#lmao i should ask him about that actually

[staybabblingbaby]

Best Friend Protocol #14 (Team Meeting part)

[Caution: These are not full fics, or even full parts of fics for some, these are part of my writing progress archive!]

Concept: You're Felix's childhood friend, and you and he have been planning a visit to see him for his birthday for what feels like years now. Unfortunately, SKZ is a very busy group, and the week-long vacation you'd planned for doesn't seem possible.Until Felix decides to ask his bandmates a favor...

Word Count: 2672

Notes: IT'S FINALLY HERE! ALL HAIL THE LEGENDARY FIRST WRITTEN PART OF BFP! I meant to have this out over a week ago, but it's here now! I will be attempting to get a regular chapter out here shortly to fulfil my promised 4 november chapters. Wish me luck! Huge shout out to one of my beautiful beloved betas, @brbwritingfanfic for taking the time to make sense of this damn thing lmao. I appreciate you spotting all my errors, you a real one <3 For those familiar with my archive style and curious, this is A3D2 for this chapter. It was kicking my ASS. If enough folks are interested I don't mind releasing the other attempts, but BFP is a bit divorced from the usual archive proceedings, so I'll leave that up to y'all. I actually really loved how Felix's character came through here, and i'm pretty pleased with how the dialogue turned out. My poor fiance had to sit through like 5 separate rants about how i could not roll back the details enough and kept having to scrap dialogue so it sounded less like AI attempting classical literature.

Warnings: She/Her Reader. Sort of? Polyamory negotiations. More like, the possibility is tossed out there.

Leave me comments or questions or anything! Love hearing from folks

Additional Note: I'm always taking interaction requests. Just fyi

Masterlist | Prev Part | Next Part (coming soon!)

The meeting goes something like this;

They pile into the living room of his and Seungmin’s shiny new dorm without discussion. It makes Felix both nervous and grateful. They’ve always had these meetings wherever Chris happened to be, before. It feels like an unspoken declaration of allegiance. Like they’re letting Felix take the lead, here.

The pressure is kind of getting to him already, as they all settle in. He doesn’t even know how he feels about it all himself, making a decision doesn’t seem like something he should be in charge of right now.

Still, he’s grateful. They’re being so mindful of him in this, and he kind of wants to cry about it. He feels seen, and loved. A bit too seen, maybe, but as embarrassing as it is he’s still a bit gooey inside about it.

Felix drags a beanbag over to where Hyunjin has settled on the couch, plopping down to lean against the other man’s legs. A hand automatically goes to bury itself in his hair, like an anchor against Felix’s stormy thoughts.

The grounding warmth of one of his best friends soothes Felix as Chris calls the meeting to order.  

“So!” Their leader casts an inquiring gaze around the room, “Who wants to start? Where are we at right now?”

A few glances are cast Felix’s way, but he tips his head back against Hyunjin’s knees to avoid their eyes. Everyone must get the message, because no one prompts him.

Jisung is the one who eventually bites the bullet, and Felix sends a silent ‘thank you’ to his birthday buddy.

“Well, I’d like to clarify everyone’s, like, goal in this?” Jisung puts forward tentatively, “Because I’m at the point where it’s more of a ‘I’d like to get to know her’ thing than a ‘I want to date her’ thing.” he shrugs to himself, “I haven’t talked to her much yet, I just think she’s cool.”

“I’m a little bit smitten,” Changbin admits from across the room. He gives Felix an apologetic grimace, but all Felix can do is wave him off with a worried smile. 

“We talked for quite a while the other day and, I dunno... We clicked? I guess? I feel like we did, anyway. I kind of want to see where that could go if we let it.” 

Changbin sends an almost appealing look to Felix as he speaks, and honestly? Super awkward for Felix right now.

Because, see, Felix’s first instinct is to get super defensive and shut everything down. He doesn’t really want to be talking about this, and it scratches at something delicate and boyish in him that they’re having this discussion at all.

It’s embarrassing to know that the feelings he’s kept so close to his chest for so many years are out in the open. It feels a bit like a betrayal that this meeting is about the fact that most of his friends have feelings for the girl he’s had a crush on basically his whole life, instead of planning how to get him to stop being stupid about said crush.

It’s just... Uncomfortable. On so many levels. An ugly monster wants to tear out of Felix’s throat as he locks eyes with Changbin, but a light scratch at his scalp from Hyunjin stalls the beast.

Right. Felix reminds himself that these aren’t any old friends. These aren’t just some acquaintances he could burn bridges with, or strange men he had to protect his angel from.

No, these were his brothers, the people he’d shed blood, sweat, and tears with. The men he’d lived with, grown with, the guys who’d seen more of him than any other person in the world.

Felix finds it in himself to spare Changbin a strained smile. He means it to be reassuring, but he’s so tangled up in his thoughts right now that it’s the best he can offer. The older man seems grateful for it anyway.

He turns his gaze up to Hyunjin, the catalyst of all this, and Felix’s current rock in the storm. He tries to keep in mind how much he loves these people as he moves the conversation forward.

He has to hear them out, at least.

“Thoughts, Hyun?” Felix gently inquires. 

Hyunjin briefly presses his lips together, gathering his thoughts into words. 

“I’ve been pretty open in my flirtation from the start, I think.” he finally says, “So I guess I’m more surprised that anyone else is? Surprised, I mean.”

Felix has to hand him that one. For all that his ‘no flirting’ rule had been mostly a joke, it did mean that he’d expected them to flirt with her. 

He wonders what makes things different now? He’d been okay with the flirting when he’d thought everyone was just joking around, has anything really changed now that he knows it’s real?

Felix sits with that thought while Minho throws his two cents in.

“I don’t think surprised is the right word,” their second eldest ponders aloud, “I’m personally more... worried about how this might work out.” He draws the words out slowly, like he’s tasting the flavor of them before he speaks.

It’s off-putting to hear Minho speak so cautiously- he’s usually so blunt with his words. 

“I’m more worried about how this will affect us as a group,” Minho admits, “I mean, I like her, she’s fun, but I don’t want her if it’s going to cause issues among us.”

And the older man has a point. Anything that causes discord in a group like theirs is a disaster waiting to happen. Especially something like this, where a misstep could lead to long-term resentments and jealousies.

Felix feels pressured by the group’s regard for him all over again. One word from him, and he knows it all ends. The moment he says he can’t handle this is the moment that the rest back off. The emotions won’t fade, Felix knows, but they’d do it anyways.

Because they love him.

He loves them right back.

“I really like her,” Seungmin pipes in, face blank. His eyes cast toward the floor for a moment, before rising again to meet Felix’s. “I really like her,” He repeats, “I don’t know that I would be okay with letting go without trying.”

Felix pulls his bottom lip between his teeth and nods at the younger man. His head tips toward his lap while he thinks, brow furrowing as he loses himself to his tumultuous thoughts.

