#maybe ill do a part two about this

[bl-inkstone]

every action has an equal opposite reaction, but love and hate aren't opposites now, are they? it's love and indifference! here, traveler, have some soft childe thoughts about some of the little things you love about him that he'd never think twice about <3

walking with childe, if you asked anyone else, is a workout and a half with how long his strides tend to be. but with you? it's almost second nature for him to slow down and match your pace so that you don't have to do that awkward half-walk-half-jog the traveler and any of his shorter companions have to do when they travel with him. it doesn't even look like he's aware of it, you've noticed. it's like he's so attuned to you and your comfort that childe just adjusts himself accordingly without thinking. and he stands so close to you as well! in the early days of your friendship, the two of you would often almost trip or bump into each other with how close you'd end up being during your walks. it's something he used to apologize for ("sorry, i'm used to being close to others when walking. it's easy to lose companions in the snow if you're not careful"), but no matter how hard childe tried to keep a reasonable distance, he'd always find a way back to your side. thinking back on it now, it was really cute how he'd gravitate to your side even before either of you realized that your feelings were, very much so, requited. does that make up for all the bootprints and scuffs he's left on your shoes from walking too close though? no.

more often than not, holding hands with childe means resigning yourself to losing autonomy over whichever hand he's clinging onto for the foreseeable future. he gestures quite a bit when he talks — a habit he's picked up from watching his older siblings tell stories when he was a child and integrated into his own way of speaking as he grew older — and he can sometimes forget he's still holding your hand when he moves to gesture just how big the fishes are back in morepesok when retelling stories of his homeland to his companions. even when you're just walking in the harbor and conversing, every other statement is accompanied with a flourish of his wrists and some other grand gesture, and you usually just watch him fondly from his side. you think it's so endearing that childe never lets go of your hand, not even once, through his entire performance. he casts frequent glances your way as well when you walk and talk together this way, like he's making sure he still has your attention that he, in all his puppy-like glory, can never seem to get enough of. he squeezes your hand, rubs his thumb over your knuckles, slides his forefingers down to feel at the pulse he loves listening to at night on your wrist. he'll take any excuse to hold your hand and maintain some form of skinship, and you especially love it when it looks like he's forgotten he's still holding you but hasn't forgotten that he's connected to you. you think about telling him that, sometimes, but you don't think you'd be able to properly explain to the man the difference between the two.

eating with childe is a comfort you look forward to at the end of every day. he loves eating meals with you and just winding down together at a table that he still, sometimes, can't believe he can share with you, but what you love most about your dinners is just how domestic he can be about the whole affair. it's an unspoken agreement between you that whoever doesn't cook is the one that sets the table. when childe's the one at the stove, he can be very fussy about you not eating anything any light snacks while dinner is still cooking because "you'll ruin your appetite, honey. don't let my efforts go to waste!" he's very big on healthy and hearty meals, so you always end up pleasantly content when you go to sleep. it's so easy for you to tell when a dish is cooked by him too. but when you're the one cooking... well. he's always been the type to say things like "do as i say, not as i do." he's a menace in the kitchen, always trying to sneak "taste tests" from whatever you're cooking and chattering your ear off about his day as he goes about fulfilling his assigned role. he does set the table pretty well, thankfully, and your playful annoyance at his antics subsides just a little when you notice him placing the "nicer" china in front of your chair and opening your windows just a little to let in the cool night breeze. childe talks to you throughout the entire process, moving around you in the kitchen like it's a song he's danced with you for years even though at this point, you've only known each other for two. childe habitually leans down to press soft, chaste kisses on the side of your head when he passes by too, and it's something that never fails to send the butterflies in your stomach off in a frenzy. honestly, at this point? you might as well just come out and say that your favorite parts about eating with childe is how easy it is to see your future with him. (and if you ask him, he'd say he loves how easy it is to see his future with you too.)

