#like despite whatever fandom i am in when i want to custom order one (1) doll for myself i picked matou sakura in a heartbeat

[thepurpleblossom]

Rises from the dead just to share with you guys this super duper cute 20cm Sakura doll I custom-ordered from @cocopines (twitter || instagram) !!!

Super grateful to her for allowing me to be her first customer. She's been super fantastic at providing suggestions/advice whenever needed even during my design draft stage, and extremely proactive in making sure I'm okay with every change and the embroidery and materials!!

Coco also very kindly made an exception and gave the OK to clothes customisation because I just very badly wanted F/HA!Sakura (and ImaginaryAround!Sakura, but we don't talk about that yet) ;w; God knows how many pictures of Sakura I sent her way even though she wasn't familiar with the fandom at all.

Especially when I suddenly decided that I'd also like to have a butterfly embroidery on her chest!!! bless her soul for agreeing to it when it wasn't stated at the start

the quality of the doll is really good (please look at her little heart paws!!) and even the outfit was done really well. I was initially a bit worried how the sleeve would look, but it is 100% perfect, even the clasp and everything. please i adore this so much 😭😭💕💕

Please consider commissioning her for your doll needs too! She does other sizes like 10cm dolls too~ I comm'd her for two 10cms too!

▸▸Details can be found here (carrd || twitter)

[kissoflightning]

A Bad Cup of Coffee

I wrote this fic from Leo Manfred's perspective when I was depressed; it's an original headcannon of what he was going through the day before his first appearance in Detroit: Become Human

Rating:

Teen And Up Audiences

No Archive Warnings Apply

Category:

Gen

Fandom:

Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)

Characters:

Leo Manfred

Jerry(s) (Detroit: Become Human)

Original Female Human Character(s)

Additional Tags:

Leo Manfred POV

Leo Needs a Hug

Hurt No Comfort

I'm So Sorry Jerry

Physical Abuse

References to Drugs

Song Lyrics

References to Depression

One Shot

Language: English Series:Part 1 of Carl Dies

Published: 2023-10-25

Words:1,276

Chapters:1/1

Summary:

Leo fucked up again. (The events of this story take place the day before we first see Leo's appearance in Detroit: Become Human)

Notes:

This fic is mostly a self-indulgence. I wrote it when I was extremely depressed and ironically I felt better after writing it. I decided I wanted to write these little stories as one shots, but I plan on writing a few more (Completely out of order), hence why I am tying this to "The Graveyard" because these stories will all be very much their own thing but work together in the same timeline. The song Leo listens to 2/3rds through the story (If you'd like to read along with it) is Green Day - Boulevard of Broken Dreams https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Soa3gO7tL-c

(See the end of the work for more notes.)

Work Text:

Thursday, November 4th, 2038

The alarm blared and it was time for another dreaded day for Leo to go to work. He had his third breakdown last week when some idiot gave him crap over how much cream cheese was spread over a fucking bagel. "Why aren't there equal amounts of cream cheese on both sides? I asked for equal amounts of cream cheese on both sides!" Leo was so done with this shit and he SCREAMED at the man "YOU FUCKING IDIOT! The cream cheese stuck to the other side, it ain't my god damn fault!" His boss threatened to fire Leo if an incident like this were to occur again.

Leo took a hit from his Red Ice vape, just enough for him to vibe enough to put up with whatever bullshit he was going to put up with today. Enough that the intrusive thoughts were there, but not enough for them to take over. Leo HATED the way he acted when he had taken too much, but it felt so god damn good!

He dragged his sorry ass to the coffee shop and lay his bag down in the break room. His boss peered over his shoulder, "You better not fuck up today, Manfred."

"Yeah, whatever." Leo replied with a shrug.

Leo asked his coworker, Sheryl to man the till today so he could avoid talking to as many customers as possible and she complied without hesitation. Sheryl was the only person who was tolerable to work with at this shit hole of an establishment. Other than her, he hated EVERYONE, even Jerry. Especially Jerry. Fucking androids. They'd never have to deal with feeling like a miserable, worthless piece of shit like him.

One hour left in his shift, and Leo had successfully managed to keep himself from getting fired so far. Sheryl pulled off the "customer service" act so well, despite the usual barrage of annoying idiot customers. He always looked forward to the end of the day where she'd go back to her normal self and talked so informal saying fuck and shit in almost every sentence with a tone that would be considered a "bad attitude" from the boss. But in reality, she was super cool. Something felt good about being the only one at work to see that side of her.

A man who ordered a few minutes ago, came back raging. "I TOLD you I wanted a fresh cup and this tastes like the stalest oldest shit you could give me!" The man screamed as he threw the coffee at Sheryl, scalding her.

What Leo saw next was neither customer service Sheryl or badass Sheryl...it was broken Sheryl. She froze, broke into a sob, and ran out of the shop wailing and crying. For once Leo's intrusive thoughts were in sync with his regular line of thinking.

[He needs to get his ass kicked]

Leo hopped over the counter, clutched him into a chokehold, and threw him onto the floor. He should have stopped there, but the violence felt so good. [It's justified] He thought to himself. [Sheryl didn't deserve that] He pinned the man down and laid down punch after punch as the man and any customers that were around to witness screamed in horror.

Suddenly he was stopped and pulled up by that fucking android, Jerry. Leo's temperament wasn't settled. "Fucking piece of plastic! Let go of me!" Leo shouted before shifting to hook his fist directly into Jerry's right cheek.