It helps to hear everyone’s feelings put so bluntly, Felix thinks. Having everyone’s stances laid out clearly like a map in his mind’s eye. 

Han, who’s not invested but interested anyways.

Changbin, who’s probably in deeper than he’d really like to be.

Hyunjin, who’d been open about his intentions from the start.

Minho, who the fact that he’s even considering her means more than Felix thinks the man realizes. And yet, he’d give her up at the first seed of discord among the group.

It’s kind of heartwarming, when Felix thinks about how much love their second eldest had shown them with those words. 

Finally, there’s Seungmin. A man whose compliments are hard earned, and whose feelings are closely guarded. A man who’d just handed Felix his heart on a silver platter, trust and love etched in every word, spoken and not.

Felix’s first instinct is still to shut them down. His clouded heart tells him to scoop up his angel and hide her away like a dragon with its hoard. To claim her as his and his alone, and feel slighted if anyone tried to contest that.

But that’s not fair. Not to his members and not to her. Not even to himself.

They’d shown him respect and care every step of the way, the least he could do is give them more than a knee-jerk reaction.

“Is it really all that complicated?” Jeongin ponders aloud.

Their maknae looks almost bored from his armchair, staring at them all. His furrowed brow gives away his worry, as does the way he allows Chris to pull him into the elder’s side with an arm around his shoulders.

“I mean, it’s up to her in the end, isn’t it?” their youngest continues, “she’s the only one that can really make a final call.”

“Could we handle that?” Felix finally speaks up. It’s a little scary having everyone’s attention snap to him like that, but this is the crux of the matter, he thinks.

“If she chooses one of us, could we handle that?” he elaborates.

A contemplative silence descends over the room. Felix kind of wishes he could peek into the member’s brains at this moment. He wants to know if they’re as worried as he is, if they’re worried about the same things he is. 

Because, quite honestly, the more he thinks about it the less he really minds if they flirt with his angel.

It’s taken him this long to untangle the ugly knot of emotions in his chest, and he still can’t see all of it for what it is, but the core of it all, he thinks, is fear.

He’s afraid that, at the end of it all, he’ll be left behind. That he’ll lose two of his very best friends, his favorite people in the world, to each other.

He doesn’t think he could handle that.

It’s an unjustified fear, Felix knows. His bonds with all of these people, the seven present in the room with him and one halfway across the world, are stronger than anything. Forged in fire and elastic with time, he’s sure there’s nothing that could ever truly break them.

That doesn’t stop anxiety from creeping up his spine.

Felix lets his eyes wander around the room, landing on each of his members in turn. It’s like something in him believes that they could guide him in this, just by looking at them, the way his gaze lands heavily on each of their forms.

Hyunjin’s hand drops from his head to knead at the base of his neck, and Felix feels himself soften. A little bit of the anxiety drains from him at the comforting touch, and with it gone he can see something new under the miasma of fear and uncertainty.

It’s bright, like hope, and a bit more exciting. A giddy little thought bubbles up with it-

“What if she chose more than one of us?” Han beats him to the punch. His eyes flick between them all anxiously, looking very much like the rodent he’s nicknamed for, and when he’s met with seven confused stares and Felix’s suppressed grin, he starts to babble.

“I- I mean, we’ve all shared partners before. Like, sexually, at least. I just- I mean- We’re not strangers to sharing, is all I’m tryna say!” Han explains himself.

His shoulders rise up to cherry-red ears under the weight of their stares. Minho places a calming hand on his thigh, even as he pokes holes in the other man’s claim.

“We’ve never shared romantic partners though,” He points out, annoyingly reasonable, “That’s a completely different thing.” 

“I’d be willing to give it a shot,” Hyunjin shrugs when all eyes turn to him.

He was, admittedly, the last of them Felix had expected to back the idea. Hyunjin was the most romantic of them all, and the least likely to indulge one of them in sharing a partner or two.

“I love you guys, and I really like her,” Hyunjin states plainly, “I don’t see an issue with it.”

“So.. what? We try for, like, a.. polycule kinda thing if she wants?” Changbin questions. He scrunches up his face in concern at the concept, pointing out, “That feels a little unbalanced, doesn't it? Is it fair to hinge the whole thing on her?”

“It's going to hinge on her whether it's fair or not,” Jeongin interjects, “You all have crushes on her, not on eachother.”

“I just don’t know how comfortable I can be with that,” Changbin explains, “There’s one of her, and currently six of us. I don’t think it’s humanly possible for her to split her time enough for all of us, and it’s really unfair of us to expect it of her.”

“It could be a good thing, though,” Han argues, “None of us have the time to dedicate to a relationship how we should. Having more than one of us to turn to could be a good thing.”

“Okay, but you’re all forgetting something very important in this hypothetical,” Jeongin stresses the word, making pointed eye contact with his hyungs, “situation. She has to agree to it too. We can’t make a decision without her.”

Felix can't help but be proud of their youngest for reminding them of y/n’s place in all this. It’s not like they’d forgotten, but it was a good reminder anyway. It did feel a bit icky to be talking about their relationship with her like it was a foregone conclusion.

“I’m just saying!” Han proclaims, throwing his hands in the air, “It’s a possibility that we should be open to if it happens!”

Finally, Chris loudly claps to get everyone's attention and forestall any oncoming argument.

“Oh-kay!” he enthuses, “Let’s refocus. Show of hands, are we okay with everyone flirting with her if they want to?”

All hands go up, none of them opposed to anyone else shooting their shot. Felix pretends like all eyes aren’t on him as he easily raises his arm.

“Alright, next” Chris pushes on, “Do we think we can handle it if she chooses one of us?”

Hesitant murmurs sound around the room at this, but Felix has come to an understanding with himself during this meeting, so he speaks confidently when he says, “I think we’ll be okay.”

His words seem to reassure the others, and a ripple of agreement and gentle ribbing starts circling the room.

“Alright,” Chris nods to himself, interrupting the wave before they could get started with any mischief. He really does know them too well.

“And finally,” he starts, an indecipherable expression crossing his face, “show of hands, who’s alright with the poly thing if it comes to it?”

This subject is more divisive, Han, Hyujin, and Felix’s hands going up, but Minho and Changbin stay quiet with worried faces. Seungmin holds his arm out in front of him with his thumb held out sideways. When questioned, he just says he’s not sure how he feels about it yet.

“We’ll circle back on that later, then.” Chris decides, “I think that’s one of those things we need to be unanimous on.”

Agreements sound out, and the atmosphere relaxes. The evening quickly devolves into an impromptu game night, the group quickly descending upon Felix’s console games like a pack of hyenas.

Felix gets up to switch the TV over to his switch, intentions of strong-arming everyone into playing Mario Party in mind. Chris grabs him by the elbow as he walks by, nodding over to the kitchen. Felix follows him over, already unbearably fond. 

“You sure you're good?” Chris asks lowly, “You've been her friend the longest, and we quite literally thought you were dating her already for a while there. They'll back off if you ask, you know.” 

