move on is what I'm hearing."

"No, no, those are lies!" The statement must've struck a deep chord within the other woman, her entire expression seemed to tense up.

"You broke up only a month ago, it's okay to still be thinking about it, no one is making you feel ashamed about it."

Monique crossed her arms, now regretting this conversation topic.

She knew deep in her heart some of those feelings were still locked away even a month later but she wasn't going to let anyone get the satisfaction of finding that out.

"Okay, let's say that's why, which it isn't," Monique began as she pointed a finger towards her friend, the two of them still running aimlessly around the field. "What do you think?"

Trinity was in absolutely no place to give consolidating relationship advice considering her current situation however, she knew Vanessa was certainly worth a shot.

"Go for it, if you think she's gonna be good fun then take a chance."

"She's so pretty," Monique groaned as she glared out of the corner of her eye, watching as Vanessa practiced drills with their club's goalie. "I think I'm gonna say yes when we're alone."

Trinity smiled, happy that Monique had some semblance of getting over her last relationship. Monét was lovely, a very great teammate.

She remembered the shock they had both felt as they tied with the UEFA Player of the Year award.

Trinity would've rather Monét simply won than have to share the trophy; the snarky comments and blatant hatred of the results had truly pushed them both to become better friends.

It was a bonding experience to scroll through each other's social media and giggle along at comments while half way tipsy in another country.

She was still a bit surprised they had broken up. Nothing seemed to be outwardly wrong though Trinity wasn't Monique, she couldn't grasp every interaction or moment simply by asking.

"Go for it."

"Speaking of going for it," the other woman said, once again flipping around the conversation topic to whatever she desired. "How about you Miss Taylor, I'm shocked she's still on the market!"

The brunette felt chills run down her spine, she in general hated any conversation about relationships but considering all of the things that had been going on with Detox, it felt almost wrong to speak on it.

"She's a busy and focused woman," Trinity replied, "I'm not gonna get into a relationship right now, too many things going on." She adjusted her hair as she felt Monique shake her vigorously.

"Please let me set you up, there is no way that there isn't at least one person or another who catches your eye."

Well, she's not wrong there…

"No matchmaking. Maybe after we win the Champions League though."

Monique sighed in defeat, "I'm always here."

"I know, thank fuck for that," Trinity grumbled as the two hugged. Moments like these always seemed to distract from their giant bubble that revolved around their sport.

"We'll find a perfect woman for you someday or another."

Girl if you already knew.

Trinity grinned, "Yeah, maybe one day."

[wrestlingisfake]

Wrestle Kingdom 14 preview (Part 2)

New Japan Pro Wrestling’s annual Tokyo Dome show continues with an unprecedented second night in the stadium.  This show features the big double title match in the main event, but since a lot of people couldn’t watch the first night live, I’ll stick all that behind the cut.

Chris Jericho vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi - Jericho is the AEW men’s world champion, but the title is not at stake.  However, if Tanahashi wins this match, he will be guaranteed an AEW men’s world title match at some future date.

This match stems from the Okada-Jericho match on June 9.  Okada scored a flukey pin, and Jericho was so pissed he attacked Okada after the match, and Tana had to run in and save his buddy.  On December 8, a Jericho video appeared on the big screen to issue the challenge to Tanahashi for this match.  Which was convenient, since Tana was frustrated that he didn’t have a big match lined up for the Tokyo Dome.

The real story here is how this match reflects the relations between New Japan Pro Wrestling and All Elite Wrestling.  A year ago, when AEW was first announced, a meeting was held in which AEW reps sought a partnership with both NJPW and Ring of Honor.  It didn’t go well.  Kenny Omega and the Young Bucks have expressed resentment about how they left New Japan, citing the lack of a proper farewell.  On the New Japan side, they’ve actively avoided any direct reference to AEW, to the point that Tanahashi likened his pursuit of the AEW title to entering “the forbidden door.”  Even though two men (Jericho and Jon Moxley) work for both groups, it’s more a matter of AEW and NJPW choosing not to prevent them from having dual contracts, rather than the two promotions exchanging talent.  AEW Jericho and NJPW Jericho have seemed to exist in parallel worlds.  Until now.

The fact that New Japan is allowing Jericho and Tanahashi to acknowledge the AEW championship does not, in itself, mean an AEW/NJPW partnership is happening.  But it does suggest New Japan is loosening up about AEW, which could be the first step towards a reconciliation.  On the other side, I really can’t believe Jericho decided to make this match about AEW without clearing it with Tony Khan first, so I tend to think AEW isn’t opposed to this angle.  Of course, if Jericho just wins the match, Tanahashi never gets that title shot and “the forbidden door” can remain closed.  But...the fact that they’ve come this close to opening the door is still news, if only because the two sides had been so far apart before.

The smart money in this match is that Tanahashi loses and NJPW-AEW relations remain status quo.  But every pin attempt by Tanahashi in this match is going to have fans on the edge of their seats, because what if he wins?  For all any of us know, the partnership has been quietly approved, and we’re a three-count away from everything changing.  We can be cynical and assume Tana has no chance, but all the big New Japan matches have a way of making you believe an upset is possible.  And, hell, it’s Hiroshi Tanahashi.  He’s made a career out of making people believe love and energy will triumph against all odds, because he’s the once in a century talent and all that.  So I expect to mark the fuck out for this match.

