#jeanne plays LiS

[sonic-nancy-fan]

Oh Rama Havenna, Oh Beloved Havenna~Jack Jeanne English Trans-lyrics

These are my English trans-lyrics for the full version of Oh Rama Havenna, Oh Beloved Havenna from Jack Jeanne. This is by far my favorite song since I really like jazz/swing music. The song also has a lot of word play, symbolism, references, etc.

My lyrics this time are based on the official short English translation, and the translation for the full song done by HanaMitsu- (https://www.reddit.com/r/otomegames/comments/15ty90j/jack_jeanne_for_the_linguists_and_jj_fans_an/).

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Download Lyrics

Shining, the street lamps stay Glowing like paintings that Pollock made In our strange party tonight Frustrations? Throw them away

Da-ba-da ba-da-da-ta Like moths to a flame comes these outlaws This party paradigm Is our lowly, lonely, sad, gesselschaft

“Oh, Rama Havenna!”

Now the, zoetrope Clatters as, it falls down Spin round, and around Visions sway, with another round

The pain you feel is a mirage Just pay it no mind The world was rough with you this time Stay, unwind, you’ll be fine Dance up and down, as you know Da-da-bee-doo-dooo Give yourself to night tonight Singing out, “Havenna”

Soon you will fall, for all the traps Artemisia vulgaris, one more glass If you want to act a fool Stańczyk’s a lonely fool too

Ha-ya-pa-ya cha-cha-cha In these sprawling neon alleys, I saw (Showering in absinthe) That here, there, everywhere, God is absent

“Oh, Rama Havenna!”

Like a, ring of smoke We’re spinning, and swirling Until you’re jonesing Listen to, this song on repeat

The pain of this world is hidden Behind smoke and lies Take some psychedelics this time Come, it’s fine, let’s get high No up, just down, as you know Du-du bi ba-ba Sway ‘til the lights go out tonight Dancing for Havenna

Da-ba-da-ba da-da-ta-ra Da-da-ra da-ba-da-ba da-da-ta-ra Cha-cha cha-cha-pa cha-pa-ya Cha-ba-ya cha-cha-cha cha-pa cha-pa-ya

“Oh, Rama Havenna!”

Human, puppets dance All twirling, as they buy A room for the night So their dreams, of heaven don’t die

Tomorrow’s pain is a mirage Act like it’s nothing From the start, the world’s been smelling That mugwort you’re smoking Dance up and down, as you know Da-da-bee-doo-dooo Give yourself to night tonight Singing out, “Havenna”

No up, just down, as you know Du-du bi ba-ba Stay ‘til you overdose tonight Singing out, “Havenna”

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Notes: I took a few liberties this time since the song's scatting lines are sometimes pointless, other times references, etc. and there's so much symbolism I had to play with things a bit to get most of it in. I am very proud of how I handled the second chorus' "No up, just down" line though! I think it gets the meaning across while sounding very close to "Dance up and down" which is what one of the goals of the original dan-dan-da-la seemed to be.

[kinghijinx22]

Top 5 queer ships from video games

HELLO my fellow queers! Just in time for the end of Pride Month I have decided to write about my top 5 queer canon ships from video games because I thought it would be a cool thing to do for the occasion, because I play the video games and am obviously very queer myself. This is also sort of a post to go along with the top 5 pansexual characters that I did last year as well. So to begin our list at number 5-

5. Alex Chen and Steph Gingrich, Chengrich from Life is Strange True Colors- Starting off with a ship not from a game I've played myself but I've seen plenty of lets plays of which is something I can say about the whole Life is Strange series, Alex Chen and Steph Gingrich from True Colors are a couple of dorky sapphics with a really cute relationship. The best in Life is Strange in my opinion, while the series has always been known for having good queer representation, I personally was not as impressed as others with the vagueness and burying of gays that LiS 1 and Before the Storm did, and while LiS 2 is better with Sean and Finn in it's explicitness, they make Finn such an asshole. Canon bisexual protagonist Alex Chen of True Colors is the most likeable protagonist in the series in my opinion, and Steph Gingrich who is lesbian, is easily the best love interest. Better then Ryan from the same game in my opinion, Alex and Steph's relationship is well developed throughout the game and the 2 of them have some really heart warming moments, especially that kiss when Alex goes upstairs to see Steph during that town event. Alex seeing the blue emotions around Steph before they kiss because she's worried about Alex not kissing her, and then she does and they explode with the yellow light of happiness. And then in the endings, Steph either settles down with Alex or Alex who is also a musician joins Steph's band and they go on tour together which is very romantic as well. Best LiS couple easy for me.

4. Bayonetta and Jeanne, BayoJeanne from Bayonetta- So now we jump into games that I have played myself with BayoJeanne from Bayonetta, specifically their relationship from Bayonetta 1 and 2 because Bayonetta 3 fucked it to ship Bayo with that loser Luka instead. Bayonetta and Jeanne though were badass power couple of witches in the first 2 game. Childhood friends, to lovers, to rivals, to lovers again, what a wild ride for a relationship to go through as well but they end up being so sweet together. To explain, in Bayonetta 1 Bayo has lost her memories and Jeanne is brainwashed by Bayo's evil sage father Balder so Jeanne as another powerful witch is Bayo's rival throughout the game and it is heartbreaking, fighting your lover who you don't even remember. They both get their memories back by the end of the game though, and Jeanne rescues her girlfriend Bayo from the goddess Jubileus so she can punch her into the sun. Bayonetta 1 has some strong BayoJeanne moments but Bayonetta 2 goes all in with their relationship, with Bayo going on a romantic rescue mission to save her girlfriend from the demon Alarune, journeying through literal heaven and hell to do so. That file that you can pick up in Bayonetta 2 that talks about someone going through hell to find their lover, and then that scene where Bayo wakes up Jeanne after rescuing her from Alarune is great. "What do you need a wake up kiss or something?" referencing some developer art that shows their homelife, where Bayo has to wake up Jeanne for work. Love this badass witchy power couple, the sapphic aunts who always spoil the nephews with Christmas gifts.

3. Jala and Tyler, Jyler? from Thirsty Suitors- who I don't believe have an actual ship name until I just made one up because Thirsty Suitors is so underrated that it's fandom is almost nonexistent? Seriously this game is really good and I wish Tumblr had more fan art for it, especially Jala and Tyler fan art because they very quickly have become one of my all time favorite couples in anything. The most recent addition to this list for me, I only just played Thirsty Suitors for Pride Month and while protagonist and biggest bisexual disaster I've even seen Jala has 7 exes in total, 6 of which you need to confront throughout the game, Tyler has been the most important person in Jala's life. Her childhood friend who she has been on and off with romantically, but the girl who was always by her side and who she would always come back to. I also want to say that, it's mentioned that Jala was also by Tyler's side and helped her while she was transitioning which is really beautiful and I think it's cool that a trans girl is the main love interest of this story. Jala and Tyler have a very messy but special relationship, and after Jala is able to reconcile with Tyler after how much she had let her down in the past, it's implied that they do end up back together and in a fully committed relationship by the end of the story through some art depicting their future together which is good. I just need to mention that Thirsty Suitors is a super charming and delightfully queer game that handles it's characters and themes very well and I highly recommend it. It's a game that celebrates queerness while also allowing it's characters to be heavily flawed and their relationships very messy, as seen with even Jala and Tyler.

2. Susie and Noelle, Suselle from Deltarune- Toby Fox has been a very supportive queer ally and with Undertale and Deltrune, his games have plenty of great queer representation. But while Undyne and Alphys from Undertale are ok, I honestly don't really like Alphys specifically and personally think Susie and Noelle from Deltarune are the much superior sapphic ship. Because both Susie and Noelle are both great characters and absolute cuties who deserve to be happy together! A super adorable story of blossoming young love and self discovery, dorky lesbian deer girl Noelle is head over hooves in love with the cool dinosaur girl from her school Susie. And while Susie does start off as a bully in chapter 1, it becomes clear that she has a lot of her own personal stuff that she's working through that is heavily implied to be from her home life but by the end of chapter 1 she makes some good friends in Kris, Ralsei and Lancer who actually understand her and she grows as a person. While she doesn't really interact Noelle with chapter 1, you do find out as Kris that Noelle has feelings for Susie when she asks them for more information on her. And it's chapter 2 that REALLY develops Susie and Noelle's relationship and gives them a lot of cute moments together, because Noelle actually joins Susie and Kris in going to the Dark World on their adventures this time. And through chapter 2, Susie and Noelle's relationship is developed incredibly well with all of Noelle's adorable blushing and freaking out around the girl that she loves, until the beautiful scene where Susie gets to rescue Noelle from being captured by Queen and they escape on a heart covered Ferris wheel of all things which gives them an incredibly sweet moment together that always makes me cry. Just seeing them these adorable young queer girls being awkward and falling in love for the first time is just so adorable and funny in the best way. And then afterwards, the thing that actually gives Noelle her courage to stand up to Queen is saving the love of her life Susie! AAAAAH I LOVE THEM AND THEY ARE PERFECT FOR EACHOTHER!!!! The only caveat is that Deltarune isn't finished yet and Susie and Noelle technically aren't together yet? But it's very obvious that their relationship is something that is being built towards and I am very excited to see how it develops in future chapters, what we've gotten already has been great though and has given us so many cute moments for Suselle.

Gregg and Angus, Grangus from Night in the Woods- The only MLM ship on this list because there is a distressing lack of MLM relationships in video games compared to there actually being a decent amount of WLW, especially with main characters. But Gregg and Angus are my overall favorite romantic relationship in all of video games. Night in the Woods is another game with some great queer representation, including it's main character Mae who is canonically pansexual which delighted me to find out as someone who is pan and she made it to the top of my Pan characters list from last year. But she doesn't get much of a romance besides meeting a girl that she has feelings for at a party that doesn't lead to much. Her best friend Gregg and his boyfriend Angus though, are also both main characters and their relationship actually gets a lot attention and development and it's handled beautifully. Their experiences accurately represent what it's like living as an openly gay couple in a small and not so understanding small town. Especially as they were the only queer people living there while Mae was away at college. A small town that also doesn't really have much going on, and they both want to move away where they can live a happy life together in a town where they will be supported and accepted more, where they can maybe meet other queer friends. It's an incredibly sweet and relatable story, and the 2 boys work their butts off at their jobs to make their dream of living that life together a reality. Which is why Mae's coming back home and bringing out the chaotic side of her best friend Gregg does bring some tension to their relationship, but she eventually realizes her mistakes and learns that she has to let them go. Gregg and Angus's relationship becomes even more sweet when you learn more about how they met, how Angus had a horrible upbringing with violently homophobic parents who didn't accept him, but then Gregg came into his life and saved him. And then also that scene where Mae talks to Gregg and he's worried that he isn't good enough for his boyfriend and Mae has to give him and uplifting talk. They just mean so much to eachother and they really bring the best out of eachother as well, with Gregg helping his shy boyfriend to come out of his shell a bit more, and Angus helping reel in his hyperactive boyfriend from getting a bit too wild. Gregg and Angus are so sweet and supportive of eachother, a beautifully written queer couple and my favorite ship from any video game.

But anyway, I hope all my fellow queers had a safe and happy Pride Month! And also that you enjoyed reading my list, I would recommend all the games that these ships are from to people. Thank you for reading and remember to stay proud of who you are all year round because no matter your sexuality, gender, what pronouns you go by, whether your closeted or not, you deserve all the love and respect and fuck any bigot who thinks they can tell you otherwise.

[ravetillyoucry]

PUPARIA

Chapter 11 - No Moon At All

prev - chapter 1

"... So, you haven't missed all that much really." Hosah slouched back into the booth seat, greatly undermining the gravity of all he'd just explained to the recently absent detective.

The ashy, almost silver, haired man opposite him seemed to be at a loss for words. Looking at him and Jeanne sat beside each other was definitely an interesting sight. In terms of just about everything, the two were polar opposites, maybe that was why their relationship seemed so distant, so cold, so strained. Hosah had told Teddy all about his concerns about the pair, but the lunch time they'd spend together, the first time as a whole group, would surely show his assistant exactly what he meant.

One thing the shifter always liked about Thierri is how they seemed to be on the same wavelength. There was no feeling of making things weird or awkward in a conversation with the guy, he seemed to always understand just exactly where Hosah was coming from, which was nice when he didn't really want any logical solutions to his problems, just someone to validate him and indulge in whatever delusional perspective he had.

"Oh yeah, same old same old, right?" Thierri tilted his head in a shrug of mutual understanding, taking a sip of his disgustingly sweetened coffee all the while.

These kinds of conversations were the ones Hosah’s father had taught him were just in man’s nature, playing down their struggles in phrases like ‘Living the dream’ or ‘Nothing new’ , not making a spectacle out of their struggle. It was a lesson the shifter carried with him through every day life, one that men such as himself wouldn’t be too talkative of their struggles as to not worry anyone, his respective job as a man to be the one to help others, and not to be helped.

It was at this point when the shifter realised he'd been the only one speaking this entire time, his coworkers all having an air of uncomfortable tension about them, an unresolved issue that Hosah had no idea about. Eugh. So awkward. The only thing filling the void of conversation was the painful sound of cutlery against the ceramic plates. God, that noise, it drove the shifter absolutely insane.

Rather than focusing on the people in-front of him, Hosah would rather just eat whatever food he'd spent an unreasonable amount of money on, and that was really saying something. It was too pretty to eat. A cute little slice of the same cake Teddy had bought for him a week or two prior, hand iced with little slices of strawberries between the layers, cemented by whipped cream. He fidgeted with his fork in his hand, trying to calculate what bites would be the best in order to get the most satisfaction out of the cake.

This was something Hosah had done ever since he could remember, it'd start with the second best bite, then he'd work his way around the meal picking out the more unsatisfying parts until he'd gotten to the very best bite at the end. Very much impractical, but the thought of not doing this just made him want to not eat at all. Not necessarily a good habit, but it could be worse.

A hand giving a reassuring rub on his knee caught him off guard. It was Teddy, with a slightly concerned smile plastered across his face, eyebrows angled down, as if to say 'All good?'. It was already hellish before Hosah had said anything about his doctors concerns, how everyone treat him as some fragile, incapable victim, constantly on the brink of breaking, but everything was about to get at least a hundred times worse from here on out.

Another thing getting progressively worse was the tension around the lunch table. The shifter desperately wanted to break the silence, feeling like a child in the middle of a messy divorce, but there was nothing that came to mind in terms of conversation topics. Lately, Hosah found himself praying for divine intervention a lot more than he usually would.

"Oh, also, autopsies came back whilst you three were sent over to the bakery." Jeanne, like the angel he was, swooped in to save the group from certain death due to awkward silence.

If the shifter had put the fork to his mouth in all the time his food had been sitting there, he would've surely spat it out in surprise. "Really? What happened? What did they all say?"

Hosah could assume the last victim had bled out from his assistant's observation, but the rest seemed to be in perfect health on the outside, aside from the fact they were dead, of course.

"Well, they all seemed to have overdosed, aside from fifteen. Looks like whoever done it has access to the medication they give the shifters who grow in order to keep them regular sized." The dark haired, one-eyed detective took a sip of his drink, leaving Hosah at the edge of his seat, wide eyed, waiting for more detail. "Obviously, 'ts gonna work differently when you're on the opposite side of the shifter spectrum. Did it to keep them small I guess."

Ugh. The more detail the shifter received, the more he wished he'd just stayed in Colorado on shit money working in retail by day, babysitting by night.

Hosah had almost forgotten there were other people around the table aside from himself and Jeanne as his assistant interjected,

"How can people do that. I don't understand. I.. What would motivate anyone to treat others so badly." Teddy didn't look at the shifter beside him, or at anyone around them in-fact, instead, staring off into the distance with glossy eyes and a pursed lip.

The shifter was always aware that his assistant was quite perceptive and insightful, but he’d not expected such a high level of empathy toward his own situation. Only made sense, given his reaction to having the parents identify their child’s shrunken, rotting corpse in front of him. Now seemed like the time for Hosah to take his turn giving the man a pat on the leg, to let him know all would be okay, even if he didn’t fully believe that himself.

"Man, you should get on the internet and just see these kinds of message forums. Just unbridled, unprecedented hatred. I don't know what the fuck we did to them, it's these fucking.. Conspiracy theorists. They have their own shitty lives, and instead of realising maybe they're the reason for it, they want to look to anywhere else but themselves to put the blame. We're just easy targets, easy to say that we use everyone around us, that we're just the same as any other city rat running around the streets spreading all kinds of diseases."