Felix nods, smiling softly at their leader’s care. “I'm good I promise.” he swears, “I meant it when I said I liked it when my favorite people get along.”

He turns to look through the doorway back at the living room. Despite the strange and personal nature of their conversation, jokes and laughter flow easily now. As if there was never any tension at all. 

Felix can feel himself practically melt as he looks at them, a sentiment he knows their leader shares.

“It would hurt,” Felix admits, “If she chose someone else. But there’s no one I’d trust to hurt me more, y’know?”

Chris doesn’t answer, but he doesn’t really need to. He squeezes Felix’s elbow gently as the younger dives back into the chaos, and Felix knows he’s been understood.

Worm List <3 :

@thatgirlangelb , @hyeon-yi, @velvetmoonlght, @missvanjiii, @hanniemylovelyquokka, @vegetablesarefuntables, @scribblesnsketches05, @kkamismom12, @alexateurmom, @baribaaari, @tayla2351, @heart-trees, @unicornwhisperer666, @aalexyuuuhm, @stilldontknowhoiam, @brbwritingfanfic, @kaciebello, @ririzisblu

Perma Tag List <3 : @mbioooo0000

[str8upjorkinit]

Why do you like the brat

(genuinely want to know lmao)

funny you should ask that...

it all started when I saw that one ad where leo was kicking his feet in the bathtub...(big yap warning)

shallowly, he gives power bottom energy. i was prepared to not like him since my friend was further in the game + picked leo bc she thought he looked cunty and quickly found out that she hated him, but my first meeting of him was that ad.... that ad.... hes so like girly and like cutesy and and :3c!! so then i actually met him in the game... hes so girly and cutesy omg, i live for that fake bitch energy. hes so like... pathetic and two faced and cute like....

so basically i have this thing where i yearn for this kind of dynamic where i can overpower him but hes smarter than me and also very interesting so i just let him boss me around. hes so like... weak. and i love his voice i need him to moan in my ear especially when hes being fake and cute bc he wants something from you? "captain~<3 can you please open this bottle for me?~ <3" ugh. fuck. boner. hes such a vixen. hes such a diva.

also him crying... oh my lord LEO CRYING!!! UGHHH. the world's prettiest crier <3 and his goddamn tongue piercing

also like the switch up is hot too, the duality of man <3 my pretty delicate princess!!

psychologically, hes such a fucking wreck and i love that, hes such a bitch, and hes so manipulative, and hes so jealous, and insecure, and such a liar, im so fascinated!!! does he know how awful he is? does he realize how toxic hes being? is he toxic on purpose?? is he a shit friend on purpose? is it a power trip to make sho pay for his food or is he just lazy? i want to know what hes thinking

his relationship with sho is so fascinating too, like its so clear hes scared of losing him but in a way he also hates/loves him. like wdym you have other friends besides me??? you're starting a business??? ugh, ur so lame. and he actively tries to isolate him, is he jealous of sho's popularity? his talents? his social life? or does he hate the things that takes sho away from him?? he also does not give a shit about shos happiness either bc he like badmouthed him to subaru just so subaru could leave him alone... wow... what a fucking asshole... im so invested, drama!!!! also the valentine's day line where he doesn't mention getting anything but sho does,,, it means something no?? dude, like, leo is everything and nothing, i bet he feels so worthless but to make up for that he uses sho and internet validation

hes built like a reality tv character, THE instigator but hes smart about it. hes such an attention whore, like .... regina george... guys real shit i have a mean girl kink /j

leos the type of bitch to flirt with and sleep with his boss to make more money.

ANOTHER THING he has like a weird sense of justice?? like he hates ppl who've made the world shitty (ref to when he jumps off the building) and so him and sho scamming old rich guys is kinda like them being vigilantes? leos kinda like an anti-hero in a way. hes so interesting!!! AHH!!!

omg also hes in his self-destructive era and i need to see how it goes, like will he be a villain? will his life get ruined bc of himself?? will he get punished? will he redeem himself? does he regret his choices??

ngl i tho im actually not romantically interested in him, which is pretty surprising considering how much i like him. im obsessed with him in the most objectifying way possible

but yeah i love my toxic fruit tart boy <333

[nobodybetterlookatme]

Weren't you just calling this coworker an asshole a week ago? What changed?

Yeah I did and I still stand by that lmaoooo 100% he's an asshole, nothing's changed in that regard

[aroaceleovaldez]

What is the PR disaster in question that made Rick announce TSATS? I wasn’t active in the online fandom at that point

Of course! This was awhile ago so it figures people don't remember it/aren't familiar:

Basically a couple years back (2020) the fandom had some posts circulate discussing the ways different characters in the Riordanverse were written poorly or offensively. There was a masterpost that went around tumblr but the two major points people were particularly focusing on were Piper and Samirah (particularly because Piper had featured prominently again in Trials of Apollo recently and the third MCGA book had further emphasized and discussed Samirah being Muslim, since it was supposed to take place during Ramadan). Basically each had multiple posts breaking down the ways they were depicted incorrectly or offensively. The entire fandom for a little bit was VERY intensely discussing this (and it's around this time the "RR crit" tag got very popularized on tumblr - it did exist before, but suddenly was being used VERY frequently - cause it was that wide-spread - though the discussion took over basically every side of Riordaverse social media on different platforms). People really wanted Rick to respond to these criticisms, so he did!

He made two blog posts, one about Piper and one about Samirah. He has since deleted both so the links are to archived versions. The short version: he essentially tried to justify his poor research and double-down that he hadn't written them offensively, actually, people were just being mean to him. The fandom, of course, reacted poorly to this.

[Further elaborated events under the cut since this got a bit lengthy]

(Fun fact, this all happened within a month or so of the time i posted an open letter on aphobic tropes in the Riordanverse that Rick replied to, and then he immediately followed with announcing that Reyna was intended to be ace-coded [which cause a LOT of fandom debate] before Rick dipped for a couple of weeks, and then came back to post the blog posts in response to Piper and Sam stuff. So I like to jokingly refer to this as "The time I imploded the fandom/drove Rick off of twitter." Twas I that set the house ablaze.)

Rick fully left social media after this and the LT Musical social media manager became Rick's social media manager for the time being.

So this all happened June/July of 2020. Tower of Nero would end up being published in October of 2020 and a few months after that Rick would state that he was done with the series and wouldn't be writing any more series installments involving Percy, and also that he wouldn't be writing a Nico quest following Tower of Nero as it "wasn't his place to" and encouraged the community to write their own versions of Nico's story.