[more soft childe thoughts posting! this time, about the little quirks and habits that you've noticed and find so so endearing bc even though i love childe being down atrociously bad for his beloved, the scale must be balanced. if he's a simp, the reader must simp in return.]

[xxplastic-cubexx]

chat i think im gonna be sick

(Powers of X #6)

[wyrmwhispers]

On the idea of “is Paul lying about this being the best path” my interpretation is no, he's not. At the very least not purposefully lying, although it may not be the actual truth. And by that i mean that there's no future where all the Harkonnens die miserable painful deaths and then yippee the Fremen rule Arrakis and Paul is there living happily ever after with Chani, that he sees. but what i do think is true is that the path Paul chooses is the one that allows him to meet all his goals which, in relative order of priority I'll say are:

revenge on the harkonnens

keep the people he loves alive (jessica, chani, alia)

free the fremen from harkonnen control (maybe, if it's convenient or if he has time)

and the really shitty thing about this list is that number three is extremely convenient and helpful for number one but not in a good way and number one is really non-negotiable for him. Like from his perspective he needs revenge against the Harkonnens, that's why he joins the fedaykin because fighting against the Harkonnens like that feels like revenge. But the idea of taking it all the way to the top and getting revenge not just against the Harkonnens but also the emperor for killing his family and the entire imperium for standing by and doing nothing is too tempting for him to ignore. And he caveat on the second point is that the people he loves being happy isn't necessary just that they're alive. (*cough cough* Chani in the movies *cough cough*)

So i think that the future Paul picks, the narrow way through is the one that satisfies all those best and you'll notice that “do right by the oppressed indigenous people” and “don't murder 62 billion people” aren't really on there. not because he doesn't care about those but… he doesn't really in comparison to the aforementioned goals. Post-water of life, he sees "the best path through" where he gets everything he wants and sees the jihad as an acceptable price and reasons it as "inevitable" whether or not it actually was.

all of this means that yeah, to him there very well may only be one way and yeah the one that he chooses is the best one from his perspective even if you've read the books you'll know that he kind of fails at point number two in trying to protect both Chani and Alia.

Lastly, in the later books Leto II talks about the Golden Path and that its the only way to save humanity and blah blah blah. Frank Herbert pretends like he mentioned it in Dune and Dune Messiah but he didn't. Although I do believe he had some ideas about it in Messiah but it wasn't fully formed until Children of Dune. How I always interpreted that in retrospect is that Paul saw the Golden Path but wasn't willing to make the sacrifices necessary (becoming a sentient sandworm god, living for four thousand years, etc. which... fair) and tried to half walk the Golden Path without ever fully committing to it and fucks it up and leaves it to Leto II. All of which to say, the Golden Path isn't a thing in the original book so the "narrow way through" is not the Golden Path because Frank Herbert hadn't made it up yet and its not what I'm talking about.

[jasontoddenthusiastt]

I think fans want Jason to be a good person or be becoming one. To have a character that is well meaning and compassionate but decided murder is ok and to stand against main heroes who’s beliefs and actions go against the people he cares about and wants in his life. It’s confusing for people. People want their fav characters to be happy. But Jason can’t have his family’s support and follow his moral code. He’s cares about people and Gotham, and he’s an asshole who kills. It’s messy. It’s not black and white. I don’t even think Jason cares about being a good person or in the right anymore. I think he cares about what will save the most people instead.

Oh my goodness gracious I’ve been bamboozled

Batman’s definition of Good is not synonymous with absolute good/right no matter how much dc insists it is. Torture, battery/assault, surveillance, those are all condemnable actions too. I won’t get into the exhausting and frankly dumb debate of comic book morality wrt killing because I’ve already reblogged plenty of posts from other people who explained my thoughts on the matter far better than I ever have the patience to sit down and articulate. I also just think the notion that there’s something to be done about fictional characters who kill nazis and senseless murderers is stupid. Jason’s point is that the “main” heroes’ sanitized definition of right has its unaddressed holes and flaws which ultimately result in more preventable fatalities, and that he’ll work to correct those missing spots.