Oops, Hosah didn't mean to rant on like that. In embarrassment, he quickly shovelled his first bite of the strawberry shortcake into his mouth, hoping someone else would pick up the conversation, or the topic would be changed.

"Mmm. After all, with great power comes great responsibility. Most don't know how to handle having such an imbalance over people in this world. People take advantage of others even when they don't have to power to kill them with one harsh movement, you guys have never stood a chance really." That last part may have been a little offensive, but Jeanne was right.

Mouth filled, all the shifter could do was give a passionate 'Mmm' with a point over to his superior in support of his statement. How great, he knew inviting Jeanne wasn't such a bad idea, look at these high intellect, insightful conversations being had. Anyone who overheard must be thinking , 'Woah, what a set of intelligent and handsome young men' .

"That reminds me, actually, sorry for the other day, Jeanne, I was careless and couldn't handle my emotions. Sorry." Teddy perked up, this was something the shifter had no idea about, what the fuck did Teddy of all people have to apologise to Jeanne about?

Was this why his friend had been avoiding the two all this time? What happened whilst Hosah wasn't there? When was Hosah not there?

"Damn, bitch, what'd you do?" , was the most casual way Hosah could put all of his questions.

Instead of giving a straightforward answer, the ghostly looking detective sitting opposite him waved Hosah off, "Long story, no big deal, it's all resolved now, just a.. misunderstanding. Don't worry about it."

Hm. No, no yeah, the shifter was definitely going to worry about it.

Everyone, now seemingly at ease, continued to chat about nothing as Hosah continued to question in his mind just what could've happened between the two. Chowing down on the cake, he wondered how exactly they got into a situation where they'd be fighting. In fact, Hosah became so deep in thought that he'd actually cleared the plate in front of him. Perfect! One less problem to worry about, surely now that he'd eaten one slice of cake, that means all future food related issues have been defeated, and he'll never have to worry about that specialist appointment or his doctor's theories ever again!

Feeling all proud of himself, Hosah and his assistant trailed behind the two detectives in front of them, walking in pairs back to the office.

Teddy took the shifter by the shoulder, pulling him in closer, his hand cupping the blonde head and pressing it into around his collar bone area due to the height difference. "We should go back to that cafe more often, since the food is good there,"

"Psh, come on," Hosah scoffed, his neck now craned up to rest his stubbled chin on his assistant's shoulder, "I told you, there's nothing wrong with me, just been too stressed to have any kind of appetite lately." If that were the case, the shifter would've been stressed every moment of his life.

It was better if he gave everyone one less thing to worry about anyway, there was enough on Teddy's plate, despite his claims of wanting to help, the shifter knew it was just too much to ask from him. This would be something Hosah would handle himself, given that everything else in his life was a shared task. It was his right as a man after all, to take care of his own shit and to not expect the people around him to help him with it.

"Right." Teddy didn't let go of the detectives head, instead playing with his hair, his fingertips moving in satisfying circles.

As much as he didn't want to admit it, the sensation was very nice. They probably looked like a couple to everyone else around them, but for once in his life, Hosah didn't really care. He couldn’t even really be bothered if his stalker took notice, maybe it’d teach them to back off, now that he had a guard dog that’d stick by his side during every second of the day.

That reminded him, his hair was one of the things on his mental list of 'jobs to cover once you're normal sized', "On the way back home, can we stop at the convenience store? Need to fix my hair, it's all grown out and shit."

"Yeah, yeah sure. I can help you with the back if you need it." Teddy reassured the shifter, despite wanting to say ‘Yeah, I can see that’.

Hosah was gonna need all the help he could get after the last time he tried to do this job alone, exhibit A of the disaster being his current state. Yellowed, with a texture similar to that of straw or hay, as his hair desperately wanted to curl, but would he brushed out and left a frizzy mess.

-~-

"I don't know, what do hairdressers do, bleach first or haircut first?" The shifter had never actually had his hair cut or bleached by a professional, which is probably why it looked so choppy and bad.

Teddy didn't look up from the instructions ok the box, "Never been to a barbers before?" he smiled, not in a demeaning way, but it still annoyed Hosah just a little.

"Nope. My grandpa owned his own barber shop so he taught my dad how to cut hair. He usually did it for me."

Instead of using his words, the assistant gave a little 'Mmm' of understanding, too indulged in using the box guide rather than trusting the process as Hosah usually did.

"Okay," he said, grabbing a towel from the back of the bathroom door in which they sat in, "Colour first, then cut."

Despite insisting to do it himself as he had done so countless times in the past, Teddy had already decided he was going to play hairdresser today, with the shifter sitting shirtless on a stool in the already cramped bathroom as his hair was being covered in the shitty store bought shit he'd become accustomed to.

"You do this yourself usually, right?"

"Yup."

".. Can tell." Teddy winced as he got around to the back of the shifter's head.

Turning back to look at the man behind him, Hosah asked, "What, is it bad? Why didn't you tell me before?"

"Keep your head forward." the assistant used his un-gloved hand to give Hosah's cheek a gentle touch back into the previous position it was in before, "No, it's not bad, it's just.. Roots are pretty long. And the length. 'Ts like mullet."

"Shut up, no it's not, it was just buzzed before, that's all"

Hosah didn't take kindly to being laughed at, resting his elbows on his knees and cupping his face in his hands like a bored schoolboy.

It was particularly hard not to squirm with the sensation of the brush against the back of his neck, Teddy's fingers gently pressing against the almond skin, keeping the shifter in place as he brushed from the ends to the roots of his choppy hair.

Shivering under the touch, Hosah felt the need to clarify, "Sorry, the bristles tickle."

"Not much left to do now," his assistant said under his breath, "Your hair is just.. very thick. It's nice."

The shifter got stuck between saying thank you or saying something self deprecating, ultimately deciding silence was the best way to take the compliment. Letting people say nice things about him put Hosah at unease, as if acknowledging it would make him come off as big-headed or vain, so instead he usually just denied it instead.

It was proving to be very difficult not to shift whilst in his seat, with the skin to skin contact around his shoulder and the gentle brushing of the bleach against his scalp. As much as he didn't want to admit it, Hosah's default size was three inches tall, he's the most comfortable when shrunken, being a 'regular' height to him felt like one massive perpetual growing pain that filled his entire body.

Despite the pain of getting around, the least physically painful time of his life was probably when he'd gotten height stuck for three months. Over time, the shifter learnt to just tune out his chronic pains, but getting into a comfortable position in life where he had someone to look after him, the thought of just staying tiny forever became overwhelmingly tempting.

" 'Kay, looks completely covered to me." Teddy said in a sigh, removing his singular glove, "Now we wait."

The urge to run his hands through his bleach covered hair was difficult to overcome, "I'm gonna go put a record on,"

It was honestly a miracle that Teddy also owned a record player, as the world had made its shift from tapes and vinyls to CDs and ipods, but that was one thing Hosah took immense pride in. His vinyl collection spanned all the way back to the fifties, as a good portion of the records he'd amassed were 'borrowed' from his father. Scanning through the box he'd had his assistant bring over, ultimately the shifter decided on a little Townes Van Zandt, playing Hosah's all time favourite song 'I'll Be Here In The Morning'.

This song always reminded Hosah of his ultimate dream, living in that cabin on the islet in the lake, although there were some sour memories and feelings attached to it, he felt as though he'd spent too many years fantasising about it to give up now.

"I never really pegged you as a country type of guy." The voice came from the figure leant up against the bathroom door frame, almost being as tall as the door itself.

"Well," Hosah sighed, "I'm not really that picky. Jazz is my favourite though. Just sucks that all the best artists are dead now."

Teddy laughed as he approached, their height difference being more prominent that ever as he stood directly in front of the shifter now, "There are still some talented musicians. Can go to one of those Jazz Clubs and bars over the weekend, it'll be fun."

The taller figure leant down, close to Hosah's face, which was hidden by the fact he'd chosen to stare at the rug underneath him rather than the person he was talking to. If that was Teddy's idea of weekend fun, then the shifter had been doing it wrong his whole life.

"Sounds nice, yeah," Hosah turned his head even further to the side as he spoke, desperately trying to hide how red he'd gotten from the close proximity.

It wasn't supposed to be happening this way around, it had been years since the shifter had been teased by a man, he'd grown used to being the one having to initiate all these sorts of feelings. It was a pleasant change of pace, one he welcomed like an old friend at his doorstep.

"Cool." Teddy echoed the shifters own words back to him.

Hosah would’ve taken this as his sign for a smoke break if he didn’t have a thick layer of convenience store hair bleach on his head. The pain of his own flustered-ness was almost unbearable, but his morbid curiosity kept him around the sofa on which his assistant had now sat on, waiting for what move he would make next, if any at all.

Still, with his eyes focused on the wooden floor under his feet, the shifter could feel eyes lingering on him.

“Hey, do we not need to put like, I don’t know, foil in your hair, or a plastic bag?” Teddy asked, his head tilted to rest on one of the many pillows accumulated on the couch.

“No clue. What are you, some kind of professional?” Hosah joked, hoping his downturned eyebrows and his squinted eyes would distract from the shade of red his face had turned.

His roommate just shrugged, “Might as well be, my mom spent more time in hair salons then she ever did at any of my games and shit.”

“Ahh, so you played a lot of sports as a kid then?” Now they were getting somewhere. A nice common ground for the two to stand on.

“I mean,” Teddy stood to his full height, “Look at me. I was six foot by my fourteenth birthday. They begged me to join the basketball team.”

Sounded about right.

“Kind of always expected you to be more, you know,” Hosah took a moment to consider whether the other person would take offence, ultimately deciding he didn’t really care as he did his best ‘classic highschool movie nerd’ voice, “In the book club.”

“God, I should’ve been,” Luckily, Teddy took it like a champ, laughing it off, showing his radiant smile, “What about you? Not really the football type, right?”

“Baseball. I was fuckin’ great at it too. Short and skinny, aerodynamic you know? Then I started shifting more, and I got busy with all the doctors visits and health consultations, had to quit in the end.”

A bittersweet memory, but still one Hosah looked back on fondly. It was one of the only times he really felt like part of a friend group as a kid.

“Yeah, I can picture that, you in the cap and the cleats?” Teddy went back to his previous teasing ways, an unexpected turn for the person the shifter assumed to be quite the prude about these kinds of things.

All discombobulated, Hosah struggled to get his words out in one piece, “I think it’s time to rinse.”

Without turning back, the shifter speedily shuffled back to the bathroom, with Teddy following close behind him.

“Just sit down on the floor and hang your head over the side of the tub,” Teddy instructed, grabbing a towel from the bathroom door, shutting it behind him all the while.

Hosah obediently followed the instructions given to him, his neck uncomfortably craned up so it rested on the bathtub’s walls, his hair still stuck in its same position due to the solution in it.

The warm water hitting his scalp certainly was a pleasant feeling, the hard pressure of the shower head being weirdly soft against the tender skin the water pounded down upon. If it wasn’t hard to shrink before, it was definitely a challenge to stay his current size now. Hosah hadn’t even realised how he’d had his eyes closed for a while now, enjoying the pampering of which the likes he’d never experienced.

“It’s nice, right?” Teddy laughed, although the shifter had no plans on saying anything in return, being too indulged in the process to even notice the fact his assistant had said anything at all.

And that wasn’t even the best part, Hosah knew true bliss as the shower head was turned off, Teddy moving over to the shampooing process. Gentle fingertips massaging the purple solution into his scalp, the sensation being so satisfying that it brought a wide, involuntary smile to the shifter’s face.

It was moments like these which made Hosah wish for just a few seconds, he could leave his body and look in from an outsiders perspective. Seeing this moment from the angle of a painted idea would probably be pretty beautiful, although his position, leaning up with his head hanging over the tub, probably wasn’t all that nice looking from a third person view point.

Teddy lifted the jug of perfectly warm water, carefully rinsing the shifter’s hair of the soapy mixture he’d just rubbed in, brushing his fingers through the freshly bleached locks to make sure he got all of it out.

As the shifter opened his eyes, long after the sensation had ended, he was met with that same smug look Teddy sometimes carried, when he’d gotten his way with things.

“Enjoy yourself?” He asked, taking it upon himself to start drying Hosah’s hair, delicately scrunching the ends rather than the usual scrub the shifter would give to his own scalp after washing it.

Hosah scoffed, too flustered to think of anything witty to get his assistant back with.

The pair sat on the cold, tiled floor together, Teddy tenderly rubbing the towel in a circular motion against Hosah’s head, the setting sun gleaming in through the small, stained glass window above the toilet which they were hanging out beside. Even with the mess from the bleaching job that just took place, Hosah could picture how beautifully picturesque this scene probably looked. Trying to imagine himself from a different perspective than his own was difficult, but it was one he was willing to try out in hopes of painting this moment, as payment for his assistant’s care.

This reminded him, he had to ask what specifically Teddy wanted him to paint for him.

“You know that painting I promised you?” Hosah began his inquiry, his big brown doe eyes looking up innocently at the figure which sat above him.

“How could I forget?”

His hands balling up into tense fists, the shifter continued, “What specifically did you have in mind for that? Just so I can get started,”

Teddy’s eyes adverted from the task at hand to look at the shifter below him, “Anything you think would be best. I wouldn’t even mind if you threw something you did years ago at me, to be honest,”

Great, perfect, that means Hosah had free rein on what he was creating, just how he liked it. But now was the hard part, making something as equally as beautiful as the person he was making it for. The task seemed daunting, almost impossible, but the shifter wouldn’t want to let Teddy down, especially not after all he’d done for him so far, with more aid surely to come in the future.

“There,” Teddy moved a few inches back, now sitting on his butt the same as the shifter did rather than on his knees, “All better now.”

Hurriedly, Hosah got up to look at his new and improved hair in the mirror, and sure enough, it looked even better than it did the last time he’d done it himself. He felt finally whole again, finally himself as his hair had been returned to the sleek, almost white colour it once was. There was still a little dark root peaking through, but this time it looked very intentional, and it made his head hair match his facial hair and eyebrows, which was always nice.

“You like?” Teddy asked, moving in behind the shifter, resting his chin on the damp hair.

“Yeah, yeah of course. Best it’s ever been.” Despite wanting to be angry over how his assistant positioned himself, Hosah couldn’t bring himself to feel any negative emotions at all.

Looking Teddy in the eye through their reflection, the shifter added, “Thank you, it looks great.”

“Aww,” the pale arms wrapped around Hosah��s dainty shoulders swaying him left and right playfully, “Anytime.”

If this is what life would be like with Teddy, the shifter wasn’t sure he’d even want to return to his own apartment once all the crazed stalker shit had worn down.

[mahs-dumpster]

a/n: I got pirate treasure brainrot while drawing Jeanne so I made this in a hurry......... Also kinda continuation from my other fit Jasmine. Imma head to bed now

cw: oc x canon (Kalim x Jeanne), uhhhh lies to try to push people away? If that makes sense? Also thoughts of self hatred

words: 1070

“Kalim.” Jeanne spoke suddenly, her hand stopping from caressing the boy’s hair. He made a sound of acknowledgement, waiting to hear what his beloved would say. “I think it's time we stop whatever this is.”

Kalim’s eyes immediately opened, and he sat down to look at the girl with confusion on his face. His red irises looked everywhere on Jeanne's face, searching for any hint of a joke, but her expression was serious, there was no smile, no indication that she didn't mean what she said.

“What… what do you mean?” He asked, his anxiety building up as he lifted his hand to touch the girl's face. She held his wrist with her hand and leaned into his touch, a melancholic look in her eyes. “We… we’re together, right? Are you– you're trying to break up with me?”

“Kalim, there wasn't even a relationship to begin with.” she gently pushed his hand away, holding it on her lap. “We never agreed to be together as lovers.”

“But we are.” He insisted, almost frantic. “I wouldn't have kissed you that day if I didn't love you. You never rejected me either, so–”

“Because I wanted to use you.” Kalim blinked. his heart sinking as he saw the girl frowning, her eyes fixated on the ground. “I wanted– I'm a pirate, Kalim.” She began, biting her lip. “I steal, that's what I do. You're a rich boy who I thought would be an easy target.”

“I… know that.” He said, and it was Jeanne's turn to feel like her heart was breaking. “I always knew that, I’m not dumb.” Of course he wasn't. Jeanne knew that. But still, hearing him say it… “But I just loved you so much I couldn't help it.”

Jeanne let out a painful chuckle, letting his hand go and playing with her hook. 