The community continued to circulate the tumblr posts and discuss the topics of Rick's offensive character depictions, and this is also where we see the dramatic shift in how the fandom depicts Piper in fanwork (though in most cases it is admittedly not an improvement 😬) because of all this discussion. This is also around the time when the fandom brought Viria under scrutiny claiming that she was whitewashing Piper as part of the same discussions, through the justification that she was drawing Annabeth as having tan skin (which she does canonically), and if Annabeth has tanner skin then Piper then that's whitewashing Piper? Except they were using completely separate images of not fully rendered Piper art versus Annabeth in dramatic lighting, so it's all very awkward and poor logic, and did actually get kind of racist. A lot of people were calling it "Tannabeth Blackchase" (yeah, i know) or similar and a common sentiment you'd see repeated is "Don't draw Annabeth as having darker skin than Piper, because that's offensive/racist/whitewashing." (Note: it was not phrased "don't draw Piper as having lighter skin than Annabeth" - we also won't get into certain offensive depictions of Native Americans, but I digress). But yeah, the Annabeth stuff in all that did not age well at all.

Anyways, in October of 2021 however Rick would announce that he was co-writing The Sun And The Star - with a lot of heavy emphasis on how Mark Oshiro works as a sensitivity reader, and some false advertising from the official social media that Mark Oshiro was the first time a non-Riordan author would be collaborating on the series (disregarding the ghostwriters completely). One of the big criticisms in the breaking down of issues in Rick's writing was his lack of ever seeking a sensitivity reader, and fans claiming that a sensitivity reader could solve a lot of the problems. This was basically Rick's "look! I totally listened!!!!" (though it did little to actually improve things, based on the book) and in TSATS as well Piper gets a large cameo at the end where the text very directly addresses a lot of points made in criticism of Rick's writing of her.

We also then of course got the CoTG trilogy later, explicitly stated to be for advertising purposes for the show.

So basically, short version: Rick came under scrutiny for a lot of offensive writing within the span of two months, made some bad blog posts doubling down about it, left social media. TOA ends. Rick says he wasn't going to continue the series/write what would become TSATS. Community celebrates the end of of the franchise but also continues to discuss Rick's poor writing and the blog posts at length. Rick suddenly announces TSATS and Mark Oshiro's involvement. Everybody gets distracted from being mad. Show announcement stuff also happens and the discussions peter out.

[phoenixcatch7]

Reading loz/lu fics and it's just so interesting how wide the spectrum is of their personalities.

Sometimes it's got an in universe reason (different past (usually gender or species change), recent or ongoing traumatic events, a spectacularly bad first meeting), but sometimes (often) the characters are just... Weirdly angsty or peppy, there's no in between!

And I'm beginning to think less people have played more than one game than I thought XD.

Not that it's anyone's fault! One game is more than enough to be part of it all, and loz is exclusive to Nintendo consoles - and all the older stuff is frustratingly hard to get hold of. Heck, I'm still looking for wind waker, and that was really popular! And then you have to play it! They're not small games!!

But could people writing wild please ease off just a tiiiiiny bit so he can be a semi functional member of society pretty please XD? He's just as much a polite boy as any other member of the chain! He won't even run in shops! He can't attack npcs! He talks to every single person he's ever seen and remembers every single name. Yes, he's three quarters woodland creature with a hefty amount of trauma but he's also a fashionista who managed to avoid accidentally taking sides in a mayoral election and that's not easy!

[senblades]

I don’t remember if it ever came up, but now that Akechi has his memories of the last timeline back, did he have Confidants then too?

hmm.... i think i kept meaning to bring it up, but since shuake are in divorce mode and Ren's the only one who would know to ask, it keeps slipping me by

and in all likelihood it will keep slipping me by, so I'll just provide an answer here:

ehhhh yes and no? I would say that he DID unlock the Justice confidant, smiled very brightly and thought "what the fuck what the fuck what the fuck" but i'm going to pull this out of my ass right now and say that it didn't happen at the TV studio like it did for Ren, but rather after their first game of billiards, since that would be the tipping point for Akechi having genuine interest in him beyond just "that's the guy that's so fucking dumb he announced his criminal activity in a hallway"

of course, this timeline the Justice arcanae activated at the same time, both because of the established precedent of Sumire and the things she'd spilled to Akechi, but also because of last timeline Justice Confidant Fuckery, as it was wont to do in early fftsr.

I keep going back and forth on whether he would have unlocked the Moon or the Devil in the first timeline. I definitely think that Akechi would have had far less interaction with the Velvet Room, to the point where they stopped bothering him at all, maybe even the entire year, since he was on-track to play his role perfectly. This time, though; even though Yaldy wasn't entirely in the know at first, he still noticed that somthing was up with time. Plus, his chosen champion kept making friends and that was a real pain in the ass.

Hm okay actually i'm going to make a call about the Devil/Moon situation. Since i've established confidants as "connections that will change fate (for better or worse)" I'll say that Akechi did get the Devil, but skipped Moon. The OG timeline was a very bleak place for Akechi HAHAHA.

He definitely was Not Thrilled by this outcome, and put all his energy into ignoring it was happening. He honestly probably thought he was hallucinating, since the Velvet Room never confronted him on it lmao.

annnnd that's it! I really did mean to bring it up at some point, but, alas. Maybe one day Ren will get curious. fhsdjkdf i remember that Sumire and Haru know about the arcana and that Akechi has them, but I can't remember for the life of me if Probably Sumire shared that information with Ren. I'll have to check

ty for the ask!

[megamindsupremacy]

okok my brain not braining rn but.... smth smth stan starting to figures tbings out when SHERMIE calls asking ford to watch the kiddos like

stan: hello? if this is the irs you can talk to me in person!

shermie: ford blah blah blah kids blah summer blah blah

stan: (why tf is my brother calling this ford guy????? and familiar with him?????) uhhhhh...

OH HEY i hadn't even read this ask when I wrote my response to that other one so I guess we're just on the same brainwave with "Shermie is the one to ask Stan to take care of the kids"

Stan is so confused because like. Shermie is his brother. He knows Shermie is his older brother. Everytime someone mentions Stan's brother they're obviously talking abut Shermie. Right? So why is Shermie calling up Stanford (how does Shermie know Stanford exists? So why does his brother Shermie somehow know who Stanford is? Does he know Stanley stole this random dude's identity? Except, no, Shermie thinks Stanford is his brother, which is super weird. And Stan is so absolutely baffled about this whole thing that he finds himself agreeing to Shermie's request before he can think through "taking care of a couple of kids for an entire summer"

[princess-of-purple-prose]

Fish, 7 (For your prompts! ❤️)

Hi, anon!! Thank you for the prompt, you were the very first one to send one in! 7 was, again, the wildcard, so I randomly generated a different number to land on Yue Qingyuan (from Scum Villain)! I have no choice but to dedicate this to @bytedykes, because I told her about this prompt and she said “yqy pet fish mental health speedrun” and we went, uh, a little insane about it. Enjoy some yuefang, folks!!!!

“Mu-xiong,” Yue Qingyuan says. “I’m sorry to bother you. Are you available?”

“Yue-xiong is never a bother,” Mu Qingfang says warmly. “And I am, actually, yes. Is everything okay, Yue-xiong?”

