#no reason I have simply been incapable of drawing lately

[gromlyn]

cahir!! one of my favorite dragons in my lair atm <3

[kalinysu]

Muzan with wife reader who failed a mission and is trying to avoid him after he yelled at her? extra fluff pls

𝐒𝐎𝐑𝐑𝐘. - Muzan x F!Reader

𝐖𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬: None/Small angst. (?)

𝐍𝗼𝐭𝐞𝐬: LAST thing i’ll write Muzan for a while. 😭

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You had been avoiding Muzan for days. At first, he didn’t take the time to realize as he had been far too busy with other things to pay your obvious distancing any mind. He also never thought of you being upset with him for something that he did so often. Yelling? He’s yelled at practically everyone.

But you, you were his wife. That was the first time he had yelled at you, and you thought that he would treat you differently because you were his wife. But he yelled and got really angry with you, just like every other demon. It hurt you, more than he realized. And the fact that the two of you hadn’t talked in days and he didn’t notice, or rather didn’t care that something was up hurt even more.

You had been cooped up in your room for a while, and nobody had ever checked up on you or anything at all, not even your own husband.

Not that you expected it, everyone had been busy with the demon slayers and such. But still, he was your husband, and he had to have even a little free time at some point. You were sulking in bed, losing track of time, until finally, someone had opened your door.

“Get up, do something productive, like finding me that flower.”

Your husbands deep voice rang out as he rummaged through your drawing and took something before leaving without another word. The fact that he was now telling you only to find the flower stung. He most likely thought you were incapable of doing anything else.

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Days had gone by now, you had nothing, and it seemed Muzan was only growing more and more irritated as time went by. You had lost all hope of him ever coming to see you for even a split second of affection.

You were outside, somewhere. An unknown location, simply sitting on a hill in the moonlight. The flowers were pretty, but you couldn’t take the time to admire them. You were far too lost in your thoughts. You didn’t care for the flowers if they weren’t the one Muzan wanted.

Suddenly, you noticed someone sit down beside you.

Your husband.

Neither of you spoke, even though you really wanted to. It wasn’t an awkward silence, the two of you just knew it wasn’t the right time to talk. Well, you knew. Muzan didn’t talk because he didn’t want to or feel like it. He’s always been like that. He rarely showed affection through his words, but you didn’t mind to much, especially not anymore. You had grown used to the small gestures of affection from a while ago, but now you were convinced they had stopped.

“.. My lord if.. If i’ve done something to offend you—“ You started, not looking at him as you spoke.

“You’ve been distant.”

You looked up at him. He wasn’t looking at you, not avoiding, but simply looking across the hills. “You haven’t spoke to me in so long.. You have only uttered few words but those were orders, and weren’t frequent either.” You said, hugging your knees.

“Am I supposed to come to you? What happened to you coming to me?”

Your husband said. It sounded cold, but you knew that wasn’t his intention. You usually always came to him, showing affection and in return receiving affection back. He was right, you never went to him anymore. But..

“It seems you’ve been mad at me..”

“I was mad, but that’s no reason not to come to me. I’ve been irritable lately with all these nuisances.”

“But if your irritated.. you don’t have to take your anger out o..” You trailed off, going silent before you could even finish your sentence as you noticed him glaring at you. Looking away uncomfortably you mumbled slightly. “..Nevermind— I.. It’s fine but—“

“Sorry.”

You blinked a few times, wondering if you were hearing things. You looked back at him. “Hu—“

“I don’t like repeating myself.”

You went quiet.

“Your supposed to say you forgive me.”

“Right!!— I forgive you.” You said, still a little shocked he had actually apologized. You’d never heard that word come out of his mouth before, unless he was mocking someone but that was different.

“—‘My lord’?”

“—My lord.” You added, a small smile playing on your lips at the reminder. You leaned against his shoulder slightly, and in return, he placed a hand on your waist.

“Don’t avoid me like that again.”

His hand came up to your shoulder, pulling you closer to him, before he leaned down and placed a kiss on your head. When was the last time you had kissed him. You looked up at him.

“No.”

“No? No to what?” You said, with a fake innocence, before quickly giving him a peck on the lips before he could speak.

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[roosterbruiser]

Can I request a Bradley thing where he goes in to get a tattoo and reader does his tattoo and he’s just super love stricken. Next thing he knows he’s going to get tattooed just to see reader till he finally asks her to go on a date??? 🫶🏻🫶🏻

𝐓𝐚𝐭𝐭𝐞𝐝

𝐚 𝐁𝐫𝐚𝐝𝐥𝐞𝐲 𝐁𝐫𝐚𝐝𝐬𝐡𝐚𝐰 𝐢𝐦𝐚𝐠𝐢𝐧𝐞

Honest to God, if Bradley knew that you were going to be the girl doing his tattoo today, he would've pretended to be sick to get out of the appointment. He would've just gone to a different tattoo place entirely. But it's too late now--he's here, sitting in your little cubicle with its potted plants and hand-drawn posters and knick-knacks and bluetooth speaker, and you're quietly humming as you look over his paperwork.

It isn't that he thinks you're incapable of doing his tattoo--God, no. You were the name that kept popping up when he asked around for artist recommendations, the highest rated artist in his area (and the surrounding three--but who's counting?). And he knows you'll do a good job because he's seen your work on other people and even if he hadn't, the posters on your wall are evidence alone. Bradley can draw a crude stick figure on a good day--so he is endlessly impressed with your skill.

It's just that you are the prettiest thing he's ever seen in his entire life. No, not just pretty--something above that. Beautiful, gorgeous. Fuck, you're ethereal even and Bradley hates people that say ethereal.

Everyone he talked to failed to mention that you are simply the prettiest person in every room you walk into and, Bradley knows just by looking at you, that you're probably the coolest person at every party you've ever been to.

You have big eyes that you wear bright colors on, which look almost too good against your skin and those pretty irises. Just looking at you legit makes Bradley want to bite his knuckle. You have a cool haircut, one that is polar opposite of all the Navy-issued chop-jobs he's so used to seeing, and your voice is raspy and lovely. You're wearing authentic vintage Levi's and a smooth bodysuit, one that hugs your body, one that shows the hills of your breasts so well.

Simply put--you're fucking perfect.

Perhaps the worst of it all is that you're so fucking nice. From the moment he walked through the door, you were all smiles, leading him back to your little area and talking him through everything without making him feel like an idiot. You were offering him drinks and asking what his ideas were and then complimenting his ideas. You were making all the little tweaks he wanted and not complaining about it even a little bit.

And now, as he sits on your table with his foot tapping incessantly on the tile, he's just watching your throat vibrate as you hum. It takes him a moment to recognize it, but when he does, it makes him want to rake his hands through his hair.

"Leather and Lace?" He asks you, perching a brow.

And the way you laugh, looking up at him with a bright grin as the sun kisses your face, should be illegal. You're about to put a needle to his skin and watch him cower in pain--he wishes you would take that into account and look less Goddess-like, for the sake of his ego.

"Stevie is my idol," you sigh, pointing casually to the portrait of her on your arm. He inspects it with a smile tugging at his lips, hoping his ears aren't as red as they feel. "You're a big music guy, then?"

He nods, slightly embarrassed. Isn't everyone a big music person? Who the fuck doesn't like music?

You like this guy--this guy that told you to call him Rooster for some reason. This guy who's wearing the ugliest vintage Hawaiian shirt you've ever seen. This guy who has a lewd pornstache, the one who somehow pulls off the lewd pornstache. God, this guy is still wearing his sunglasses inside, but he's just so goddamn cute. He has one of those infectious laughs and a headful of nice, sandy hair. He looks like California has kissed him--pretty. He just looks pretty.

But you can tell that he's nervous. Most people are before getting under the needle--you totally get it. Sometimes you still get nervous about it, too, despite having your arms almost all the way filled in. but you have a hard time imagining this hunk of a Navy man is nervous about a tattoo on his peck. Even just based on the scars littering his face and throat, you're certain he's been through worse.

"So," you sigh, moving your chair closer to him so he can see the paper in your hands that has the mock-up of his tattoo. He leans in and you get a whiff of sea salt and vetiver--God, he smells good. "I scaled down the legs just a bit. I was thinking some light shading through here and filling in here and here--is that okay with you?"

Rooster nods, swallowing hard, crossing his arms over his broad chest.

"It looks good," he tells you. "Like really, really good."

You beam at him.

"Well, thank you," you say softly. "I'm a big art girl."

It makes something come loose in his chest--some breath he's had bated releases through his smiling lips. You're teasing him, you're joking with him. It feels good--natural.

"So, with this detail, I'm gonna put us at three hours. Does that sound good?"

Rooster nods immediately--his afternoon is entirely clear. But the prospect of getting to be with you for three hours is exciting--so exciting that it makes his throat tight. Needle be damned, he's going to get to listen to that laugh for three hours. Three!

"Sounds great," he tells you.

You grin, clapping your hands together.

"Well, I bet we're gonna be good friends by the end of this, huh?"

He grins. He already aches to kiss you and he doesn't even know you. Rooster does consider himself a hopeless romantic--but this is a whole new line he's crossing.

You point to his shirt, a slight blush covering your cheeks.

"You can go ahead and take that off now. I'm gonna prep the area."

As he obliges, he watches as you grab a little plastic razor and some paper towels. You're putting gloves on and still humming along to music that isn't playing, mentally cataloguing everything you're gonna need presently.

"Prepping the area includes--?"

You smile, standing up. He still hasn't taken his tank-top off yet, but you can tell already that this guy is fucking ripped. Not even in the usual California way--no, this guy is like movie-star ripped. He looks like he's been plucked out of a blockbuster.

"Shaving and disinfecting," you tell him, gesturing to the razor.

He nods, sinking his teeth into his bottom lip as he finally shrugs his tank and lets it fall into the chair he was sitting in.

"At least let me buy you dinner first," he teases.

Then you laugh--it's the first time he's really heard you laugh. He likes the sound, likes that you laugh with your mouth closed and your eyes wide.

"We'll see how the tattoo goes," you wink.

You're very careful as you shave and disinfect him, humming Stevie Nicks and Don Henley still. And you can feel his eyes lingering on your face as you work, but it doesn't bother you. He has pretty eyes--you're glad he's looking at you.

"Wanna be the DJ?" You ask with a grin, nodding towards the speaker.

Rooster feels like his heart is about to fall out of his ass. If he'd have known that he was going to be DJing this three-hour tattoos session with you--the prettiest girl he has ever seen--he would've made a playlist. Like, a proper playlist. One that is carefully curated and accounts for all possible avenues of this appointment. His dad used to make his mom mixed tapes--he still listens to them. Even though he thinks that making playlists is only a fraction as romantic, he understands that it's the modern mixed tape.