Kazuchika Okada vs. Tetsuya Naito - This is the final match in the Double Gold Dash.  Okada has defeated Kota Ibushi to retain the IWGP heavyweight championship.  Naito has defeated Jay White to regain the IWGP intercontinental championship.  Now they face each other.  In the immortal words of Jack Tunney, it is champion versus champion, title for title.

Because of the nature of the build to this match, we suddenly have a big Okada-Naito main event with only one day to hype it up.  Luckily history has made this matchup self-explanatory.

Naito’s career as a result of a match with Okada at Wrestle Kingdom 8.  Naito was being groomed as the next big star by management, but fans resented him for winning the 2013 G1 Climax at the expense of Hiroshi Tanahashi.  New Japan pivoted by letting the fans vote on whether the heavyweight title match (Okada-Naito) or the intercontinental title match (Shinsuke Nakamura vs. Tanahashi) would close the show.  The intercontinental title bout won, and the main event that Naito earned became the semi-main.  If you wonder why Naito has such a weird attitude about the intercontinental title, about Tanahashi, about Okada, about the fans, about double main events, about working hard and following the rules to get what you deserve...well, that’s where it comes from.

Naito came up short at Wrestle Kingdom 8.  He would finally win the big one by defeating Okada for the heavyweight title in April 2016, but he lost it right back in June of that year.  Since then, he’s mainly been on the back burner, winning the intercontinental title or otherwise being second from the top.  It seemed like he’d finally exorcise the demons of Wrestle Kingdom 8 by headlining Wrestle Kingdom 12...except the international hype for that show was the newly arrived Chris Jericho, whose match was a part of a double main event.  And then Okada just beat him again.

Naito’s big plan over this past year was to embrace being the intercontinental champion, win the 2019 G1 Climax, and do a double title match at Wrestle Kingdom 14.  Of course, various twists and turns almost left him watching his double title match from the sidelines.  But now he’s finally where he wanted to be.  This match is the unquestioned main event of this show.  He’s challenging Okada.  Fans around the world are rooting for him.  And if he wins, he’ll have achieved something far more legendary than getting voted out of the top spot at Wrestle Kingdom 8.

...But he’s gotta beat Okada, and that’s as tough a nut to crack as it was in 2013.  Ask Kota Ibushi fans about getting your fairytale happy ending against the Rainmaker.  It’s not just hard, it’s unprecedented.  Okada has lost in the Tokyo Dome, and he’s lost IWGP heavyweight title matches in the Tokyo Dome.  But when he’s the defending champion in the Tokyo Dome, he’s undefeated.

I want to say this is too close to call, but fuck it, Okada is Superman, and Naito is all outta kryptonite.

Kota Ibushi vs. Jay White - This is the consolation match for the Double Gold Dash, featuring the losers of Okada-Ibushi and White-Naito from January 4.  Basically you’ve got two top guys with nothing better to do on this show, so let’s have them face each other.  I’m not sure if anything is officially at stake, but it stands to reason the winner will be the next challenger for the winner of Okada-Naito.

This happens to be a rematch of the excellent Ibushi-White match in the finals of the 2019 G1 Climax.  That match was great because White pulled every heel tactic in the book to steal a win, and Ibushi fought back with pure babyface energy to keep it from happening.  But without the prize of a Wrestle Kingdom title match at stake, I don’t think you’re going to see that kind of energy here.  Instead the story ought to be that both guys gave it their all last night in pursuit of an impossible dream, and got their asses destroyed.  Now they’re both banged up and essentially fighting for scraps.

Last night’s White-Naito match kinda dragged--at times I felt like I was watching an underwater fight scene, which you don’t want to do at the end of an all-nighter.  I am not in the mood for White to do his shenanigans to control the pace of the match again.  I’d rather just see Ibushi run wild on him and force White to keep up.  But I’m not holding my breath for this match to be all that good.

I’d be fine with Ibushi winning, but putting him right back into the title hunt seems a bit pointless.  At least if White wins he’ll either be chasing Okada (renewing a feud form a whole year ago) or chasing Naito (for a bigger stakes than what they’d been fighting over for the past six months). Somebody’s got to go 0-2 in this series and have their confidence shaken, and that’s a better story for Ibushi than White.

KENTA vs. Hirooki Goto - Goto pinned Kenta during the World Tag League tournament, which earned him a shot at Kenta’s NEVER openweight title.  They’ve been brawling ever since, so this match is almost less about the title than getting these two to settle it in the ring before they tear the whole promotion apart.

Of course, the big angle starting all of this was Kenta’s heel turn, where his longtime friend Katsuyori Shibata tried to stop him and got his ass destroyed.  Everyone hoped against hope that this meant Shibata could be cleared to return from his career-ending brain injury, but it looks like that wasn’t meant to be.  In the back of my mind, I always figured Shibata’s other longtime friend, Goto, would be a suitable backup.  But when the Goto-Kenta issue finally started, there was no mention of Shibata as far as I can recall.  This whole program has been kinda strange, and that’s without even getting into Kenta’s “dating sim” promos.

New Japan has been trying to promote the idea that Goto has reinvented himself over the past year, so I would think a title win would be in order to cement that idea.  Then again, New Japan has been trying to convince me Goto is on the verge of stepping up to the big leagues ever since I started watching New Japan.  So I could just as easily see Kenta retain.  This one’s too close to call.