He doesn’t not care about doing what’s right. What he doesn’t care about (at least during his Winick characterization) is whether Batman thinks he’s right or wrong, because he sees the flaws in Batman’s methodology (and since he has a mind of his own). Batman’s methods alone cannot address Arkham’s revolving door and the rogues that come and go through those doors who have no intention (or capability from the doylist pov) of ever changing or undergoing redemption. Jason knows that he’s minimizing the number of preventable deaths by killing his targets, typically Characters Who Simply Do Fucked Up Shit Just Because, Why The Fuck Not?

Secondly, Jason is compassionate … to a fault. That was his fatal flaw. If he wasn’t so hell-bent on saving his potential birth mother he just met from that bomb despite everything she did to him prior, he could have protected himself instead, however slim his odds of survival were. What about his relationship with his other parents? He was a caregiver during his early childhood years for Catherine, until her death. Even mature adults who are financially stable find being a caregiver to a dying parent to be extremely burdensome on their bodies and minds, but he never complained about it or resented Catherine for being unable to care for him. Despite how none of his parents have really been what he needed them to be, he doesn’t blame them for their failings, and even continues to think highly of them (Bruce included).

And post-death? Enter Lost Days. Despite being dead set on plotting his revenge on Bruce, he constantly sidelines this in order to save other victims who are helpless like he once was. His own anger, trauma, and mission don’t remain his priority. (Sound familiar? Something something my own trauma above my son’s, mission above all else, etc.). Why would he waste precious time and risk his own life to do this if he wasn’t empathetic towards these victims or didn’t care about doing the right thing. He is simultaneously horribly traumatized and full of rage, and also incapable of ignoring what’s happening to victims around him (even as he claims that it’s indeed not his priority). And in that same vein, the entire premise of his rebirth outlaws run was that he doesn’t care if the public views him as a villain, an outlaw, so long as he can protect Gotham. And anyway where is this portrayal of him not caring about being in the right anymore. Almost every modern Jason story is about him grappling with where he stands with Bruce/Batman. During the early 2000s was probably the last time he did not care (hello, tentatodd??).

Jason has very evidently been portrayed as a kind and compassionate character. He is also simultaneously a calculated killer who doesn’t hesitate to kill when he deems necessary, and does so without remorse. It’s called being a Complex Character With An Edge™ that as you said, people so often claim to love. However when he fulfills that latter part, that seems to upset people because “killing bad”, and they then try to shave off and round out all his edges and claim he shouldn’t be that angry. In that case I guess you should just stick to liking traditional one-dimensional characters instead of claiming to like Jason but then encouraging his character assassination attempt by dc. Lol.

Lastly, who said anything about the batfam making Jason happy? Just because he’s written nowadays to want acceptance from Bruce (a shoddy attempt at forcing a non-existent nuclear batfamily), doesn’t mean that it’s a sound decision or that it does his character justice. I certainly don’t empathize with the idea that Jason needs the family’s approval or acceptance to be happy. (And anyway he has enough outlets for angst and pain aside from the batfam hello explore his other sources of trauma and do more deep dives into how he thinks when he’s alone). I don’t want them to magically make up and become one big happy family. This is not disney Lol. Besides, there are plenty of stories from dc that have that type of “wholesome” (hate that word utilization) characterization for Jason (Li’l Gotham, Tiny Titans, wfa, and even new stuff like the brave and the bold mini) and that is sufficient imo. Jason fans who are invested in the character deserve accurate, nuanced characterization and well-written stories, whether they be from his robin days (e.g., Batman: The Cult) or as red hood.

[todayisafridaynight]

whatever og text i had in mind for this post about ko shibasaki looking like sayama in this movie is completely cancelled on account of utsumi (this character)'s first name being kaoru and i only found this out cause i was looking up her name just to be sure when making this post

like jesus christ i legally have to make this post now

[bittsandpieces]

.