"Sure," he says softly, connecting his phone. "Are you exclusively a Fleetwood Mac girl?"

You shake your head, making sure all your ink is set out on their stabilizing beds of petroleum jelly and your gloves are intact. You pat the bed and he takes the hint, laying down while you adjust the light above you. Jesus, his muscles are practically rippling and he's not even doing anything.

"Mainly," you tell him, running your fingers along his peck and trying not to drool. "But I'm pretty diverse with my music. Hit me with your best shot."

Bradley suddenly feels nervous--put on the spot. It isn't even that he is about to have a needle against his skin. No, he was in Afghanistan, he doesn't really give a fuck about three hours of needle pricks. He cares about picking a song you think is lame. God, he'd just die of embarrassment if you didn't like what he chose.

As if you can sense his sudden nervousness, you grin up at him--it has the ability to completely relax his shoulders.

"C'mon, flyboy," you smile at him, readying your tattoo gun, "give it to me."

And suddenly Bradley can't breathe. You know that--it's why you said it. You watch him suck in a breath, watch him flounder for words, watch his pupils blow. Now he knows what it feels like for you to stare at his upsettingly beautiful midsection.

So Bradley gives it to you--very subtly turning on Hot Stuff by Donna Summer. It makes the both of you laugh--you even dance a little bit for him, in a silly and unserious way that makes his heart warm.

"Bet you're a good time at the bars," he tells you with a grin.

You nod rapidly, biting your lip.

"Oh, I'm the best to go to bars with," you tell him with a grin. "I dance and I sing and I drink."

"Triple threat," Bradley grins.

You nod again, chewing on your lip again. This guy is cute--like too cute for his own good.

"Few and far in between," you say, sighing. "I'm really a spectacle."

His heart is sitting in his throat. He loves the way you blush when you're being mockingly egotistical--he thinks that makes you genuine. Genuine and confident.

"I'd gladly spectate you at any bar," he says. You smile at him, the blush in your cheeks darkening as you narrow your eyes slightly. "You know, if you're up for it."

Your answer is a resounding yes--you know that already. But you can't just give it to him like that--you like to keep guys on their toes. Especially Navy boys.

"Actually, I have a two-tattoo minimum dating requirement," you sigh, shrugging.

He smirks at you. He can do this--he can do the chase.

"Is that so?"

You nod.

"Unfortunately," you say.

"What's your availability look like tomorrow?"

There's that sweet laugh again--it's bigger this time. God, Bradley loves to make you laugh. You just look so fucking happy. Happiness looks really, really good on you.

It isn't hard for him to imagine that you really are the best person to go to the bars with. He can imagine you in a pretty little skirt, sweat dampening your hairline as you twirl on the dance floor, the golden lights above you reflecting off the glitter on your eyelids. He can imagine that your warmth would be enough to heat the entire place. You seem like someone who is just down--down for anything and everything. He likes that.

"Ready?" You ask sweetly not a moment after, still laughing quietly.

He just nods, blinking rapidly at you.

The three hours honestly flies by. The pain really isn't all that bad, not when you're making conversation the entire time. By the end of the tattoo session, he knows where you grew up and that you don't have a boyfriend and that you have a cat named Strawberry and that you don't have a boyfriend and that your favorite food is street tacos and that you don't have a boyfriend and your first concert was Neil Young. Oh, and that you don't have a boyfriend.

And by the end of the tattoo, you know that Bradley is getting the tattoo in memory of his father, who was also in the Navy. You know that he has an affinity for Jerry Lee Lewis. You know that he has a vintage car and an endless collection of vintage Hawaiian shirts. You know he's gonna be stationed here indefinitely and that he hangs out at the local Navy bar--The Hard Deck. And you know that he is endlessly pleased that you don't have a boyfriend.

"Careful sitting up," you warn softly as you take your gloves off. "You've been laying down for a while. Want a hand?"

Bradley feels totally fine. He doesn't want to brag, but he's pushed his body to the brink in his life. Laying down for three hours having a conversation with the prettiest girl he's ever seen is like a luxury for him. But he wants to touch you--so he lets you grab his hand, lets you help him sit up.

And then the two of you are close--like close enough that he can smell that sweet, flowery musk on your skin. He can see the little flecks of his favorite color in your eyes and the way your lashes fan out over your cheeks.

And you can see his scars when you're this close, these pretty white lines that roll over his skin like ridges on a map. You like scars--as an artist, you think they're part of what make bodies art. They're the human equivalent to an eraser smudge.

He doesn't move for a moment, just looking down at you with that sweet smile, just letting his eyes wash over you. And you don't move from his gaze--you feel totally comfortable in it. You haven't known Bradley for long, but you're a good people reader. You can tell that this man, intrinsically, is a good person.

"Don't you wanna check out your new ink?" You ask with a teasing smile.

He makes a show of glancing down at his chest with his eyebrow perched. Then he hums and nods in approval. When he looks back up at you, you're biting a grin of your own.

"So," he starts softly. "Your availability tomorrow?"

eeeeek fun fact about me: I have eighteen tattoos! so it would by me greatest HONOR to write this little fic!!

[jynxeddraca]

BG3 Drabble - Astarion/Tav Moonridge

Wrote this up one day because I had absolute fluff on the brain and was impatient to get to the romance part of the fanfiction I'm writing. It's just a short, cute, fluffy thing about Astarion and my Tav - post confession - where she wants help sleeping and Astarion is privately suspicious of what her "real" intent is. All my original posts about Baldur's Gate 3 are located here: [Link] If you just want the AO3 link, that's here: [Link]

Astarion was a little skeptical of Tav’s motives when she asked him to lay on her when they went to bed.  The excuse she’d given him was because she’d been having troubles falling asleep and said it would help.  While she had assured him, multiple times, that she really was fine not having sex until he was ready, there was still a paranoia in the far back of his mind that it wasn’t true.  That she was far less okay with it than she claimed.  That this was some kind of manipulation to entice him.  That part of his brain had him all but convinced this was a scheme.

“I promise it’s nothing nefarious I just…sleeping with you on me is comforting.”  Tav had admitted, sounding embarrassed and face flushing.  “No sex, I swear.”

Hesitating only a little bit, he’d agreed – as of late he found himself incapable of telling her ‘no’, especially not to any kind of bedroom activity.  Once Tav laid back on his bedroll, Astarion stretched out over her before carefully lowering down.  Placing his head over her chest, he slowly put his weight on her.  Waist resting between her legs, arms bracketing her torso before sliding up under her shoulders, so his hands were by the pillow.  Her heart steadily thumping under his ear as he settled.

“Comfortable?”  Tav asked uncertainly.  Her hands lifted and moved around him. One hand found his hair and slowly, gently, she carded her fingers through it, nails gingerly scratching his scalp as she did so.  The other hand gently rested on his shoulder, running her thumb idly up and down soothingly.  However, he made a face when he felt her legs shift – certain they were about to wrap around him.  Instead, they both simply bent at the knee, one a bit more than the other, and went still.  It took him longer than he would ever admit to realize that she was just shifting to be more comfortable.  Same way she did every time she’d fallen asleep under him.

“I am.”  Astarion said softly.  He wasn’t lying.  Physically, this was comfortable for him.  Emotionally though, it was far less comfortable.  They had gone to bed like this before, more than once, but it had always been after a vigorous round of sex when both of them had been too lazy to move apart from each other.  Any other time he rested on top of someone like this had been for the same reasons.  Even his body knew this and, despite still having clothes on and not wanting to do anything, there was a twitch in his groin anticipating something more energetic to come.  As he felt the twitch, Astarion was relieved that he was taller than her, from his position her pelvis was just under his stomach, no where near close enough to have felt the involuntary reaction.

“See?  It’s not so bad.”  She teased lightly.

He only gave a humorous chuckle in response.  Part of him waited on edge though, expecting her to initiate something.  Expecting any moment to feel her hips tilt or her body arch up against him.  Instead, she simply laid quietly, humming softly in the dark, drawing her fingers through his hair.  Absently, her tail took up it’s usual spot, draping and curling around his lower leg.  Slowly, her humming faded, her fingers in his hair slowed before resting on his neck, her breathing evened out, and the hand resting on his shoulder went limp, sliding down.

Astarion blinked.  ‘She’s…asleep?’ The sound of her heart slowing to it’s nightly rhythm under his ear confirmed it.  Staring off to the side, head cradled on her chest, he once again felt his world crack and reorganize around him.  Which it seemed to do that more often than he liked with her.

Tav had genuinely meant it. Tav wasn’t initiating sex, or coercing him into something they agreed not to.  All she wanted was to feel his weight on her because she was having trouble falling asleep.

The urge to push himself up and stare at her was strong.  He probably would have if the feeling of her hand resting on his neck, fingers twitching softly as she started to dream, hadn’t been so damn soothing.  Instead he closed his eyes and tightened his arms around her.  ‘Damn woman.’ He thought nearly laughing.  ‘You have no idea what you do to me do you?’

[ishibishie]

been 5 months since i've continued this series so welcome back to 47(!) MORE HEADCANONS ABOUT STEVEN

- steven has incredibly thin and soft hair, a trait he got from his mother. attempting to put anything in his hair (a hair tie, bobby pins, ect) is a lost cause as whatever he tries to put in his hair WILL end up on the floor five minutes later.

- he's never educated on the latest hip trends and sayings. by the time he finally gets to understanding some new lingo, that phrase is on the way out.

- in a huge contrast to his disdain of his female fans, steven is a lot more relaxed and down to earth with his younger male fans. he'll willingly take selfies and sign autographs for younger boys who give him the respect and patience he desires!

- he's the type to always have an extra blanket on hand every night. even in the dead heat of hoenn's summer. just in case the temperature somehow drops over sixty degrees.

- a part of him secretly enjoys doing boring pokemon league paperwork, only because it gives him an excuse to not be bothered by anyone or anything.

- steven is terrible at accepting praise involving his personal achievements. if you compliment him, he'll likely start a debate on how he's not THAT special and you're just being too kind. he's humble to an infuriating degree.

- due to being raised as a pretty sheltered and spoiled child, steven sometimes has moments where he loses touch with other people in a conversation and freely talk over them. he'll just keep rambling, not knowing that who he's talking to is upset or angry until he's told to shut up.

- he's the guy with the Infuriatingly Perfect Planner. despite having a planner, he tends to scribble important details given to him on his hand/wrist instead.

- after abandoning his sinnoh vacation home, steven instantly bought another vacation home in unova to fill the void and to be close to all the caves there. he's currently looking into available real estate in the paldea region as well.