“I think I need help.” A bit dramatic, perhaps, and Yue Qingyuan hates to trouble Mu Qingfang on a rare day off, but Yue Qingyuan and impulse have never been the best combination, and he would appreciate a second opinion.

Mu Qingfang’s voice turns hard. “Where are you? I'll come right away.”

“What—?” Yue Qingyuan stares at his phone like the blank call screen will tell him why Mu Qingfang suddenly sounds so serious. “I'm at home, but—”

“I'll be right there,” Mu Qingfang says, and hangs up.

Yue Qingyuan stares at his phone for another second, then lifts his gaze to his sparkling new aquarium. His new betta, white and black and resplendent of fin, stares back. Was his crisis of faith about his viability as a fish owner really so deserving of such urgency…?

—

“So,” Mu Qingfang says. “This was your emergency?” He looks about as unimpressed by the betta as it does by the two of them.

Yue Qingyuan feels obscurely like he’s being scolded. Mu Qingfang is one of the nicest men he knows, but that just means that his censure takes the form of a blunt instrument of mass disappointment.

“In my defense,” he points out meekly, “I didn’t say there was an emergency. Mu-xiong just assumed.”

“That’ll teach me,” Mu Qingfang huffs, but at least he looks amused. “Yue-xiong should get used to asking for help more so this gege doesn’t have to panic every time he does ask.”

Yue Qingyuan’s mouth almost drops open. He can only hope his cheeks aren’t as red as they feel. “Er—well, I asked this time, didn’t I?”

“You did,” Mu Qingfang allows, looking something horribly close to fond. Yue Qingyuan swallows and tries to hurry on.

“So—not an emergency, but I do want your opinion,” he coughs out. “I’m having… doubts. About the fish.” Mu Qingfang’s eyebrows contract. Yue Qingyuan rushes it out. “Do you think I should keep it?”

“Yue-xiong…” Mu Qingfang looks politely incredulous. “Why does my opinion matter? The fish is already yours, isn’t it? If you don’t think maintaining its upkeep will be feasible, that’s one thing, but… Surely Yue-xiong did the research before getting it?”

He doesn’t sound judgemental, but Yue Qingyuan feels his cheeks warm. “I did, but I wasn’t planning on getting a fish; I was only admiring the tanks. There was a salesperson who was… very insistent.”

Mu Qingfang regards him doubtfully, which is fair. Yue Qingyuan towers over most people he meets, and his bulk only further adds to the impression of immovability. It’s only when he opens his mouth that it becomes clear how spineless he actually is.

Yue Qingyuan falters. “I had thought… I thought it might be nice.” The bettas had seemed so majestic in their tanks, iridescent monarchs of false grass and plastic coves, and Yue Qingyuan had thought, wildly, that one might be rewarding to keep, might breathe a touch of life into his immaculately sleek living room. The whole affair hadn’t even been expensive by his shiny new standards, forget difficult to physically arrange. It was only when installation and set-up for his new aquarium had finished and he was left to watch that jewel-bright being swim disaffectedly through its new home that doubt had seized him, all-consuming and black. He had, admittedly, panicked a little after that.

(Yue Qingyuan’s apartment is very large, and very clean, and very empty. It holds the barest amount of decoration and muss to qualify as lived-in rather than a snapshot from a magazine ad. The fish may, in fact, be the only thing in the entire place which really qualifies as his. No wonder Yue Qingyuan wanted to jettison it from his life as soon as he got it.)

Mu Qingfang’s expression hovers between concern and simple confusion. “I’m sure Yue-xiong will be a more than adequate caretaker,” he says, more gently than Yue Qingyuan and all his neuroses probably deserve. “What’s this really about, Yue-xiong?”

Ah. There it is. Being the mildest person of Yue Qingyuan’s admittedly sharp-tongued social circle doesn’t preclude Mu Qingfang’s wit from being as keen as the scalpels he works with.

“I don’t…” Yue Qingyuan falters. How to express to Mu Qingfang how manifestly unfit Yue Qingyuan is to care for any living creature at all? He changes tack. “I think he hates me,” he admits dolefully.

Mu Qingfang stares at him for a long time, long enough to imply that he’s reevaluating certain opinions about Yue Qingyuan’s intelligence. “Yue-xiong, with all due respect to your new pet—it’s a fish.”

“Fish have emotions!” Yue Qingyuan argues. He flushes at the volume at which it comes out, and at the way Mu Qingfang’s eyes go wide-eyed in startlement. But the salesperson had been very insistent about that, as well. “Bettas are intelligent animals. They dislike certain colors, apparently, and they’re very sensitive—ah, to environmental disruptions, that is. And—”

Mu Qingfang’s eyebrows are still high, but his face has relaxed into a smile. “It sounds to me like you like it quite a bit already. Isn’t that reason enough to keep it?” His tone curls with sudden mischief. “Have heart, Yue-xiong—you’ve hardly known each other for a day! Give it time to adjust to you, and I’m sure you’ll win it over as surely as you do everyone else.” And he grins, sure and easy in his trust that Yue Qingyuan won’t fumble and shatter something so small and monumental as a life that he could cup in his palms.

While Yue Qingyuan is still dazed by that, Mu Qingfang’s eyes alight with interest. “Ah, Yue-xiong—what have you named it?”

“...”

Mu Qingfang’s face falls as devastatingly as it had lit up. “Yue-xiong…”

“Mu-xiong is aware that I was unsure of whether or not I’d keep him!” Yue Qingyuan is terribly aware that his ears are now heating up to match his cheeks. Mu Qingfang’s ensuing laughter does not help with that matter.

Yue Qingyuan is not very good at holding onto things. More often than not, he makes a mess of whatever he’s set his clumsy hands to, lets it fall right through his scarred fingers. But Mu Qingfang’s words ring through his head: Isn’t that reason enough to keep it? And, well, isn’t it? Surely Yue Qingyuan is adult enough to follow through on this. Maybe happiness can be look like his new betta swimming up to the tank to observe the new colorful form moving in front of it, can come as easy as Mu Qingfang quipping that his knowledge about fish is clearly lacking and vowing casually to read up on bettas to be a better fish uncle.

Yue Qingyuan buries a smile and walks over to let Mu Qingfang know that bettas can be trained to follow fingers around. The betta’s clear preference for Mu Qingfang over Yue Qingyuan is as good a marker of intelligence as any fun fact the pet shop worker could have given him. Yes, Yue Qingyuan thinks with a smile—he thinks he’ll be keeping this after all.

[zrllosyn-art]

i love gen narumi because he truly is customizable.... any hcs, as long as they're in character, are true if you think & reach hard enough. like. butch gen. (not elaborating) and gen who's definitely in the know about the thomas jefferson miku binder thing. and gen who was like 17 witnessing Dashcon through tumblr (he didn't even speak a lick of english at that time)

YEAGH he is,, so fun, ,, he's multi-fasceted which lets you kinda, have flexibilty to mess around with him but also. Dumbass. I love that for him

he is most DEFINITELY chronically online though lmao. He feels like the type of person to poke around websites outside of japan and just, find himself in really weird websites.