The impact scraped the part of synthskin where it landed, and the android seemed to emulate fear. "My name is Jerry!" The android shouted before frantically running out the door. That display was so convincing that Leo almost felt bad about punching the thing. However, he knew better than to fall for the emulation of human emotions. Self-preservation was probably something built into their program - or perhaps Leo caused it to malfunction from hitting it too hard.

The boss came out finally. He'd probably been in his office blasting shitty music and playing Level 28,453 of Candy Crush or something. "What the hell is going on here? Where's Sheryl and Jerry?" He hollered.

"Your employee jumped over the counter and attacked me like a wild animal!" The beat up asshole shouted.

"He started it! He threw hot coffee onto Sheryl and she ran out crying!" Leo protested.

"Which I wouldn't have done if you had given me fresh coffee like I asked!" The man retorted.

"FUCKING ASSHOLE!" Leo screamed before throwing the man a sucker punch in the stomach, and he fell to the ground.

The man, speechless, shook his head and limped towards the door once he regained his composure.

"Please don't press charges." The boss pleaded to the customer.

"I won't, but I want to see you fire him." The man told him.

"With pleasure." The boss complied before he turned to Leo to shout "YOU'RE FIRED!"

Leo went home and upon approaching the door to is apartment, he'd spotted an eviction notice. "Fuck my life!" Leo shouted out loud as he entered through the door. He plopped onto his bed and screamed into his pillow. "AAAAAH!"

He plugged his airpods into his ears, and blasted the song Boulevard of Broken Dreams by Green Day, closing his eyes for a moment and taking a exaggerated breath during the initial guitar riff. He started singing along to the lyrics. "I walk a lonely road. The only one that I have ever known. Don't know where it goes, but it's home to me, and I walk alone." He proceeded to load the red ice into his pipe, lit it up and took a deep inhale, laying back into his bed as he watched the red smoke release into the air. He sank into his bed as he felt his stress start to dissipate, though a lingering was left behind. Leo needed more ice; he was almost out. Not to mention he would wind up homeless soon if he could not get any money.

Leo continued to sing while laying down, attempting to relax. He nodded his head slightly while belting "My shadow's the only one that walks beside me. My shallow heart's the only thing that's beating. Sometimes, I wish someone out there will find me." He took another inhale from his vape, savoring it before releasing the breath. He closed his eyes and hummed along with the "Ah-ah, ah-ah, ah-ah, ah-ah. Ah-ah, ah-ah, ah-ah" while simultaneously feeling the music, imagining himself walking down a deserted outskirt in slow motion.

Leo tried to let his mind wander, but it kept coming back to reflect on his shitty predicament. He would need to ask his dad for more cash. If the requirement to ask his disapproving father for money was not bad enough, having to see Carl treat that plastic toy like his actual son was so much worse.

"Read between the lines. What's fucked up, and everything's alright. Check my vital signs. To know I'm still alive, and I walk alone." Maybe if he punched Markus, it would run off like Jerry did. However, Jerry had been in a public place at the time; what if Markus reacted more violently? It could be incredibly dangerous to pick a fight with an android where nobody could hear you scream.

And there was something different about Markus; it was so good at acting human. Leo would not doubt it if Kamski built it with some protocol to beat the shit out of anyone who provoked it. Leo closed his eyes once again and let his mind continue to drift until he passed out.

[THE END]

If you enjoyed reading this story and you firmly believe that Leo Manfred deserves redemption, feel free to give a Kudos/Comment on AO3 to give him some love!

[pearl-pilots-in-chains]

Ice Cream Expertise (All the Little Lights #1)

Fandom: Neon Genesis Evangelion

Ships: Kawoshin

Rating: G

Summary: Shinji is faced with a dilemma of sorts, and is characteristically indecisive. Fortunately, Kaworu is there to give some helpful advice. Or maybe just call himself an ice cream expert. Let's be honest, it's a bit of both.

Notes: This is intended to be the start to All the Little Lights, my attempt at a relatively happy Evangelion high school AU featuring the pilots we know (and maybe love) actually getting to live a normal life (including all the cute gay romance they deserve). That said, it also works totally fine as a one shot. Considering it's an AU, there's going to be some rather interesting deviations from canon, some of which are alluded to here. So, if something seems off, that's probably because it is.

As usual, any errors, grammatical or typographical, are mine. I apologize in advance.

This was originally posted to my old AO3 on May 21, 2020. I hope you enjoy it!

_________________________________________________________

Shinji Ikari was not having a good day. No, perhaps that was an understatement. He was having a distinctly bad day. School had been tedious to say the least, considering that testing week was approaching, and the teachers seemed to be doing their best to “prepare” the students using every form of academic torture known to humankind. Okay, perhaps that was a bit of an exaggeration, but it had been a hectic hell all the same. Not to mention the fact that his best friend Touji was going through a rough patch (not the first one, mind you), with his girlfriend Hikari, which led to a tense mood within their friend group outside of class as well. Adding onto this was the fact that he was getting worried about his sister (what wasn’t new?) Rei, who had been especially quiet the past week or so, even by her standards. That was usually a sign that her depression was going through a rough spot. He had wanted to mention something to his mother about it, considering she usually had better luck at getting through to Rei than he did when his sister was going through a difficult time, but unsurprisingly, he hadn’t gotten around to it yet. He was gone too often, and his mother was gone too often. There was all of a one to two hour period when they were both home and awake on any given night. Rei always ending up alone probably doesn’t help her state of mind improve either. I wish she had more friends. People she could connect with.