“Love? You don't know what love is, Kalim.” He couldn't love her. It was impossible to love someone like her. “You’ve known me for months.”

“But I knew I loved you from the moment I saw you.” Kalim tilted his head, his hand moving to her chin, making her lift her face and look him in the eye. Kalim smiled softly, his dimples that Jeanne loved so much showing up. “I love you.”

No.

She took his hand out of her face and got up, but before she could walk Kalim held her wrist, making her look at him. Her face was redder than an apple, but she couldn't help it, he had always been like that… so gentle, so loving, so honest.

She would poison his existence if she stayed for longer.

“Jeanne, please.” He pleaded, deciding to get up, not once leaving his grip on her wrist, scared she’d run away. “I don't care about your intentions at first. I only care about how you feel now.” He smiled, his fingers caressing the girl's face, and she felt herself melting into his touch once again. “So, please, stay with me.”

Jeanne closed her eyes tightly and gently took his hand out of her face, she was bracing herself for the absurdity she was about to say, for how much this would hurt not only her, but him as well.

But there was no other way. She needed him to get away from her. For his own good.

“I don't love you.” 

Kalim blinked. “What?”

“I don't love you, Asim.” 

“What are you saying…?” He questioned, holding onto her tighter. “Jeanne, I told you, I–”

“This was all a trick, Asim, I never loved you.” She continued the lie, daring to look the boy in the eyes, no matter how much it stung. “Unfortunately, I realized that Jamil and Damali are onto my schemes. There's no benefit for me in pretending any longer.” 

She pushed his hands away, but she couldn't help but do it softly, gently. Almost as if trying to undo the damage she had caused. But she was too far gone. 

“Do me a favor.” His red eyes never left her gaze, not even when he started to tear up. She bit her bottom lip in an attempt to stay strong. “Forget that I ever got into your life.”

With that, she turned around, closing his bedroom door behind her. As she did, she tried to hear anything from the boy inside, but it was pure silence. 

Then, she heard soft sniffles, almost as if trying to keep quiet, as if trying not to bother anyone. Jeanne felt her eyes tear up.

He was hurting. Because of her.

She was a monster.

The girl crouched down, her face resting on her knees as she let a few tears fall. She couldn't help it, she wouldn't be able to wait until she reached her room in Savanaclaw, she needed to let it out now, at least some of it.

She hated herself for this. She hated every last part of herself. How dare she, a girl like her, try to take advantage of a boy like him, and later think they could be happy? Why? Because he had ‘changed her'? Because he was gentle and caring? Because he made her feel safe, and loved? And as if she deserved attention? And deserved kindness? Because he treated her as the most precious jewel in the entirety of Twisted Wonderland, despite all the riches he got?

What a joke!

She had tried to manipulate him, and therefore she didn't deserve his love. Kalim needed to find a wonderful, kind girl who would love him for who he was, and not for what he could get her. He deserved someone whose family had a decent job, who didn't steal for a living. 

He… deserved the opposite of her.

“Jeanne?” She fell on her butt upon hearing her name, and after realizing it was Jamil, a plate of food in his hands, – probably for Kalim – she dried her tears and got up almost immediately. She didn't want him of all people knowing how much this affected her. “What–”

“I'm not gonna show up at Scarabia anymore.” She said, making Jamil blink in surprise. “Sorry for being a nuisance this whole time.” 

And with that, she left, running back to Savanaclaw with tears in her eyes, and a heartbroken. She hated admitting this but she would never be able to love anyone as she loved Kalim.

But he should love someone else. For his own good.

[anthroxlove]

AMBER RESTARTS X FROM ITALY After a long silence, Amber Heard returns with a film, presented at the Taormina Film Festival. At the center of the plot is a woman who is not believed. Just as it happened to her, who narrated domestic violence and was the subject of a hate campaign during the trial pitting her against ex Johnny Depp, triumphantly welcomed at Cannes only a short time ago By Enrica Brocardo

A little more than a year after the end of the defamation trial that had seen Amber Heard and ex-husband Johnny Depp confront each other in the courtroom in Fair- fax, Virginia, and ended with the star's victory, the actress chose the Taormina film festival for her first public appearance. Her new film, In the Fire, or In the Fire, premiered June 24, accompanied by Heard, who walked the red carpet that evening. Last May, on the other hand, it had been Johnny Depp's turn to indulge in a crowd at the Cannes Film Festival, where Jeanne du Barry - The King's Favorite, in which he plays France's King Louis XV, had been chosen as the opening film. Awaiting him was a winner-take-all reception, where it was the seven-minute standing ovation at the screening rather than sympathy for Amber that weighed in. Yet this collective takedown somewhat contrasts with the entire court story, which actually ended in a draw of sorts. It is true that, in America, she was found guilty of defamation for an editorial she wrote in 2018 in The Washington Post newspaper in which she spoke about the harassment and violence she had suffered (but never mentioned her ex-husband's name). But it is also true that Depp had lost his previous lawsuit against the British newspaper The Sun, which, again in 2018, called him a "wife beater." Many wondered why two such similar prosecutions could end with two opposing verdicts. One of the reasons, according to an analysis by British lawyer specializing in Media Law Mark Stephens, is that while in Britain the decision was made by a judge, in the United States it was a people's jury that convicted Heard. "It reflected the judgment already made by the public opinion, which, from the very beginning of the trial, had stood up for Depp," the expert explained. Another reason would be that the judge in the trial against the Sun had defused the strategy of the plaintiff's lawyers, namely to prove that Heard had lied on a few occasions in order to undermine his credibility, and had focused rather on the evidence of the incidents of violence against his wife. In Fairfax, conversely, Depp's lawyers had a free hand in discrediting Heard. Moreover, not only in the eyes of the jury, but of the world inter- not because the trial aired live on the web, resulting in a hate campaign against the actress that, a few months later, prompted her to leave Hollywood and move with her 2-year-old daughter Oonagh to live in Spain. Meanwhile, late last year, the two exes reached an agreement whereby she would no longer have to pay over $10 million in compensation, but "only" $1 million, which the actor, in turn, said he would donate to charity. At the same time, alongside the actress, associations against gender violence and feminists lined up with an open letter (see opposite page) also signed a few days ago by French writer Annie Ernaux, who will be awarded the Nobel Prize in 2022. In the Fire, which will hit theaters in the fall, is a supernatural thriller of sorts: the story of a psichiatrist who in the late 1800s is called in to take care of a child that people believe possessed by the devil. She tries to pit science against superstition but, even as a woman, is not believed. A more muted return to the scenes than that of Depp, who also recently signed a contract with a luxury brand. In short, refinding her place in Hollywood, despite the release of Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom next December, promises to be more complicated for Heard. [ The open letter supporting Amber can be read here. ]

[androgynealienfemme]

"Raging Butch Publisher: The Lesbian Tide Meanwhile, life on my own newspaper, the Lesbian Tide, was a study in lesbian contradiction and feminist paradox. How did a raging butch get to be publisher of the nation's premiere lesbian-feminist paper of the seventies? Like much of the turbulent seventies, it was a dialectic accident. I snuck in the back door.

In 1971, when DOB abbreviated my "communist" (Women against the War) presidency, they offered me the booby prize of remaining on the Board of Officers by holding the lowest position- newsletter editor. I accepted. I'd been editor of my high school paper; I knew the power of the press. From here, as Marx would say, it was just a hop, skip, and a job as this editor collided with herstory. I changed the name of my four-page mimeograph from the DOB Newsletter to the Lesbian Tide, because I could feel the tide of herstory changing. The whole world was.

Realizing its mistake, the DOB membership soon voted me and my communist tide out of the organization. Politically, I'd been gone for months already. But I was now free to invite my lesbian-feminist soul mates onto the staff.

The makes of the not-so-collective Tide Collective reflected the infra-chaos of our movement. In addition to my paradoxical self, there was an archetypical lesbian-come-lately (from heterosexuality) feminist femme, co-editor Sharon McDonald; our very own politically correct Vassar white girl, Shirl Buss (who later processed her own organization, White Women against White Women against White Women against Racism, to death); an old-gay femme, Barbara Gehrke, a former navy woman who thought women's liberation meant changing laws to make women free (poor dear!); and a bisexual, Cheri Lesh, who also must have crept in some window simply because she was a great writer. Lesh taught me that there were indeed a small percentage of human beings who did not find gender a factor in sexual attraction.

My ten-year indenture, 1970 to 1980, to the Tide and this outrageous family of women helped me survive lesbian-feminism. With our Vassar analysis editor, Buss, I completed my studies in lesbian-feminist language: androgynous was synonym for butch; cheating on your lover was called "having a nonmonogomous relationship"; and "role-playing" was "consciousness raising." Learning all these new things was called "networking" or "skill building" depending on the environment you were studying. And, of course, fighting for your identity, even unsuccessfully, was called "processing."

As the undercover butch publisher of the Lesbian Tide, I edited major features such as "Are Roles Really Dead?" and quoted myself as the anonymous "Marianne" (pretty femme, pretty clever) - defender of the now ancient heritage of butchdom. I survived through coups and controversy, not the least of which was whether the Lesbian Tide was a "lesbian-feminist" publication or a "feminist lesbian" publication.

Lesbians of the nineties might rightly wonder why their foremothers spent three years in this ridiculous semantic debate when they could have been proclaiming "Queer Power" on the "Donahue Show." What can I say? It seemed important at the time. I was a dyke long before I learned to spell feminism, so I was adamant that no Jennie-Come-Lately politic was going to give my lesbianism second billing as a descriptive adjective. i was not just a feminist who happened to be a lesbian. That would be as silly as calling myself a butch feminist. Somewhere in my gut I knew feminism had both saved me and shoved me back into the closet. Feminism rescued women, but it subverted lesbianism."

Butches, Lies, and Feminism" by Jeanne Cordova, The Persistent Desire, (edited by Joan Nestle) (1992)

[melit0n]

Delicate Is The Flesh - Chapter 9

- Synopsis: On the brink of the bustling new city of Rosholt lies a forgotten palisade of abandoned homes, shops and streets that sit mummified after a chemical outbreak in the 70s, leaving the city uninhabitable.

Over the years however, the place has become a hotspot for urban explorers and crime junkies alike.

Whispers of reanimated bodies stalking the dead streets and brutal murders worm their way into your friend's ears and, having nothing to do on your Winter break, you reluctantly agree to go exploring the abandoned city with them.

What could go wrong, right?

- Chapters →

Prologue

Chapter 1: For Whom The Bell Tolls

Chapter 2: Corvus and Krater

Chapter 3: Belly of the Beast

Chapter 4: Something Forgotten

Chapter 5: Citrus and Cinnamon

Chapter 6: Mumbling Conscious

Chapter 7: Heavy is The Head that Mourns The Past

Chapter 8: Be Not Afraid

Chapter 9: Eye for an Eye (you're already here!)

- Status: Work In Progress.

- Obsessive!Demon OC/Reader

- Word Count (for chp): 10.3k

- Warnings (for chp): None.

Ao3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/55444003/chapters/140685856

Your chest burns with the need for oxygen, but your legs feel numb. Detached. If you were to look down, you’re not entirely sure if you’d even see them. The river is more mud and silt than water, and with a heavy shackle dragging behind you, you’re surprised you’re getting anywhere at all. 

It’s dark. So very dark. You think Helen’s flashlight has finally snuffed out–not that you’d be able to replace it. You’re pretty sure Noah took all the batteries with him. Either that, or she’s dropped it, favouring your sullied hand over glowing guidance. 

You blink, but your eyes only twitch. 

You’ve closed them. When, you’re not sure. You wish the thin layer of skin–the fine veil that billows with kaleidoscopic phosphenes–would help you focus. Focus on keeping Helen with you. Focus on keeping your legs moving. 

But it doesn’t. In a way, you’re thankful. Thankful, because it allows you to play pretend. Play pretend and tell yourself that you're not here. Instead of bruised and afraid, you’re fourteen and running. Running through a muddy field in offputting, cheap polyester clothes as Jeanne cheers you on. You don’t know her yet, but she sounds almost like Helen. 

There’s a low rumble from behind you–the horrid sound of heavy hooves and a swinging iron fork dragging across concrete. You feel the rumble of the old, iced walls all around you as it tries to fit itself into the cramped stairway, made for human feet and not wood-splintering hooves. 

It’s Sport’s Day soon. Summer is creeping in and licking at the heels of Spring. There’s sweat soaking into your shirt and you know, by the end of this, you’ll never be able to get the smell out. 

Your pocket knife jumps around in your hoodie, as do the keys in your trousers. It almost tempts you to stop, to rid yourself of the iron, symbiotic weight, but your legs are moving on their own. There’s no point: you’ve gotten this far with them, haven’t you?

Come on, Y/N! Almost there, Jeanne shouts, voice worming into your right ear as she runs on the unmarked grass beside you. There’s mud drying on your legs.

You tighten your hand around Helen’s, and you hope she’ll forgive the way your nails dig into her soft skin.

Fourteen years old, and you’re sure this is what death must feel like. You swear to yourself to never come close to it again. 

Your lungs ache. God knows you deserve the long, two-week hibernation that’ll follow the end of this trip.

Just a little bit further, she shouts again. You’re not here. You’re fourteen and the most fear you’ve ever known is horror films and your first nosebleed. 

A heat is building in your chest, rampaging through your lungs like an unruly fire and even fighting against the frigid sensation crawling just below your skin in your leg. The pain is finally there. It aches, and each step feels agonising, but you’re so close to the chalk drawn finish line. 

This isn’t happening. You’re not here. Not here, not here-

-Something solid knocks into your side. Maybe another nightmarish creature. Maybe the wall. 

Whatever it is, it sends you tumbling over your own fast moving feet and head first onto the damp wood. A small layer of dank water seeps upward with a squelch as you make contact. Your uneven inhales easily draw the lukewarm liquid up into your nose; coughs wracking through your tired body.  

Veins riddled with enough adrenaline to run a marathon, you attempt to pick yourself up. Palms braced against the soggy wood, skin crawling with the sensation, you lift your face off of the floor. As you gasp for air, your dry coughs gradually fading, rainwater and sweat slides down your temples. You think some of it dribbles into your mouth, along with the building saliva attempting to escape down your chin.

For a few moments, it’s only you. The sound of two sets of heavy breathing, your heart pounding through the floorboards–climbing up your arm–and the darkness. For the first time, you feel safe in it. Safe, because you know the two of you must be somewhere near the twentieth floor: far, far away from stitched together cadavers, grumbling corpses and radio static. From the barren innards of the last apartment by the staircase. 

As you shift, propping yourself with a hand and your forearm, some saliva drips to the floor. You feel like a fish out of water.

Despite the pain in your chest, you can’t help the nervous laugh that spills out of your dry lips. You can’t wait to get a nice, cold cup of water after all this. “Hey, ha,” another laugh. You think it sounds a bit maniacal. “Helen? Did you,” you cough. It’s throaty, and the saliva you swallow does nothing to soothe it. “Did you see that? I think I jumped up like,” you begin to crane your head to find her. “Ten steps.”

Your own breathing echoes back in answer.

The small smile that was growing on your face immediately begins to fall. “...Helen?”

No response. 

You begin pushing yourself up, hands and shoes slipping on the wood as pinpricks of pain assault your palm. “Helen? Are you there?” You mutter the last half of the sentence, more for yourself than for Helen. 

So, so dark. You think the Moon peaked out from Her soft, aerial blindfold for a moment downstairs, you remember the light bouncing off of the broken glass, but She’s hidden Herself away again. Saw the horrors that were happening and turned her eyes away. 

“Helen?” You call again, standing once more with eyes squinting in the gloom to find any hint of her. Any hint that she’s simply staying deadly quiet, and that this is all some cruel joke. 

Your feet tap outwards, searching for the lip that leads to the stairs. You can’t see a damn thing–it’s like searching for a grain of salt in a sandbox. Each wall feels warm enough to be a living body, and the tiny stars that blink and wink at you are bright enough to be eyes. 

While you’re half sure it saved your life, you really wish you hadn’t thrown your torch. 

Pausing, you realise the weight that burdens you in your pockets isn’t just keys.

How could you be such an idiot? 

Holding onto the right–or is it left?–wall, you lean down and awkwardly search for your phone, hidden amongst keys that you’ll never use. It’s practically the only chance of light you have.

Eventually, you grasp it: the back of your case warmed by your body heat. You press down on the ‘on’ button–probably a little too hard–and wait for it to blink to life. 