Personally i feel like he would be the type to go on reddit for games he plays and google translate a buncha posts just to get angry at people with opposing opinions and get into arguments but like. Having to machine translate everything the whole time

I am betting he's unwilling to loose arguments even with a language barrier lmao

(he is going to learn so many swear words)

[bacchuschucklefuck]

Can you expand on what you mean by Baron being "too cool" to really fit a horror monster? It's a very interesting concept and I'd love to hear your thoughts. Is it that they're too active/involved/tangible and it detracts from their scariness?

I feel like I should preface this with a wall of disclaimers lmao 1/I am a hardcore, down-to-the-marrow, avid, deeply sincere horror enthusiast, esp. horror creatures. this usually means my mileage is vastly different from the average populace's, and my scaredy bone has been disintegrated by longterm exposure. most things in a piece of horror media won't scare me! so I practically never use that on its own as the scale to talk abt horror experiences, but when something does scare me it's always a special occasion to be treasured. 2/canon d20 is never really meant to be horror horror, and for good reasons: it doesn't fit the company's output, it takes a kind of carelessness in production estimation that is always a huge risk, it's often vulnerable in a way that kinda goes against how TTRPGs usually facilitates vulnerability, and for most people it's just! stressful! d20, even with the "horror-themed" seasons, generally just plays with horror tropes and stays focused in its goal of being a comedy improv tabletop theater show. 3/fantasy high's chosen system is DnD, which as I've mentioned before is before all a combat-based game system, which means the magic circle of play is drawn based on stats that facilitate and prioritize combat. want or not this affects every interaction you have in the game, and given fantasy high's concept from the ground up (everyone's going to school of DnD stuff to get better at DnD) it's doubly relevant. 4/This Is Fine I have no quarrel with this. my meters are internal, I do not ask this show to be anything it doesn't advertise itself to be, and what it is is fucking great! I like it! when I expand on this ask's question it will be like a physicist going insane in a lab. that's the mindset we're going in with.

disclaimers done. my stance on horror as a genre is that it's a utility genre rather than a content genre or a demographic genre; it is the discard of narratives. it's the trash pile. horror, above being scary, is about being ugly and messy, it's the cracks on the ground any story inevitably steps over to stay a genre that isn't horror. the genre's been around long enough to develop a codex and a general language that medias and makers and enthusiasts of the genre can use to talk about and build onto, but if you go into individual pieces there's really no unifying Horror Story. one person's beautiful life can be another's horror story, it's just how it is.

this makes The Monster a deeply intriguing piece of the genre. thing is a monster is in a decent percentage of any story - it's just when the antagonist force steps into something past a certain line traced out in the story's world. monstrousness is in pretty much every western fantasy story, it's in any story with a hero and something to vanquish or win; more than anything it's a proxy of that thing up there. the line in a narrative's world. the monster is the guard of the unknown lands, where heroic, civilized people don't tread.

what does this mean in the context of horror? the genre is about that perceived lawlessness, that "unknown land" so to say. we're in the monster's home. that's the literary context that we often walk into a horror piece with; the monster knows more than you about where you are. it may not understand you, but it holds more information than you, and with that it moves swifter than you, has more covered than you, and is more assured in its existence in this context than you. it's a struggle to catch up to it, it's nigh impossible to get one over it, and you're never sure it'll 100% work, because you just don't have the information necessary to.

with that framing you can kinda see where I'm coming from here: horror's often about the breaking of rules. I always think a monster's most effective when it breaks well-established rules of both existence and visual storytelling. think Possum (2018) or Undertale's Omega Flowey or the Xenomorph Queen - unique change in medium, unique change in graphic, unique change in design language, etc. in that sense I actually really like how canon baron plays out: they don't really function like anything else in the fantasy high universe, the bad kids have not managed to kill them when they've felled literal gods, their domain in fhjy literally introduces new mechanics to encompass their existence! from an experience design standpoint they slap mad shit. BUT! I can't help finding their character, like as a character riz (and the other bad kids, eventually) interact with, to be very... coherent? in design. this is kinda hard for me to articulate in words, it's more often a sense you get once you've looked at enough of these scrumptious fuckers, their general design and the way they show up is just kinda too clean, so to say. always kinda newly made? fresh unboxed. it, once again, makes sense for their lore - they are looking for more about themself from riz - and their function - they're an antagonist in a game experience, they're meant to be interacted with in a way that produces results and meshes with the existing magic circle - but that shininess takes away from the implied history they should have dominion over and the person they're haunting doesn't.

from another angle there is kinda something there about how put-together canon baron is as a concept; the domain they call home is riz's deep-seeded fears, extremely vulnerable things he's drawn borders around to quarantine and refused to walk into. things that from his perspective would irreversibly shatter certain pleasant fictions his world is built on top of. canon baron, While Extremely Cool, I feel is kinda too neat to connect with and signify the apocalyticized mess that'd result from this paradigm shift. the part where they're in riz's briefcase and looking through every mirror is Very Cool And Fucked Up! but ultimately the show draws a line around them as well, by making game-physical, tangible spaces they're in (the mirrors and the haunted mordred manor) and put riz and the bad kids there only when they need to confront stuff. riz is meaningfully narratively away from baron's unknown land for most of fantasy high.

with that and all of my disclaimers in mind my conclusion here is if canon baron wants to be a Horror Monster they'd have to cross way more lines. be a Lot more invasive. hence (holds up my class swap baron like a long cat)

[triglycercule]

eusgahhhhh goddddd the lazy urge to just beg the internet to mansplain killer's lore to me in baby talk so i can finally GET IT and then the other less appealing urge to actually do an analysis on him so i can form my own opinion and observations. fucj

[cranberrymoons]

.

[agentark]

whatever you do, don't imagine a young J Corvin waiting every day at the end of their drive, hoping today is the day the mail carrier finally brings a letter from their very best friend

[hauntingblue]

ARCANE EPISODE 7!!!!

MY GOD I WASNT READY FOR ANY OF THIS!!! WHAT WAS THAT!!!

Also ekko wallpaper I got with my fries lmao

[sweet-star-cookie]

if you were to drop cassie + the zodiacs into a human/modern AU (an AU where all the zodiacs and constellations were humanized and there is no magic in the universe), what jobs do you think they would do? what would their new human names be? would their dynamics change as a result of the lack of magic and the trauma that comes along with it? and what do you think flicker's normal animal equivalent would be?

(definitely not related to a christmas special i'm cooking up nooope no frenzied AU writing here)

Oooooooh? 👀 Whatever you've got cooking, I'm very excited :D You know it's funny, now that I think about it I've done a lot more speculating about humanization/AU stuff for this set of characters than even I remembered initially, haha! The upside is that means I actually have some stuff to give you :D Of course I don't consider any of this to be "canon" even in an AU sense, as the ideas here are pretty spur-of-the-moment overall and I would need to develop them more if I were to ever make an actual AU story myself. Some of these I've never thought about prior to now, so it is by no means complete in terms of info, but I hope it helps!