[bonefall]

Briarlights death makes sense to me. As much as I love her character, the movement technology you’ve come up with wouldn’t be enough to keep her alive in a society where her nether regions are constantly exposed to the outdoors. She would get UTIs and kidney infections very quickly, which would be fatal when you can’t feel pain. My partner has to use catheters to avoid them (he is paralyzed in the same spot Briarlight would be.)

I think it’s disingenuous to have a character that’s paralyzed but have no other health problems or concerns regarding it, even if it’s uncomfortable to think about for some readers. It’s just as ableist to minimize the additional struggles she’d face as it is to kill her off unnecessarily.

Not accusing you of ableism, but expressing my concern. They’d need to find a way for her to poop and pee in a way that’s sanitary and a way to combat infections long term - even if the thought is “gross” to some people it’s the reality she’d have to live with. She should, at the very least, remain immunocompromised.

That is a valid concern. I will keep this in mind-- I'll make sure to note her immediately being cleared out of camp at the first sign of sniffles to avoid it. My cats can do some very minor building and there are now several cats on Jayfeather's Garden Patrol, it wouldn't be too much of a problem to make that area into a comfortable "satellite camp".

I do want to add though that my most important guiding principle is a stronger narrative which includes better portrayals of disabled characters, not perfect rugged woodsman realism. The medicine I add and the guides I write are in the hopes of better representing the lives of the real-life people who see themselves in the fantasy battle cats.

Realism does factor into that of course! But it goes out the door the minute it would smash up against a disabled character's inclusion. This is a series for human beings like your partner; as close to it as I can get by bending the setting when needed.

For example, Epilepsy

Epilepsy was deadly before modern medicine. Full stop. The herbs I created for that guide would not save someone like Shadowsight, whose convulsions are at extreme risk of turning into Status Epilepticus. It would help manage, but Shadowsight's life would have been very brief.

All the chamomile in the world wouldn't replace phenobarbital... or even the older medications, barbituates. Barbituates have been replaced and good riddance, but it's important to understand that even this drug known for causing EXTREME lethargy and horrible side effects was revolutionary. It saved countless lives.

But I'm not here to write a story for the real-life horror that is epilepsy in a pre-modern society. I'm here for the parent who personally thanked me for making their daughter feel less alone.

Evil spirits attacking the living! God knocking over trees! Attacking a bulldozer! That all happens; there's no reason they can't help Briarlight too!!

But I'll make sure to include her being immunocompromised. And I'll include ways they handle that. Just like I included a cat engineer who made a blanket sled.

So... suggestion accepted! I will keep this in mind.

Briarlight's Canon Death

...I will maintain though that the canonical death of Briarlight was one of the worst, most short-sighted, cruelest decisions that has ever been made in this series.

Because ultimately Briarlight is not a real person. She is a writing choice. She is a character based on Vicky's paralyzed cousin, "Dan," and Briarlight was directly modeled on Dan's personality and recovery.

What did the new writing team do, the minute they were writing a series without Vicky? Killed Briarlight to fucking greencough. For shock points. Narrative moves right on back to the MAIN conflict-- Alderheart having feelings for Velvet and Jayfeather enforcing the vow of chastity. ShadowClan officially falls apart in the background lol

It was never about realism, or realistic portrayal of disability.

This series doesn't care about realism when cats have bloody Freddy Kruger deaths in their sleep, or when shadow goo starts eating cat hell, or when lightning strikes Shadowsight. But they suddenly care about how realistic it is that the only paralyzed character survives greencough?? No! Of course not!

In the middle of the CONSTANT "Ohh she's finally in heaven where she can run and jump and not have a disabled life"? And the infamous Squirrelflight's Hope line, "You don't want to be alive again, Squirrelflight! You might become disabled like BRIARLIGHT"

(WHICH BTW THEY STILL HAVE NOT REMOVED DESPITE PROMISING IT YEARS AGO)

I absolutely do not believe for a second that they had a realistic portrayal of an immunocompromised cat in mind when they did it! Hell, screw it. I'll just say it outright;

I firmly believe that the new writing team killed Briarlight because they did not want to deal with her.