And, of course, to top all that wonderful baggage off, he had had work after school, which had gone lovely. Just lovely. A simply wonderful group of customers had come in, and stayed for a better part of three hours, ordering intermittently while they all talked (way too loudly, in his opinion) at their shared table, which, in a predictable move, they hadn’t even bothered to clean off. He was a barista, not a waiter, despite what some people seemed to think. To make matters worse, they had been laughing so hard partway through their “discussion,” that one of the party had practically flung her iced latte through the air by accident (how someone could do that by accident, was a whole other topic for conversation), sending its contents flying halfway across the room (in a bafflingly impressive display, he had to admit, as irritating as it was). Of course, he had drawn the short straw and been the one tasked with cleaning it up. His boss seemed to get a special satisfaction out of giving Shinji all the “fun,” jobs. Okay, maybe Mr. Anno’s not that bad, but he still gets a kick out of watching me suffer. Or something like that.

Shinji sighed as he pulled his car into the store parking spot. As he exited it, he glanced down at his phone. 7:16. That meant he should have enough time to get home and get dinner going before his mother got home. These days, it seemed as though she worked progressively later and later. It had been a couple months since she’d been home before 8. She was almost certainly still out at the base at that moment. Whatever project she’s working on now is one of the more intensive ones.

He headed for the doors. He was planning on making stir fry, which meant that he needed to get soy sauce for sure, since he knew they had run out from the last time. He thought they had most of the rest of what he needed at home. So, this should be a quick run. Just in and out. After a day like today though, he was tempted to grab something sweet. Come on, after this whole mess, I think I at least half deserve something to take my mind off of it. Just a little.

Inside, he made a bee line for the condiments aisle. Alright, first things first. Get what I need. Then, maybe, I’ll just check out what they have. He grabbed soy sauce, and then wavered for a moment, trying to decide just for what he was in the mood. Okay, just something little. Nothing too big. I am going to be cooking, after all. Hmmm . . . I mean, it’s probably not the best idea, but . . .

Making his decision, he set off for the frozen section. Once again, he paused when he arrived at the aisle, looking through the glass freezer doors at the available options. I’ll just get a pint. That should be more than enough. Even if Rei goes for some too. ‘Cause mom hardly ever eats anything sweet, so I doubt she’ll have any. He tilted his head, tapping the soy sauce bottle against his thigh as he considered the selection. Why are there so many flavors? I didn’t even realize they sold Pumpkin outside of November. And Lime-Raspberry? What would that even taste like? Who comes up with these things? I’ll go for something classic. I could always do Vanilla. But, that’s a little boring. I don’t even really like it that much. Chocolate’s always classic, except that Rei doesn’t like it. And her favorite is Cookie Dough, which I don’t like the texture of . . . there are way too many choices here. Running his eyes over the racks, he did a quick count. Forty-two different flavors. Why are there forty-two different flavors? I wonder if anyone’s ever tried them all. Then again, that might take a while. And be kind of pricey. Dammit, I’m getting distracted again. The only conclusion that Shinji was coming to was the fact that he liked ice cream far too much, and was wasting far more time than he should be trying to pick out something. Maybe I should just get the soy sauce and head home. He peaked down at his phone. 7:29. Yeah, I’ve already been here longer than I should be.

A voice interrupted Shinji’s thoughts. “So, what’s your drug of choice?”

Shinji head snapped to the side, his concentration broken. “What?,” He asked, a little surprised.

The source of the interruption was standing a little further down the aisle, casually leaning on one of the freezer windows, his head cocked to the side, watching Shinji with a friendly smile on his face. Shinji thought the interrupter looked to be about the same age as him, though that fact was complicated slightly by the fact that though his face was youthful, his hair was an ashen grey. He must dye it. Is grey hair a style though? The interrupting individual sported a pair of black jeans and a band shirt for a group whose name looked vaguely familiar to Shinji. Porcupine Tree . . . I feel like Rei might listen to them. Maybe. Not to mention the fact that the newcomer had red eyes. Red eyes. Okay, so maybe this is a look he’s going for. I mean, those are definitely contacts, right? Unless there’s a genetic mutation I’ve never heard of, I don’t think humans can be born with red eyes. Which means that they’re contacts. Which means that the hair is almost definitely dyed too. I’m pretty sure that’s not what ‘scene’ looks like . . . there’d be brighter colors . . . and I don’t think it’s emo either . . . I’m pretty sure his hair would be black then . . . huh . . . maybe that’s goth. Yeah. Let’s go with that. In addition to making him second guess what scene fashion looked like, Shinji’s visual analysis of the interrupter also led him to a more definite conclusion. That regardless of what category his fashion fell under, he was pretty cute. Seriously Shinji, focus here, and stop thinking about how some random boy in Safeway who asked you what type of drugs you like is cute. Don’t be an idiot. Sure, you haven’t been on a date in months, ever since Martin broke up with you, but he was a manipulative jerk anyway— Shinji realized the interrupter had started talking again, which snapped him back into reality and out of his wandering mind.

“Yeah. What flavor is your favorite. I mean, out of the forty-two, there has to be one you’d pick, right?”

“Oh. Yeah. Probably cookies ’n’ cream,” Shinji answered, feeling more than a bit confused. On an afterthought, he added, “You’ve counted all the flavors too?”

“Not a bad choice,” the boy said with a firm nod. “Although, I’m more into mint chocolate chip myself. And yes, I’ve counted them all. It’s an important part to being an ice cream expert. Keeping track of the available flavors at the nearest store.”