With that in mind, don't feel restricted by what I give you here, if you come up with something different for these characters that you want to write about, go for it! Feel free to play around and have fun ^_^ Alright, on to the (very long) answers!

I'll start with the Flicker question, since that'll have the shortest answer comparatively! When figuring out their size in the main story I have compared them to a small kitten before. Considering they can fit in the palm of Cassie's hand most of the time too, something in the rodent family might be more suitable here. Given their stubby limbs, small paws/feet and round body, a hamster comes to mind for me (though I'm biased because I grew up with pet hamsters, haha).

As for Cassie and the zodiac, it would depend on what setting/context this takes place in to determine how they meet and interact with each other, and what dynamics they'd make or keep from their original counterparts, including what part of the world they/their theoretical ancestors are from. Are they all somehow in Cassie's town, or are they all somewhere else? How Cassie would meet them would obviously be very different too, and depending on their occupations she'd be less likely to meet some than others, but of course you can find ways to bring them together anyway.

Since there are nearly infinite options to answer the question of setting, I'll instead give you some general ideas for their possible occupations and such and you can go from there! Some of the "jobs" the adult zodiacs have on the Astral Plane do translate pretty easily to regular Earth occupations, but again you don't have to stick to those if you don't want to. Same with the names, I only have some that came to mind or that I've had previously so feel free to make some up for yourself!

------ ARIES

Possible Occupation: I could see him as a gym trainer or something, the kind that may yell a lot but that actually works for people who are motivated by that kind of intensity, and he genuinely cares about the health/strength goals of the patrons with great passion as well. Perhaps he's still underestimated for his size/height but is able to prove himself with his strength anyway, and thus everyone at the gym respects him. What's funny is Aries actually used to be half-human in canon! Here's the old concept art from around 2016, if that helps at all:

The only reason I eventually changed him was to balance out the cast a bit more variety wise, as Leo was the only anthropomorphic animal zodiac character at the time. This is the same reason I changed Capricorn to be anthropomorphic as well, though in his case I felt it also strengthened his concept as the "sea goat" a lot more easily that way.

Possible Name: For some reason any variant of Aaron comes to mind, I'm assuming because it matches with the "ar" syllable in Aries (though that may also be me thinking about Aran Ryan, the stereotypical unhinged/angry Irishman character from Punch-Out lol)

Relationship with Zodiac Companion: (If you're including them too) I'd imagine that Perseus would be a rather anxious member at the gym that takes a lot of effort to motivate properly, but Aries sees potential in him and sees it through anyway. Either that or he simply wants to help out with other things around the gym to build up his confidence more. He's young, so maybe it's his very first job or something, and a challenge for Aries to learn how to train someone who doesn't match his own demeanour very much at all.

------ TAURUS

Possible Occupation: I can see her as some kind of animal rescue operator or a park ranger that's focused on areas with protected species. A zookeeper could work well too, she'd definitely be one that would be excited and energetic when giving tours and facts about the animals because she loves them so much.

Possible Name: One that I have in my old "what if" notes is Tori Dellman (I don't remember why lol)

Relationship with Zodiac Companion: Wherever Orion would be in his original character arc could determine their relationship here, like maybe he's still a hunter/poacher that Taurus has to deal with but eventually befriends, or he is a fellow park ranger/animal rescuer/zookeeper.

Coincidentally, at the time of writing this I am finishing up Part 2 of Orion's updated reference sheet that shows his human form prior to his deer transformation, so stay tuned for that soon :D

------ GEMINI & LEO (Putting these two together since they're the children of the zodiac cast and thus wouldn't have set jobs/aspirations like the adults do)

Possible Names: The Gemini twins could theoretically keep their original names (Solana and Luna) but there are a bunch of other names that mean sun/moon that you could use if you want to keep that duality theme but in a subtler way.

Same with Leo, there are a bunch of names that mean "lion" that you could use (though that already includes Leo itself, of course).

Relationship with Zodiac Companions: I feel like this would also be determined by what dynamic they have with their guardians/parental figures (Sagittarius and Cancer) and if they're adopted as their children or not. This would extend to their companions as well, as I consider Leo Minor to be Leo's little brother in canon and that could be the same here. Auriga could be an older sister to the Gemini twins in turn, though I could also see her as a camp counsellor or some other kind of teenage volunteer on a school trip or something.

------ CANCER

Possible Occupation: Her giant claw cannons that can shoot water and her strong build make me think she could work well as a fire fighter, the kind that isn't weighed down by her gear very much and doesn't mind leaping into danger multiple times if necessary, still keeping that ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ kind of attitude when it comes to her own safety.

Possible Name: The only name I have for her in my notes is Maura Kinloch, though this was a relic from a very, very old lore draft where it's implied that her incarnation of her constellation has been around for literal centuries, further implying that she was the only one of the armour clad characters on the Astral Plane who actually lived as a knight during the medieval times on Earth (make of that what you will lmao)

Relationship with Zodiac Companion: This would again depend on how you interpret Hydra/Hydrus and their relationship with her, though you don't necessarily have to humanize every single one of the animal characters either. Considering their constellations are defined as "the water snakes" you could also have them be her pets, either as snakes or some other kind of reptile/amphibian.

------ VIRGO

Possible Occupation: Considering her Lady Justice themeing in canon, she could have a similar job in a courtroom, though which one she has is up to you. A judge or attorney might be most fitting, but she could also be an investigator or detective as well.

Possible Name: Not sure, sorry ^^' Whenever I need to think of AU names I usually either pick a name that has a meaning adjacent to their original concept, or one that phonetically sounds similar/has some of the same syllables as their canon name to tie them together.

Relationship with Zodiac Companion: Given Corvus's status as a former thief/delinquent in canon, you could use that in the AU and whatever job Virgo has could determine what relationship they have. Perhaps Corvus is a part of a case she's working on as a suspect and she needs to prove his guilt/innocence, or he's the classic "help us out now and we'll reduce your sentence" kind of thing, perhaps acting as a sort of double agent.

------ LIBRA

Possible Occupation: I picture her keeping her job as a librarian/archivist, though how high up the "ladder" she is in terms of that occupation is up to you, and whether or not museum experience is included is a possibility as well. If you want to connect her AU part to Virgo's to match canon, she could also be either a fellow attorney/judge, or the stenographer (the person who transcribes what is said in a courtroom). They could always just be friends outside of their respective jobs too, though.