I flatly refuse to give them charity towards this choice. At NO POINT did they earn a speck of good faith. They continued every negative trend that was set up by the previous writers (including Vicky herself tbf), and went a step further by killing her to "we need to get rid of some randos" disease.

Not only that; but the Clan dynamics were NEVER the same after her death, because there was no character who could replace her personality. In this cast of cardboard cats, they plucked out one of the few optimists with a clear, unique perspective, not shared by ANYONE else.

My ire wouldn't JUST be because they happened to kill a disabled character in the way they did (though that is frustrating on its own imo). It's because it was Briarlight.

I hope every writer involved with the decision to kill Briarlight in the "Nothing is Happening! Quick! Kill Someone!" book of AVoS chokes on it. I will DIE on this hill and my blood will never wash out of the grass.

[ghosts-devilman-wip]

Dumping out devilman thoughts today.

I know I'm far from the first person to think about this, but I don't feel like it's given enough attention. What I'm talking about is the really noticeable lack of discussion about god as a character/driving force throughout the story (and I mean the lack of discussion on the fandom's end as well as within the stories.)

Like, you really have the all-powerful being who is the only thing in existence with the true ability to completely stop the war - to completely halt the cycle of violence. But they never intervene. Not until humans and devils have all destroyed one another. Not until Lucifer has finally killed Akira, and he's all that's left, alone on a rock on a decimated earth, watching the stars and expounding on the concept of love to a cooling corpse.

THEN god intervenes. To scorch it all and start it over again, only for the same story to play out time and time again. The only consistent exception to this, really, is whenever divine force is shot down in the beginning phases of the war. Though usually, this just ends up causing destruction in a different way. It never saves anyone, it just overpowers a show of force from the devil's side.

You could make the argument that god isn't the same all-powerful being here that he's seen as being in a larger cultural sense outside of this story. But I'd both disagree and say that's a bad take. He clearly carries more power than anyone else, as again, when he does intervene it overpowers everything else. And yeah there's the idea that he didn't make devils, but that doesn't make sense to me either. So much of this story is based both on christian mythology (or dantes inferno, but still).

To rewrite the concept of god in this way. And to practically ignore this character's existence. ESPECIALLY in a story that is so much about the cycle of violence and the failings of humanity. It does the whole thing such an injustice.

In devilman, the war between devils and humans is ultimately constructed by god himself. Because it all comes back to the fact that he had to have created the devils in some manner - how else would they have come about? - and then tossed them aside to make room for humans. Running parallel to the way he tossed aside one of his own angels for going against god's authority. An angel who then went to the devils, joined with them and led them toward liberation.

What else were the devils supposed to do? What else was Lucifer supposed to do?

God is absent from the story until there's nothing left. Then he does it all over again. For what? To punish lucifer and the devils? Again and again for their refusal to lay down and die quietly? And it's not to protect humans - how many human lives are destroyed in the process?

God is absent from this story and we continue to let him be. We focus so much on Akira and Ryo, and on trying to save them and rewrite their connection into something that can be saved. We try to rewrite it so Miki lives, and the war is averted. But that doesn't make sense to me.

This story has already been written to be a tragedy. The omniscient, all-powerful god of the story has decided that's what it's meant to be.

As long as lucifer lives to the end of the story, it will be scrapped and retold again and again. And if lucifer were to die? That would still be a tragedy, let's be honest.

The cycle of violence has already been set in motion, and it will not be stopped so easily. That's important to me. Because ultimately, erasing the tragedy of it suggests there would be an easy solution to the world's problems - that escaping oppression is as simple as being kind and quiet in the face of your own eradication, that stopping a war is as simple as crying in front of the right person, and that making the right choices are as easy as listening to what you're told is "good."