It doesn’t.

Your face falls. “You’re kidding.” You try again, wondering if you hadn't held it down hard enough, or long enough, or whatever finicky shit that would cause it to stay blank. 

If there were any light, you’re sure your own glistening, scared face would be reflected back at you. 

How could it even be dead? It was on charge the entire night: you’d barely used it on your way here; you hadn’t even touched it since you entered the building. 

Motionless, you stare at where the screen should be for a few moments more for any signs of life. 

Still, no response. 

Brilliant. Just perfect. 

Riddled with fearful annoyance, you shove it back inside your cargo pocket. 

You stick a leg out, still hanging on to the unseen wall for support, whisper shouting “Helen? Helen!” in hopes of a reply. 

All is quiet, minus the billowing of the wind outside, and the endless creaking of doors. 

The rain has stopped. 

Ba-dump. Ba-dump. Ba-dump. 

Down another two steps. You try to move with as much speed as you can, if only to find Helen a few seconds faster, but your legs feel dead. Odd spikes of pins and needles run up and down your muscle, and you’re not entirely sure how you’re even moving them. You're certain your legs will be cramped and sore come morning.  

However, much to your quiet elation, you watch as the surrounding darkness steadily evaporates. Enough, at least, for you to finally see your own hand in front of your face. It’s only a little light–barely a dull beam–but you’re grateful for it. Relinquishing a stabilising hand from the wall, you realise you can finally see the stairs, too. 

Louder this time, you call, “Helen! Helen, please…” Another two steps. 

If Helen isn’t responding, then it means one of two things: she’s either hurt to the point of being unconscious–or non-verbal–or…

Your feet begin moving with a little more haste. Your speed ramps up easily. If you ran like your life depended on it for simple running practice for a stupid, performative Sports Day at fourteen, you could most definitely do it to find your friend. Your feet find the concrete mid-landing with ease, soles grateful for the temporary, flat surface that doesn’t threaten to collapse on you.

It’s your fault after all–you even said to yourself that you’d put her in front of you. Put her in front so she could go first. Put her in front so you’d be the one-

-Your head slams into a ledge. For possibly the second time in the last ten minutes. 

The shock of it reverberates in your skull, buzzing and fizzling out as it resounds from your chin to the rest of your jaw. It throbs in your nose, and you can’t help the muffled noise of pain that escapes your lips. For a few moments, all you can do is lean your forehead on the blockade–hands grasping your pulsing nose–and wallow in your stupidity. 

Tears begin to brim in your eyes. You refuse to shed them. What do you even have to cry about?

It doesn’t hurt. All you’ve done is hit your head. 

A wet inhale. 

This is the least of your worries. Stop being so pitiful and get up. 

Get up. 

Get-

Shakily, you bring your hands away from your face, stepping back and trying to find a wall to brace yourself upon. 

You find yourself frozen, struck solid by a slit-eyed gorgon, when you realise it wasn’t a wall you slammed into. It was the staircase. Well, the underbelly of it. The part that’s there’s no way in Hell you’d be able to run into.

The bottom of your palms rub at your eyes, putting pressure down on the slick orbs as if to pop them into your skull. 

As you remove them, sight fuzzy and filled with shifting shapes, you can still see the underside of the staircase, disappearing into a thick layer of concrete. 

Quickly, you glance at the stairs behind you: still normal. Normal and leading up to the floor you were on beforehand. 

…what?

Cautiously, you stretch your leg out and tap your feet against the seemingly solid slab. Even if you had stood there moments ago, you almost expect it to crumble under your weight. Or, maybe your foot will disappear right through it, like a hand grasping for a ghost. 

It stays solid, palpable. It doesn’t collapse, and doesn’t disappear. 

How…how is that even possible?

Riddled with utter bewilderment, you squat down, ignoring how your tired joints pop and your overused muscles ache. You stay there, observing–a bird watching a rabbit from high above–before you place a hand down, testing the waters. 

You’d come up from all the floors below–it physically isn’t plausible for you to pass through solid concrete. For this to even have existed while you were rushing up the staircase. 

Your knuckles knock against it. Once, twice, three times, quietly anticipating for it to open up. Like an unwelcome guest, you stay shut out. 

You remember Helen’s hand around yours: you can practically still feel the warmth of her palm. Only minutes ago were you with her; you know that you didn’t let go of her. 

Small pebbles of shrapnel and concrete dig into your palms as you scrape against it, very much so real, and very much so not a realistic hallucination.

In short, there’s no way that you would’ve been able to lose her. 

But…if you’re here, then Helen…

For the nth time tonight, your stomach drops. Drops right down to your feet and flinches at the shards of glass that dig into the crimson muscle. You shake your head in silent disbelief. “No.” Frantically, you claw at the concrete, begging for it to open up. “No, no, no.”

Layers of dirt and fragments of cement dig into the soft skin under your nails and prick against the pads of your fingers. How could you let this happen?

Mentally, you plead with each blink of your eye–growing blurry again with frustrated tears–that it’ll finally disappear from under you. 

You’ve left her. You’ve left Helen alone, in pitch darkness, with inconceivable horrors. 

It’s not working.

The pads of your fingers sting. 

Why isn’t it working?

You try smashing your knuckles against it. 

What have you done?

All it does is leave you with stinging scrapes against the thin skin.

How could you be so stupid? So careless? 

You return to scraping–a dog stuck in its kennel–against the blockade. You’ll wear yourself down to the bone if it would allow you to get to her. To make sure she’s okay. To apologise. 

To repent. 

“Shit.” You pull your hand away with a gasp, gripping your wrist as if it would stop the pain. Half of your nails are gone: thinned, snapped and cracked. There’s blood pooling around them, sinking under your nail bed and staining them ruby.

Taking your other hand of your wrist, you bring it to your face. The once S/C skin on your knuckles is red and raw, littered with small wounds: lithe layers of skin peeled off and begging to be picked at. More cuts cover your fingers, and by the looks of it, you’re one hangnail away from losing an entire nail. 

You hadn’t even noticed. 

Ba-dump, ba-dump, ba-dump, reverberates through your legs. 

Finally, after so long of keeping them contained, salty tears finally fall. It doesn’t feel good, nor freeing. It doesn’t take any sort of weight off of your chest. They fall into the corners of your lips, down your jaw and pool, awkwardly, in the dip of your collarbone. You can’t tell it apart from sweat. 

It hurts. 

What are you meant to do?

It hurts bad. 

You’ve practically just signed Helen’s death warrant, and for what?

Gently, you attempt to wrap your fingers in your hoodie, quietly watching as the fabric blossoms in dimmed crimson. There’s something digging into your leg from your pocket.

For you to stumble about in a decrepit apartment block until someone finds a way to get to you? Your phone is dead, and Helen dropped her walkie-talkie in one of the apartments downstairs. 

A thought strikes you. But you still have yours. 

Temporarily invigorated, you shift your legs, bloodied hands jumping out from their make-shift wraps and fumbling for your pocket. Your cuts sting as they graze over the fabric in search of it, but you don’t care. That hunk of plastic and wires is another small ember of hope. One you may be able to light a fire with. 

And it might just be your only way out.  

Keys…keys…keys- walkie talkie!

Frenetic, you drag it out, fingers gliding over its dull shape in order to find the button that would turn it on. 

And then something that sounds eerily like plastic clatters to the floor. Looking down, all you can see is a black, squarish shape, sitting innocently in front of you. 

Please, please, let that not be something important.

Hesitant, your fingers trace the shape, searching for where it could’ve fallen from. Quickly, they find the back, hands greeted with an uneven surface that makes every cell in your body droop with despair. 

Standing, you move yourself closer to the second set of stairs, leading up to the floor you crash landed on: closer to your only light source. 

The inside of the walkie-talkie looks completely busted. Dented, the circuit board gleams in extraterrestrial green, coded silver and glinting gold. A main wire, red, like the ones they always cut in the movies, is torn: rubber split and innards sparkling with copper. 

You’re sure if Noah were here, he’d be able to figure out some way to fix it. Maybe Jeanne, too: she’d always been mechanically inclined.

If you’d gone as a group, if you spat out the food given to you for once, you wonder if you’d even be here. 

There’s a spark of life in the wire, a quick, sharp glint that illuminates your face, and you promptly bring it away from you. It smells…burnt. Squinting, a good chunk of the top half seems practically fried: green tinged a smokey grey. Because of course it is. 

What amazing luck you have. 

It must’ve broken–somehow–when you fell. Or went legs first into a wall. 

The growing urge to throw it makes your fingers twitch. You’re itching to see it shatter against the wall, but you know red hot anger will do you no good. Hopelessness and exhaustion seep into your bones. Sits heavy in your marrow like lead. 

There goes your only other way of contacting the outside world. 

Despondent, you sink to the floor, bringing your knees to your chest. For a few moments, you stay there: silent and the only breathing thing for miles. 

You feel like a bystander watching a car crash, legs glued to the floor as the engine eats itself and flame licks at charred skin. 

Reluctantly, your eyes wander back to the concrete blockade. The wall between you and Helen. Between you and freedom. 

Deeply, you inhale–arms tightening around your legs–trying to get your mind to focus. To let your synapses snap and neurons connect. To have some other thought than ‘I want to go home’ run through your mind. 

As the darkness creeps in, you desperately want to leave your body here. To roam somewhere green and feel summer blossom in your chest rather than a panic attack. 

Focus. 

Deep and dark, what little you can see is blurred as you sink into your own mind. 

The moment the sun came out, Jeanne would always insist on spending break, and eating lunch, outside. You remember always making daisy chains when they started popping up in the field. She used to love having them braided into her hair when she grew it out–you’re half sure it was the only reason she did. Helen liked, likes, it, too. You’d even be able to get a few in Noah’s if you pleaded hard enough. 

You’re not done here, Y/N. 

And you’d almost always go wading in the creek near Helen’s house on Saturdays, too. Half to cool off, and half to indulge in Noah’s habit of rock collecting. Back when he first met you, he’d give you a new one every week: you still have them. While he doesn’t believe the stories behind them, hag stones have alway been his favourite. 

This isn’t over until you decide it is. 

You don’t even know how many wishes you’ve made on them. 

Focus.

A door slams in one of the lower apartments. Brusquely, you find yourself staring, dry eyed, into darkness again. 

Think. Just think. 

You dig your head deeper into your knees. 

Use your head for once and think. Don’t just give in. 

A shiver wracks your body. The wall digs into your spine. 

Just do this one thing for her. For Helen.

Your head rises from your legs. With utter disdain, you stare at the blocked off stairs. 

This place follows a pattern–you already know that. There’s an object of interest, something that spikes your suspicion. That’s the first trigger. At least, you think it is. Unless that tangle of hair was it, there was no ‘first object’ in the floor below. Either way, entering the final apartment is the second shot: there’s either something in the apartment itself, or something that’s then triggered to appear. 

You shift, overly aware of the sting in your fingers. You try your best not to brush them against anything.

You’ve never been anywhere near the staircase while exploring the floor…who’s to say that the lower floors haven’t closed off before now? What if this is normal–and just something you haven’t seen? 

Just a bit of bad luck and selfishness that’s left you two separated. 

You go to chew on whatever’s left of one of your nails. Your canines dig in deep, and you taste grit on your tongue. 

Everything here works on some sort of trigger, some action that must be completed–a domino pushed–in order for something else to happen. Well, you guess that’s how things usually work: cause and effect. 

So, what’s the cause needed to trigger this effect? What metaphorical lever do you have to pull in order for this thing to disappear? 

You attempt to brainstorm: searching your mind for anything that could be of use. 

A thought strikes you. Hard. You wonder, if you can't go down–if Helen is trapped on the lower floor–can you even go up?

Or are you just as trapped as she is?

Timidly, you turn to the rest of the stairs, dimly lit by pale moonlight. 

Do you even want to know?

Your body feels like liquid mercury–weighted to the warm, throbbing concrete by fear, drowsiness and some other feeling you don’t want to name. You think it’ll make you feel cowardly if you do. But that’s all it is: a thought. 

With a sniff, you do your best to leave it unacknowledged. You wipe underneath your nose, cleaning up any snot attempting to dribble onto your lips, and try not to think about the phlegm caked at the back of your throat. 

If upstairs is closed off…

You stare upwards at the endlessly spiralling stairs with utter vindication. 

…you disregard the thought as soon as it comes. For now, you leave it at the back of your mind: huddled in the thrumming flesh and waiting to bite you in the ass later. 

Haltingly, you begin. Begin with feet of iron and the walk of an innocent sent to the gallows. It’s so quiet without Helen. No second set of steps, no soft laughs, no aimless conversation. 

You’d prefer talking about school over this. Prefer having Helen than being alone. 

You’d be an idiot not to know that she can fend for herself, but the image of her: a bleeding corpse poised with an unheard plea, battered and bruised in a corner, for the sake of your living, hastens your steps. 

Cautiously, you glance down the rotting hallway, waiting. Nothing appears, and it stays a long-dead building. For now.

You don’t dare to even look at the last apartment. 

You wonder what’ll be up there–if there is anything. Eerie graffiti that says ‘turn back now’? Another concrete blockade that’ll coldly confirm what you’re trying to ignore?

You scoff. Maybe if you speak a magic word, it’ll-

Your thoughts fall silent.

You’re a step away from the second set of stairs, but- but it isn’t there.

Your brows furrow in confusion. One hand darts to your face, dirty sleeve rubbing at your eyes before flinching away from the pain. You’ve learnt well that here, that trick doesn’t work, still, old habits die hard, you guess. 

You look up again. Look up, and realise you are face to face with nothing. It looks like a piece of what you’re meant to see–like a piece of the world–has been cut out. Surgically sliced and diced, revealing the pulsating innards of the fabric of reality. 

It’s what you imagine the quiet corners of space to look like. 

You blink a few more times, whipping your head around and searching for any other similar shadows, any light source that would cause that. 

It looks dark enough to swallow you whole. You feel like you’re barely comprehending what’s meant to be there–only able to feel the thrum of colours and sounds that are lost to you. 

The only light that remains for you is the moon: pale and wisp-like and slinking into the staircase from the window at the end of the hall.

You feel…glued to it. As if wandering from it for a moment will do something. Like how, staring at a predator hidden in the brush, you know will strike the moment you turn your head. 

You’ve seen stitched together amalgamations, half-moulded monsters and heard phantom flies, but this is much, much worse. Worse, because it’s just pure nothing. No winking stars hide in it, like those between the cracks of the stairs, nor do any shapes flicker at its edges. 

Beyond it, you think you’d find the mother of the stars. That, and something your mind has long forgotten the name and sight of. 

You try to rationalise it, like you always do. Surely, it’s the trick of the light?

Slowly, you bend down, hands searching the floor as you keep your eyes pinned. You almost expect something to crawl its way out of the tar: something old and blind who hungers for spilt blood and prayer. A small rock of concrete digs into your palm.

Good enough. 

You remember Jeanne teaching you how to throw a good ball: you don’t think your bones will ever forget the muscle memory forged into you. With a pop of your shoulder–moving too fast with too much vigour–you throw it into the void. You know, for a fact, that the next floor’s hallway is there: you might’ve even thrown it hard enough to reach the end of it. 

Impatient, you wait for the impact. 

It doesn’t come.

A frown stretches across your face. In the dark, you fumble for something else to fling into the unknown. Glass, this time. It’ll shatter on impact, a noise that you’ll most definitely hear. Again, you pull your arm back. For a split second, the shard is a baseball–heavy in your palm–and you swear you see Jeanne’s face just underneath the darkness: opaque, cocky, and focused. 

Again, you wait. And, again, no noise greets your ears. 

A low wind, cold and stale, just like the air of this place, whistles through the nothing. It smells like bile and an old memory. 

What if…what if you were to put your hand into it? What would you find?

Your hand moves slowly, but unhaltingly, as if drawn in by an invisible string. The bleak grey around you seems to fade, and all you can see is endless darkness. 

Would it open up around you? Is it simply that–a thin veil meant to scare you from trying to go anywhere near the next floor without having faced the horrors of the one below?

So close. Small zaps, almost like electricity, nip against the tips of your fingers, and sends goosebumps climbing up your arm.

It’s frigid, lonely and suffocating, but surely there must be something on the other side, right? 

Almost there, now. The pads of your fingers buzz with energy as they’re engulfed. It’s like ice against your skin: burningly painful and crawling into your burning wounds. 

Maybe this is your ticket out of here–a rip in the horror that is this apartment that will let you out.