Jon Moxley vs. Juice Robinson - This is for the IWGP United States championship, which Moxley just regained from Lance Archer last night.  As it happens, Juice won the IWGP heavyweight tag team title with David Finlay last night, so he’s in a position to score double gold before anyone in the main event.

I thought it was kinda weird to promote the Archer-Moxley Texas death match to build toward the winner in a straight singles match with Juice here.  It would have been more logical for Juice and Mox to face each other first to determine which of them could challenge Archer for the championship.  If Moxley is just gonna beat Juice here, then I don’t understand why it had to happen after getting the belt off Archer.  The only way any of this makes sense is if New Japan’s primary goal is to show us Moxley dropping the title to Juice--they likely meant to do that in October, but the typhoon got in the way, and this was the shortest route back to that plan.

I’m in favor of seeing Juice get the belt back from Moxley to end this feud, but I can’t quite convince myself it’s really going to happen.  In my head, Moxley is still the obvious favorite, and they could easily hold off on giving Juice this win for a long time.  I’m also not sure it’s a good idea for Juice to be a singles champion and a tag champion at the same time.  But everything about the booking suggests this is his time, and Moxley may be riding off into the sunset for at least a little while.

Zack Sabre, Jr. vs. SANADA - Sabre is defending the Revolution Pro Wrestling British heavyweight championship, since Sanada had scored some wins over him here and there.  There was some concern a while back that Sanada might have to be pulled from this match due to an injury, but it looks like he’s fine and the match is on.  (In the meantime, though, Sanada’s teammate BUSHI pinned Sabre in a singles match, so I would guess he’s next in line for a title shot.)

These two are always fun to watch against one another.  I was there for the Sabre/Sanada match in Dallas and it was a real treat watching them chain wrestle and shit.  If they do that stuff, but turned up for the Tokyo Dome, I think we’re in for a classic.  Of course, I’m not exactly a wrestling puricist, so what I really want to see is Sanada trapping Sabre in the paradise lock, and then Sabre freaks out but he can’t throw a proper fit because he’s tied into a little ball of British rage.  If this happens, I will declare this the match of the 21st century.

I have zero idea whether it makes sense to do a title change right now, but if I was a RevPro booker or fan I would love to see a cool dude like Sanada walking around with my team’s belt, so that seems like something they ought to do.

El Phantasmo & Taiji Ishimori vs. SHO & YOH - Roppongi 3K (Sho and Yoh) won the Super Jr. Tag League tournament to earn this shot for Phantasmo and Ishimori’s IWGP junior heavyweight tag team championship.  ELP and Ishimori were pissed about some technicality in the tournament scoring and felt they should have won, so they swiped the Super Jr. Tag League trophies, although I think R3K finally stole them back.

This match would probably be an afterthought if it was crammed into a one-night Wrestle Kingdom card, but since we already got the heavyweight tag title match on 1/4 maybe this one can shine a little more than usual.  I’m personally just relieved it’s not R3K vs. El Desperado & Yoshinobu Kanemaru again.  I guess I have to thank Phantasmo and Ishimori for that, but Phantasmo is a such a hyperdick that I’d rather not.

My prediction is Roppongi 3K finally regain the belts, and then tomorrow Despy and Kanemaru issue a challenge to get us back on that treadmill.

Jushin Thunder Liger & Naoki Sano vs. Hiromu Takahashi & Ryu Lee - This is the final match in the storied career of Jushin Thunder Liger.  He handpicked his partner--Sano, with whom he had a legendary rivalry 30 years ago--and his opponents--Takahashi and Lee, who have a legendary rivalry today.  (Interestingly, Takahashi is a member of NJPW’s official spinoff of CMLL’s Los Ingobernables, while Lee is a member of ROH’s unauthorized spinoff La Faccion Ingobernable.  So does that make them teammates or enemies?)

Hiromu, incidentally, won the IWGP junior heavyweight championship last night in a Match of the Year Candidate.  I would expect Lee will be a prominent challenger for that title by the end of the year.  So, you wanted the best, Liger?  Well, you’ve got the best.

What brings this match together for me was a backstage interview Liger did about how he believes it would make no sense to retire if he handily wins his last match.  To him the whole point is that he can’t keep up with the younger crowd, so therefore you would expect him to get destroyed because it’s time for him to hang up his tights.  So I expect this match to be about Hiromu and Ryu just absolutely clobbering these two old fellers.  Not a squash, exactly, but it’s Liger’s last stand, and he should take everything they can throw at him until he’s got nothing left.

Trios gauntlet match - This is the pre-show match, for the NEVER openweight trios championship currently held by Ryusuke Taguchi, Togi Makabe, and Toru Yano.  Two teams will start, and when one team is eliminated by losing a fall, the next team will enter to face the remaining team.  This process continues until all the teams have entered the match.  The last team left will be the champions.

The teams are:

Ryusuke Taguchi [Hontai] & Togi Makabe [Hontai] & Toru Yano [CHAOS] (the defending champions)

Tomohiro Ishii & YOSHI-HASHI & Robbie Eagles [CHAOS]

EVIL & Shingo Takagi & BUSHI [Los Ingobernables de Japon]

Taichi & El Desperado & Yoshinobu Kanemaru [Suzuki-gun]

Bad Luck Fale & Chase Owens & Yujiro Takahashi [Bullet Club]

The order of entry is supposed to be random, but as I recall the champions tend to get the advantage of being the final entrants.