Devilman is a tragedy, but I don't think that's inherently nihilistic. I think it can make you think and ask questions and consider layers to the problem. It will not give answers, because it's not that easy - because if we had those answers then the world wouldn't be the way it is. What we see at the end isn't meant to be a prediction, or even a threat. It's simply null - this is complex and painful, and our characters were not able to figure it out, because of that. Possibly, very likely, because they were not able to see outside of their own perspectives and drives (who could? At a certain point, that would mean abandoning feeling. There's a reason Michael is the most unsettling character in any of the stories to me.)

I mean, sure. God always had an easy answer. He probably wants the story to go this way.

[tana-draws]

my brain is so fucking stupid. I was bullied in fourth grade, my friends were like “actually erm we don’t want to be friends with you :/“ on the second to last day of eighth grade (even though we were all zoned for different high schools and would never see eachother anyway). And because of that my brain is, as my therapist and mother (two different people,) theorized, “hyper vigilant for any perceived social ostrichaztion”. The thing is it’s fucking stupid about it. Sure it has the generic “uwu your friends probably hate you secretly” thing.

But it also. Like: I’ll see a post that is somewhat negative towards a thing I like or a trait I even remotely identify with (including stuff as vague as ‘nervous’ or ‘writer’) and I’ll be like “yeah that makes sense” or “I don’t agree but I also don’t care”. But then my brain will repeat the negative phrase on loop for like a week. And will trigger physical reactions (crying, shortness of breath, etc) in response to it. I’ve actually had public panic attacks over things I give 0 shits about because my brain is a fucking helicopter parent.

[faaun]

the forest looks like heaven today i woke up feeling the heaviest weight at the top of my heart

[alchemiclee]

been looking in tags for a few days now to see if anyone else found the whole high cloud quintet and related story to be a bit.....poorly written, nonsensical, contradictory, full of plot holes and loose ends, etc. apparently i'm not the only one. (and i'm not even talking about shipping stuff, because any time I saw someone mad about bad writing, someone always replies to be homophobic and laugh about failed ships. weirdos.) it could have been so good but was thrown into the garbage for the most part (IF you noticed all the plot holes and contradiction. if not, then it's a fine enough story tbh. I expect most people to see it on surface level and not read all the little hidden lore bits and try to piece it together like my autistic brain did. which is ok! enjoy it if you liked it and ignore me 😆)

[tokruta]

I’m starting to hc Miguel as Miguel Rivera (from Coco)’s great grandson.

It’s mostly because I’ve been doing my family tree for a good while now, so most of my free time is occupied with tracking down Mexican ancestors, looking for resources to better understand the different settings they lived in, reading old Spanish handwritten records, etc. So, with genealogy on the brain, and seeing some names repeated down family lines…I think having Miguel O’Hara be descended from Miguel Rivera would be a neat lil idea.

Like, imagine little Conchata growing up in Mexico with a famous musician grandfather who loves her and dotes on her and her cousins. Yes, he’s a famous musician, but he’s a family man first and is always ready to pass down stories from his life and his loved ones, dead and living. She loves her grandfather so much she decided to name her firstborn son after him.

She wasn’t always the best mom, especially to Miguel, but she passed down those stories and traditions, including singing and a love for music. And Miguel grows up loving to sing, and being good at it but keeping it to himself and Gabriel because George hated to hear it.

Gabriel, on top of being a good artist, is a pretty damn good guitar player and also has a great voice. He mostly keeps it on the down low, though, even in adulthood.

Miguel didn’t pick up any instruments, but he sometimes wishes he picked up the violin before he became Spider-Man. Instead, he let Gabriela pick out an instrument she wanted to play, and if she happened to pick the violin, the onions that manifested were a complete coincidence.

Plus, it’s literally canon that Miguel goes to Mexico to celebrate Día de Los Muertos and that his suit in the comics was one he wore to the festivals. I think it’s better for that to be a thing he does bc the holiday is a big deal in his family rather than bc it’s an excuse to party or whatever.

His mother had an ofrenda and so does he.