“Okaayyy.” Shinji’s tone betrayed his uncertainty concerning just how he should deal with this stranger. “Ice cream expert?”

“Yep, that would be me,” the boy replied matter-of-factly, as though the question was a pointless one. He strolled over to Shinji and extended his hand. “Kaworu Akagi, ice cream expert, at your service.”

Shinji shook the offered hand, deciding he should be polite, despite the fact that his perplexity had not been substantially diminished in any way. This guy is . . . interesting, to say the least. As their hands met, Shinji was struck by the strange, but intense, sense that this wasn’t his first time meeting Kaworu.

“Shinji Ikari.” Against his better judgement, he decided to follow his introduction with, “Have we met before?”

Retracting his hand, Kaworu pursed his lips, ostensibly mulling over the question in his mind. After a few moments, he shook his head. “I don’t think so. At least, not that I can recall. I just got into town a few days ago. Why do you ask?”

Shinji shrugged, trying to play off his earlier question. “Oh, I think you just reminded me of someone I used to know.”

Kaworu nodded, seeming to accept this answer. “Ah, that makes sense. So, have you come to a conclusion, or would you like a second opinion?”

Shinji raised an eyebrow. “About the ice cream, you mean?”

“Indeed. That is the topic on the floor, as they say,” Kaworu responded nonchalantly.

Shinji blinked. “Who says?”

“Why, they do of course.”

“Oh. Umm, alright.” Shinji looked back through the window, surveying his options once more. A obvious choice didn’t present itself. “Well . . . I suppose a second opinion probably wouldn’t hurt.”

“Great,” Kaworu stated, his tone even and pleasant. “Any occasion in particular you’re buying for?”

Shinji shook his head. “Nope, not really. Just . . .” he hesitated, uncertain how much he wanted to tell someone who was still basically a stranger to him. “Just a bad day,” was what he ended up deciding on.

Kaworu pretended to stroke nonexistent hairs on his chin, nodding slowly as did so, in an amusing imitation of the stereotypical philosopher. “Hmm . . . ice cream for a bad day, you say?”

“Uh. Yeah. I guess so.”

“I’d have to recommend Cherry Chip for that. It’s a guaranteed mood improver from my experience. It is nearly impossible to feel down while you’re eating Cherry Chip ice cream.”

“Really?” Shinji’s ice wandered down the display, finally locating the flavor in question. Fortunately, they had it in pint size, which meant that the option was on the table. He couldn’t think of any reason not to go for it. As far as he knew, Rei liked Cherry Chip. At least, he thought she did. He wasn’t entirely sure that he’d ever seen her eat it. For that matter, he wasn’t entirely sure that he’d ever eaten it himself. Which means it might be pretty good, and I just don’t know it yet. You never know. “Really. Trust me, I’ve tested its potency. It won’t let you down.”

“Alright. Why not?” Shinji opened the door and grabbed a pint of Cherry Chip. He examined the container in his hands for a few seconds, before looking back up at Kaworu, who now seemed to be smiling in encouragement, which had the effect of making him look even cuter than before. Come on Shinji, don’t get distracted! Sure, he might be attractive, but he’s also a self-proclaimed ice cream expert. . . not sure whether that’s a good or a bad thing yet, to be honest.

“That’ll do the job,” Kaworu remarked, in a straightforward tone that made it sound as though he was utterly confident in the truth of his words.

“I’ll take your word for it.” Shinji furrowed his brow as another question popped into his mind. “Hey .. . you said you just got into town a few days ago. How is it that you already know all the different flavors they have here?”

“It was one of the first things I scoped out after we got into town. Always important to know what kind of ice cream game you’re going to be dealing with. Plus, I had plenty of free time once we finished unpacking, considering I won’t be in school up here until the fall.”

“Ah, okay. That makes sense.” Almost on a whim, Shinji was tempted to ask Kaworu where he had moved from, but decided that could come across as prying a little too much, since Kaworu hadn’t offered that information. As it was, Kaworu gave a partial answer to the question without Shinji even verbalizing it.

“School down south ends earlier. Though, to be fair, it also starts earlier there as well. We left a couple days after my semester ended. Which means I currently have relatively few obligations, other than locating and obtaining a job for the summer.”

“Oh. Yeah.” Shinji still wasn’t exactly sure how to respond, but he decided to field a question of his own. He figured it could come across as a polite inquiry, rather than being nosy, taking into account what Kaworu had just revealed. “So, what brought you up north?”

“My mother got transferred out to the base,” Kaworu returned offhandedly.

Shinji tilted his head in response to this answer, the gears in his brain turning. Well, that’s interesting. He almost wanted to make some sort of follow-up remark expressing their similarity in that regard, but he decided that might be a bit too much to say for the moment. Instead, he merely offered a casually, “I gotcha.” He continued with an amiable, “Well, welcome to Asherdale,” along with a more ironic, “It’s halfway decent, once you get used to it.”

Kaworu’s face broken into a grin at the humor, an expression that Shinji couldn’t help but feel made him look all the more attractive. Oops, getting distracted again. . . don’t do that . . . too much.

“Thanks, I appreciate it,” Kaworu said warmly.

“No problem.” The thought suddenly entering his mind, Shinji shot a momentary glance down at his phone. Hmm, what time is it? The answer was 7:37. 7:37?! I’ve been talking for eight minutes?! That felt like four or five at the most. I have to bail, now, if I’m going to make it home in time to get cooking.