- steven almost always stands up straight and proper. if he's slouching for any reason, there's probably something bothering him. most likely about his not-straightness.

- he never tends to stay up late into the night. literally incapable of pulling an all-nighter.

- steven loves to read! you would think he's a fan of nonfiction/informational books, but has a modest collection of various fantasy and fairytale books he inherited from his mother. he also does have a pair of reading glasses he uses every so often.

- whenever it rains, steven likes to sit by a window and simply watch the rain roll through. bonus if it's in the morning and he's just finished making his cup of tea!

- he's been added to an instant messaging group with all the regional champions. he never sends messages in the chat, and has only done so once: simply telling everyone "i am muting this conversation." mute it he did.

- rarely, on some warm evenings in mossdeep city, you may be able to hear steven sitting at the cliff's edge near his house and playing a medley of songs on a flute. once word gets out, he ends up drawing a small crowd for his solo concert.

- geologists lick rocks. steven stone licks rocks.

- steven owns a mudkip! he got him from wallace, who simply handed over a mudkip to him with no warning one day. this mudkip happens to be steven's only nicknamed pokemon as he seldom sees any battle and is more of a companion pokemon: steven named him olivine.

- while great at a lot of card games, steven's best game is blackjack. do not bet anything against him if he suggests you play blackjack with him. you ARE going to lose.

- if he's on a longer trip out of hoenn, you're pretty much guaranteed to see steven when it's evening and if the hotel he's staying at has a bar. especially if he's staying in galar.

- steven is ambidextrous! he simply grew up learning how to use both hands well. he tends to use his right hand for most tasks to the point of people assuming he's right handed, but particularly favors writing (and by extension other tasks with a pen) with his left.

- his house is a lowkey mess even if you don't take the scattered rock displays into account. since barely anybody comes over, steven is content with leaving various things in places they shouldn't be, not folding clothes, among other lazy homeowner things.

- one way to tell if steven is not in a perfect headspace is paying attention to his vocabulary. he'll instinctively start using galarian terms if something's on his mind.

- if he's around mainland hoenn and has free time, steven will visit his gym leaders! he enjoys trading friendly conversation with his fellow hoenn league members.

- due to living in mossdeep city, his most frequent gym leader visits are with tate and liza. he always enjoys saying hello to the twins and making their days: the number of times steven has taken the two out for ice cream per their begging is in the double digits.

- steven owns a LOT of hand-me-down clothes from wallace. since he's considerably smaller than his friend and their clashing styles, a lot of that clothing has the sole use of making him less recognizable when he's out in public and REALLY doesn't feel like being bothered.

- rarely, you'll be able to catch steven with perfectly painted nails. it's never his own idea, though: moreso an intervention from wallace after seeing steven bite his nails again.

- steven's favorite settlement in hoenn is lilycove city. there's a contest hall, a relaxing ocean view, and he's definitely biased due to him and wallace meeting in lilycove almost a decade ago.

- for his favorite galar city, wyndon city is his pick. the few years he was raised abroad by his mother, he stayed in wyndon city!

- behind his cutesy pretty boy personality and friendly charm, there's a surprising amount of hatred for the few people steven dislikes. if you've gotten yourself onto his list of enemies, he's more than willing to fuck your day up. out of pure, unfiltered spite.

- he's surprisingly good at math. to compensate, his skills with the deeper nuances of written language are his bane. he's extremely proficient with the task of writing itself, but he cannot tell you what a haiku is or what alliteration even means.

- he has no real preference when it comes to his favorite music genre, and he's very open to listening to new styles. but fitting for his name, he does somewhat enjoy more laid-back rock music if he needs to stay a bit more alert for whatever reason.

- in the event that his reign as hoenn's champion ever ended, steven has gone on the record with some news outlets and stated that he'd have no interest in becoming a gym leader. all because he knows the chairperson of the hoenn league would kick him out due to how much time he'd spend in caves instead of doing his job.

- steven doesn't really get along with the hoenn league chairperson. once he's dropped his "cutesy pretty prince" facade during business meetings, he always has to remind himself that he dislikes how pushy the chairperson can be, and how he's treated as a prodigy being one of the youngest regional champions.

- for similar reasons, he actively dislikes geeta. he simply doesn't think too fondly of people who go too far in pushing the best out of people. this is a quite rare change for steven, as he's known for getting along with pretty much every other regional champion.

- he doesn't like small children he doesn't know. if asked to watch a small child for any reason, steven will only look at said child in a "the hell am i supposed to do with this?" way and not concern himself with them. but if a kid starts acting nicely towards him, he can't help but return the sweetness. it might be his curiosity about what it would be like to have kids, as he's not interested in having any children of his own.

- he doesn't really do much in terms of celebrating holidays. it's mostly a "oh it's a holiday today, neat" thing. he actively dislikes ANY "holiday season" event, as his mother died very close to the december festivities.

- steven is an expert at ghosting people. he doesn't like replying to emails, mundane text messages, or any of the "fun facts" wallace finds from social media and sends him at two in the morning. he's not a good texting penpal if you dislike being left on read.

- he's VERY prone to jet lag. whenever steven has to attend a meeting in another region for any reason, he'll be asleep for half of it.

- steven has made a small secret base for himself in meteor falls! having a secret base in hoenn's largest cave system is a perfect excuse for him to go caving for literal days at a time.

- the record for the longest steven has ever caved in his life stands at three weeks and two days. he did this after almost accidentally outing himself during a sudden paparazzi "interview," hoping that if he just stayed away from the public they'd forget.

- steven never reads any mail he gets. he can't be bothered to sort through a mountain of fan letters from every girl in hoenn to find official newsletters and notices.

- he never opens fangirl letters anymore, either. his floors have seen enough glitter and confetti for a lifetime.

- he's almost accidentally set his entire kitchen on fire before: all because he tried to cook a cup of cheap macaroni and cheese and forgot to add the water. wallace actually gave steven the mudkip right after this, somewhat poking fun at steven's blunder.

- out of all the regional champions, steven is one of the youngest, and holds the title of the youngest adult to reign as champion. he's doted on fairly often by cynthia and lance specifically due to this. it does not help that he's also the shortest adult champion. (throwback to volume 2: he's 167cm tall)

- he's held his position as champion since he was eighteen years old. he has no plans to step down: he's vowed to only relinquish his title if someone can actually win a league conference, take down his elite four, and then himself. he's gone as far as to say that he'll die with the hoenn champion title if nobody can get to him before his demise.

- with paldea being a place on his radar, he's shown interest in being an adjunct professor at the academy for a semester and has written letters about these wishes to the academy's director. but like all his letters he sends to other region officials, nobody seems interested in replying.

[randomvongenerico]

HELLO!

It's me, randomvongenerico. I'm finally getting around to replying to you again. 😅 Sorry about this incredibly belated response. Like, ridiculously late 😓.

I had started writing down my reply to you, and had made good progress (there were a lot of things I wanted to say, add and ask), but I was writing late at night and had to go to sleep, so I noticed I could save my comment as a draft and thought "oh, cool! I'll do that and continue later".

Except I don't know where it got saved. So I lost what I had already written down which made lose the incentive to continue because I'd have to start again. It took me this long to finally sit down again and give it another go. So once again, sorry for this super late reply that you probably don't even want to see anymore.

But anyway, I'll get on with going over the points of interest of your last reply to me and what I have to say about them. Btw, as a heads up, at some points I'm going to go on some rambles here, and at points I'm just going to start venting about some things that I've been wanting to get off my chest for some time. I just want to clarify that none of my ranting is directed at you, it's just me shouting (or I guess angrily typing) at the wind. So don't think I'm getting angry at you or anything, okay? Good? Good.

Anyway without further ado:

Sure, he still presents a huge threat to lots of people, but given that we’d just seen proof that AFO did not know about Shinsou’s power,[2] they could also have used Machia to, for example, rapidly transport the heroes to some place they could set up a second ambush to trick AFO into responding to Shinsou.  I mean, good god, AFO’s the chattiest villain in the comic; Hawks lured him into at least two extended conversations even after he’d resolved that he needed to leave.  He’s a Demon Lord and thus categorically incapable of shutting up.  And that would have been that, really.  Take control and let the clock run out; end of problem.

While that sounds like a good use of Shinso's Quirk, I can't help but feel like it'd end up being useless because then Horikoshi would just be like "oh, AfO has a Quirk that makes him immune to brainwashing or something", or simply say that AfO is THAT strong that he can break out of it. AfO, Midoriya and Shigaraki are the three characters that completely bend around any rule that they need to when they need to. The only time they don't, is coincidentally when they're facing eachother (although the plot still has them pull out curve balls anyways).

I’ve observed this problem in a few different areas, that Horikoshi sometimes writes the heroes, particularly Hawks, as not taking actions or drawing conclusions that, from their perspective, should seem sensible, well-reasoned, and with solid chances of success; instead, they simply disregard possibilities they should logically be considering but which the reader knows are dead ends, or they benefit from things they could not have known at the time they acted.  That hurts immersion because it gives the heroes victories, both tactical and moral, that they simply haven’t earned.  Shinsou’s control of Machia is a particularly egregious example.

Okay, so I'm having a bit of trouble following the first half of what you just typed there (english is not my main language, so that doesn't help), but I think I got it(?): You're saying that when a choice is going to lead to a dead end, the heroes conveniently don't follow it, even though it would've been a logically sound decision and no one from the readership would've faulted them from making said choice, even though we the readers already know it's a waste of time (well, a lot of readers would give them shit about it, actually). Did I get it right?

To be brief about it (because I’ve talked about this at length elsewhere), I don’t think the heroes should have known where all the PLF bases were, I don’t think they should have been as effective in disordered mass combat as the PLF, I think the advisors should have put up a better fight in all cases, and I think there should have been enough members of the PLF in significant positions of influence or power that the HPSC couldn’t uncover them all, leading to complications when those members realized their organization was under attack.

On one hand, yeah, things didn't get as bad as they could've. In retrospect too many things went smoothly (well, except for the massive property damage, countless dead or injured, and the whole system crumbling, but the story doesn't focus enough on that, so to the readers it feels like things didn't get bad enough).

On the other hand, I remember at the time those chapters where coming out, just how schizophrenic everyone was being. As far as the fandom was predicting, it was going to be revealed that the PLF had actually known that Hawks was spying on them the whole time, so they had been prepared for the heroes attack. But Hawks actually knew that the PLF knew that he was spying on them, so he had infromed the heroes of all the counter measures the PLF had prepared to resist the attack. But in another twist, it would be revealed that the PLF knew that Hawks knew that they knew that he was spying on them, so they fed him false information. But then things get even CRAZIER when it's revealed that Hawks knew that the PLF knew that he knew that they knew that he...