Possible Name: Elise, from my old notes. Not sure if I picked this one because they both have L in their spellings but I like it. :)

Relationship with Zodiac Companion: Lupus would still be some kind of assistant to Libra I think, regardless of what occupation either of them has. Similar to Scutum (see below!) I actually have a drawing of him as a human, though it's not finished yet:

I had fun with this one :D Though he appears a lot younger as a wolf, he's actually a young adult in terms of age. ------ SCORPIO

Possible Occupation: This is one I actually have a slightly more fleshed out AU idea for, believe it or not! I pictured Scorpio as some kind of secret agent/spy or maybe even a trained assassin or bounty hunter depending on whether he actually has a body count in this AU or not. Perhaps he's caught up in a conspiracy or plot where he realizes he's on the wrong side of it all with what he has been assigned, and has to pivot to save the victim(s) despite the extreme danger in doing so.

If you want a more "pedestrian" angle for the AU though, he could just be the type of guy who tries his best to get by with whoever will hire him, but somehow keeps finding trouble or having trouble find him. Maybe he was categorized as a delinquent in his youth because of his suspiciously adept knife skills, rightfully or otherwise, leading to his characteristic brooding pessimism even after he became a young adult.

If Virgo/Libra are still tied to the justice system in this hypothetical, I think it would be funny if Scorpio was truthfully just a regular guy, but one that constantly gets roped into ridiculous situations through no fault of his own. So once they get him on the stand and they look at him like "...again?" he's just like "for the love of god it's not me this time-"

Apparently I cannot give him a break even in an AU, sorry bud xD

Possible Name: To match his occupation, it's likely that his real name is unknown/redacted and he uses Agent Scorpio/Scorpius as a code name or alias instead. Not sure what his name would be in an otherwise normal situation though, maybe he has to keep changing it to avoid whatever trouble keeps finding him.

Relationship with Zodiac Companion: In sharp contrast to Scorpio, Scutum is a paramedic with a big heart and chipper attitude, the kind that may not follow the rules all the time but is always riding off on his Moped with his medical bag to save a life somewhere. If he arrives on the scene on time, he has a tendency to put himself between a victim and the assailant's weapon to protect them, earning him his nickname. I've actually drawn this version of him too :D

(this is still one of my favourite designs to date, heehee :'D )

Despite their opposing occupations, he and Scorpio end up working together a lot more than either of them expected. As a paramedic, Scutum has the MO of "everyone deserves rescuing", including trained assassins in this case! To him it doesn't matter who they are, a patient is a patient. ------ SAGITTARIUS

Possible Occupation: For some reason I picture him as an outdoorsman, like a hiker or survivalist or something. I think it would be funny if, even when fully human in this AU, he is still mistaken for a bear in the woods from a distance because of his hair and stocky build. Whether he practices archery as a job or simply a hobby is another thing as well, as that could factor into his survival skills or perhaps he competes in tournaments with it.

Possible Name: I have Argus or Darius as a first name here, and considering the Scottish inspiration for his canon design you could give him a Scottish surname as well if you like.

Relationship with Zodiac Companion: If you want to keep Centaurus's insatiable desire to explore, you could have him be a companion on Sagittarius's hikes or a survivalist-in-training. He might want to partake in some spelunking as well if the area in question has caves. Even in canon Centaurus's name is often shortened to Rus, so you could use that here as a short form of Russell.

------ CAPRICORN

Possible Occupation: I think he'd be a well-to-do patron of the arts, likely still an owner or an otherwise staunch financial supporter of a theatre, big or small. Whether he is/was an actor or is simply a performing arts enthusiast is up to you, but I think his refined taste and penchant for the extravagant would still shine through in his demeanour, clothing and possessions. Whether he and Aries are still brothers here is up to you too, though the contrast in their occupations might make for an amusing dynamic, as Capricorn in this AU likely wouldn't lay a finger on a weight even if his life depended on it.

Possible Name: Quentin Armanis, Noctus Finch, or Atticus Strombold (I'm really good at coming up with fancy names I guess lmao)

Relationship with Zodiac Companion: I think Pegasus and her siblings would still be in the performing arts here, though depending on the setting, how they and Capricorn meet might be different. Perhaps Capricorn has a more hidden altruistic side where he supports young and/or indie theatre efforts in addition to the larger ones, but all on the down-low for the sake of whatever reputation he's trying to keep.

------ AQUARIUS

Possible Occupation: I can see her keeping her fashion designer/hair stylist angle here, but how "high profile" she is in this regard could vary in the AU depending on her goals/passions. Regardless of whether her and Pisces are still married in this AU, I could see Pisces becoming at least a muse for Aquarius's designs if nothing else.

Possible Name: Odessa, or some other fancy name that a fashion designer would have.

Relationship with Zodiac Companion: Similar to their initial rivalry in canon, Aquila could be a rival of hers in the fashion world as well, perhaps even "fighting" with similar clothing styles and motifs to see who can do it better. Whether they patch things up or continue the drama would remain to be seen!

------ PISCES

Possible Occupation: For some reason I see her going in a lot of potential directions. She could work at a spa, an aquarium, or maybe she'd be a swimming instructor/competitive swimmer, all options to keep her water/fish theme. Whether or not her and Aquarius are married in this AU may alter one or both of their occupations as well.

Possible Name: Cherise, perhaps to match her predominantly pink/red colours in canon and cheerful personality. Depending on her occupation, I can see others calling her "Miss Cherry" as a nickname (the word cherry derives from cherise, and cerise is French for cherry).

Relationship with Zodiac Companion: This also depends on how you'd approach Austri in this AU, as even if she's still a circus performer like she is/was in canon, how she and Pisces meet would likely be very different regardless. They don't necessarily have to be connected outside of meeting each other at some point though. I could see Pisces simply knowing Austri for being a performer at the aforementioned circus or even as a mute comedian that specializes in physical comedy instead of verbal. Considering Austri's canon connections to Capricorn as well, perhaps they know each other through association that way.

------ OPHIUCHUS

(Including him too because he's sort of the 13th zodiac and it would feel wrong to exclude him considering how important he is to canon lol) Possible Occupation: Considering he's a healer in canon, I'd imagine him being in the medical field would be appropriate, especially since the caduceus (a symbol associated with Ophiuchus and traditionally represents healing) is still used as a medical symbol today. Depending on what you wish to do with Scorpio/Scutum's part of the AU, you could have them be connected (for better or worse!)

Possible Name: No idea, sorry ^^' It could be similarly long/complicated as his constellation name, and maybe has a degree of unintentional intimidation to it. For me at least, the name Ophiuchus always felt very grandiose even if my character with that name is of a more humble nature comparatively, so you could play around with that depending on what angle you wish to take with his character's personality/goals in this AU. Is he still considered an antagonist here, or something else entirely?

Relationship with Zodiac Companion: A similar situation to Cancer where you don't necessarily have to humanize Serpens and Cetus and could make them pet snakes, though having them be Ophiuchus's assistants at his medical practice could also work well too, since that's basically what they do in canon (and the caduceus imagery often includes two snakes already).

[sluttyten]

My afraid-of-romance ass has just been asked by another regular customer for my number and the stupid thing is that again I do think this guy is kinda cute and I really probably should say yes