In the past the trios title has been a hot potato, changing hands frequently in title matches at minor shows or in the undercards of big shows.  This year, however, we haven’t seen much of the title because the champions all seem to get pulled into different directions.  Taguchi is always doing some comedy thing, Makabe has been teaming more with his buddy Tomoaki Honma, and Yano gets pulled into Chaos stuff a lot.  The other four teams here are more cohesive, and it’s easier to see them focusing on the title because no one man on the team has a lot of other things going on. 

I’d be particularly interested in seeing the LIJ group win, since usually it’d be Evil, Bushi, and Sanada going after the trios title, but if Sanada is going to be busy as a singles guy then that shakes things up.  If they win here, and Sanada wins his match, we’ll have a situation where all six members of LIJ have a championship at the same time, so that would be neat.

Realistically, though, I think New Japan will want to give the championship victory to someone who they want to push above this level but never quite get around to it.  Someone like Ishii or Taichi, frankly.  But since an Ishii win would technically mean that something good happens to Yoshi-Hashi, that’s not possible.  So I guess I gotta go with the Taichi team to become the new champions.

[toonstarterz]

BECAUSE I’M NOT POPULAR, I’LL READ WATAMOTE: CHAPTER #159

Another day, another chapter of Watamote to fill that hole in your heart.

The suspension arc continues on, and in what seems to be a reflection of characters’ emotions, it’s a slower chapter that on the surface, doesn’t offer much in terms of “progression”. Thankfully, my overly analytical mind is here to pick up all the delightful subtleties of our cast, and pick apart the unexpected, but welcome direction this series has set itself up to move towards. All aboard the Tomoko Train! 

Chapter 159: Because I’m Not Popular, I’ll Still Be Suspended

Yeah, that figures. Suspension becomes a lot less stressful when you realize you’re too bored to be stressed. 

Not much else to say other than the lighting in this shot is absolutely gorgeous, ya’ll.

Sorry...I was distracted by Yoshida wearing a tie. By all accounts, it should not look as good on her as it does. Too bad we only get it for like 1 1/2 panels, but I’ll take what I can get.

♪ Wooooah, we’re halfway there! 

WOAH! Livin’ on a prayer! ♫

Just some more scenery porn courtesy of Niko. Her work has really come a long way.

I sure do love these unexpected pairings that get thrown our way from time to time. They may not be the matchups we wanted, but they’re sure as hell the ones we’ll undoubtedly love.

Tomoko at it again with the sick comebacks.

It may just be out of respect to her friend Komiyama, but I’d like to think that Itou secretly(?) would like to see Komi and Tomoko become closer. A true (friend)shipper on deck.

Ah, Itou. If nothing else, your friendship with Komiyama is the real deal if you can admit to all her lunacy.

I can’t help but love how Komiyama’s whole identity is 80% related to her glasses. No surprise since its a given fact that all meganekko girls are either super pure, or super perverted, and Komi has the distinct honor of being both.  

Good luck, Itou! Just play the Lottes theme song and you're guaranteed to bring at least one person to tears.

I wasn’t sure if Tomoko fully cleared up the whole “Tomoki is my brother” thing in the groping chapter, but the implication here is that Yoshida still doesn’t know. This is building up to what will surely be a hilarious revelation.

Guess we don’t have to worry about adding Itou into the Tomokibowl, huh? That would’ve been such a trainwreck. Makes you wonder who’s Itou’s type though...

As in, “Are you doing well?” or “Well, how are you?”. C’mon, Yuri, you gotta dial down the tsundere-ness and give your favorite idiot a little more context than that. 

Damn, Nemo was right on the money, wasn’t she? Even over LINE, she’s not afraid to play dirty.

Btw, I love how Tomoko’s expression doesn’t change at all while looking through the messages. Like her face is frozen from processing so many slaps in the face at once. 

I think this is the first Tomoko has been genuinely unnerved by Katou’s (s)mothering. Getting spoiled is a hot fantasy the first couple times, Tomoko. But once it starts bleeding into your everyday life, that’s when it starts getting a little creepy.

Let’s be honest. We all know who this is, right? 

Side note: How did she get Tomoko’s LINE number?

I wanna say it’s another Mako case where Okada sent her a message because of Nemo’s influence. Poor girl is falling down the rabbit hole.

Oooooh, Katou’s getting special treatment. In her defense, I don’t think it’s necessarily that Tomoko likes her best or anything. For one, Katou the only one whose message was fairly normal. But also, it’s easy to send a quick reply to someone you’re not as close with. Logically speaking, Tomoko would likely prefer to send more detailed responses to Yuri and Nemo because she’s closer to them. And she’ll probably ignore Ucchi entirely. 

Of course, logic has no place between girls fighting for dominance.

The first time we get to see Katou’s inner thoughts and...it’s nothing special.

I wasn’t expecting to see a monologue of deep-rooted insecurities or anything. That’s not this series’ thing. If anything, that mundaneness works to Katou’s advantage because it shows that while she may be incredibly attractive on the outside, she’s just a regular person with simple concerns on the inside. If they’re really going to take Katou’s affection on Tomoko into romantic territory, it’s a good place to start.

The Cuck Sisters have graduated into the Ghosted Sisters.