Miguel Rivera is still alive (he was born in like 2005, he could totally still be alive in the 2090s and 2100s, so he is in my hc ☺️) so Miguel visits him in Mexico, too. Miguel is shy about singing in front of anybody, but his bisabuelo is able to bring him out of his shell, especially by singing his old songs that Miguel grew up listening to.

The more I think about it, the more attached I become to this hc.

Now I want to write a fic where Miguel is visiting a dimension in the 2020s (616B, 1610B, etc) and he happens to see that a young Mexican musician is starting to trend, and it’s his bisabuelo Miguel as a young man 🥹 so he buys tickets and flies to Mexico 🥹 to watch him live 🥹 and yes he knows this isn’t his bisabuelo but he is as close as he can get to a young Miguel Rivera at the start of his long and successful career and it just hits him in the soul 🥹

And if Miguel Rivera happens to notice a 6’9” giant at his show, who looks strangely familiar, watching him perform like it’s the best thing he’s ever seen… who’s to say.

[darkartistyt]

lore time :] (the crossover arc)

Inspired by @/citrus-soda's au, this au (name pending) started out as just a combo between two ideas I had: what if the Bracelet of Tiamat had extra powers, and what if Katrielle and Raphael interacted? Of course, because I'm me, things got out of hand quick, and now there's a whole story and stuff

I also decided it was going to be one of my pl harpy aus specifically because I didn't know how else to get the ball rolling with the bracelet nonsense. All you really need to know about the harpy aus is that at one point in the main one, Luke has a vision (he's a seer) of some distant-ish future, and one person in his vision was somehow able to look back through it, which shouldn't be possible with the way visions work in this magic system. Magic fuckery ensues, creating a bunch of issues in alternate timelines which result in them diverging so much they become separate universes

In this world, the magic fuckery in question ends up creating a bunch of random space-time rifts for a minute, and Kat and Ernest just happen to fall through one that opened up on the floor in the midst of some investigation. So now they're in France in like. 2012 or whenever this game is set

Since it's post-game, I decided that how they meet Raphael is by crossing paths with him as he goes to return the Bracelet to the Louvre (as Phantom R, ofc). It senses their presence and the magic energy they carried --- it works kinda like how scents can be carried --- and activates, wrapping tightly around Phantom R's wrist so that he can't take it off

He dips after affirming that he's okay in order to avoid any potential questions of why he was trying to sneak into the museum, and he tries that night to pry it off his wrist, but to no avail. On top of that, he ends up crossing paths with them again while on a date with Marie and Charlie, and Kat recognizes him immediately and asks how he's doing

So now he has to explain not just the fact that he couldn't get it off but also how he met these two to his partners. He also makes Kat and Ernest swear not to ever reveal his identity as Phantom R, and they oblige on the condition that he help them with their predicament

The group plan to meet up at Raphael's apartment later that afternoon, which gives Kat and Ernest plenty of time to continue snooping around and seeing if they can find anything that will help them (spoiler: they don't)

When they all meet back up, Kat explains her and Ernest's situation. Marie and Raphael brief them on the admittedly weak powers they've seen from the Bracelet and Marie's violin before, but they all agree that there may be more that they have yet to unlock, which could hopefully help the duo return home. They decide to try and strengthen those powers while also still searching for other methods of opening portals and whatnot in the meantime

Given how small Raphael's apartment is, Charlie agrees to take in the two, even though Ernest wanted to find a hotel or something so as to not burden him. He reluctantly agrees only because Kat argued that it would be a lot easier (and cheaper) to accept Charlie's offer versus go through the process of converting the money they had, especially when taking into account the fact that they were from the past, if not an alternate universe entirely. Charlie does have to explain their predicament to his father, but Inspector Vergier ends up being surprisingly willing to help