He looked back up at Kaworu, who was still watching him, his gaze soft, the smile still on his face, his head tilted to the side. Shinji had the strange feeling that if it had been anyone else, the observational pose the boy had struck would have looked unusual, to say the least, but somehow, on Kaworu, it didn’t look half bad. It gives him a kind of elegant aesthetic . . . okay, where did I come up with that? I definitely need to head out.

“Hey, look, I’m sorry to leave so quick, but I need to get going.” Shinji cringed a little internally, hearing the awkward tone in his voice. You could have said that in a way that didn’t basically announced the fact that it made you flustered. Great going.

“Understandable. You wouldn’t want that ice cream to melt before you get the chance to test out its powers.”

“Haha, yeah, you know it.”

Kaworu nodded, imply that yes, he did indeed know it. “Why don’t I give you my number?” He remarked. “That way, you’ll have someone on hand for any future ice cream dilemmas.”

“Ahhh . . .” Okay, that was actually kind of smooth, in an odd way. And . . . it’s not like it could really hurt anything. I mean, he didn’t even ask for my number. Which means he’s not even necessarily flirting with me. It’d probably be a bit of stretch to say he is. After all, if I have his number, and he doesn’t have mine, that means I can choose whether I want to text him or not, and there’s nothing he can do about it. Which isn’t really a good way to flirt with somebody. I think I’m stalling again here . . .”

Shinji noticed Kaworu was watching him again, waiting for a response. “Sure. Sounds like a good plan.” He pulled out his phone and hastily created a new contact, before offering it to Kaworu. “Here, you can put it in.”

Kaworu nodded, his smile remaining intact, and typed in the digits, before handing it back to Shinji. “It was nice to meet you, Shinji Ikari,” he commented affably.

“You can just call me Shinji,” Shinji quickly responded.

“Alright then. It was nice to meet you Shinji.”

“You too . . .” Should I use first and last name like he did the first time? Or just go with first name. I don’t want to offend him, if that’s the sort of thing that’s important to him. After all, he does seem a bit, umm, particular.

“You can just call me Kaworu,” the boy suggested, his smile widening.

“It was nice to meet you Kaworu,” he finished lamely. “Guess I’ll see you around.”

“Yes, maybe so.”

Shinji nodded again, spun on his heels, and promptly made for the registers. Well, that went excellently. You meet a boy who’s kind of cute, even if he is a little eccentric, and straight off the bat, you’re second guessing yourself and fumbling for words. Fantastic.

Shinji shot a brief glance back as he reached the end of the aisle, to see that Kaworu was now retrieving an ice cream carton of his own from the merchandise freezer. Shinji turned away again before the boy could look back in his direction. Don’t want him to think I’m staring at him or something.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Shinji collapsed back onto his bed with a satisfied sigh. He was glad to have finally reach it, after the nigh-interminable day. Well, maybe not quite interminable. But definitely overlong. Without much thought, he grabbed his phone from his nightstand and spun in about in his hands a couple times, feeling the sensation of the textured case against his skin.

Dinner had been a success, such as it could be, anyway. He had impressed himself with just how fast he managed to throw things together when he went into slight (well, maybe more than slight) panic mode.

The ice cream had been a success as well. He had to admit, Cherry Chip was a pretty good flavor. He still wasn’t sure whether he had tried it before or not, but he was glad he had definitively tried it now. Rei had also enjoyed it, which was an added plus. In fact, their mother had even had a bowl, something altogether unexpected. Apparently, Cherry Chip ice cream was one of the sweets she would indulge in. Didn’t see that coming. All in all, the majority of the pint was no more.

Powering on his phone, Shinji was faced with another choice for the evening. Unlike his earlier ice cream deliberation, however, this cerebration was of a cursory duration. After a few seconds, he had composed the text, and was hovering over the send button. Alright. Let’s do this. He tapped the icon.

Shinji I.: Thanks for the recommendation. It was a good choice! Lol. This is Shinji, btw.

The response to his message came swiftly. Wow, he must type fast.

Kaworu A.: Happy to be of service. I’m glad it worked out.

Shinji found a smile edging its way across his lips. Maybe, in spite of everything, today wasn’t such a bad day after all.

[professoruber]

Epithet Erased Role Swap AU FanFic: A swapped place in Sweet Jazz City Prologue

Hi, This is just a quick Fanfiction I've written up based on the amazing Role Swap AU made by @spliinkles. I actually did have a somewhat similar idea before (which was what if some epithet related event caused characters to switch ages) but I really love the ideas of this AU and wanted to write about it.

Sorry first of all if there are any errors. I wrote this up kind of quickly and if I do find errors I will be willing to fix them if  I get around to it.

Am posting this fanfiction here because the Epithet Erased fandom seems biggest on Tumblr and also that's where this AU is from.

Prologue: You're reading it

Chapter 1: https://professoruber.tumblr.com/post/189841325568/a-swapped-place-in-sweet-jazz-city-chapter-1

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Giovanni Potage was what some might call a variety of unflattering yet undeniably accurate descriptors. Such things included ‘problem child’ and ‘wannabe delinquent’, both titles he wore with pride.

With the exception of the ‘wannabe’ part of course, if you were to ask him, he would insist he was the most feared delinquent in his school’s history and most definitely not an adorable little soup child.

His reign of delinquency was joined by his friends, his ‘boys’ as he called them. Two of these aforementioned boys were now accompanying him on the most boring field trip ever.