I’m sure Katou isn’t trying to arrogant about being the only one to get a reply. I mean, anyone would have a bit of an ego boost from that. 

But I’m sorry, Katou. There’s just one small thing you have to realize...

...finding out that your girl was out seeing other people is the initiation for entering the Tomoko harem.

Poor Itou. Girl was just minding her own business and now she finds herself in the middle of the moshpit. 

On that note, I absolutely love the composition of this panel. Even though the line of sight is directed at Itou, Katou’s stance draws in your full attention. Even more amazing is how having these six specific people in the frame adds to the overall intensity. We having Tomoko’s old friends, new friends, and acquaintances all together for the same discussion, and it really emphasizes just how much Tomoko’s influence has affected the whole classroom dynamic.

Small tidbit, but I appreciate that Yuri asked about Yoshida, too. Those two haven’t had many scenes alone together lately since the pachinko parlor moment, and it would sure be nice to more of their relationship outside of Tomoko. 

Ucchi’s teleportation powers always gets a good laugh out of me. I also like how the very first thing she asks is if Tomoko’s creepy, like she needs that confirmation to validate even being there. Girl needs to start coming up with better excuses.

Having Ucchi and Futaki in the same panel always feels so unreal to me. I feel like if the two of them starting talking to each other, the universe would implode upon itself. 

Ucchi:

I like the direction they took this. It would have been very easy for Komiyama to pretend she doesn’t care a la tsunderism. But nope. Komiyama only has a mild interest in how Tomoko’s doing, letting Yuu act as a proxy for them. Even if Tomoko and Komiyama don’t care much about each other, their history belies this odd level of intimacy.

Alright, alright, you got me Nico Tanigawa.

...Poor Minami. 

I think its a merit to the mangaka’s storytelling skills that we can easily infer that Mako’s talking about Yoshida. Between Mako being who she is, Yoshida being who she is, and their growing friendship gaining attention, who else could it be?

That’s...kind of sad, honestly. We’ve seen several times just how clingy Minami is to her (one-sided) friendships, but never have we seen her sound so dependent on others. It’s been hinted at before, but being a bitch is the one thing Minami’s good at, and she might actually know that. She may act stuck-up on the outside, but the fact that’s she’s so upfront about it may actually mask a bit of an inferiority complex.  

Curse you, Nico Tanigawa, for making Minami a three-dimensional character with legitimate wants and fears.

I’m glad Mako isn’t mentioning her by name. She knows Minami enough that outting her friend will lead to harm.

On Minami.

Tomoko’s triangle mouth is unironically cute. There, I said it.

Character development for Yoshida, whaaaaaat?

Let’s face it. The trio of Tomoko, Yuri, and Yoshida are all slackers in some way, shape, or form. It makes sense that Yoshida would be the last of them to put any real effort into her future. Since she isn’t the type to make personal changes just because someone told her to, the reasonable way to make Yoshida understand is through observance. As thick-headed as she is, Miss Yoshida is not about to be left in the lurch while her buddies move on without her.

Between this and my recent watching of Aggretsuko S2 (shameless plug!), it’s become apparent to me that getting a driver’s license isn’t as “mandatory” there as it is in my country. I’d imagine it has to do with the work environment there being so focused on public transit, but feel free to correct me if I’m wrong.

Tomoko actually makes a solid point there, though I get the feeling she’s imagining Yoshida driving getaway cars for the yakuza or something. 

Or, you know, her chauffeur. 

Ignoring the somewhat obvious advertisement for a vehicle that I’m sure was blacked out in the original version, this is totally setting itself up for the next arc of Watamote. As summer vacation gets closer and closer, I was wondering just how Tomoko was going to spend it. She obviously can’t stay at home the whole time like she did in the past, so I was thinking she’d end up doing things with her friends like working part-time jobs, going to a festival, or in this case, a road trip.

Bring on the Road Trip Arc!

Oh, I get it. Tomoko did the whole “min-na” thing that slice-of-life moe anime girls do when talking about their friends, right? 

Traitor.

I’m joking, of course, but only partially. It’s clear to us all that Tomoko feels like she’s betraying a part of herself for saying something so bubbly. It was a direction I had anticipated to some degree when Tomoko began making self-deprecating jokes about becoming a normie. It was always in that “haha, like that could ever happen” tone, but it was only a matter of time before Tomoko started to become the mask. It’s scary to think you might subconsciously be changing a core part of yourself, and that realization is something Tomoko will eventually have to come to terms with.

At least we get her most adorable, genuine blush ever thanks to this.

Damn, expulsion for driving a vehicle? What’s with this school and it’s beef with having your own set of wheels?

Ah, saving up for a car. The first glimpse into Tomoko’s (and everyone else’s) efforts at adulting. 

To get the obvious out of the way, no I don’t think Mako and Yoshida are naked in this panel. While Nico Tanigawa have shown that they’re not above very mild levels of fanservice, I don’t think they’d resort to something this teasing.

Probably. 

Anyways, there isn’t anything necessarily wrong with Yoshida’s decision. Taking things slow is very much in line with her character. Sure, it’s kind of inconsiderate of Yoshida to flippantly go the other way after asking for help, and Mako’s frustration is understandable. But more importantly, it highlights Mako influence on Yoshida, and the Kyoto Group in general.