The joints of your fingers are inside. Your hand feels utterly numb. You wonder if it’s there anymore. 

Just a little further-

“Y/N?” 

Your head whips around, fingers instantly retracting from the all-consuming darkness. 

Helen. That’s- that’s Helen’s voice. 

“Y/N? Where are you?” 

Your body turns at light speed, ears barely picking up the shaky exhale that expels itself from behind you. “Helen?”

“Y/N!” You’re already running down the few steps you climbed, a grin spreading across your face. You don’t think you’ve ever smiled harder. She’s safe: she’s alive. 

Somehow, you must’ve done it: managed to open up the lower floor without even knowing how you did it. 

You make the turn, ready to barrel into her and latch on. Latch on and never let go. 

Your words fall flat before you even finish saying her name. 

The concrete is still there. Helen isn’t. 

Swiftly, you crane your neck to the shadow ridden hallway. Maybe it opened for her and closed back off? 

The remains of a smile twitch on your face. Hopeful, you call, “Helen? Where are you?”

No response. 

You stay frozen for a few moments, joy slowly being replaced by dread. You know you heard her voice, clear as day.

Vigilant, you begin trekking through the hall. You call out again, still expecting some sort of response. “Helen?”

Only a few of the doors are open: half ajar and hidden in pale shadow. Everything pales in comparison to whatever has lodged itself in the staircase. 

You try to tell yourself that it’s human to feel eyes on you from the dark. That it’s normal to feel watched and only half sure that you’re alone. 

“Helen? Come on, please say something.” Intact wallpaper manages to hang onto the walls for the most part: unhidden by graffiti and surprisingly untainted. It’s the same as what remained in the lobby: striped, dull, light blue and cream. Large, abnormal lumps, bubbles of air, most likely, also dot the wallpaper. As you walk by, you swear you almost see a face in them, like the markings on wooden planks. 

The metal of the elevator doors glint in the low light as you pass them, an elongated smirk cracked across the ceiling above it. A mere slit opens the doors: lips parted as if to begin speaking. Whatever the rust and decay have to say, it falls deaf on your ears. What does reach you is the rising and falling wind from the dusty cavern, slipping through the crack and brushing against your neck like cold fingers. 

“Please, don’t do this again.” Please tell me you’re here. 

Please tell me this isn’t another trick. 

It almost sounds like breathing. 

Wood whines loudly underfoot, rising and falling like ocean tides that remind you to be wary about falling feet first and shattering your ankle. 

Helen would have said something by now. 

After so long in the dark, the direct light of the moon through the window almost burns. You’re half sure you’ll have night vision by the end of this. 

Seeing the outside world is…strange. For the last few hours, all you’ve known is concrete, dust, and the remains of what could have been. You can’t see much of it; simply shadowed trees, what you think may be the road and the outlines of a few scattered buildings. It doesn’t even look like you’re that far up. 

With lungs yearning for fresh air, even if it was infested with chemicals, you wish this was one of the broken windows. You’d probably cut your cheek sticking your head out, and maybe, just maybe, you’d lean a little too far and lose your grip, but you don’t think you’d mind. 

You wonder…could you open it? Go against the system and find another way out?

A quick glance and a painful, fruitless tug reveals the answer: nailed shut. 

Could you break it? Your knuckles are already bruised and bleeding: another cut or two wouldn’t make much of a difference. 

Your foot knocks against the small wooden table underneath it, heavy glass hitting your foot with a hollow thump. A vase spills water and long dead flowers onto the already rotten wood. 

As if burnt, you jerk your leg away from it, letting the glass roll and listening as the water drip, drip, drips to somewhere unseen. 

No way in Hell are you touching that. Practically anything could be a, or, rather, the trigger object. You have temporary safety–even if it doesn’t truly feel like it–and a chance to find, let alone help, Helen. There’s not a chance you’re going to throw it away for the sake of curiosity. 

A breath shudders in your ear. Immediately, you clamp your hand over it, turning back to the hall. 

Nobody there except the shadows. 

Maybe Helen is there too, somewhere, draped in ebony; peering into the immovable darkness and gifting you phantom touches and the memory of the warmth you desperately yearn for. 

She has to be here somewhere. 

The brass of the door handles are warm with the touch of a recent palm. As you pass through each of them–a ghost with heavy steps and a heavier mind–you grow increasingly worried. You know that you heard Helen. Heard her soft, dulcet tone bounce off of the blank walls. 

Then again, you also heard ghost flies and a susurrous of rats. 

The walls glow with off white paint; something too light to be called cream, and too stained to be close to be colourless. At home, a place that feels very far from here, the walls are a stark white–once accented with light blue, which has long been painted over with more white–and are almost always splattered with mud that the cleaners constantly try to remove. 

Your eyes quickly graze over the two bedrooms, finding no ominous message nor any furniture poised to tempt you.

Back when you first moved in, they’d repaint it constantly. Nowadays, the fake wood floors are always scuffed and stained and the walls haven’t seen a fresh coat for who knows how long. 

Either way, you’re not sure if you’d like something closer to home or not. 

A floorboard, practically black, cracks underneath you, and you jump like a frightened animal. You’re pretty sure you’re running on sheer dumb luck and something you don’t yet know the name of. 

You don’t think you want to know.

Easily, you decide the bathroom and storage rooms aren’t worth examining. If Helen were in there, for whatever reason, she would’ve come out. She’s heard your voice: she knows you’re here, and that you’re looking for her. 

If only she’d just say something.

You jostle a knob. Locked tight. If Helen were here, you’re sure it’d open up happily under her hands. The hatred between you and the wooden entryways is mutual, at this point. 

Maybe…maybe you’d somehow heard her through the walls? Or the window? Perhaps she’s still downstairs–or she found a way out of the building all together?

Apartments fly by you in a dank, murky blur. You’re tired of the same broken, discoloured kitchen counters. The same dreary living room. The same dirty, slimy bathroom. The same everything. You feel like you’re going in endless circles, trying to find something–someone–unreachable and untouchable. But, so what? So what if you are: it’s worth a shot. 

Isn’t it?

A moth flutters, slow but erratic, in circles in a storage room. It’s pale, a depressing concrete grey, and its wings are frayed. You wonder how long it’s been here; aimlessly turning in circles in a windowless room. It’s painted a light blue; accented by a deep navy–practically black–and a poorly painted white door. You can feel dried drips of paint under your dirtied, stinging fingers. 

There’s nothing besides that. Even if there was, you don’t think you’d have the courage to touch it, or even look at it for too long. There’s no point in risking it. 

A thought worms its way to the front of your brain. What if it wasn’t her?

The remains of a door number glint by your feet; a five. The gold film has chipped off. 

Hands swathed in your sleeve, you place it against the doorframe as you lean into the apartment. The wood twitches–rises and falls–under your palm, and you feel a pulse that isn’t your own thump against your arm.

You don’t want to think about it. Everything here is impersonal: sure, it’s scared you half to death, but it’s generalised. Everyone would be afraid of a walking corpse, ominous radio static and disembodied voices. In short, nothing, so far, has come close to being targeted directly to you. 

You’d like to keep it that way. 

Many of the doors are closed: locked tight as if hiding a secret. Each time you pass by one, you place your ear gently against it and listen in. Normally, only the sound of wind and bending wood greets you. 

You’ve thought about trying some of your keys, but you’ve got no clue what floor you’re on, let alone which doors are which. It’d be like trying to find a needle in a haystack. For fun. 

But, if there’s something here that uses Helen’s voice, that means you’re no longer in the twitching bowels of a slumbering concrete creature. It is very, very awake, and it knows, like any animal does, how to adapt. 

A hand, a something, tugs at your hoodie, like a child wanting their mother’s attention. Immediately, you whip your head around to find the culprit, but, alas, there’s no one there. Normally, you’d tell yourself that it’s just your nerves, that it’s just the dark and translucent fingers playing games with you, but you’re painfully aware that the dark is just as alive as you are. 

After another door, another five rooms of repetitive dust and mourning, all hope seeps out of you. It pools on the floor around your feet–grimy and more mud than feeling–and anchors you to the wood. 

Helen isn’t here. Helen is still downstairs–where you selfishly left her–and you’ve never felt more alone.

Your breathing begins to pick up, a pathetic sob on your tongue and the itch to claw your own throat out. Let all the nerves, the bile, the guilt seep out in carmine and iron. 

If she isn’t here, that means you’ve just fallen for another trick. 

Your heart thumps in your chest like a war drum, breaths puffs of ash and smoke that fade into the moonlight. Without Helen here, with only you and the heartbeat in the walls, it leads you to another truth. 

Feet crumbling like limestone pillars–battered by sea wash–you limp your way up the stairs. 

Helen hadn’t been let up. The concrete hadn’t moved unknowingly: naught had happened but this place deceiving you once again.

Please don’t make me do this, you sob in your own mind, praying, pleading, begging: a decaying leper at the feet of pure light in human skin. 

Which leaves only one viable option, one rational choice–something you desperately don’t want to make–that you’ll have to decide upon when you reach your destination.

…

The cut of void remains. 

You feel sick. Sick in the way that a deer knows its fate in the face of a shining shotgun barrel. 

The slow walk to the last apartment feels like a death march. If floor five was a stitched together horror–Frankenstein’s monster revisited–that was hellbent on spearing you with its twisted horns, you don’t even want to think what this floor’s monster was. 

But you have to. You have to if you want any chance of finding Helen, let alone escaping. 

The sight of the hallway is a grim one. You almost spite the light of the moon. Almost. 

Each floor has steadily gotten harder: both on your mental state and on escapability. You’d gotten away from the last one by sheer dumb luck of something shattering the window at the end of the hall. Now, all you have is a burnt and broken walkie-talkie, a handful of useless keys, your own two legs and your pocket knife. The blade was–is–helpful, sure, but it’d require you to get up close to cause any sort of damage. 

You’d rather stay as far away as possible from whatever it is that’ll come jumping out at you. 

With an exhale, you turn to face the apartment door. 

Gingerly, you approach it. The gold numbers, crooked, gleam in the low light. They’re the only ones that remain: completely ignored and disregarded by your nescience. Number ninety-six. 

Your eyebrows twitch. Hold on.

You trace the numbers with your hand–cold metal prickling–and trying to ensure that what you’re reading is correct.

Quickly, you do the mental maths in your head, using your fingers to aid you. 

Sixteen, thirty-two, forty-eight, fifty- no, sixty-four, eighty…ninety-six. You glance back up again, doubtful of your own eyes and mind. Sixteen apartments on each floor. Six sixteens. 

Your stomach drops.

You’re only on floor six. 

How is that even possible? You were bolting up set of stairs after stairs after stairs for what must’ve been over five minutes. Surely you must be near the uppermost floors by now? 

The glinting numbers tell you otherwise. 

You stand, numb, for a few moments. Only on the sixth floor. Which means Helen is still down there with that monster. 

And you left her there. 

You’re trapped, alone, scared right down to your core, but as long as you don’t enter the apartment, you’re safe. 

Helen isn’t. 

There’s that feeling again. The want to crumble to dust: the all-encompassing, heavy weight of thirty pieces of silver in your pocket. You wish you smelt fresh bread instead of blood. It’s dried in crusted clumps around your nails now–ripe for agitated picking–and stains your shaking palms a dirty mix of red and brown, but you still smell it. No matter how much washing, no matter how raw you rub your skin, you think it’ll always be there. You’ll always smell it.

Your eyes rise to the door again. 

If not for yourself,

Your hand falls to the doorknob, the other gripping the pocketknife tightly.

Then for Helen. 

You peek your head in, a shard of moonlight piercing through the darkness–a shining sword of silver striking the dark beast’s heart. Uneasy, you lean in, keeping your feet beyond the threshold. Slow and steady, your neck cranes over the edge of the door, checking the shadows that hide in the kitchen. 

If this is anything like the two before, all you have to do is run. Run like a dog who’s finally caught the dying scent of iron and find your way to Helen again. 

You take the first step inwards, cringing as a floorboard creaks loudly. 

Either the monster will come from somewhere inside, crawling out of a dark room with teeth bared and malnourished limbs scrambling, or it'll appear from somewhere in the hall. 

The walls are painted some murky, mixed colour you can’t identify–somewhere between grey, green and red. 

All you have to do is run from it; you’re sure of it. Now that you’re here, now that you’ve triggered what could be your end, all you must do is bolt. Bolt, find Helen, and leave. 

Easier said than done, you think. 

A loud crack echoes in the hallway.

Here goes nothing. 

Quietly, you make your way back to the doorway with careful steps, poking your head out and poised to run to the stairway. 

Ba-dump-ba-dump-ba-dump.

Another loud crack sets you off. 

Your legs already hurt, muscles tired from so much running, but that doesn’t stop you. You gain speed within seconds, lungs trembling as you gulp in air and run like a bat out of Hell into the staircase. 

You can’t even see–you don’t want to–whatever chases after you, but you know it's there. Feel its hot breath against your back, smell the sour miasma of a rotting corpse: all of it. 

You’re almost tempted to close your eyes again. 

Your feet practically slide from under you as you make the turn, ready to dart down to the lower floors at a moment’s notice and-

-shit. 

Shit, shit, shit. 

The concrete is still there–it’s still blocked off. What have you done wrong? 

Cacophonous, wood and concrete and stone wail like a banshee behind you, and you swear the walls are closing in on you.

Your feet are antsy, itching to run again, but your consciousness keeps you motionless. 

Leaving her behind, when there’s the smallest chance that it could still open up, feels like an even worse betrayal. 

Your legs move on your own. 

All that surrounds you becomes a grey blur: shapes incomprehensible and body buzzing like the hum of a radio. 

The upper floor has to be open now; it just has to be. 

You refuse to believe you’re trapped. 

Wood, loud as a gunshot, splinters behind you. 

Pure joy, bright as sunlight and as heavy as iron, sparks in your chest when you see it. 

The nothing is gone. Sure, shadow remains, but nothing close to as oppressive as before. 

Just a few more steps. Just a little bit further. 

You practically fly down the hallway, skidding to a stop in the middle as you attempt to shove air into your lungs. 

It was only a short burst of speed, another pump of adrenaline, but you feel like you can’t breathe. 

Guilt weighs heavy on your chest. 

Breath doesn’t want to stay in your lungs, pushed out the second it gets there.

You’ve saved yourself, but at what cost? 

There’s that clump of nerves lodged at the back of your throat, begging to split the seam of your lips. It tastes sour–rancid–when you swallow it back down. 

Helen wouldn't have left you behind. 

You think your legs are finally about to give out, either from strain or the weight of the world on your shoulders. You refuse to let them. Legs buckling, your hands grasp at your hoodie as if to ease the aching organs. A cough strikes through your body, throaty and harsh with the sting of flem.  

Acid dances on your tongue, dribbling out along with saliva and metal-tinged crimson.

For now, you can breathe, deep inhales filling your lungs, but you’re sure death is still close behind. 

A loud screech–one of pipes and snapping wires–digs into your ears, eyes squeezing shut as if to block out the noise. 

“We are sorry, but running gets you nowhere.”

Your breath stills, lungs constricting at the mere sound of hundreds of different voices bouncing off of the walls.

“Feeling scared yet?”

You let out a wet whimper as you unconsciously shake your head, hands grasping at your hoodie. You want to go home. You want Helen here and safe and happy and you want to leave. 

Your palms press into your eyes. “Shut up, please, please just be quiet.”

A dry chuckle. “Well, no need for the impertinence.”

You keep your eyes closed as you remove your hands; you don’t want to look at whatever is talking to you–if there even is anything to look at. You’re unsure whether seeing a monster is better than just dust and asbestos. 

“We would like it if you looked at us.”

Your breath finally evens out, threatening to hasten each time whatever is there speaks. 

You keep your eyes closed like a scared child. You want to be a big kid, one who’s not afraid of the dark under your bed, but you’d much rather stay ignorant. “I don’t want to.” It’s more of a scared whisper than a statement. 

Unlike the rats, it doesn’t whisper from all around you. It’s from above, the calm, almost tired words of, “Open your eyes.” dripping down to your ears.

And what if I don’t? You think to yourself. You half expect it to be able to read your mind. 

All is quiet. Just the subtle bending of wood, your breathing, and the wind–the breath–from the elevator. 

You don’t like the quiet. You think you hate it. 

Your eyes are lined with dried tears and dirt–cracking like ancient columns as you hesitantly open them, mentally preparing yourself for whatever you may see. Maybe it’ll lunge at you the moment your eyes adjust. Maybe it won’t even give you time to see it. 