You get where I'm going?

I'm kinda glad things didn't get THAT complicated in terms of both sides one upping eachother.

That has repercussions going forward, as well: heroes clearing the board of all the (named) PLF members save Skeptic leaves the bulk of villain forces in the subsequent arcs to be prison escapees, and man, if the PLF’s moral nuance has been squandered, the depiction of the prison escapees is even worse.

I don't know how controversial this is going to be for you, but imo, the MLA already lost it's moral nuance from the moment they got absorved into the LoV. I firmly believe the MLA should've remained a completely separate faction that the heroes had to deal with on top with having to deal with the LoV and AfO.

Because a lot of things get muddled with having the MLA and LoV becoming a single group. For example, I would see a lot of villain enthusiasts being discontent with how Horikoshi wasn't devoting any time in the story to have Shigaraki, Dabi and Toga "spread their message/agenda". But the thing is, the LoV doesn't have a "message". Shigaraki, Dabi and Toga are all mentally and emotionally unwell individuals lashing out at the world for the pain they've been through. They don't have some agenda or plan for a "brighter future".

The MLA are the ones with a concept for what they want the future to be. What society they dream of. Sure, the fact that it's based around Social Darwinism is off putting (and it has some little touches of fascism), but at least it's a conceived idea and plan for a different societal structure.

I don't believe any of the original LoV members are in a mental state where they could, or would even be interested in envisioning some "new society". Maybe Spinner, but his whole character is him jumping into causes that only sound good on paper without actually understanding them or fully believing in them, so I don't think he'd be able to (or want to) either.

I have significantly more issues with the second one, but most of that boils down to the fact that the divide and conquer/Tempt and Trap plan feels crueler, meaner, and much more openly aimed at extrajudicial murder.

Mmmh. Interesting. What exactly is "crueler" about divide and conquer? I'm assuming that you're referring to specific beats in the story and not the strategy in itself. Because it is a sound strategic move. And had the story been better at making the heroes feel outnumbered it would even be the only logical course to take, and the one that would give them a fighting chance.

And like, that would all be fine and in-character for Hero Society in general and Hawks, the main planner, specifically, but with Deku, Shouto and Uraraka all starting to think Save Villains thoughts, and fresh off the traitor reveal, the kids should never have been as collectively okay with the second war’s tactics as the story has presented them as being.

Once more, this is probably something I'm missing. But why should the kids have been opposed to the plan? Again, I'm guessing you're referring to specific parts in the plan, I just can't figure what it is you're referring to.

To echo an older complaint, good god, what universe is Horikoshi living in that he thinks the people that converted a place of learning into an arena they call a “coffin in the sky” are the heroes?

Maybe he didn't make the connection? It wasn't supposed to be taken literally? It's just a name to sound cool and dramatic? I don't know. There's many things that sound wrong to us that to the japanese probably don't sound wrong due to the language barrier, or because they don't have the same perception as us.

Like, remember we're talking about the man that introduced the kickass hero name "Alien Queen" for one of the female characters just as a little movie reference, and then instead he gave her the less respectable name "Pinky". And I'm still mad about that, btw.

I’m not sure from this if you’re explaining how you read Hose Face’s attack on Midnight at the time, or if you’re maintaining that that’s an accurate read

I'm explaining that's how I had read it. That's why I asked you for clarification. I wasn't trying to claim that was fact.

Also, in the thematic/meta sense, I expect the heroes to either conduct themselves as heroes—admirable, upright, heroic—or face the narrative consequences when they fail to live up to that ideal.

And what is that "hero" ideal, for you? Are we talking Superman levels of altruism, with complete lack of self preservation, or nothing that extreme? I already know that's not the case, but I just wanted to pose the question anyway to get your thoughts. Cause even though the story sells Midoriya's behaviour as "truly heroic", that level of self destruction just for the sake of others is deeply concerning.

It reminds me how Stain's ideology is just plain wrong.

I kinda wish the story had focused on that. It would've been interesting being simultaneously presented how while the system dehumanizes "villains", fanatical and extreme ideologies such as Stain's also dehumanize heroes. The angle of both heroes and villains being victims feels like something that should've been followed more.

But I don't know. Anyway.

The hyper-encapsulated version of this conundrum is the recurring idea that attacking Shigaraki never actually prevents Shigaraki from coming back worse and more dangerous next time; the heroes are never going to achieve a different result by attacking him again but harder this time, and that’s why Deku is set up to finally try something different.[3]  I would just like it if what’s true on the micro-level could even be attempted on the macro-level.  Or, in other words, if the narrative is going to tell us that saving villains is the correct path, it can’t only demonstrate that for the villains with known-to-the-heroes sympathetic backstories.

That's actually a thing I don't get at all (or at least didn't, until the most recent chapters. Oof. Although, honestly can't say I'm surprised). The whole concept of "saving villains". What does that mean, actually? I'm interested in hearing what your take might be, since you have a nuanced take on the story and characters, even if you lean more towards the villains, you still take into account that they're criminals and their actions are not okay. Almost everyone else has too biased of an opinion, everyone leans in too heavily to one side or the other, and that's just not realistic or goes completely against what the themes of the story are. What does "saving the villains" mean to you?

The reason why I can't wrap my head around the whole thing is because there are some questions that I just can't decipher. Does it mean they all get to go free and face no consequence for their crimes, and people act as if nothing happened? That doesn't sound sensible. And if they do face consequences. Doesn't that directly undo and oppose the whole "saving villains" thing? Or is it fine? Are you still saving them if they face justice, or is granting them complete amnesty required?

I just can't understand it. So that's why I would like to know what "saving the villains" entails, in your view.

I would just like it if what’s true on the micro-level could even be attempted on the macro-level.  Or, in other words, if the narrative is going to tell us that saving villains is the correct path, it can’t only demonstrate that for the villains with known-to-the-heroes sympathetic backstories.

Yeah, but how do you achieve that, narratively? And how do you reach someone if you don't know them?

How could a high school student reach a fanatical member of a shadowy cult hell-bent on establishing a new world order?

As we saw in chapter 383, the Skull Mask villain completely ignored Mina's words. And I don't think there's anything she could've said that would've swayed him to surrender peacefully.

I just don't know if it's feasible to get every single criminal to stop with only words and diplomacy. Rehabilitation should be possible (for those that are willing to be rehabilitated at least), but you're still gonna run into criminals that simply will refuse to surrender and will require to be incapacitated.

If I had to take a guess as to why Horikoshi’s so staunchly avoided letting Mina cut loose—other than regressive gender politics—I’d say it’s that acid simply feels nastier or more morally dubious than fire.  Fire has positive as well as negative connotations; acid’s a lot more, shall we say, unilateral in the collective imagination, especially given what’s going to turn up if you run a web search for “acid attacks.”

Yes, that's exactly what I was trying to say. That's what I meant when I said that it's harder to dowmplay. I was referring to the moral implications.

Perhaps, then, because readers are somewhat conditioned to think of acid as particularly dangerous and nasty compared to fire, and because there’s a limit to how morally dubious Horikoshi is willing to (consciously) write the students, especially the girls, Mina’s sharply limited in how she’s allowed to use her acid.

Well, can't say I fault him for doing that. I would imagine the majority of the readers, if not all of them, would give Mina a lot of shit if Horikoshi wrote her using her acid more freely. It makes me sad. I imagine everyone would be wishing for her to suffer a horrible and gruesome demise, and actively rooting against her at every opportunity.

And in case you think I'm talking crazy, let me remind you that a considerable portion of the fandom gave Mina shit for "torturing Mineta". So if people hated on her for what was essentially just a silly slapstick gag that you're not meant to take seriously, then I can imagine the fandom would really be calling for her head if she used her acid to attack in fights.

That honestly made me so fricking mad. In case you're wondering what I'm talking about, people were giving Mina hate for rightfully punishing Mineta after he pulled one of his usual pervy schemes and deliverately took advantage of her in a moment of vulnerability. When Mineta harrases the girls and is a total pig they go like "it's just a joke, don't take it so seriously", but then the ridiculous slapstick moment that is the obvious punchline to the whole joke of Mineta being a pervert, THAT they decide to take seriously.

It honestly feels like there's some sort of conspiracy against Mina. Seriously, all of the other girls in the class have physically punished Mineta whenever he was being a total pig, and no one batted an eye but then when Mina does it everyone suddenly calls her a vicious monster for getting angry at him over a "little accident" and that she's being ungrateful to Mineta after he "selflessly" saved her. Did they actually miss the part where Mineta openly states that he PLANNED to smash into Mina's breasts?

I swear, this fandom makes me so fucking mad. 😤

That’s a big oof, all right.  I know about the Midnight non-connection and the issue of Mina’s anti-vengeance words having first been delivered by Shouji and relayed to the audience by Koda (it being his flashback, rather than Shouji’s), but I didn’t know there was no indication of Kiri-Mina connection until after his flashback.  Wowzers.

The only connection between Mina and Kirishima prior to his flashback was that both of their character infos mentioned that they went to the same pre school. That's literally it.

I will have to disagree with Reddit User That Guy that Shinsou’s quirk should be viewed as less villainous than Bakugou’s.  It sounds like he was conflating heteromorphobia with the bias against villains/"villainous" quirks, and while there is overlap, they’re still distinct categories.  Shinsou’s quirk inherently subordinates one’s physical body, allowing him to force his targets to act against their will, or potentially take the fall for things they didn’t willingly do.  Of course people are nervous about it or think it’s more villainous than heroic!

The guy wasn't correlating "villainy" to heteromorphia, actually. He just simply couldn't get it into his head that mind controlling someone is a morally questionable thing to do. He was saying that Bakugo, Tokoyami and Mina should receive prejudice instead because their Quirks are destructive. He was even suggesting that Shinso's Quirk would be super valuable to be used during interrogations. I'm no lawyer, but mind controling someone during an interrogation doesn't sound like something that would fly in a court of law.

Even Dabi’s fire is that ethereal blue, like spirit fires, instead of everyday orange-red!

Dabi's fire is actually blue because it burns hotter 🤓. Like the fire from the stove in an oven. I know you know that already, I'm just being silly.

Ahaha, very fair.  Honestly, Class A would have benefited tremendously from more kids with bite to them.  A Mina whose competitiveness had some real fervor to it, or a Mina who had some heaviness in her backstory she was faking her way through dealing with, would have been a good contribution to that.

That I'm not so sure of. Like, a lot of people complain that the heroes are too boring, and say that the villains are more interesting and that's why the readers tend to root for the villains more.

But I honestly just don't get how having the heroes be more flawed would make the readers like them more and root for them more.