When it’s just Tomoko, Yuri, and Yoshida, they have a unique bond where they don’t really try to push each other out of their comfort zones. Yoshida especially, for being so damn stubborn. But when you add Mako into the mix, a.k.a. the “Mom Friend”, suddenly the level of morale and effort within the group rises. And as the most “normal” friend, Mako’s existence helps to keep their friendship from growing stagnant.

As the Suspension Arc continues, the lack of “action” gives the cast some room for a little introspection. The gags themselves may have been on the limited side, but a lot of these set-up chapters usually are. The future is near, folks, and there are no signs of slowing down, for the characters or the series itself. Changes are over the horizon, but for now, the journey continues.

[unfortunatematchups]

May I please get a Homestuck matchup? 2 Matespirits and 2 Moirails from Alpha kids, Beta kids, and Beta Trolls. I am a Bisexual Male who prefers Females. Some of my interests are games and gaming in general. I love cartoons and youtube videos alike, animated stuff is really awesome. I tend to get knee deep in fandoms for things I enjoy and do all kinds of stuff for it. For a third interest I'm really into things like art and drawing. I sent these in backwards sorry

not gonna lie i tried so hard to make the eridan match work but i had to accept the cold hard truth that eridan was a lil bitch boy 

-mod olio

For your Homestuck moirail, we match you with…

DAVE STRIDER

♢ Honestly? He gets it. Whenever you’re feeling stressed or angry, Dave’s got your back. While he won’t tackle the problem head on, he can bring your attention elsewhere, distract you with something funny or pull some baffling bullshit to take the edge off. He might be a little hurt when you lash out at him, but he’s not going to let a couple of bumps destroy your friendship.

♢ You two draw a lot, and that’s a fantastic way for the two of you to pass the time. There’s a lot of scribbling and drawing nonsense, since he’s not the type of person to put in too much effort into drawing. He also loves to spend time either playing games or just sitting around doing nothing or idle things, just talking about anything under the sun.

For your Homestuck moirail, we match you with…

KANAYA MARYAM

♦ Kanaya will care for you during bad times in a different way from Dave will, but that works out well too. She has a lot of patience and will go to the end of the world for you, so she can certainly put up with a couple of fits every now and then. She will be your rock and ground you, telling you when you’re going a bit overboard and try to soothe you to the best of her potential, even spending her entire day with you if need be. If you need care she can and most certainly will deliver.

♦ Even if she doesn’t share many interests with you, she appreciates and respects the fact that you have a deep passion for the things you like. She is willing to try and learn to love the things you do, but she makes no promises that she will take to it. Instead, she understands that having similar interests is not what makes or breaks a strong friendship, giving you space to do what you enjoy and expects the same understanding from you.

For your Homestuck matesprit, we match you with…

JADE HARLEY

♡ Jade’s a bundle of fun! Your laid back nature balances her bombastic energy perfectly, with the two of you having just the right amount of fun. When both of you go out on dates it’s always something the two of you can enjoy, never too dull or too draining. She can push you to try and discover things that are out of your comfort zone, and you can make sure that she doesn’t go too far in one direction or the other. 

♡ Although she may be a bit insensitive to you when you’re moody, she will slowly learn to be patient and help you instead of angering you further. It may be a bit rough at the beginning, with her snapping back, but with enough time spent she is willing to take a few steps back on her end to help you settle down, either just apologising directly or suggesting you two do something fun but simple together. 

For your Homestuck matesprit, we match you with…

ARADIA MEGIDO

♥ Aradia, similarly to Kanaya, understand that two people don’t need to share interests to be a good match. Instead, she thinks that your interests can be combined to make something the two of you can enjoy together, like her bringing you various odd-looking objects she finds during her explorations for you to draw or reimagine into an animated character, or her bringing you with her to look at the places she’s explored for inspiration should you need it. She’s also open to trying out whatever you want, so there’s always something to do with her.

♥ Though patient, Aradia’s the sort to be distant when she feels a fight will happen. She won’t snap or bite back at you because it won’t fix anything. Instead she’ll just wait it out, maybe giving you some time to cool down before she comes back, asking if you’re better and want a hug or a kiss. She will stay if you ask her to, perhaps letting you play with her hair or hands until you’re calm again.

[theliberaltony]

via Politics – FiveThirtyEight

One of FiveThirtyEight’s goals has always been to get people to think more carefully about probability. When we’re forecasting an upcoming election or sporting event, we’ll go to great lengths to analyze and explain the sources of real-world uncertainty and the extent to which events — say, a Senate race in Texas and another one in Florida — are correlated with one another. We’ll spend a lot of time working on how to build robust models that don’t suffer from p-hacking or overfitting and which will perform roughly as well when we’re making new predictions as when we’re backtesting them. There’s a lot of science in this, as well as a lot of art. We really care about the difference between a 60 percent chance and a 70 percent chance.

That’s not always how we’re judged, though. Both our fans and our critics sometimes look at our probabilistic forecasts as binary predictions. Not only might they not care about the difference between a 60 percent chance and a 70 percent chance, they sometimes treat a 55 percent chance the same way as a 95 percent one.

There are also frustrating moments related to the sheer number of forecasts that we put out — for instance, forecasts of hundreds of U.S. House races, or dozens of presidential primaries, or the thousands of NBA games in a typical season. If you want to make us look bad, you’ll have a lot of opportunities to do so because some — many, actually — of these forecasts will inevitably be “wrong.”