“-and that’s when I smash that ball right into the principle’s office, and everyone cheered” Giovanni finishes accounting his latest most definitely truthful anecdote about his misadventures as a dangerous criminal delinquent.  His squeaky twelve-year-old vocal cords pushed to their deepest potential level in order to attempt to put on a wave of coolness on top of what he considers his amazing storytelling ability.

 “WOW GIOVANNI. YOU’RE SO AMAZING! I LOVE YOU SO MUCH” Screams one of his friends, known most often as Crusher for rather self-explanatory reasons. The high volume of his sudden outburst eliciting a glare from one of the museum guides who were currently giving a tour to their class.

The young guide turns away from the crowd of youths briefly to pop another pain pill before taking a deep breath and snapping back towards the kids with a forced smile.

“As I was saying before I was… interrupted…” she began, briefly pausing to once again glare at Crusher, who blessed with embarrassment and hid behind the protection of Giovanni as she continues “Epithets are rare and amazing powers gifted to just a one in five of the population. Wow, so cool. Anyway, moving on…” she begins to keep walking before being lightly nudged by her older bearded co-guide.

“Come now my apprentice Mera. It is important to show enthusiasm for this thing. It’s important to always do your best in every situation” the man says the last sentence with such sheer power that he flexes for emphasis, prompting a array of awed stares bystanders at his muscular build.

Mera even admires it for a moment before turning back to the children and sighing “You’re right Indus… I’ll try to spice up the tour a bit” she gives a somewhat more genuine smile this time, as Indus pats her on the back.

“Now that’s the spirit! Why don’t we tell them about the Arsene Amulet, that will certainly spice things up” Indus suggests with large genuine smile aimed at his young apprentice.

Mera goes wide eyed at the mention of the amulet before whispering to Indus “Uh… Indus I’m not sure if telling these kids about the amulet is a good idea”

Indus looks thoughtful but nevertheless was still in proud teacher mode “Do not worry apprentice Mera. No harm should come from granting these children some of the wonder of this museum”

Mera eventually relents and soon launches into a somewhat less half-hearted explanation of the amulet as well as other cool and interesting exhibits, Indus sometimes dropping in to suggest topics, such as the Dinosaur exhibition which he insists is amazing.

However, these were quickly drowned out Giovanni’s criminal mind as it’s focus settled firmly on the fact a mysterious cool amulet was hidden within these halls. An awesomely evil formed from the dark confines of his self-proclaimed delinquent mind.

“Car Crash, Crusher, come with me” he whispers in his best covert voice before snatching his pair of friends away from the tour. The former blushed at the close contact to his crush while the latter looked annoyed.

“Hey, my name’s Fred. All I did was crash Ben’s go-kart five times and now everyone just won’t let it go!” He complains and throws up his hands in annoyance.

“Shush, will you? Whatever. I have an awesome plan to show the whole entire world my awesome criminal skills so no one will deny that Giovanni Potage is the most awesome supervillain of all time!” He exclaims quietly with clenched fist.

Crusher loved every moment of It and even ‘Fred’ was captivated by the intensity if nothing else.  

“I will sneak inside the museum; spray paint my name on the exhibits. And then for the finale I will steal that amulet thingy and leave a pool of boiling lava and… uh… acid! In its place. These history nerds will never no one hit them” he gives a smug smile, proud of himself for having come up with such a villainous plan.

Crusher fell to the floor as he clenches his heart, overwhelmed by the sheer continued amazingness of Giovanni. Fred meanwhile was somewhat confused on What Giovanni’s plan was.

“So, you want to get an amulet which steals Epithets?” he asks with a raised eyebrow.

Giovanni looks confused for a moment before putting two and two together “oh is that what that thing does? Nah that’s totally lame. What I want is the street cred. If I pull this off then all the greatest criminal gangs will be begging to have me join them. Maybe I might be able to join the Bushido Blasters… or even the Banzai Blasters!” He exclaims with enthusiasm.

As Crusher continued to be amazed, Fred scratched the back of his head “I don’t know man, this seems kind of dangerous even compared to what we usually get up to. And me and ‘Crusher’ can’t be out after dark, so you’ll be alone for this”

Crusher cries manly boy tears at the thought of having to abandon Giovanni. But Giovanni simply dramatically holds his hand to his chest and begins to reassure them.

“Don’t worry my boys! I have the greatest- hey what’s that over there!” He suddenly shouts pointing to the left, and grinning as Crusher and Fred look to in that direction. While his friends are distracting, Giovanni quickly dashes behind them and yells “Teleports behind!”, startling both boys.

“As you can see my stealth skills and unmatched. And after tonight no one will able to deny the supervillainy of Giovanni Potage!”

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Across the city in the backroom of a family owned toy store sat a young barely adult woman wearing a dark green dress and a yellow apron and boots, her dark brown hair tied up to prevent it getting in her face.

The woman was working stoically on toys which would be sold in the Blyndeff Toy Emporium, her family’s store.

“Police are still baffled at the recent theft of expensive several statues from a local art gallery, all of which were replaced by teddy bears. Despite the absurdity of this case police have still found no leads on the criminals responsible, although reports suggest Banzai Blasters may have been involved- “ the noise drowns out in the woman’s mind as her lips slip into an evil grin as she recalls the recent caper which led to her promotion from Blaster to Captain in the Banzai ranks.

In the monotonous world of manufacturing and retail she was glad to have an outlet to cut loose when she could, keeping up appearances in front of customers and not hitting the many who deserved it was tiring, and she’s been doing this for around a decade at this point.