Like, in my mind, if people already don't care for them when they're perfect goody two shoes, then I don't see why if they had actual flaws or shitty personality traits people wouldn't be actively rooting against them. You get what I'm saying?

Like if Momo was your typical cold hearted, rich mean girl, or Mina was an annoying and disrespectful gossip that invades people's privacy and spreads nasty rumors, or if Todoroki was racist towards heteromorphs, I don't see how the fandom would like them more. I think they would despise them. Would you like them more? Would you actually find yourself rooting for them like that when they're facing adversity?

I just can't see it.

Like sure, Bakugo and Endeavor are some of the most popular characters and they're heroes with serious flaws. But they're also the two most hated characters in the story. Even though Bakugo's bullying of Midoriya hasn't really been relevant in the story since ages, people still won't let that go.

That none of the students other than Shouji have ever even imagined that heteromorphs can still be victimized in this way represents an over-the-top ignorance that I have to read as either a bleak condemnation of the shallow focuses of heroes or reflective of Horikoshi’s own beliefs about discrimination and the understanding of it possessed by those who aren’t immediately threatened by it.

Or maybe Horikoshi doesn't know how to write a plot about discrimination. It could also be that the japanese perspective is so different from the western perspective that we were never going to get a story that completely aligned with our beliefs.

But I'm no expert, so I don't know.

Well, I'd still say that, feeling as strongly as I do about how morally dubious this whole second war has been, even if I were telling this scene with the same components, I probably wouldn’t be writing towards a hero success because I don’t think the heroes have earned it.

Oh, interesting. So you would write the villains winning here? I have so many questions about that.

Like, what would happen then? Would Midoriya and the other kids flee the country and train for years and return to free Japan after a time skip? I remember that was a popular theory and prediction that many readers had back when the first part of the war was happening.

If that's what you would do. What would happen to Japan then? Like, what would the villains do with the country? If you actaully have something thought up, I'd actually be interested in hearing it, since I've seen you have pretty nuanced takes.

Although, there are a couple of other things in the story that you'd have to change to allow for a time skip, because as the villains are in the actual story, if they win I don't see how there would be a Japan left to save years later. You'd completely have to rewrite Shigaraki, since his main and only goal is to destroy everything.

Also, if the PLF does create some new form of "society", I imagine it wouldn't be some perfect utopia where everything is good and fine. I actually picture them turning into a worse HPSC.

The latter would offer a less awful read on Hose Face’s personality: He’s not bringing up the death out of pure sadism, but as a psychological tactic.  The former would give him some real characterization and motives while also giving the kids something to argue against, rather than the easiest possible reaction of, “Hay did u kno Might Makes Right iz bad?”

Mocking someone's death in front of their loved ones as a psychological tactic is less awful how? 🤔 Just wondering.

So, in a scenario where Machia is up and not falling prey to Shinsou, but rather prioritizing getting to New Master Shigaraki, and the PLF is likewise loyal to Shigaraki and not AFO, I’d just let it work, because I’d be slanting this whole combat towards an overall heroic loss.  Give Mina a face to obsess over until next time but also let Kirishima get a good eyeful of it so he at least knows there’s a serious problem with his best friend and one of his hero inspirations.

"A face to obsess over until next time"? So she'd get to try again further on and kick his butt later?

Also, and this is likely just me having come to resent Kirishima for how Mina was used as a tool to further his character development at the expense of hers, but I don't like that last part much. To my cynical mind, it sounds like another "let's make Mina look bad so Kirishima can look good" situation. I know that's not what you meant, and it's all on me and my pessimism, but I can't help it.

Mineta would have a chance to weigh in, too, as he's a good middle ground: he's got his own anger about Midnight, who he adored, but he's also worried about how that anger looks on Mina. Mineta always worries about his classmates, but he's shared a pretty fair amount of incidental screentime with Mina specifically over the course of the series, ranging from her sweetly offering to put a harem moment into the band performance just for him to stuff like the Clockwork Orange gag, as well as more serious stuff like Mineta being the first one to ask aloud if Midnight's dead, with Mina warmly, and with a confidence it turns out she doesn't truly feel, reassuring him that Midnight's fine.

Can't say I like the sound of that either. Sorry, but because of how the story has always sidelined the girls in favor of the boys, this again to me sounds like "let's give Mineta development by using Mina as a tool to further his character", as well as also sounding like it makes her look bad so he can look good. Just like with Kirishima, I've come to lowkey resent Mineta, specifically for the Clockwork Orange gag that you mentioned. As you could probably tell by my previous venting, I was really annoyed at people giving Mina hate for it. So I'd rather not see her interacting with him either. Sorry. 😓

I've said before that Mineta should have had more to do in the confrontation with Midnight's killer, but that's not just about his fondness for her. It's also about him being the first to question if the heroes didn't just make the whole situation worse, and, if Mina really took Midnight's death so hard it had her thinking about revenge, it should also have been about Mina and Mineta's shared experience surrounding that death.

Since I'm not sold on the idea of Mina and Mineta interacting, how about instead we see Mina and Aoyama interacting? That could be interesting, huh?

His relationship with Mina—the ways he’s trying to live up to her example, as well as his desire to support her when she falters—is a profound motivator for him, something we see much more explicitly and from his own perspective than we do Mina's feelings about him.

Please don't remind about how Mina is used as a mere tool for Kirishima's character progress. I used to love their relationship, but now I actually resent it. It's even worse because Horikoshi gives Kirishima all the attention and all the cool moments, and then still tries to present him as the underdog when compared to her, which only makes Mina look even worse. SHE SHOULD'VE BEEN THE UNDERDOG! 😤 Every time I see Kirishima praising her I get upset. Feels like the most pàtronicing thing ever, even though I know it's not meant in that way.

That being the case, if anyone were going to be able to make an impression on Hose Face via appealing to his sense of camaraderie and desire for strength, it seems to me that Kirishima has the better groundwork in place to sell the moment, regardless of whether he could successfully “reach” Hose Face in the way that’s being attempted with Shigaraki/Toga/Dabi.

I'd put my money on "not manage to reach him". Not everyone can be talk no jutsu'd

Assuming we’re stuck dealing with him, I’d probably let the Class B kids do it.   Have Mount Lady—who was there for the Sludge Villain’s rampage using Bakugou, and therefore knows what Sludgey looks like and that he can possess people—yell for people to stay away from him.  Let there be a moment of panic and confusion, where it looks for a moment like a repeat of the mess in Chapter 1 where no one had the exact right answer to deal with him, so no one’s willing to step up.

Then, in a 1-2-3 combo move that reminds everyone why Class B is said to have advanced more quickly than Class A, and just as Sludgey lunges for someone, have Yamagi use Poltergeist to manipulate him into a steel drum barrel being held by Yui, let her shrink it down to a good tight fit before dropping it, then have Juuzo soften the ground to half-sink it, top down, then resolidify the earth, trapping Sludgey for later removal.  Ta da, a neat demonstration of the next generation outperforming the old generation when it comes to on-the-fly teamwork and decisive action even when no one individual has the perfect quirk for solving a problem.

So you think class B is better than class A?

Btw, that thing you mentioned with the teamwork actually answers one question I had. I remember, back when Death Arms returned and helped after he had quit, you stated that you loved the premise, but that you were left disappointed that he solved a problem that he was suited for solving.

Now, I gotta be honest. I thought what you wanted was for the heroes to solve problems that they were 100% not the right person to be dealing with. Like someone with a fire Quirk having to put off a fire, or something like that.

I was actaully going to question how that would be possible, since MHA has set up it's power sytem in a very "rock, paper, scissors" sort of way. The only exceptions to this are Deku and Shigaraki, who just do whatever they want. But what you were talking about turned out to not be as extreme as I thought. 😅

Although, I'm gonna play devil's advocate here for a second. Wouldn't the 1-B students trapping the Sludge villain through teamwork still count as the right people with the right Quirks solving the problem they were meant to solve?

Wouldn't it need to be a success from people whose Quirks aren't suited for the job at all, and don't even synergize well when put together?

Then again, that's asking for the impossible. Or just straight up plot armor.

So that just leaves Machia, Mina, and Shinsou.  And honestly, rather than having to power through it, I’d rather see Mina, in particular, talk her way out of it.

Me: Asks how they would write Mina's moment better.

Stillness-in-green: Tells me how he would write better moments for everyone except Mina.

Me:

I'm merely joking.

Although it is a little disappointing. This is essentially just Mina doing what she already did once before. There's nothing noteworthy, admirable or impressive about it. I would even dare to say there's no character growth.

I obviously don’t expect her and Machia to wind up breakdancing together when the stakes are as high as they are, but Mina would have at least a bit of an opening—her encounter with Machia in middle school wherein she lied to him about where the Springer Agency is.  I don’t for a moment think that Machia’s forgotten her smell—I doubt he forgets anyone’s, though he may or may not care about them otherwise.

For this version of the scene, I’d probably play Machia as more ambivalent—tired of being abandoned over and over again by the people he’s tried so hard to be loyal for, so not immediately inclined to run off after them, open to a bit more dialogue.  He doesn’t fall for Shinsou for the same reasons I outlined above, so Shinsou and Mina have to talk Machia into acting—or at least stop him from just rumbling off to bury himself under a mountain for the next decade or two.

I don’t know how they’d go about making that argument.  Honestly, I don’t really think there’s anything in the story for Mina or Shinsou to fall back on (by which I mean earlier panels Horikoshi’s assistants can look up and copy/paste into the storyboard to accent a dramatic speech).  Maybe they could ask him why he’s so loyal to All For One and find some commonality, either through heteromorph discrimination or bias against villains.

Maybe Machia is torn on his loyalty, betrayed by AFO one too many times to want to help him but not sure where that leaves him on supporting Shigaraki.  Hearing this, Mina brings up that AFO is threatening Shigaraki right now, but also that a friend of Mina’s is trying to stop AFO/help Shigaraki,[12] so maybe Machia could help them with that and then decide?  Machia doesn’t trust her due to the Springer Agency thing, but that same experience does lead him to believe her when she says she just wants to help people, not hurt them.

That last bit has the benefit of providing an explicit reason for why Mina uses her quirk nigh-exclusively as a watery defense barrier or to take out inanimate objects: She long ago made an active choice not to use her acid against sentient people.  This would give her some room for a little motivation-establishing flashback of her own—maybe canonize that theory about her chipperness being at least in part a front!—and provide a nice alternative to the current state of Mina’s narrative, which has spent nearly 400 chapters refusing to allow her the same free hand people like Bakugou and Kaminari take with their quirks for no established reason.

Yeah, I don't know. Doesn't sound like what I would've liked either.