Sometimes, there are more sophisticated-seeming criticisms. “Sure, your forecasts are probabilistic,” people who think they’re very clever will say. “But all that means is that you can never be wrong. Even a 1 percent chance happens sometimes, after all. So what’s the point of it all?”

I don’t want to make it sound like we’ve had a rough go of things overall.1 But we do think it’s important that our forecasts are successful on their own terms — that is, in the way that we have always said they should be judged. That’s what our latest project — “How Good Are FiveThirtyEight Forecasts?” — is all about.

That way is principally via calibration. Calibration measures whether, over the long run, events occur about as often as you say they’re going to occur. For instance, of all the events that you forecast as having an 80 percent chance of happening, they should indeed occur about 80 out of 100 times; that’s good calibration. If these events happen only 60 out of 100 times, you have problems — your forecasts aren’t well-calibrated and are overconfident. But it’s just as bad if they occur 98 out of 100 times, in which case your forecasts are underconfident.

Calibration isn’t the only thing that matters when judging a forecast. Skilled forecasting also requires discrimination — that is, distinguishing relatively more likely events from relatively less likely ones. (If at the start of the 68-team NCAA men’s basketball tournament, you assigned each team a 1 in 68 chance of winning, your forecast would be well-calibrated, but it wouldn’t be a skillful forecast.) Personally, I also think it’s important how a forecast lines up relative to reasonable alternatives, e.g., how it compares with other models or the market price or the “conventional wisdom.” If you say there’s a 29 percent chance of event X occurring when everyone else says 10 percent or 2 percent or simply never really entertains X as a possibility, your forecast should probably get credit rather than blame if the event actually happens. But let’s leave that aside for now. (I’m not bitter or anything. OK, maybe I am.)

The catch about calibration is that it takes a fairly large sample size to measure it properly. If you have just 10 events that you say have an 80 percent chance of happening, you could pretty easily have them occur five out of 10 times or 10 out of 10 times as the result of chance alone. Once you get up to dozens or hundreds or thousands of events, these anomalies become much less likely.

But the thing is, FiveThirtyEight has made thousands of forecasts. We’ve been issuing forecasts of elections and sporting events for a long time — for more than 11 years, since the first version of the site was launched in March 2008. The interactive lists almost all of the probabilistic sports and election forecasts that we’ve designed and published since then. You can see how all our U.S. House forecasts have done, for example, or our men’s and women’s March Madness predictions. There are NFL games and of course presidential elections. There are a few important notes about the scope of what’s included in the footnotes,2 and for years before FiveThirtyEight was acquired by ESPN/Disney/ABC News (in 2013) — when our record-keeping wasn’t as good — we’ve sometimes had to rely on archived versions of the site if we couldn’t otherwise verify exactly what forecast was published at what time.

What you’ll find, though, is that our calibration has generally been very, very good. For instance, out of the 5,589 events (between sports and politics combined) that we said had a 70 chance of happening (rounded to the nearest 5 percent), they in fact occurred 71 percent of the time. Or of the 55,853 events[footnotes]Although we’ve issued a lot of forecasts, the sheer numbers slightly exaggerate the volume of what we’ve done because a lot of forecasts are somewhat redundant, i.e., the odds of the New York Mets winning the World Series on May 15 don’t differ much from the odds on May 16, but each one is technically a separate forecast. The statistical techniques that we’ve applied to measure whether forecasts are well-calibrated account for these redundancies.[/footnote] that we said had about a 5 percent chance of occurring, they happened 4 percent of the time.

We did discover a handful of cases where we weren’t entirely satisfied with a model’s performance. For instance, our NBA game forecasts have historically been a bit overconfident in lopsided matchups — e.g., teams that were supposed to win 85 percent of the time in fact won only 79 percent of the time. These aren’t huge discrepancies, but given a large enough sample, some of them are on the threshold of being statistically significant. In the particular case of the NBA, we substantially redesigned our model before this season, so we’ll see how the new version does.3

Our forecasts of elections have actually been a little bit underconfident, historically. For instance, candidates who we said were supposed to win 75 percent of the time have won 83 percent of the time. These differences are generally not statistically significant, given that election outcomes are highly correlated and that we issue dozens of forecasts (one every day, and sometimes using several different versions of a model) for any given race. But we do think underconfidence can be a problem if replicated over a large enough sample, so it’s something we’ll keep an eye out for.

It’s just not true, though, that there have been an especially large number of upsets in politics relative to polls or forecasts (or at least not relative to FiveThirtyEight’s forecasts). In fact, there have been fewer upsets than our forecasts expected.

There’s a lot more to explore in the interactive, including Brier skill scores for each of our forecasts, which do account for discrimination as well as calibration. We’ll continue to update the interactive as elections or sporting events are completed.

None of this ought to mean that FiveThirtyEight or our forecasts — which are a relatively small part of what we do — are immune from criticism or that our models can’t be improved. We’re studying ways to improve all the time.

But we’ve been publishing forecasts for more than a decade now, and although we’ve sometimes tried to do an after-action report following a big election or sporting event, this is the first time we’ve studied all of our forecast models in a comprehensive way. So we were relieved to discover that our forecasts really do what they’re supposed to do. When we say something has a 70 percent chance of occurring, it doesn’t mean that it will always happen, and it isn’t supposed to. But empirically, 70 percent in a FiveThirtyEight forecast really does mean about 70 percent, 30 percent really does mean about 30 percent, 5 percent really does mean about 5 percent, and so forth. Our forecasts haven’t always been right, but they’ve been right just about as often as they’re supposed to be right.