Slowly, you open them, and drag your eyes upwards. 

You think you’re in front of the elevator, or, what was the elevator. Only dull wallpaper remains, printed over the rusted door. You’re far, far away from the concrete blockade and the darkness of the stairwell, and face to face with the broken wall. Above the space, painfully cut and carved between the ceiling and the rest of the wall, the wallpaper is sliced, curling in on itself around the edges of a crude smile.

The same smirk that stared down at you from the floor below.

“Well done. We knew you could do it. Can you keep them open for us?”

Two more crude cuts are made in the concrete, one still on the wall–crooked–and the other on the ceiling. Both shine with rusted gold numbers: nine and six.

Nine and six. Ninety-Six. 

You’re still on floor six. And you really want to close your eyes again. 

“What are you gonna do to me? Eat me whole?” You breathe out, damp cheeks and brimming tears glinting with moonlight and a fear heavy on your shoulders. 

It laughs tiredly, a cough–one of cigarettes and weed–ringing out behind the main echo of voices. Watching its mouth move, hearing the crumble of concrete and the crack of wood–too similar to broken bones–is an almost painful scene. “No. We do not maim: we watch and listen.”

Even when its mouth stops, still parted in a grin, there are still voices. Aimless conversations and laughter. For once, it doesn’t sound malicious. “For,” you swallow. “For what?”

“Stories to tell. We like stories. You certainly have one to tell–will you speak it?”

Your panicked, oxygen deprived brain can barely make any sense of its words. Let alone the fact that it’s talking to. Civilly. “I don’t- what do you mean?”

Your answer is a giggle. Something playful and deliberate–like a child that knows something that a parent doesn’t. 

“We guess not. Hm,” words, men and women, blur behind its main voice. “How about, if you tell us your story, we’ll tell you things that are right in front of you? A quid pro quo.”

Your brows knit in confusion. “What’s that?” You know you’ve heard the term before–probably from Noah. It sounds Latin, and it sounds like it comes with a cost. 

Its smile seems to widen, pupil-less eyes staring you down from above. “Each question you ask,” the face shifts in the concrete, sliding down–practically like liquid–to the empty space of the elevator. Metal snaps loudly, and in its smile, you can see twisted wires. Its eyes are still crooked. “We shall have one to ask you in turn.”

You were right. “Why?” What does it have to gain from this? A short burst of entertainment before it decides you’re no longer of use? 

Would it eat you?

You wonder which bones will break when you hit the bottom of the shaft. 

“We like hearing stories.”

Your eyes slowly wander to the corners of your vision, mapping out any way of escape. What you find is a treacherous path of splintered wood, pressed against each other like crashing waves and blocking your only path. The path which you know was empty–unstable, but still empty–before. 

It’s still smiling. 

A frown crosses your face. What does it even mean by ‘things that are right in front of you’? You’re afraid to ask: scared that you’ll waste a question and be made to answer one that’ll leave you more weakened than before. 

Your disrupted mind hums as its thoughts attempt to fix themselves back to place. This could be your one chance to understand what on Earth is going on here. Well, other than what you’ve already figured out through tiring, tortuous trial and tribulation. 

Half awake, you nod to yourself. “Okay.”

Its smile widens, wood splintering in sharp teeth. “Take your turn first.”

You exhale, gathering as much saliva in your dry mouth as possible before swallowing. “What is this place?” 

Better to be direct, than waste an opportunity. 

Cold air drifts across your face. Maybe an archaic exhale. Maybe just the wind. 

“A playground. You’re its playdate, it seems.”

The iron arrowhead of fear digs in further in your stomach. “Who-”

“-Ah, ah!” It looms over you, tutting like a disappointed parent. “Quid, pro, quo, Y/N, what are you most afraid of?”

You don’t like that it knows your name. At all.

On edge, you try to mull the thought over in your mind: carefully tiptoeing through the idea before letting yourself speak. A fear is something that can be used against you–the price you’ll probably pay come the next floor–so, is it worth telling the truth? Can you lie?

Will it know?

What little is left of your nails dig into your palms. Covertly, your eyes dance around the dark gullet, looking for an answer hidden in moving shapes and shadows. 

“Heights. Heights and,” you solidify your answer. “And spiders.” It’s up to the wall to decide whether to take it as a truth or a lie. “Now, who is ‘it’? Give me a straight answer this time.” You hope you sound more confident than you’re sure you look. 

The wall hums, hundreds of voices reverberating under your feet like the endless buzz of a train station. “A hungry thing that likes playing with its food.”

Irked, a sharp, confused sigh escapes your lips. What you’re being given is metaphors, not information. “That’s not-”

It shifts again, melting down the wall and silently ripping the somewhat-pristine wallpaper. “That is what it is, in its core. But, you didn’t hear that from us.” It’s almost eye level, and the glint of gold has never made you more uncomfortable. “Quid pro quo: what is your favourite memory?”

After the first question, you had to admit, you weren’t expecting that. Even if they are complete opposites, it’s still something that can be used against you: you’d rather a warm memory not tarnished by dust and ugly cream carpet. 

But, something still comes to mind. Something sweet on your tongue, grass waving in the wind and cigarette smoke. It’s late June, maybe early August, and the sun beats down on your S/C skin. You’d forgotten to put on sunscreen, swearing you didn’t need it and woke up the next day with the itchiest burn you’ve ever had. 

Y/N.

There’s something else there.

Y/N.

What was it?

“Y/N?”

“A picnic.” It stumbles out of your mouth before you can stop it. “With one of my friends.” With the word, your eyes dart to the unreachable staircase: an island surrounded by jagged rocks itching to cut you bow to stern. “My friend, Hel-” You’re hesitant to give this thing her name. Though, it already knows yours, does it not? “...Helen; she’s downstairs–is she okay? When- how can I open the staircase back up?” The words make you feel manic. 

You’re sure if it had eyebrows, it’d raise one of them. 

It chuckles, gentle but knowing. The smile twitches into something devious, if only for a moment, before returning to its suspiciously benign grin. “That was two questions.”

Shit. 

“We will answer,” a woman's voice distantly sobs, wet and strangled. “But we are allowed two in turn.” Hesitant, you nod, as if you have any say in the matter. “Your friend is in good hands, we can assure you that. She will come out unharmed.” Instantly, a weight crumbles off of your shoulders at the mere words. Although, you’re unsure what ‘good hands’ would mean in a place of rot. “Now, quid pro quo: why do you care?”

Your brows knit in confusion, eyes searching what little expression it shows other than that stupid smile for some sort of hint. “What?”

You realise your mistake the moment it laughs. Almost to itself, itself and the hundreds of other voices that echo out, coddled and confined within it, it mumbles, “Another one. We think you must be more careful with your tongue. We will repeat for you: why do you care?”

Your response is instant. “Because she’s my friend. I’d,” you let out a short sigh, half-nervous and half painfully conscious of what you should and shouldn’t reveal. “I’d do anything for her.” 

“Yet you still left her behind.”

“I didn’t mean to–I didn’t want to.” It should be me there instead of her, goes unsaid. You hope the cold concrete, with its shining Midas eyes and spear head teeth, still understands you. 

“What a righteous response.”

You don’t answer.

“Quid pro quo,” If you squint, you think you can see yourself, distorted and discoloured, in its eyes. “What do you hold dearest to yourself?”

Again, another thing that can be used against you. 

“...My friends.” You hope that doesn’t come back to bite you. 

“One more. Do you think you’re a good person?”

A confused ‘what’ almost spills out of your mouth. You purse your lips before it can.

If you were honest, you’d say it’s a question that has rung–loud as Church bells and screeching tires–in your ears for the last few years. Kind, slow tones tell you it was not, is not, your fault.

You glance down at your hands, clenched at your side: bloody, bruised and caked in dirt. 

You try to tell yourself it, you really do, but the shouting, the screaming, just won’t stop. 

It wasn’t your fault.

The voice, the one that made its home in the hollows of your ribcage and between your broken, bruised fingers that don’t bend right anymore, that tells you that you’ll never be clean. 

You’ve done nothing wrong. 

That tells you that you’ll always be tarnished with glinting, broken glass and blood that isn’t your own. 

It isn’t my fault.

It always will be. His dark blue eyes will forever look at you, drunken and disappointed, from across every room. 

You feel like you sound like a child. A child crying at their parents that the shattered vase was the wind, and not them. 

“...I don’t know.” You don’t look it in the eyes–don’t stare at your warped self in the golden numbers–when you answer.

It is quiet, for a few moments. Like you both know the weight of the lie that now sits, misshapen and black as tar, between the two of you.  

You exhale a shaky breath. “My turn now, right?”

“Your last.” 

Seems it has finally decided that you are no longer worth the entertainment. That didn't take long, did it?

You're not sure if you should feel grateful or fearful. 

“How do I get out of this place?” It’s one you should’ve asked from the start. Considering you’re now on your last question–your last hope–it’s taken priority. You tense in expectation of the answer: hopefully something helpful. 

“You do what you’re best at: you play pretend.”

Quietly, you nod to yourself, as if the action will help better understand the words spoken. You almost feel like you’ve been given some sort of riddle. Clear cut words, but given where and what you’re talking to, half impossible to understand. Either that, or a fable. A fable told by mouth, layered in symbolism that asks you to dissect–needle and scalpel–each word for the real meaning. 

Your mind wanders back to its words from before: ‘we’ll tell you things that are right in front of you’. 

Things that are right in front of you. 

Things that are obvious, but ones you can’t see? 

To you, this place is a horrific shit show. To whatever ‘it’ is, this place is a playground. All is fair in make-believe and swing-set promises. So, to get out…you have to play along with the game it’s made. 

Not the conclusion you wanted. 

But what if you do cheat the system? 

Your eyes wander back to the window at the end of the hall. You’re on the sixth floor now, maybe twenty metres up.

Before you can continue with your thought process, the walls interrupt. “We wouldn’t, if we were you.” It pauses for a moment, as if hoping to drag your eyes away from the moonlight. “If you land a bit off, you will suffer on the pavement. We don’t think you would like making friends with the man upstairs.” Another pause. “We thought you said you were afraid of heights too, no?”

“Yeah,” you turn back to the ripped wallpaper. “I am.”

Slowly, in the quiet–only interrupted by the odd whisper or whistle from one of the voices–you feel nerves creep up your back. What now?

If the window had a long drop, you don’t want to think about the elevator. 

“We have asked for it to be opened for you.”  Your stomach jumps with joy too quick to find you. ���You may be on your way. We thank you for your story.”

But, how are you meant to get anywhere when the floor-

-...is broken.

The floorboards are the same as they always were: bent, oddly lumpy, but walkable. 

Like a bird released from the maw of a cat, you cautiously inch away from where the watchful concrete slit eyes you still, walking backwards with hands, pawing at the darkness behind you, until you reach the staircase. Immediately, your eyes peer over to try to catch a glimpse of the lower floor.

“We are afraid, for now, you must go without her.”

You glance over your shoulder at the somewhat distant noise. 

It takes a few moments before you make the first step. Then two. Then three, until you reach where the tear in reality was. 

It’s finally gone. Really gone. 

A smile twitches on your face, and you almost mumble a thank you.

Although, something small, a question that you’d rather not leave unanswered, dances on the tip of your tongue. 

Slowly, you begin walking back down the steps. Hesitantly, you mumble nonsense to yourself: a jumble of words even you can’t make sense of. 

“Pardon?”

Fear stills your steps. “...Seems I get another question.”

For a few moments, there is silence, and you prepare yourself to make a mad dash for the next floor. To try and reconcile your stupid mistake. 

A loud sigh, silently amused, rumbles through the walls. “If you must.”

You reach the turn, glimpsing the first doors of the sixth floor. “How do I know you’re not lying?”

“You don’t.”

A response dances on the tip of your tongue, but dies the moment you see the elevator back in its place. The only thing that remains is a twisted crack in the concrete, smirking at you from a distance. 

.

.

.

.

.

. 

.

⋆.˚✮U N R E A D  M E S S A G E S✮˚.⋆

When she was younger, Helen’s father used to almost always take her out on his boat when he went fishing. While he mainly wanted to teach her how to fish–a family tradition–Helen was much more focused on the dolphins and odd whales that would take an interest in the boat. 

One of her favourite memories is slinging a few fish to the local pod of dolphins: they’d wait for her father’s boat because they knew it would guarantee a free meal. 

Her favourites are Right Whales and Risso’s dolphins: when Y/N comes to Greece with her, she hopes they’ll go out on the boat with her so she can show them her favourite animals. 

-----------------------------

Sorry that this is late and that it’s written a bit weirdly. I had a family member pass away and I’m not feeling too great. I don’t know if I’ll have the usual update next month, but, we’ll see. 

As per usual, thank you for all the support and lovely comments. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to express how much they mean to me. You’re all lovely. 

[ilikedyourablogithere]

If nothing else I'm gonna keep doing Warm UP matches in the hope that after all the whales get their Li Guang skin they'll go away so the normal people playing the game and can get theirs in peace

in the meantime remember

You don't have Toland but you have a max out Li Ao

you know? the guy that was Toland before Toland was even in the game does and the reason the dev made Toland so busted... cause they had to force him to be better than him

Don't have Tiye but you do have a Melanie

Not as flashy as her but AP manipulation all the same and when petrified debuff is applied they don't gain AP

Not Feng Nuxi but you got a Jeanne by now ya?

Can't be a CD queen? Deploy some stun team scum tactics

David ultimate move attacks 4 times

Build him right and he can counter Anna

Not saying any of this is a guaranteed winning strategy but if you build your stuff correct they can take on some whales

[he-is-so-stupid]

howdy fellow otome gamers. I play way too many of these games and I need to get things off my chest. feel free to ask me anything, gush about games you know I've played, gush about games you want me to try, ask my opinion about games you haven't tried yet, et cetera.

Games I've Completed

storm lover, sweet fuse, amnesia, hakuoki (kw + eb), code: realize, collar x malice, psychedelica of the black butterfly, psychedelica of the ashen hawk, 7'scarlet, norn9, london detective mysteria, bad apple wars, cupid parasite, variable barricade, olympia soiree, piofiore, cafe enchante, even if tempest, princess nightmare, taisho x alice, nightshade, bustafellows, nameless, yojinbo, dandelion, tmgs 1-3, mystic messenger, cinderella phenomenon, lover pretend, starry sky in spring, arcana famiglia ancora, arcana famiglia fandisk*, charade maniacs, code : realize~ future blessings*, birushana, nekopara catboys paradise, jack jeanne, code:realize~ wintertide miracles*$

*=fandisks, $=unfinished

Games in My Backlog

ephemeral, anniversary no kuni no alice, starry sky after spring*, ayakashi gohan, dot kareshi 1-3, fashioning little miss lonesome, re: birthday song, ozmafia, palais de reine, the second reproduction, bakumatsu renka shinsengumi, my vow to my liege, backstage pass, taisho x alice heads & tails*, brother's conflict, period cube, hakuoki sweet school life, collar x malice -unlimited-*$, piofiore: episodio 1926*, dairoku: agents of sakuratani, steam prison, amnesia: later x crowd*, butterfly's poison: blood chains, the crimson flower that divides, winter's wish spirits of edo, paradigm paradox, arcana famiglia 2*, radiant tale, norn9 last era*, shuuen no virche

Platforms I Play

Switch, PS Vita, 3DS, PC. (I have a phone but I don't play many mobage.)

My Top Favorite Games

Bustafellows, Psychedelica of the Black Butterfly, Psychedelica of the Ashen Hawk, 7'scarlet, Taisho x Alice, Sweet Fuse, and Charade Maniacs. I have a big love for games with deep mysteries that get unraveled through the course of the story.

My Favorite LIs

Impey (Code:Realize), Mineo (Collar x Malice), Alice (Taisho x Alice), Chigasaki and Dazai (Charade Maniacs), Levi (PotAH), Yamato (PotBB), Yamazaki and Shinpachi (Hakuoki), Suzu (Jack Jeanne), Heishi (Norn9), Watson (London Detective Mysteria), Higa (Bad Apple Wars), Peter Flage (Cupid Parasite), Gilbert (Piofiore), Limbo (Bustafellows), and Liberta (Arcana Famiglia). I have a bias towards dumb boys, basically.