One major problem I immediately see, is that letting Machia go would make her look really bad. I can already imagine the fandom making memes dunking on her, calling her useless and making fun or her for failing everyone and possibly getting multiple people killed by letting Machia traverse across the city.

It wouldn't be the first time it's happened.

Remember in Kirishima's flashback, when she gave Machia random directions? In the anime they actually changed the line. Instead, she gave him directions to a police station. Why did they change it? Idk, maybe Bones and Horikoshi thought it was more responsible of her to send him to the police instead of giving him random directions. Whatever the case, "being responsible" was not what people took out of that.

People begun shitting on her and making jokes about how she got an entire police station killed.

I was so mad. I remember I was looking forward to the anime getting to that part. Finally, one of the only praise worthy things she's gotten to do in the series getting adapted. I couldn't wait to see what people had to say about her, to see them gushing over how she was so brave protecting her friends... and then the fandom reminded me why I fricking hate it here. 😤

This doesn’t give Shinsou much to do, but that’s okay: his moment comes against AFO instead.

Oh, of course. Mina only gets to talk and do nothing heroic. But Shinso gets to face off against the story's Big Bad. Sounds just like something that would happen in the manga.

Don't mind me. I'm just gonna be here, sad.

Just kidding, btw. Well, maybe I'll cry a little.

I realize that Mina's fans want her to have a big badass moment, and simply talking down a confrontation is not the kind of thing that tends to get viewed as "badass" in a shounen battle manga. Sorry about that.

Yeah, that was kind of what I was hoping for, unfortunately. 😔

Eh, it doesn't matter. It's only natural that you would have difficulty thinking of something for a character that you're not particularly interested in. Thanks anyways. Even though it's not what I would've done for Mina, it was fun reading your ideas.

She can still jump around and dodge a lot while giving her pitch? Maybe she could get a big badass moment later on?

Well, if this had happened in the story, I would've been left expecting for her to still get her badass moment. Cause that wouldn't have looked like one to me. Not after how they did her dirty with chapter 280.

What were you thoughts on that chapter, btw? And has your opinion on it changed with time? What did you think of the color page of chapter 280? I thought it was unintentionally (at least I assume it was unintentional) mocking and patronizing.

Anyway. Now, regarding the whole thing about Midnight's killer and what you said about how you feel about him getting arrested. It's completely understandable that you'd feel that way if you have a bias towards the villains. It makes complete sense. I'm the same way with the characters that I care about (as you've probably noticed from my deranged ramblings 😳. Sorry about those).

Me? I'm glad he's arrested. I just want to have every single plot thread tied up in a neat bow. Leaving Midnight's murder unresolved would be just as disrespectful as her funeral not being addressed, imo. And the way she got killed was already plenty disrespectful. Especially since Torino survived getting turned into a donut.

Disclaimer: I obviously don’t spend much time in the hero-fan circles of the fandom, so this is just my perception.  I’d be curious to get your perspective of Kaminari’s relative popularity, rvg!)

Eh, I don't pay much attention to Kaminari, he's alright, but not one of the characters I gravitate towards. But he's one of those characters that you see people calling underrated, and at the same time they have a decent amount of popularity. So I'd say Kaminari is in the middle. He's liked well enough by the fandom, but he's not crazy popular. Probably very popular with fujoshis though.

Then, when the actual traitor reveals landed (first the fake-out and then the real one), fandom deemed Hagakure an ungrateful bitch and Aoyama a whining coward.

Saddly, that would've happened to anyone that ended up being the traitor. The fandom is sucky like that. It's why I used to be so worried Mina would turn out to be the traitor, because I knew it would just get her even more flack.

Mineta is, by any measure, more problematic, and it's even worse that U.A./Aizawa are so blasé about him, but, at least from where I’m standing, he’s still more layered, more compelling, more dynamic, and speaks in more interesting ways to the world around him than Kaminari ever comes close to matching.

Well, you do you. Personally, I still don't like him much (I have my reasons, as I've already told you. They're petty, I know, but they're my reasons).

Having you tell me how you would've written Mina's part differently makes me want to do the same.

Would you be interested in that? I was actually planning on doing it all on this one post, but I've been writing for a while now (the whole day 😱), and I'm getting tired. I kinda feel like I should leave it for another post. Only if you would be interested in such a thing, of course.

There are a couple of things that I would change from the story. Unfortunately I'm not as drawn to the villains as you are, so I don't really have much to say regarding them, so I probably won't have much to say that interest you. Although one big change to the story I would make involves Chitose Kizuki, aka "Curious".

You have seen SalvagesMHA posts about their attempts to give each of the students a nemesis, right? He pits Mina against Curious, which coincidentally is something I was thinking of.

What did you think about that matchup, btw? I thought it sounded very interesting. And I liked the parallels that he drew between the two.

Would it be racist to pit the two characters of color against one another though? 😲. Silly joke. Ignore me, I'm dumb like that.

Anyways, thanks for reading again through my dumb ramblings if you did, and sorry once more for taking several months to reply.

Do let me know your thoughts. Or don't. If you're busy and there's other things you'd rather do, please tell me, so at least I know I shouldn't expect another lengthy reply.

Anyway, Bye. Have a good day, afternoon or night, whichever it is when you're reading this.

More and More on Mina, Machia and the MLA

For my readers other than @randomvongenerico, please have this peremptory list of this very lengthy post's contents to help gauge your interest:

Some more discussion on what is or isn’t, would or wouldn’t be blameworthy about various characters’ actions (or hypothetical actions) during the war arcs.   

More discussion about Mina, chiefly about how (and why) her acid powers are handled compared to all the male characters with fire powers, and the way her plot points are poorly set up by the narrative, with the result of shortchanging her development.   

Yet More Complaining About How The Story Is Handling Heteromorphobia, this time featuring a compare and contrast on quirk-based bias as it might affect Mina, Bakugou and Tokoyami, as well as a dissection of Shouji’s contention that the only possible way to know about the violent bigotry in the rural areas of the country is to be from them.   

Some fairly extensive spitballing in response to questions about how I would have handled the scene at Machia’s prison compound if I were writing it, as well as why I have trouble conceiving of anything Hero Society could do to Hose Face for killing Midnight that would actually feel like justice.   

A little bit of basic talk about Tumblr, its functionality and some relevant slang.   

Buried at the very bottom, I stand up in front of God and everyone and explain in brief why Kaminari is a worse character than Mineta, with some particular focus on Kaminari as emblematic of the conflict between what the series tells us versus what it shows us about the legality of quirk use in careers other than heroism.

Hi again, rvg.  Because it's been forever since our last post exchange, let me say again that I appreciate the apology and want to thank you for being such a good sport about it.  Last time I had something like your initial response, that person told me straight out that they’d been condescending and antagonistic on purpose, though they regretted having done so after my reply.  I appreciated the regret, but would have preferred they take a day or two to cool off in the first place!  That’s the experience I was bringing to your comments, but I’ll keep in mind what you said about lack of experience with initiating chats and Tumblr in general.

For what it’s worth, yeah, there is a character limit on both asks and replies, so that’s the trouble you were running into there!  You might also consider using a cut next time before a really long post, though if you’re on mobile, I recall that being a difficult-if-not-impossible feature to find, and it’s not as important as it used to be ever since Tumblr’s started adding default Expand drop-downs on long posts.  That aside, welcome (belatedly) to Tumblr!  I hope you find some good people to chat fandom with; I’m always open to some back and forth about things I know well enough to talk about, though I’m, er, decidedly unprompt with replies.  And, as noted, definitely more of a villain fan, so probably not the most fun person for discussions on the kids.

That said, to your replies!  Other readers should note that, while I wrote all this roughly in response-order to rvg’s points, I reorganized everything after the fact to group together the broad topics.  I’ve tried to provide some bare minimum context for anything that would otherwise be too much of a zero-context non-sequitur, but if anyone wants to see rvg’s comments in their intended order and context, their reblog can be found here.  Otherwise, hit the jump!

  

Would You Have Held It Against ___?

But would you hold it against Mina if she had actually done more substancial damage to Machia? Let’s say, not the face, but Machia’s fingers instead of his claws. Machia still doens’t feel any pain. Would you chastise Mina for it? Even though she’s actively saving Mt Lady by doing that?

It’s hard to say for sure, since I imagine that if Mina’s acid had hit Machia’s fingers instead of his claws, we probably would just have seen them abraded and singed, like how Dabi’s fire damage was drawn on Hawks, not with chunks of skin melting off and exposing naked bone.  Physical damage in BNHA just doesn’t work like that, at least not against named characters.  If Mina were doing realistic damage, I imagine everyone else would be too, and then I’d be criticizing all of them, because, holy shit, that is not okay to do to people, any people, and especially not when you’re acting as an agent of the state.

But hypothetically, no, I think I would be more lenient even if she did do concrete and permanent damage to Machia’s hands, and it’s because she’d be doing it to save Mount Lady.  Shinsou could have taken control of Machia and then just had him lie still while whoever was in charge of this facility redrugged him,[1] and that would have been fine by me—disappointing, sure, but only because Machia’s interesting and I’d like to get more on him than we do, not because I’d be critiquing Shinsou’s actions.

It’s specifically Shinsou and the rest choosing to weaponize Machia against AFO that I object to.  Mina harming Machia would be taking that action herself, to protect someone that’s right in front of her, risking no one’s life but her own in doing so.  Shinsou throwing Machia up against AFO—which he’d made the decision to do before hearing Machia’s angry grumbling—is risking Machia’s life, without Machia’s consent.  And it’s not even for the sake of saving anyone, at least not anyone that’s right there in that moment—AFO is fleeing.

Sure, he still presents a huge threat to lots of people, but given that we’d just seen proof that AFO did not know about Shinsou’s power,[2] they could also have used Machia to, for example, rapidly transport the heroes to some place they could set up a second ambush to trick AFO into responding to Shinsou.  I mean, good god, AFO’s the chattiest villain in the comic; Hawks lured him into at least two extended conversations even after he’d resolved that he needed to leave.  He’s a Demon Lord and thus categorically incapable of shutting up.  And that would have been that, really.  Take control and let the clock run out; end of problem.

It would have been anticlimactic as hell, so obviously that was never going to happen, but there’s no reason the heroes couldn’t try for it, you know?  Instead of the bone-headed decision to just hand AFO his most loyal soldier on a silver platter on the thin chances that they could either prevent the brainwashing from being broken at all or that Machia’s upset would translate to both the capability and willingness to attack his master.