Taking a deep breath, she got back to work, turning off the news livestream playing on her phone just had it had begun talking about how a Detective Ashling had been assigned to the case. She had bigger things to concern herself with right now.

Namely that of her first heist as a Banzai Captain. Her crew of minions were ready and a location had been mapped out. Now all she needed to do was complete the final workings of her special criminal helper toys, as well as the toys which need to be sold.

“Molly! Mum wants to know if the new toys are ready yet!” The bratty voice of the woman’s little sister comes through the door of the workshop as the young girl in question walks into take a look herself.

Molly feels like grimacing but instead effortlessly donned a smile as hollow as her soul.

“Almost done Lorelai. Tell mum I’ll have these out on the shelves soon” she said with a mask of cheerfulness, to which Lorelai simply rolled her eyes at and gave a quick “Whatever” before leaving back to the rest of the building, shutting the door behind her.

Molly got back to work, only stopping at one point to take out a small picture of the Sweet Jazz Museum, causing her to gain a much more genuine, and evil smile “tonight” she simply says, as she returns to work.

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Later in the dead of night, Giovanni’s head raises up above from a bin. He leaps out and whisper shouts “Teleports inside!” to himself as he looks around.

He proceeds to run carelessly around the now empty halls of the museum, slipping and knocking some stuff over a few times before arriving in the entrance.

“Uh hu! This shall be a great place to begin the reign of terror of Giovanni Potage” the twelve year out super-criminal announces as he walks up to the desk.

“I should call my boys, to let them know I got it, not that they would be surprised of course” He picks up the phone and dials Car Crash’s number, only for it to fail to go through. Confused, Giovanni looks at the phone only to find an explanation of its true nature.

“Internal and emergency calls only? Pfft, lame” he comments as he slams down the receiver. He then proceeds to duck down under the desk and take out some items from his bag. First a whoopy cushion which he fashions to the chair and then a canister of spray paint.

He begins spray painting a message about how lame their phone system is. Meanwhile as the young delinquent writes, a hole in the roof is silently made and a group of Banzai Blaster begin slowly coming in from above, going unheard from anyone who might be within earshot thanks to their leader’s Epithet.

The last to go down is their new Captain, Bear Trap, who under the silence of her Epithet begins handing out instructions to her minions.

“There all done” Giovanni says proudly as he finishes his villainous vandalism, popping back up from behind the desk her suddenly comes eye to eye with Bear Trap.

All parties present simply fall back, startled due to not expecting to encounter anyone else. For a few moments silence reigns even without the assistance of Bear Trap’s Epithet.

The silence isn’t broken until the shock face of Giovanni suddenly shifts into one of wonder and excitement.

“Wow criminals! Awesome!”

[callioope]

I’ve been vague about what has been going on in my life intentionally, both because I needed to tell some people offline first and because it’s a lot to process. 

But here is what happened: I am in the process of miscarrying.

I thought it might help to share my story. Miscarriage is more common than people realize and rarely talked about. If someone can benefit from my story, all the better, but mostly this is to help my grieving and coping process.

This is pretty detailed, so trigger warnings and all that.

Exactly one month ago, I read the results I had longed for: pregnant.

Today, I’m sprawled out on the couch in the most excruciating pain I’ve ever experienced. 

They don’t tell you that miscarriage is a process.

We’ve been trying to conceive since the end of last June. It was taking so long, I was convinced I’d be scheduling a fertility consultation this coming June. They tell you if you’re under 35, to give it a year. Before we started trying to conceive, I’d tell anyone about how time speeds up the older you get. It makes sense logically, of course, when a year is 1/5 of your life, it sure seems long, but went its 1/32, well... 

But this has been the longest eleven months of my life. The first month we started trying, I had an unusually long cycle. 39 days. I was so sure I was pregnant. My breasts had been hurting for two weeks. Husband and I were vacationing in Minnesota to see Aston Villa play. I bought a pregnancy test, beaming, excited, and was puzzled by the negative result. A week later, when my period came, I cried to my mother, and she said something about the universe saying I wasn’t ready or something. Whatever it was sounded bleak and ominous to my ears. It sounded like it meant I’d never be ready. 

The fall was busy and stressful, and despite all the tedious ovulation test strips, nothing happened except somehow, my period got lighter month by month. I was pretty sure something was wrong with me. I thought I had a UTI. (I was actually stressed and dehydrated, which I eventually remedied.) While I cried at a Sara Bareilles concert in November, my mother told me that her OBGYN said it can take as much at 9 months for the body to recalibrate after being on the pill.

Speaking of which. I’ve been taking the pill for over a decade. For the most part, I took it correctly. There is some leeway to taking it incorrectly, for the record. You can miss two pills in a row and it still has instructions for what to do (while cautioning to be safe and use extra protection). Maybe only once did I ever have to throw out a pack for missing too many in a row. 

(This is maybe neither here nor there, but rebelcaptain accidental pregnancy fics have become a bit of a pet peeve for me. Jyn and Cassian are far too careful and intentional to let that happen, and it is so easy to be responsible since there are so many birth control alternatives these days that don’t even require reliance on routine or memory.)

So, of course, the concern lately is that clearly 10+  years on birth control has messed me up. I do not know this objectively (what I do know is that I have OCD and anxiety and obsess over Everything That Can Go Wrong), but the point is that birth control really can have consequences that I don’t think are necessarily fully understood or studied. DO NOT GET ME WRONG, USE BIRTH CONTROL. My only regret is what I didn’t know.