[maiji]

Three Generals Showdown

I was in the middle of something else when Barricades from Attack on Titan came on and I was like OHHH NOOOOO because I was overcome with the urge to drop everything and draw something cool instead. Well, at least attempt cooler than what I was working on at the time. 

If there were ever a full-on mortal combat scenario between the three generals - just them, no interference/support - how would you bet on the outcome?

What we know from the actual series:

Hokushin is intelligent and strategic, employing psychology in his battles. He has demonstrated he can catch a significantly more powerful opponent off guard with a power level difference as massive as D class VS S class (which some people might say is roughly comparable to an ant VS God lmao). However, this was a brief demonstration match against a Yusuke who was unaware of the nature of Hokushin’s powers nor the extent of his own, and also not a fight to the finish. In addition, Hokushin is honourable, a.k.a. not likely to play dirty in a fight even if his life depended on it.

Shachi is not necessarily the brightest, but not stupid either. He's the exact opposite of Hokushin - conniving and opportunistic, having killed all potential threats to his position as Yomi's general (until Kurama).

Kirin we know the least about, but he's definitely more opportunistic than Hokushin, and all signs point to him being smarter/more strategic than Shachi. This is extrapolated from his caution and effectiveness in dealing with Mukuro for two centuries - see "On writing Kirin". (In comparison, Kurama comments that Yomi was infinitely patient in letting Shachi hang around for as long as he did.)

On pure base stats (which you can see in the manga and slapped onto some fanart here), Hokushin is the weakest of the three. He only beats Shachi in a few defense/endurance-focused areas, but not by all that much.

Shachi's offensive power is practically double Hokushin's.

Kirin is significantly stronger than both Hokushin and Shachi in every single category, and his total points exceeds the other two generals combined. This isn't a three-kings-stalemate scenario where all three powers are nearly equal in strength. In a one-on-one of Hokushin VS Kirin or Shachi VS Kirin, I'd bet Kirin every time.  

With all that in mind, here's my 0.02. I feel like my conclusions are super obvious based on the above summary lmao (Spoiler: I think Hokushin's odds are not good.)

Kirin would easily emerge the victor. The only way for Hokushin or Shachi to stand a real chance against him is if they BOTH target him together and manage to take him out first, then they can focus on each other for a slightly more even matchup. But even if they both realize this - which they must - I highly doubt it would happen because of their diametrically-opposed natures. And anyways, Kirin would obviously realize this too, so his best move is to make the first one. He'll just come out and mow one of them down as fast as he can so that it doesn't give them any opportunity.

So, what's the order of defeat, i.e., whom does Kirin go after first? I say Shachi because I think Kirin, like everyone else, would be like "UGH can't stand this guy" and fry him to a crispy fish before dealing with Hokushin who is a much more palatable opponent lol. Also, if you're focusing your efforts on someone else, I'm willing to bet Hokushin won't attack from behind, whereas you can rest assured Shachi will be doing anything he thinks will benefit him, so it's safer to get rid of Shachi first.

However, the above assumes everyone's starting at ground zero and there were no other dealings going on before this.

If we wanna talk stealth coalitions, again, Kirin has a distinct advantage. As the strongest, he doesn’t really need to ally with one of the other generals, and he's the best strategic option to guarantee victory for your side - assuming you feel confident about being in a super unbalanced alliance where you’re sharing things with someone who could easily crush you too lmao. Hokushin is technically the most appealing alliance partner because he wouldn't betray you, but he's unlikely to make an alliance he doesn't believe in.

In a best-case scenario for Hokushin, he should ally with Kirin in advance. Besides being the most logical option (because Hokushin can’t exactly ally with himself...), the official narrative also indicated it was a potential direction - before Raizen dies, he recommends Yusuke to ally with Mukuro's forces. But, because this is still such a problematic decision for a character like Hokushin, I think this would only happen if Raizen or Yusuke said something similar to him as well, or if the scale of impact were far beyond Hokushin alone, i.e., it was the best option if many people's lives were at greater risk otherwise - see "On writing Hokushin".

Nobody wants to ally with Shachi, but he's probably the easiest of the three generals to manipulate into thinking an alliance is for his own benefit and then to trip him up. IMO this tactic is way too out of line for Hokushin to pull, but feasible for Kirin depending on how sadistic you write him. He could bait Shachi with some kind of one-sided fake "alliance", they both kill Hokushin, and then Kirin kills Shachi.

Ohh, I know, for ultimate drama that's still believable to their characters as depicted in the series, you could contrive a story where Kirin "allies" with Shachi by making Shachi think he's got some secret upper hand to be able to control Kirin during or after the fact so that he drops his reservations about an unbalanced alliance, they target Hokushin in a two-cats-and-a-mouse type thing, and then just as Shachi is about to deal the final killing blow, Kirin slaughters Shachi. And then ... OK I already have enough comics and fics I need to work on and this whole thing seems headed for long drawn-out torture/evisceration/whatever which isn't the kind of thing I usually write anyways. BUT IT SEEMS LIKE AN INEVITABLE CONCLUSION