I’ve observed this problem in a few different areas, that Horikoshi sometimes writes the heroes, particularly Hawks, as not taking actions or drawing conclusions that, from their perspective, should seem sensible, well-reasoned, and with solid chances of success; instead, they simply disregard possibilities they should logically be considering but which the reader knows are dead ends, or they benefit from things they could not have known at the time they acted.  That hurts immersion because it gives the heroes victories, both tactical and moral, that they simply haven’t earned.  Shinsou’s control of Machia is a particularly egregious example.

  

Speaking of Monoma. Since we were talking about the morality of Shinso’s Quirk. Would you say Monoma using his Quirk to copy a villain’s Quirk and use it on him and his allies, would also qualify as something that should be criticized? I’m curious.

Nah, I don’t think so.  Taking an opponent’s weapon and using it to subdue him is a perfectly valid tactic, especially since Monoma’s method doesn’t actually deprive his opponent of their weapon, just replicates it for his own use.  It really all does boil down to Shinsou’s method forcing people to fight and hurt their own allies.  Mina causing Machia physical harm, Monoma using a villain’s own weapon against them, even the heroes’ surprise attack: none of those are remotely on the same “holy shit that is a literal war crime” level as what the heroes planned in advance to have Shinsou do to Machia, and what he willingly agreed to do well before he found out that Machia was not as opposed as the heroes thought.

  

I mean, I get what you’re getting at. I’m just wondering. If the heroes hadn’t launched a suprise attack, and had left the villains do the first move and come to them, would you then be criticizing them for being irresponsible and incompetent instead? Sorry for going on a tangent, it’s just something I’ve noticed when it comes to readers criticizing the heroes. It’s either people complaining that the heroes are too ruthless, or that they’re too nice, naive or not pragmatic enough.

(This is in response to some discussion of the heroes' actions in the first war arc's raid on the villa+hospital lab, not the second war's divide and conquer plan.)

I actually don’t really have a huge problem with the surprise attack in principle—I might criticize Cementoss ripping the building in half when there could well have been people on those upper floors, but otherwise, it’s hard to imagine what else the heroes could generally have done to deal with the numbers they were dealing with.  I mean, it’s basically just a scaled-up version of the attack on the Hassaikai base, and I don’t have any moral quibbles with the way the heroes and police handled that.

Rather, my problem with the raid is that I thought the heroes were too effective given the way their forces and those of the PLF had been set up.  It’s not the tactic itself that’s the problem (though individual acts of worse violence within the attack, like Hawks killing Twice or the attempts to outright murder Shigaraki in the tube, are still an issue), it’s the finality, the totality, of how effective the attack was.

To be brief about it (because I’ve talked about this at length elsewhere), I don’t think the heroes should have known where all the PLF bases were, I don’t think they should have been as effective in disordered mass combat as the PLF, I think the advisors should have put up a better fight in all cases, and I think there should have been enough members of the PLF in significant positions of influence or power that the HPSC couldn’t uncover them all, leading to complications when those members realized their organization was under attack.

As it is, the heroes handily win every fight they have with the sole exception of Gigantomachia and Shigaraki.  The PLF is neatly swept off the table save for a few “remnants,” with no attention given to the practical difficulties of detaining tens of thousands of combatants with no motivation to let themselves be quietly arrested, much less how the justice system is going to handle trying and sentencing them all.  That has repercussions going forward, as well: heroes clearing the board of all the (named) PLF members save Skeptic leaves the bulk of villain forces in the subsequent arcs to be prison escapees, and man, if the PLF’s moral nuance has been squandered, the depiction of the prison escapees is even worse.

The raid is, of course, only the first of two big surprise attacks the heroes manage.  I have significantly more issues with the second one, but most of that boils down to the fact that the divide and conquer/Tempt and Trap plan feels crueler, meaner, and much more openly aimed at extrajudicial murder.  And like, that would all be fine and in-character for Hero Society in general and Hawks, the main planner, specifically, but with Deku, Shouto and Uraraka all starting to think Save Villains thoughts, and fresh off the traitor reveal, the kids should never have been as collectively okay with the second war’s tactics as the story has presented them as being.  To echo an older complaint, good god, what universe is Horikoshi living in that he thinks the people that converted a place of learning into an arena they call a “coffin in the sky” are the heroes?

  

I was under the impression Midnight was off to the side from where the MLA minions were passing by, and the Skull Mask guy took a detour to kill her.

I’m not sure from this if you’re explaining how you read Hose Face’s attack on Midnight at the time, or if you’re maintaining that that’s an accurate read, so just to clarify, here are the panels in question:

As you can see, the PLF guys’ path through the woods has them coming in from directly behind Midnight.  Hose Face calls out that he’ll take care of her once they get close enough for the reader to make out who they are, at which point he gets out in front of Scarecrow and hits Midnight from the same direction as their initial approach: directly behind.  He most certainly doesn’t take a detour of any kind, but rather chooses the action that is going to get his group through the obstacle with the least amount of time and effort possible—entirely his prerogative as the highest-ranked member of the Guerilla Warfare regiment on-scene.

  

But if we classify this entire conflict as a war, wouldn’t that mean that both sides are free to use whatever tacticts and methods they feel like as long as it’s not a war crime?

If we classify it as war is irrelevant if the side aligned with the current ruling authority hasn’t done so themselves.  I imagine the Japanese government is in no hurry to validate the terrorists on an international stage by acknowledging that they’re numerous and dangerous enough to declare actual, formal war against!  Calling it a war drags in a whole pile of wartime conventions Japan has signed numerous treaties about; it grants the opposing side some legitimacy as a cohesive, organized force that will need to be negotiated with down the line.  As long as you’re calling it a police action, you don’t have to negotiate shit until you get to the plea deals!  Team Hero never declared war here, so yeah, I still expect them to carry out their plans and actions accordingly.

Also, in the thematic/meta sense, I expect the heroes to either conduct themselves as heroes—admirable, upright, heroic—or face the narrative consequences when they fail to live up to that ideal.  The hyper-encapsulated version of this conundrum is the recurring idea that attacking Shigaraki never actually prevents Shigaraki from coming back worse and more dangerous next time; the heroes are never going to achieve a different result by attacking him again but harder this time, and that’s why Deku is set up to finally try something different.[3]  I would just like it if what’s true on the micro-level could even be attempted on the macro-level.  Or, in other words, if the narrative is going to tell us that saving villains is the correct path, it can’t only demonstrate that for the villains with known-to-the-heroes sympathetic backstories.

  

General Mina Points

Regarding your analysis about Mina’s acid being underpowered because it’s harder/less believable to downplay the effects of acid than fire/explosions/etc. in Shounen Damage Logic, I think we’ll have to agree to disagree.  I don’t see anything wrong with just showing the Nebulous Abrasion Damage that’s the ubiquitous, default mode of illustrating nonspecific injury in this comic for Mina’s acid the same way we get it for the boys.

I can see your argument, but like, just for example, when Endeavor first encounters a Noumu, he bathes it in fire under the assumption that it’s a normal villain and then says he’s surprised it’s still up because he’s never seen anyone stay conscious after that attack.  Bathing someone in flames in real life is not a “knock them out” kind of attack; it’s a “severe burn ward for months” kind of attack.  If Endeavor’s been throwing that around at random criminals for thirty years, we are plainly very far away from realistic damage, and I’d be perfectly satisfied with treating Mina’s acid the same way.

If I had to take a guess as to why Horikoshi’s so staunchly avoided letting Mina cut loose—other than regressive gender politics—I’d say it’s that acid simply feels nastier or more morally dubious than fire.  Fire has positive as well as negative connotations; acid’s a lot more, shall we say, unilateral in the collective imagination, especially given what’s going to turn up if you run a web search for “acid attacks.”

To look at it in JRPG logic (and I don’t care if AFO’s admiration stems from a comic; that comic was clearly playing with Dragon Quest tropes), acid is pretty much the same thing as poison, and poison effects are chiefly the realm of enemy characters.  It smacks of underhandedness or cowardice in anything more cognizant than roving toxic plants or venomous beasts.  Certainly you see the occasional party member specialized for status effects who can inflict poison damage on enemies, but I can’t readily think of a main character that does.[4]

Perhaps, then, because readers are somewhat conditioned to think of acid as particularly dangerous and nasty compared to fire, and because there’s a limit to how morally dubious Horikoshi is willing to (consciously) write the students, especially the girls, Mina’s sharply limited in how she’s allowed to use her acid.

That said, I got a very hearty laugh from, “Just look at Dabi.  He can’t even kill himself with fire,” so thank you very much for that.

  

It’s as if Horikoshi only ever figures out what to do with Mina retroactively instead of in the moment (e.g. there were no interactions between Kirishima and Mina until AFTER Kirishima’s backstory, we never got any hint that would connect Mina’s and Midnight’s characters until AFTER Midnight died, when Mina speaks about not giving in to vengeance she references SHOJI’S WORDS which happened in HIS FLASHBACK, and then this whole chapter is technically a flashback too when you think about it).

That’s a big oof, all right.  I know about the Midnight non-connection and the issue of Mina’s anti-vengeance words having first been delivered by Shouji and relayed to the audience by Koda (it being his flashback, rather than Shouji’s), but I didn’t know there was no indication of Kiri-Mina connection until after his flashback.  Wowzers.

  

But also, in one of my comments I had left a link to a post analizing Kirishima’s and Mina’s characters and their dynamic. I don’t know if you checked it out or not, but it was a pretty interesting read. If you did read it, let me know your thoughts on it.

Apologies for not responding to that; I hadn't clicked it because I just wasn't terribly interested in the topic. Having checked it now, I can say that I'm unlikely to read it because I've encountered this person's meta before and, even at a glance, found it to be flawed for reasons I am not comfortable gabbing about in a public space. I'm sure they make some valid points, but I will have to respectfully bow out of reading and commenting on it here.

  

But what about Mina telling Kirishima that “now they’re even” though?

(This is re: my contention that Mina saves Shinsou, not Kirishima, from the Sludge Villain, and that Kirishima was never in any danger from the Sludge Villain.)

I mean, she can say it, but that doesn’t mean I have to believe that she/Horikoshi are accurately portraying the stakes involved.

  

Just for the record, you’re not saying that Mina not giving in to revenge isn’t noble in and of itself. What she does is indeed good.  You’re saying it doesn’t have any emotional weight because Mina has always been a morally good character, so you never thought she would ever give in to revenge in the first place. Correct?

Correct!  As I’ve said, Mina has perfectly healthy emotional regulation: when she experiences negative emotions like anger, guilt, or grief, she doesn’t dwell on them; she vents them to friends and finds healthy ways to channel them into bettering herself and the world and people around her.  She’s got a great head on her shoulders!  But all of that means that her giving into anger about Midnight’s death was never a remotely convincing threat to me.  Of course she wouldn’t; there’s never been a moment that foreshadowed that she was in the slightest danger of harboring that kind of obsessive, vindictive grudge.