I learned too late, but a lot of conception advice articles tell you to quit the BC as soon as possible. Even if my mom’s OBGYN is wrong, the general advice does seem to be that it can take up to 3 months for your body to recalibrate. So, if by any chance someone reading this is thinking about conceiving soon, if you take nothing else away from this rant, take this. I wish I had stopped taking the pill a few months before we actually intended to start trying.

After ten months of all this worrying, I finally got what I’d longed for. The moment I saw that positive result, it felt so surreal. There had been little things leading up to that moment, strange hints and signs, like I knew subconsciously even before a test would have been positive. I wrote that Howl’s Moving Castle pregnancy fic before I knew. I started learning “Here Comes the Sun” on my ukulele before I knew (it’s... silly, but I decided I wanted to learn the ukulele because I wanted to be able to play that song for my kids some day). It involves finger picking, so I’d been putting off learning it, but one day I just decided it was time. And finally, I decided to watch the latest season of Brooklyn 99. I’d avoided it because I knew Amy & Jake were also trying to conceive, and it was too emotional for me to watch that when I was so frustrated for how long I was taking. (Of course I didn’t realize they also had trouble, and watching it actually felt cathartic for me.) I got that positive result literally the next morning. 

I spent Monday, April 20, making checklists and spreadsheets. I set my first prenatal appointment for May 8. Those two and a half weeks were the slowest of my life. They stretched out like a rubber band. I couldn’t really focus on anything except this pregnancy I’d waited so long for. That’s probably why time moved so slowly. I wasn’t filling it with the hobbies I enjoyed, writing and playing my ukulele. All my overwhelmed brain could handle was the hilarious distraction of Community. Yeah, this is also around the time I disappeared from fandom. It was originally for a happy reason, I was just too excited to focus!

I know many women who have miscarried. The data seems to vary from source to source, but anywhere between 10% to 20% of pregnancies end in miscarriage. I couldn’t wait to get to the doctor to confirm everything was okay. I wondered if they would do an ultrasound; I dreamed of seeing a fetus on that screen.

We started talking about how we were going to tell our family. We wrote a pretend promotion letter for my sister, promoting her from “sister” to “aunt” (she’s a badass at her job and we had recently been talking about her promotions so it was thematically relevant). We planned to do a video call with my parents where we played Quiplash and created custom answers related to the pregnancy. 

But we never got that chance. On May 8, I went in for my first appointment. I’d spent the last three days sewing a mask because the ones we ordered still haven’t arrived yet. So all the time I would have spent preparing myself for the worst (as is my way) was spent instead distracted by sewing and finishing up Community. 

They took me to an office first and went over medical history questions. “Any morning sickness?” the nurse asked. “Not at all,” I said. “Should I be worried?” “No,” she answered. “Consider yourself lucky!” 

(For the record, many women who carry to term do not ever get morning sickness.)

(It was just one of those unfortunate exchanges.)

Then the exam with the doctor. All in all, it’d probably been 30 or 40 minutes by this point, all of this excited talk. I was going to tell my parents on Mother’s Day. My due date was Christmas.

I video call my husband just in time for the ultrasound. 

There was no embryo. 

The doctor said a lot of women are ovulating later in their cycles due to the stress of the pandemic. At the time, I thought maybe. Hope is funny like that, in the face of logic. It started to grow like a weed in the cracks of my breaking heart. 

But the thing is, even with that stubborn hopeweed, I knew. I’d been doing this for ten months. I knew when my last period was, I knew when I ovulated. I was 7 weeks and 1 day, and there was no embryo, and that was it.

The beginning of the process of miscarriage. 

Technically, it’d started a few days before that appointment, but I was distracted at that time. I’d noticed one morning that there seemed to be more hair in the shower floor than there should be. 

Dots started to connect. My breasts had stopped aching. Now, they started to shrink back to their original size. 

This happened over several days. I felt certain I would miscarry on Mother’s Day; fortunately, that did not happen. No, enough days had to pass for that hopeweed to prosper. Only then, when it whispered maybe would I start spotting and cramping. 

On Tuesday, the second ultrasound confirmed what I already knew. Not viable. Missed miscarriage. Technically, the prescription the doctor hands me reads “missed abortion.” “It’s just the technical term,” the doctor explains, acknowledging that many women might find this triggering. 

I don’t cry as much as I did. I only cry when I tell people. It seems important for people to know, just in case. Just one person in the relevant circles of my life. I had to tell my boss to explain the sudden uptick in unexpected doctor appointments. (I’m Rh negative, so I needed to go to the hospital to get bloodwork and a Rhogam shot -- and being in a hospital these days in anxiety-inducing enough without this trauma.)

It still feels surreal. All of this happened in one month. Somehow my life has changed completely and then reverted back. This is just a blip in my life, relatively, and yet it seems the longest month of my life.

In movies, in stories, miscarriage seems to go the same way: a flash of bloody sheets, a shout of shock and pain, and then grief. I never knew how it really goes: that it would stretch out for weeks, from the moment I saw that first ultrasound to now, twelve days later, just starting to bleed. I’ll have to go back for another ultrasound to confirm it’s done, and if it’s not, then I’ll need surgery. 

This speaks nothing of the grief. 

And then it’s back to square one, a whole year later: ovulation tests and endless waiting. 

It’s been a whole month; it’s been only a month, and miscarriage is a process.