[carcharsaur]

ok I have jack jeanne character delusions bouncing around my skull I need to let loose, spoilers of varying severity for every main LI and maybe some side chars

kisa: at least a little bi (THOSE AO EVENTS MAN), also an NB girl

kai: my autistic king. depressed as hell where a lot of his emotions feel numbed. also avoidant attachment. I don't think he's ever had a thought or feeling about orientation etc in any shape or form he just loves kisa as a human being.

neji: he's mentally ill in a way that idk how to ascribe tbh. he is also giving ADHD (or at least executive dysfunction) though. I think he's bi/pan but heavily leaned toward men due to his fear of women but also he plays everything as a joke because he's scared of intimacy period so wildcard bitches

shirota: HE/HIM LESBIAN FOR REAL OK. also C-PTSD or at the very least disordered/resistant attachment

fumi: straight and cis but in a fun way. could easily be a drag queen

suzu: straight but had a bi crisis. questioning maybe. he's so genki that it don't matter

sou: straight and cis in a boring way. to me. anxious attachment though

minorikawa: gay but extremely in the closet about it

mare: questioning nonbinary trans fem (LITERALLY HAS A DEADNAME ???)

kasai: GAY AS HELL. in a way that's weirdly straight

ao: she is in gay love with kisa you can't tell me otherwise. she has a valentine event with handmade chocolate and everything come on now

[mslevbiascorner]

KOKUTO NEJI (JACK JEANNE)

Who is Kokuto Neji?

Kokuto or Kuro is one of the love interests (LIs) in the otome game titled Jack Jeanne. He is the Boss/Leader/Director/Playwright/Lyricist of Quartz Class, he is also one of the third year students alongside Kai and Sarafumi.

Profile:

Before we proceed I just want to warn you that this is going to be a long ass post because this dude got me on CHOKEHOLD and second, WHY THE FUCK DID THEY MADE HIM SO FREAKIN' HOT?!

Okay, I have standards in otome games y'know? I like smart, kuuderes, serious/villain characters, with that being said, Kokuto is the COMPLETE EXACT opposite, he's so freakin' loud, whimsical and eccentric for my taste.

When I started playing the game I was aiming for Mutsumi Kai, I was attracted to him because he is a classically handsome otome LI, and definitely exudes kuudere vibes lol. Despite the urge of playing Kai's route first, I decided to stick with the reviews, I've played Suzu, Fumi and Kai's route.

Wait whut? So where is Soshi and Mitsuki?

Okay, okay, believe me I really wanted to finish all the routes first before Kokuto but GODDAMN I just can't take it anymore I had to skipped Soshi and Mitsuki for him (I'm so sorry). I was so drawn by him, I felt like he's watching me from behind and telling me to PLEASE DO MY ROUTE ALREADY, you have no idea how daunting it is and how hard it is to resist the urge of playing his route because WHAT THE FUCK?

Why he got me on CHOKEHOLD [May Contain Minor/Major/Out of Context Spoiler]

Character Design: 10/10

Yeah I know, some of you will probably attack me for this rating because some players hated his hair, but let's not talk about that, I love his hair it suits him perfectly, period. I like his uniform a lot! He looks so neat and likes wearing long polo sleeves which I sooooo fuckin' love! I like his aesthetics because I can definitely do his style. I actually realized that he really does look like a film director. Also, those jaded eyes dude, those freakin' eyes, he looks like a CAT and I love cats! I think he deviates to the "usual" otome handsome LI due to his design that is very Tokyo Ghoul(ish), but nevertheless he is very very handsome and attractive, 100/10 would smash, lol.

Talent: 10/10

LISTEN y'all, Kokuto Neji is INSANELY TALENTED I'm telling you that! This is not even an exaggeration. His forte is writing and directing, but I was at complete shock that he can also ACT, SING, DANCE, and even WRITE A SONG! And oh, the fact that he can play both Jack and Jeanne roles is a major WOW to me. At first, I was not taking his acting seriously because he picks a role that is so so so random lol, often times he has been outshined by other characters but not until he played as Domina in Oh! Rama Havenna! like urgh! His acting is superb, there's already a foreshadowing about his personal story there. His singing voice is so gooooood as well, I love Ghost Party and Intense Confessions at the Confessional, he ate those songs up!

Kisa's inner monologue (same girl, same)

Yep he did that!

Personality: 9/10

Fuck my life and why I haven't met a person like him in real life? Haha! Kokuto is too complex since you'll never know what's going on inside his head, in fact, Kai mentioned that Kokuto doesn't know how to communicate very well despite his eccentricity, but Neji can be very very serious especially if it's related to the projects he's doing and I think he can be cold asf, iykyk. It's a no brainer, Kokuto is a gifted one, a genius as called by many but because of that he tends to be selfish, inconsiderate, unreasonable and brutally honest at times, I think this is a conundrum with intelligent people in general. I also believed that the writers (Sui Ishida and Shin Towada) perfectly convey the word "genius" through Neji. While I admit that he is quite self-centered I think Neji just wants the best for the members and for the Quartz, he is the class leader and has the responsibility over them. He wanted to push everyone because he believed that they are more than capable of what they can offer.

Neji realizing that he went overboard, lol, he is so precious huhu

This hit me like a train

Of all LIs Kokuto's dialogues are my favorite, they are deep but at the same time very sensible, this is because I like introspective people in real life. Aside from that, Kokuto is so freakin' FUNNY! Oh good lord, you have no idea, there were no dull moments with him! I had to admit, his role as Crowley in their final performance almost got me so emotional but his comedic lines ruined it for me I ended up laughing instead, LOL! Despite being a troublemaker to Quartz and to his previous class I love how his teachers acknowledges his talent and even waited for him to finish the final script when they can just use the Univeil archive but they opted not to (Neji best boy >.<).

LMAO! This is probably one of his unforgettable dialogues!

STORY: 10/10

Despite all the spoilers I've read, his story still surprised me to a great extent. Okay, perhaps the main reason why I liked Kokuto is because his story and my personal story is similar even his contemplations/sentiments are the same as mine. Of course, unlike him I am no genius, just an average person but I also like doing things that piques my interest, we have the same blood type and love over food especially rice lol. I've read reviews about his route being lackluster or Kokuto being irrational, some even said that his route has a great potential but went down hill for some reason. I'd say Neji's route is not for everyone, of course he has flaws. With his experience with his father Kokuto formed a certain defense mechanism channeling his emotional burden to somebody else. Despite the trauma, Kokuto still respects his father, admired him as an excellent director, and even inspired him to become an excellent playwright. My mind and heart were so conflicted when Neji got his writer's block because huh? Why he can't accept the fact that he's inlove, of course he cannot think of anything duh? I emphatize with Kisa like it's not her fault to begin with, however I can't also invalidate Neji's feeling because after all he's protecting himself from potential heartache and because of his past experience *sob*. Moreover, it so refreshing too see Neji in stage acting as a lead actor, and bringing his own script to life. He's always been working so hard behind Quartz and let other members shine. Also, I am convinced that Neji purposely wrote the Sissia of the Central Nation for Kisa even without his route, I say this because I've played 3 routes before him and to think that the final play was actually based on Kisa's story is quite a mystery, perhaps he knew her secret after all?

Yes Chui, I agree.

ROMANCE: 100/10

Hoo boy we’ve come this far, aren’t we? Yeah, I mentioned that he deviates to the classically handsome otome, at first I was like “this character is so random, What's with the hair? Can he romance me tho? What is it going to be like?” Those questions became the driving force for me to finally give in! Also BRUH?! Kokuto’s affection events left me in awe, my heart really went “doki doki” did I also mentioned that I liked Kai?! Yes, Kai’s affection events were good but Neji went TRIPLE! He got me kicking my feet, giggling and twirling my hair, I had to put down my switch in order to process my emotions because goddamn what was even that for?! He was such a tease like I didn’t even expect those.

KYAHHHHH!!! This one left me in SHOOKT! Yep this is not an acting anymore lol

Despite JJ's limited romantic offerings, Kokuto's affection events can compete with Piofiore or other similar games I've played even without kissing CG or 18+ CGs, that's how impactful his route is. I'd say his route had a right amount of romance. His antics and exaggeration makes him even more adorable his lines were the best! I guess it all boils down to him being a writer and an actor, gosh he knows exactly how to play with words! My favorite line of his is probably during the Univeil Performance, the scene where Sissia (Kisa) and Crowley (Kokuto) where about to perform the final song: Sissia: I can’t understand 80% of what you say. Crowley: Though it may be trouble for you, I absolutely love the time I spend with you, speaking feverishly on the 80 percent you don’t understand DUDDDEEEEEEE this line particular is so touching! :( please help me to hold all these feels. After playing his route I can say that Kokuto and Kisa really fit and compliment each other and could make a power couple! (Me to myself: you wish that was you huh?) which actually make sense since Kokuto has always been looking for a "gear" as he claimed himself as the "mechanic"

That's it for my Kokuto Neji appreciation post, I am officialy brainrotting but I have to keep going I have like 9 otome titles to play with lol. I will be thinking about him until I'm 40. Ciao!

[achy-boo]

Dawn Melody Libya

Name: Dawn Melody Libya

Romaji: Libya Melody Dawn

Quote: "Seeing blood from my victims..excites me."

V/A:Eleven from Path to Nowhere(English) and Zoya from Path to Nowhere(Japanese)

Gender: female

Sexuality: bisexual

Age: 20

Birthday: February 14th

Zodiac Sign: Aquarius

Eye color: Blue(mixture of dark blue and light blue)

Hair Color: dark blue with pale-ish blue ends

Height: 5'5

Weight: 100 lbs

Race: undead vessel(Blood Mage/Blood Siren

Homeland: Shenzhen, China(Move in Tsukii's mansion in Yokohama, Japan with Night and Jeanne

Family: a mother, father, and older brother and Night(Identical twin sister)

School Status and Fun Facts

Dorm: Sapphire Lake Dorm

School Year: 2nd year

Class: 2-B

Student Number: No.9

Occupation:DJ, Hostess at the host night club and babysitter.

Club: basketball club

Best Subject: Flying and History

Favorite Color: Dark colors but she also like neutral colors too

Favorite Food: Depends on her mood. But she always loved home cook food, sweets and sour food.

Least Favorite Food: She never like Lilia’s food, certain type of food, and I hate to say this but for some reason: Dawn hates overly spicy food.

Likes: Tea, coffee(She preferred Tsukii’s way of making tea or coffee), she likes to party but not too much, drama, chaos, she like the night sky, the moon cycles, Malleus, Silver, ADEUCE’s shenanigans, her dorm, being herself, Kalim

Dislikes: Heat, She hates Crowley’s guts, she hate sexist people, Some of the Savanclaw members, She hates Rook and Floyd. She hates liars, she never likes when her dorm is being insulted. She never likes scaring people of her abilities so she never says anything about it. She hates being mistaken as Night.

Hobbies:She reads A LOT in the NRC’s library. She cooks and bakes which always makes her dorm happy. She can sing, dance and play the piano.

Talents: She is a room reader, she is also an empathetic girl. Don’t lie to her because she can catch lies. She had a keen eyes.

Nicknames: Dawny(Tsukii, Night, Jeanne), Rebel (Leona, Riddle and Ace), Little Moon(The staff but Crowley, The ghost,Malleus and Lilia)

Other Nicknames: Blood Siren(Vil), NRC's Bloody Mary(Sebek called her that) La princesse du sang(The Princess of Blood) or La Princesse de la Lune de Sang(The Princess of the Blood Moon[Both came from Rook])

Appearance and Personality

Appearance: Dawn has dark blue hair with pale-ish blue ends with her eyes a mixture of dark blue and light blue. She has an eyebrow piercing but rarely shows it. Dawn(in her sadism mode) will have blood red rings in her eyes. Dawn looks like an easy victim but she is one harsh fighter. A black cross with a choker/ dog tags is how you know its Dawn and not Night.

Personality: Oof! Dawn is..protective. She is fiercely loyal to her dorm and her loved ones that she will refused any shady offers(Azul I’m looking at you). Due to her coming back from a..terrible event: She grew observant and quiet. She will let her voice be heard and she is make sure that her dorm has some privacy and freedom. Dawn is not the type to anger but when she is angry..It is not a pleasant sight to see or experience it. But she will warm up to you,letting you show a carefree and yet kind twin sister and childhood friend. You can even see her smile often. However when she sees blood from anyone who wronged her or her loved ones, watch how her expression changes from a calm yet quiet expression to the expression of PURE sadism in an eerily slow manner.

𝑻𝒓𝒊𝒗𝒊𝒂

Blood Moon Hypnotize is Dawn's UM(never used it)

Due to her having abilities to control blood, she had to keep herself on check every time

She is mostly afraid of her sadism when she sees blood

She earns the blood control ability from Bellatrix's dead twin sister.

She once killed someone who was confusing her as Night on purpose

She is a part of the 2nd year gang and she is the silent type

She has favorite plushie(Spoiler alert: Its a bunny plushy)

She trusts her sister and childhood friends more than anyone in NRC

She once ate a large box of Takoyaki in front of Azul whil staring him deep in the eyes out of pure pettiness(She still hasn't forgiven him for trying to steal her um/magic)

[teutaranaway]

hi teuta do you wanna convince me to play bustafellows. i'm pretty into otomes and i keep up with commercial releases but bustafellows never really grabbed me despite all the buzz around it. why do u enjoy it

HONESTLY if i had to rank bustafe with commercial otomes in regards to like story and romance its pretty mid like. 5 or 6 but i personally love love love the story and the characters and the found family trope so it was really easy for me to get super into it, plus the art is great and i love the ost and the story is pretty good imo, its just like hard to get ur head into it if ur actually from america bc the america new sieg is based on is a very "i only know about america from what i see on tv" type of america, like its just a concept of america. im not from the us however so i didnt care abt that one bit teehee

if u like found family its great .......like, except for some commercial otomes like maybe jack jeanne, the found family trope is STRONG with this one (in other otomes they usually have LIs be rivals for the mc but in bustafe everyone is eachothers wingman lmfao) its so hard to view the main cast without all of them together bc the group dynamic is rly strong, i like how they handle some issues like mental health, gender etc even tho they dont handle some other issues that well. the supporting characters are also great and they are such a big part of the story that they cant be removed so theyre not sidelined at all

ummmmmm. i love crow. do it for him

[couldbebetterforsure]

I already gave out my big thoughts about the Final Performance arc of Suzu’s route in over a dozen different individual posts (sorry for spamming the Jack Jeanne tag 😞) so I won’t repeat myself too much on that.

Basically I am super duper wholeheartedly in love with Suzu’s route. It was incredibly well written, had great characterization of both Kisa and Suzu. I also think Suzu’s route flowed well from the common route, like a natural progression. I loved how the rest of Quartz was like on the route too, how supportive and loving they were. Once again, special shout-out to my boy Sou for being the funniest fucker during this arc. Boy really put the fear of God in poor Otori…Fumi and Kai were able to happily pass along their titles as Quartz’s Al Jeanne and Jack Ace to Kisa and Suzu with no regrets. Neji got to have fun with this last play and with how many references to the plays from over the year this one had, seems like he was feeling pretty sentimental. And Mitsuki really showed off how ready he is to be Quartz’s next leader, he knows his class so well! And yeah like I said before, Otori did end up growing on me, he’s such an entertaining gremlin!

Also all the people who tried saying Jack Jeanne isn’t romantic were definitely exaggerating. If you’re looking for spicy romantic contact or lots of physical affection, you probably won’t get it (at least that’s what I’m understanding after doing Suzu’s route). But to say it isn’t romantic at all??? LIES!!!! At the very least Suzu’s route is so incredibly deeply wonderfully romantic!!!!

I already mentioned this but Sissia of the Central Nation is my favorite of Quartz’s plays. Everything about it was beautiful, I felt like I was watching an anime, and like I said before if the developers wanna make a separate visual novel based on the play 👀👀👀👀👀 Though preferably with an ending that leans more towards the sweet side over the bittersweet (seriously you asshats you couldn’t wait for Sissia and Chance to get down first????)

The music was sheer perfection. Departure was a beautiful solo from Kisa, like no wonder Sissia was immediately picked to join Kielce. Kielce the Nation at the Center was without a doubt my favorite, it was such a catchy hype song for the circus troupe! Quartz Anima was a VERY close second, like it so narrowly missed out on being my favorite, it’s beautiful and has so many callbacks to Quartz’s past plays and I found out it also apparently references all the Quartz members’ names in the lyrics too!!! And Over the Wall was another gorgeous solo from Kisa!