Over the next few days, Raphael unlocks stronger and stronger powers, from animal whispering and heightened senses to stuff like teleportation and the ability to breath fire like a dragon. Speaking of dragons, he begins to undergo a physical transformation over the last three days they're all together, which slowly turns him into some weird dragon-like creature. All the while, they're trying to figure out how the Bracelet's power works and trying to see if they can at some point re-open that portal that sent Kat and Ernest to their world

On the fifth day after their initial meeting, they decide to go back to the place the portal was and see if there's any remaining magic there, since at that point Raphael might be able to sense that stuff. They set out rather late into the night, and even though he's exhausted, he hides it and tries to see if he can sense anything, and he manages to pick up on something very, very faint

While they're trying to determine if anything can be done, the Bracelet suddenly starts to loosen itself from his wrist. Its eyes glow, then its body. It begins to straighten out, moving strangely organically. Then, it spirals up his arm and shoots directly into his mouth, nearly choking him

Everyone's like "WHAT THE FUCK?!" and rush to ask Raphael if he's okay, to which he says he's fine, but they can all tell he's lying. He feels dizzy, like he could faint at any moment, and his vision's starting to distort, as if the world around him was glitching out (Kat can kinda detect a distortion too, but not as strongly, meaning though a lot of the Bracelet's magic fuckery was internal, it was strong enough to spill out into the outside world too). Before he knows it, he passes out

Marie, being the closest to him physically, is the first to check and make sure he's not a) dead or b) feverish, both of which thankfully end up being false. So she carries him home, the other three trailing behind her. They discuss what to do now and end up planning to meet up early in the morning, before Raphael wakes up, to at least make sure he's okay. Charlie also insists that if they need anything to call him --- that he'll have his phone on and nearby

The next morning is when the transformation is complete (which is what my first sketch was about). He has, in a way, fused with the Bracelet, and is now able to utilize its full power. It' starts raining as they're messing around's a rainy day, which works in their favor as there are not that many people out and about. They decide to head out and try to reopen the portal. But no matter how hard they try, and no matter what Raphael tries to do, it doesn't work. Eventually, Charlie asks if, instead of opening a portal, they try teleporting to their world instead, since the leftover magic is still there and Raphael is able to teleport, at least. They try that, and it works after a bit, but it leaves him completely drained

find themselves in some random part of town in the middle of the night. After a bit of wandering around, Kat and Ernest are finally able to recognize where they are, and they head towards the Detective Agency, letting the others crash there for the night. Given the fact that it was closer to midday in the Rhythm Thief world, no one (spare Raphael) is super tired, so they stay up for a bit trying to figure out how much time has elapsed in this world

They form a plan: Kat and Ernest will go to whoever they need to to show that they're safe and no longer missing, then Kat will go to Luke and/or Hershel (whoever she meets first) for help with the whole "Raphael's now a dragon" thing and in sending the quartet back home

The two set out kinda early the next morning, leaving the others to explain everything to Raphael (who fell asleep halfway through their conversation). They return with Hershel, who, after introductions and all that, agrees to help. Given that there isn't anything that Raphael wears all the time for her to enchant, he ends up manifesting a small armband which is enchanted to keep him in a continuous shapeshifting state and to help him control his powers better. Marie asks if they need to find where they arrived again, but he says there's no need and tells them he can transport them back home whenever they're ready

They give their thanks and say their goodbyes, and Hershel brings them back to their world, staying with them for a little while so that he can make sure his magic would be stable here (it is, so Raphael shouldn't have any issues with the armband in the future)

[killjoy-prince]

That scientist should not be 18 years old are you kidding me???

[watery-melon-baller]

its so fun :)) and awesome :)) that i cannot fucking make my brain focus on my homework :))) holy shit im gonna kill someone :)) why can't my brain just work for five fucking minutes :)) this is easy homework too I just can't concentrate on it at all :)) and it's due tomorrow morning :)))

[todayisafridaynight]

Religiously i think about one of my twitter mutuals pointing out how aoki's design is subtly asymmetrical while ichiban is more symmetrical

when i think of it, masato's design is fairly symmetrical as well isnt it.....