The ending song, I think it’s called Where the Wind Blows, was absolutely beautiful and I loved that for me it was a duet between Kisa and Suzu 🥰🥰🥰

So yeah, Jack Jeanne is such a good game and deserves way more attention. I have only played the one route so far but I can confidently call it my favorite otome game and one of my favorite video games in general!

Before I get to the other routes I wanna take a break to play Radiant Tale! There’s another red haired genki sweetheart voiced by Yuma Uchida in that game but I can’t access his route until I woo all the other boys first 😡 So I need to get to work on that!!! When I come back to Jack Jeanne I likely won’t liveblog as extensively as I did Suzu’s route. I probably will give general thoughts at the end or make note of anything major.

But yeah, thanks everyone for reading my thoughts! And sorry again for spamming the Jack Jeanne tag so much! 😅😅😅

[protect-namine]

final performance thoughts (kisa's route) and I guess just overall thoughts on the game.

the thing is, I did expect the final arc to be a bit (thematically) underwhelming because it's hard to follow up oh rama havenna when both the play and the lead up to it was perfectly executed. and I mean, I was right, but I'm still a little bit disappointed lol. I see what ishida and towada wanted to do with the "jack jeanne" role, and I was really hoping it would land hard during kisa's route. it didn't hurt the game, but it also just. could've been more.

some thoughts on sissia of the central nation:

great music, probably has some of the best costumes for the cast. jj being a visual novel definitely removes some of the showmanship but I understand how sissia would be amazing to see live. it's like if you watch a mix of the greatest showman and les miserables. the border performance is like if a circus performed on the barricade from les mis.

I'm sure ishida and towada was itching to write a greater message with sissia but they're at least aware that they're writing an otome game lol

I think because all the actors have already gone through their character development in previous arcs, the rehearsals seemed a bit too easy? sissia rehearsals have to accommodate seven routes, so I imagine there are individual conflicts in each LI route. but when it comes to kisa's route, neji didn't really give anyone a challenging role. I realize that my favorite element of the story is when actors struggle to connect with their character, and there wasn't much of that in kisa's route. and because kisa's route focuses on sissia's relationship with the kielce troupe instead of individuals, there is a loss of intimate character moments that usually make neji's plays so good

the conflict was more around quartz vs amber. it's nice, but man I kinda wish the winter performance rehearsals was saved for the final performance because having neji give every single quartz member challenging roles to overcome for the finale with the help of kisa acting as the glue that keeps them together? and them winning because of it? feels like a better way to show that "gear" metaphor they love to use

but I also prefer that mitsuki was the one doing that during the winter performance, so idk. I get it

(watsonian) you know, I was gonna say that I can't believe that neji thinks sissia is one of his best plays when oh rama havenna exists, but actually, that's very in character lmao. neji himself didn't understand what made oh rama havenna entertaining. he's a writer whose inspiration can sometimes work on a deeply unconscious level sometimes.

I also just realized what else was lacking in kisa's route. I wish there was more improv!!! every quartz play has an improv scene that's designed to go straight to the actor's heart. sure, sou did improvise his monologue and kisa did tsuki's line at the beginning, but it's not the saaaame. it's not the same as figaro riling up charles riling up mary, or rukiora/mitsuki's "that applies to you too", or neji and kisa reworking mukai's characterization the day before the performance without telling anybody. I wish someone had thrown an improv scene at sissia. or even better, maybe kisa met eyes with chui in the audience and went off-script.

I like the exploration of gender expression in the game, so I was disappointed that they didn't really do more with the jack jeanne role. they SAY it's a revolutionary concept in univeil but like. there isn't anything in the script in kisa's route that really highlights how she's neither/both jack or/and jeanne. again, doesn't really hurt the game and its overarching themes, but it just could've been more. it could've landed harder. maybe it's highlighted more in the other routes though (I have high hopes for mitsuki to at least touch on this), so we'll see.

the closest we get is mitsuki and mare's commentary on it, as well as the audience's, but like. that's outside perspective. the actual play itself doesn't really do anything about it? neither does kisa's voice acting lend itself to being ambiguous about gender, which was supposedly the goal. if anything, it was closer to her voice acting as maiden. I thought her voice acting for chicchi and charles were closer to what the jack jeanne role intended, but that's just me

but!! for all the finale lacked, chui made up for all of it. which is ironic, but really, there's like so many things going on with the neji/kisa/chui dynamic on a relationship and theme level. love whatever's going on with them. I am petitioning for sui ishida to write a side story where they're all amber students

anyway, kisa is a great protagonist and I'm really glad all her lines are voice acted because I don't actually self-insert that much in these games. going through the other routes will be painful because this is 80% common route, but I am also so glad the common route is long but sprinkled with a lot of flavor text (I finished one route and I've only gone through 21% of the text). very slow burn. I'm also the kind of person who usually would just do 1-2 routes and move on, but because the common route is so long, all of the characters have endeared themselves to me, so now I do want to go through all the routes. amazing.

but I have to make the executive decision to do neji and mitsuki's route last because if I finish them first, I really will probably not do anyone else's routes. to me, neji is the deuteragonist of the game even if he's not intended to be.

[unmeisenshi]

BIOS (Living muses)

NAME: Solaris (VA: Roger Craig Smith - Kyle Crane) TITLE: “The Ray of Light and Hope” AGE: 60 HEIGHT: 5'10" SPECIES: Charizard BIRTHDAY: 09/26 GENDER: Male SEXUALITY: Bi FIGHT STYLE: Zui Quan (Drunken Boxing) WEAPON: None ABILITY: Tough Claw STATUS: Living

After the riots, Solaris became traumatized at seeing his home in ruins.  The former guildmaster blames himself for the tragic fate of his guild members, and is battling his inner demons that haunt him.  Thanks to the help of Zane and the others, he has become more mentally stable, although the ground below him is still shaky.  He now runs his own bar that he, Zane and Morello opened, called The Caravan, and spends the majority of his time serving the people just like he used to. After helping a Zane from a parallel timeline, Solaris' arms were severely injured, the scales being torn off of his arms. The scales are healed over, but now he suffers from hand tremors, and cannot fight or hold heavy objects for long.

NAME: Florence (VA: Jeanne Tirado - Android 21 (Lab Coat)) TITLE: “Princess of Dark Shadows” AGE: 59 HEIGHT: 3'5" SPECIES: Umbreon BIRTHDAY: 08/28 GENDER: Female SEXUALITY: Bi FIGHT STYLE: Choy Li Fut WEAPON: None ABILITY: Inner Focus STATUS: Living

Florence has given up rescue work, and is working on bettering her mental health and returning to some normality.  While she has some bursts of her usual cheerful and sassy self, her death has traumatized her, and left her an emotionless husk.  She often times can only feel sadness and fear, and would do anything to feel some good emotions again.  Even though she doesn’t fight to rescue any more, she continues to keep up with her martial arts training, as she finds it cathartic and relaxing.  Once she feels she’s ready, she plans to find a job again.  She has considered pursuing a smithing career in Vance’s stead, but she has yet to make a decision.

NAME: Beck (VA: Kyle Hebert - Adult Gohan) TITLE: "The All-Round Ice Gator" AGE: 61 HEIGHT: 5'6'' SPECIES: Feraligatr (Shiny), Human (Former) BIRTHDAY: 07/08 GENDER: Male SEXUALITY: Asexual Homo-Romantic FIGHT STYLE: Bajiquan WEAPON: Ice weapons ABILITY: Sheer Force STATUS: Living

Beck is the friend of Zane, and lived with them when the pair were still human. He arrived suddenly in Flora after he was hit by an unseen car, and found Team Destiny when they came to rescue him. He worked with the team for years, and was forced into an early retirement after he and Misha were crippled during the crisis with Urie's sister. After years of physical therapy, both he and Misha are back, and are working with team Neo Destiny to continue honoring Zane.

NAME: Morello (VA: Troy Baker - Kanji Tatsumi) TITLE: “Predecessor of Powerful Lightning” AGE: 65 HEIGHT: 6'2" SPECIES: Lycanroc (Dusk) BIRTHDAY: 05/30 GENDER: Male SEXUALITY: Gay FIGHT STYLE: Capoeira WEAPON: None (uses Zane’s Thunderseal to control lightning) ABILITY: Tough Claws STATUS: Living

Morello spends his days watching over Phoebe and helping out at Solaris’ bar.  During the riots the Lycanroc was trampled trying to protect his daughter, and because of this can not help the team at full capacity like he used to.  The most he is able to muster are light jobs, ranging from easy rescues to fetch quests.  He has continued his hobby of crafting, even learning to sew, and he plans on opening a plushie shop to sell his goods.  But for now, he rests at home and plays with his daughter.

NAME: Misha (VA: Justin Cook - Eijiro Kiroshima) TITLE: "Bitter Cold Aurora Ray" AGE: 62 HEIGHT: 6' SPECIES: Ninetales (Alolan) BIRTHDAY: 10/31 GENDER: Male SEXUALITY: Gay FIGHT STYLE: Hung Gar WEAPON: None ABILITY: Snow Cloak STATUS: Living

Misha met Team Destiny after he ran away from an abusive relationship. He voluntarily joined to keep himself safe and away from his abuser. He was a strong asset, before he and Beck were crippled during the crisis involving Urie's sister Miles. During his recovery he got to know Beck better, and the two hit it off and are in a relationship. The pair run Misha's combination coffee shop and library, the Aurora Veil cafe. After years of physical training, both he and Beck now help Team Neo Destiny on missions.

NAME: Remi (VA: Erika Harlacher - Ann Takamaki) TITLE: “Benevolent Blood Sucking Vampire” AGE: 58 HEIGHT: 4’ SPECIES: Floatzel BIRTHDAY: 04/25 GENDER: Female SEXUALITY: Lesbian FIGHT STYLE: Tai Chi WEAPON: None ABILITY: Swift Swim STATUS: Living

Remi, now grown up and evolved, is the current leader of the new Team Destiny, Team Neo Destiny.  She has learned a lot in her time away from Flora, including the ability to manipulate water.  She has even shown the ability to manipulate the blood in a person’s body to subdue them.  She would unfortunately lose her mate, Heart, after Zane was having a hallucination.  She was devastated, but is now using the pain of losing someone to become stronger so it would never happen again.  She lives with the others at the team’s home, ready to help the community to the best of her ability.

NAME: Noel (VA: Elizabeth Maxwell - Sae Niijima) TITLE: “All-Seeing Aura Samurai” AGE: 55 HEIGHT: 5’ SPECIES: Hybrid (Lucario/Zoroark) BIRTHDAY: 05/04 GENDER: Female SEXUALITY: Bi FIGHT STYLE: Iaijutsu WEAPON: Chuten (Aura-strengthening katana) ABILITY: Steadfast STATUS: Living

Noel, much like her sister Remi, has learned a lot in her time away.  She learned to harness her aura in a way that no other Lucario has, as she is able to conjure her aura into a blade, and can channel it into the blade she inherited from her father.  After an incident on a mission, she lost her eye and both of her legs.  She was given prosthetics for her legs, and she decided to go fully blind to continue her father’s legacy.  She wields her katana and relies on her aura sight to cut down her enemies.

NAME: Adiemus/Audie (VA: Xander Mobus - Ren Amamiya/P5 Protagonist) TITLE: “Emotionally Charged Empath” AGE: 54 HEIGHT: 6'1" SPECIES: Espeon BIRTHDAY: 05/30 GENDER: Male SEXUALITY: Gay FIGHT STYLE: Wing Chun WEAPON: None ABILITY: Magic Bounce STATUS: Living

Audie got a good control on his psychic abilities, being able to open doors, push and pull objects, and even the ability to lift any object he sees.  In addition to this, he had gotten a bit of studying in secret from Avett, who taught Audie his Mach X technique, which he can use in battle.  This makes him incredibly light and agile on his feet.  He also has the use of his wings, inherited from his father Joseph.  He looked up to his father during his time away, and so strove to look like him, even growing out his hair to be long.  He is an incredibly strong asset to the team, and off of the field he is sweet and caring. 

NAME: Phoebe (VA: Kate Higgins - Sakura Haruno) TITLE: “Wild Steadfast Storm” AGE: 51 (Appears 25 due to Gear Cells) SPECIES: Lycanroc (Midday Forme) HEIGHT: 5'11" GENDER: Female BIRTHDAY: 05/12 SEXUALITY: Lesbian FIGHT STYLE: Silat WEAPON: Bo Staff ABILITY: Lightning Rod STATUS: Living

The daughter of Zane and Morello, shown by her having a Marowak’s skull mask attached to her head.  Due to her half Gear nature, she aged rapidly, and was fully grown at age 3.  Zane’s lightning abilities passed down to her, and she has honed them into her own unique style that isn’t a copy of her late father’s.  She is a very powerful lightning user, with Zane on record stating that hers was even more powerful than their own.  She now carries on Zane’s legacy, becoming the one that people call Lightning.  She may look unassuming and weak, but her strength is overwhelming.

NAME: Cadenza (VA: Anna Graves - Naoto Shirogane) TITLE: “The Goddess of Thunder” AGE: 59 SPECIES: Zeraora HEIGHT: 6’ GENDER: Female BIRTHDAY: 01/31 SEXUALITY: Bi FIGHT STYLE: Jeet Kun Do WEAPON: None ABILITY: Volt Absorb STATUS: Living

Coming from a futuristic dimension, Cadenza was unwillingly thrown into Flora by a high-ranking official from her world. After being saved by Xan and Urie from the Tree of Souls, she learned that her parents died at the hands of the same person that caused her situation.  Zane would father her, being her guardian for 16 years before the Marowak’s death.  Using the abilities that her adoptive father taught her, she now fights with Phoebe and the rest of Team Neo Destiny.

NAME: Kiske (VA:Lucien Dodge - Sin Kiske) TITLE: “The Hair-Raising Hellraiser” AGE: 56 SPECIES: Hybrid (Cinderace/Greninja) HEIGHT: 5’ GENDER: Non-Binary SEXUALITY: Gay BIRTHDAY: 01/24 FIGHT STYLE: Tae Kwon Do WEAPON: None ABILITY: Libero STATUS: Living

The older of two children born from a Greninja and Cinderace.  Their parents died in Lotus Tower when they were young, and them and their brother were taken in by Ben, who trained them. Kiske can be seen as reckless and aggressive, but they know how to dish out damage.  They were often the instigator of fights during the sibling’s training, but Kiske was usually the one to come out on top.  Even though they only think with their fists and feet, their street smarts and extroverted nature makes them a favourite when they work with others.

NAME: Ann (VA: Erin Fitzgerald - Chie Satonaka) TITLE: "Kind-Hearted Dream Chaser" AGE: 35 SPECIES: Hybrid (Charizard/Typhlosion (Hisuian) HEIGHT: 5'7" GENDER: Female SEXUALITY: Bi BIRTHDAY: 02/04 FIGHT STYLE: Hellfire WEAPON: None ABILITY: Flash Fire STATUS: Living

Ann is born to Karie and Solaris, and has inherited genes from both of her fathers. She is a Charizard with blue flames, and dark blue fur along her back. She also inherited the flame vents along her neck from Karie. Ann is kind and gentle, much like Solaris and Karie, and wantes to follow her dreams and keep people safe from harm. She has also inherited the strength from her fathers, and uses it to help Team Singularity keep Flora and all of Infinity safe from harm.

NAME: Louis (VA: David Vincent - Jin Kisaragi) TITLE: " AGE: 35 SPECIES: Marowak HEIGHT: 5'9" GENDER: Male SEXUALITY: Gay BIRTHDAY: 12/13 FIGHT STYLE: Iaijutsu WEAPON: Yukianesa ABILITY: Lightning Rod STATUS: Living

Louis is the reincarnation of Zane, as he has a piece of Zane within his soul. He has a mastery over ice and lightning, having learned some of Zane's techniques over the years. He has white fur all over, and looks similar to an Alolan Vulpix. Louis has many of the same mannerisms and sense of justice that Zane had, and he carries it with pride. He can be boneheaded like Zane, but he doesn't stop until his job is complete.

NAME: Kitajoh/Kita AGE: 4 SPECIES: Hybrid (Eevee/Scorbunny) GENDER: Female BIRTHDAY: 12/10 ABILITY: Libero

Kita is the daughter of Kiske and Audie. While Solaris had the chance to age Kita up, they would rather she stay young so her parents can see her grow up. She is an Eevee through and through, but with white fur and red striping similar to a Scorbunny. She already is beginning to learn how to control her fire, though it may take her a while due to her rather short attention span. If you were to meet Kita, be prepared for a raucous and energetic child that will talk your ear off if given the opportunity.