That being the case, it feels unfair of Horikoshi to pin a big dramatic monologue on a desire for revenge which Mina was never shown to possess to any greater degree than any of her classmates.  She’s one of the last hero-aligned characters I’d have guessed if you’d asked me who was going to get a beat like that in the endgame.

(To anticipate the obvious question, Aizawa would have been my first guess; he’s even been written for it properly in the way he and Mic have responded to Shigaraki—clearly holding a grudge for something that would have happened to their classmate when Shigaraki was all of six years old.  Conversely, while plenty of the 1-A kids could have believably carried a “struggling with vengefulness” plot if they’d been written with it from earlier on, I don’t think there’s a single one of them who feels like a good match for it in their current incarnations.  Iida’s moved on from his Stain days too smoothly to buy it from him, Bakugou’s only real obsession is Deku, and Deku already had a whole arc of being obsessively negative and driven by dark desires to find and deal with a villain.  If any student was going to show up to the fight with bloody-minded revenge on the brain, it should have been Shishikura.)

  

But What About the Heteromorphobia, Tho’?

(Warning: Incoming off-topic harping about Shouji and the inane resolution of the hospital attack.)

I have even seen someone make a post on Reddit arguing that Shinso being discriminated for his Quirk makes no sense because it’s not villanous, and that it makes more sense for characters like Bakugo, Mina and Tokoyami to be discriminated because they have more villanous looking Quirks. I don’t really agree with everything that guy said. But he did bring up a good point. How come Mina doesn’t get side eyes from people due to her Quirk like Shinso does?

I will have to disagree with Reddit User That Guy that Shinsou’s quirk should be viewed as less villainous than Bakugou’s.  It sounds like he was conflating heteromorphobia with the bias against villains/"villainous" quirks, and while there is overlap, they’re still distinct categories.  Shinsou’s quirk inherently subordinates one’s physical body, allowing him to force his targets to act against their will, or potentially take the fall for things they didn’t willingly do.  Of course people are nervous about it or think it’s more villainous than heroic!

Conversely, the Number 2 Hero has been attacking criminals with fire for decades now, so I think the BNHA general public is more than ready to accept a hero whose quirk lets him fire off explosions.  The commonly accepted idea in the fandom is that “flashy and offensive quirks” are the ones most valued in heroes.  I think that’s a bit oversimplified—Crust was the Number 6 Hero and his quirk was neither—but it’s certainly true that purely elemental quirks (fire, lightning, wind, earth-shaping), no matter how damage-dealing they are, don’t tend to get treated as villainous in nature.  The real “villainous quirks” in the series tend to be the ones that are more creepy, dark, invasive, or impure.  Even Dabi’s fire is that ethereal blue, like spirit fires, instead of everyday orange-red!

Bakugou’s quirk is much closer to the “pure elemental” category than anything very villainous and, indeed, when he got kidnapped from the training camp and that one journalist was suggesting that he might have turned to villainy already, he based that suggestion on Bakugou’s behavior, his conduct during the Sports Festival.  Nothing was said about his quirk at all, but rather his recent public demonstrations of violence and “mental instability.”  That’s perfectly consistent, I think, with the biases we see elsewhere.[5]

Tokoyami has the potential to get hit by both the villainous quirk bias and the heteromorphobia, but I think Japan seeing ravens as emblematic of wisdom rather than death and rot would mean his bird head is less ill-seen there than it would be in the West.  I don’t think it would take much more than the proverbial One Bad Day to get him to a very bad place indeed, though—there’s a reason Mr. Compress judged him a good potential recruit!  Tokoyami was rescued before it became an issue, but if he hadn’t been, I’m sure we would have seen the same journalist mentioned above making similar statements about Tokoyami and his dark quirk/mien.

Mina’s an interesting case study in not experiencing a lot of the same sorts of discrimination others in similar situations do.  She has three distinct heteromorphic traits—her skin, her eyes, her horns—as well as having a potentially extremely deadly quirk which, as I discussed above, could easily attract judgmental side-eye because of the cultural view of acid.  So why doesn’t she seem to face discrimination?

As I said in the post you’re replying to—and as you mentioned is a common headcanon—I think a lot of it boils down to her relentlessly chipper attitude.  If she had, for example, Mustard’s personality, or Muscular’s drive to violence, would people be quicker to say that her Acid is a “villain quirk”?  If she glared more, would people be more creeped out by her eyes?  It’s possible, I think, that we would actually see her facing some of this if we spent more time with her, but the narrative doesn’t make that time, at least not anywhere Kirishima can see it.

  

Well, if I had to guess, I’m sure you would say that would make her a more interesting character. You might get to be interested in her character, which then would probably mean you would be even more upset and disappointed with this chapter.

Ahaha, very fair.  Honestly, Class A would have benefited tremendously from more kids with bite to them.  A Mina whose competitiveness had some real fervor to it, or a Mina who had some heaviness in her backstory she was faking her way through dealing with, would have been a good contribution to that.

  

It really sucks that Horikoshi had to justify Shoji being the only one to experience prejudice by clarifying that heteromorph discrimination is only still prevalent in small villages. I feel like it robbed characters like Tsuyu, Mina, Tokoyami and Koda of being part of an actual narrative and get more depth and development.

Before I talk about this, let me clarify something: Shouji’s line about what his classmates know about heteromorphic discrimination is an example of very crucial nuance being wildly different between translations.

The fan scanlation suggested that Tokoyami and Koda, who grew up in cities, must feel like such violent heteromorphobia resembles something out of a textbook, with the implication that the textbook in question is a history book.  They’re presumed to think that blood-cleansing rituals and children with scars like Shouji are artifacts of a terrible past, not a modern-day concern.

The official Via release suggested that Tokoyami and Koda could know that stuff like this still happens in rural areas because they might have read about it in textbooks.  They’re presumed to know that such rituals and scarred children do exist as modern concerns, but only out in the boonies.

Those are completely different propositions!  Which one was accurate was far beyond my capability to judge, but the official translation did feel a little off to me, so, as I usually do in such situations, I brought it to my trusty Translator Sis.  For possibly the first time ever,[6] she told me that Viz had this one wrong—that Shouji’s implication, to her eye, was indeed that T&K would think such violence was limited to the past, not that it was limited to rural areas.

That established, I was actually talking about that line from Shouji with a friend the other day!  I was aggravated that the writing would portray city-born heteromorphs as so oblivious to the problems facing them in other parts of the country when that seems so counter to my (American) perception of the ways members of threatened groups communicate danger to one another.

My friend reminded me that silence is a much more common Japanese way of addressing (or attempting to address) minority discrimination: trying to make a problem go away by starving it of conversational oxygen, treating oppression like an infection that needs to be quarantined until it dies out on its own.  In that light, it’s entirely possible that Tokoyami and Koda might not know this stuff because no one around them thinks it would be helpful to tell them if it’s not a problem they’re directly dealing with.  A lot of people propose the same approach to burakumin issues in real life, for example.

Also, technically Shouji doesn’t say that Koda and Tokoyami don’t experience heteromorphobia at all, just that the idea of fear and hatred that extreme, that violent, must seem like something out of a textbook, rather than something that happens here and now in certain parts of the country.  Also too, Tokoyami and Koda are teenagers; I can forgive them not having much understanding of life outside their own circle of experience.

That all said, it still feels more than a little telling that Horikoshi thinks everyone in Shouji’s whole class, including and especially all the other heteromorphs, could never have heard in their entire lives about acts of bigotry-driven violence against heteromorphs being carried out in the here and now.

While it’s true that silence is a widely accepted way to address these sorts of issues in Japan, they’re hardly universal!  Activist groups are out there trying to raise awareness, trying to get their issues on the floor of the Diet in hopes of getting laws passed about them.  There’s not some kind of media blackout on talking about it, and, indeed, I’ve read any number of articles from Japanese publications online covering such topics.

In BNHA, however, silence does seem to be universal.[7]

No one but Shouji is from a remote enough place that they knew about violent heteromorphobia.  No one recognized it as a thing that e.g. disadvantages heteromorphic heroes in the public approval ratings.  No one tripped over a magazine article about it and got curious enough to look the topic up online.  No one’s heroic mentors or family members have talked to them about it (particularly egregious with Koda, given the fairly strong implication that his own mother suffered it).  No one had a patch of morbid interests (Tokoyami) that led them to dabble in reading about real-life horror stories of human hatred, or an interest in how their society came to be that might have led them to reading about the CRC and realizing it still exists in the modern day.

They attend a hero school, and yet Shouji seems to be the only one with an inkling that there are heteromorphs out there who need, and have been needing, heroes.

That’s all a lot to ask of the reader, but what really pushes it past plausibility to me is what happened with the Ordinary Woman.  How close to the surface must violent heteromorphobia be even in the cities if the current state of Japan brings it all right back into the open in a matter of weeks?  That none of the students other than Shouji have ever even imagined that heteromorphs can still be victimized in this way represents an over-the-top ignorance that I have to read as either a bleak condemnation of the shallow focuses of heroes or reflective of Horikoshi’s own beliefs about discrimination and the understanding of it possessed by those who aren’t immediately threatened by it.

Whichever is the case, and with Spinner’s higher brain functions out of commission, it leaves Shouji carrying the whole plot on his back and he just can’t do it, both because the audience hasn’t had enough time with him to buy it and because the answers the series uses him as a vehicle to deliver are facile, victim-blaming nonsense.

...And here’s where I admit that even if the hospital attack had climaxed with a whole bunch of heteromorphs from Class A and B and the Pro Hero ranks acknowledging the mob’s feelings while pleading with them to not give into hatred and to stand down, I would still have issues if the resolution didn’t involve concrete suggestions and promises about how the heroes would address the mob’s grievances going forward.  Which canon very much did not, and just adding more voices to Shouji’s wouldn’t have changed that.  But my whole rant about that can be found in the relevant chapter posts, so I’ll not repeat it further here.

  

How Would I Have Done It Instead?

Let’s be real here for a second. Even if Mina had been the one to stop Machia. How would she even do that? I remember back when people were talking about when Mina would get her moment to shine, and that it would involve Machia again, I had serious doubts about that idea ever becoming true because I couldn’t think of a single thing she could do against him. I thought for sure Mina’s moment was going to be relegated to fighting Midnight’s killer, since that seemed more within her capabilities. In the end her shinning moment did indeed involve Machia, and no one really had a confrontation with Midnight’s killer. I actually want to hear your thoughts, if you happen have a thing in mind that you think Mina could’ve done to be the one to stop Machia. I’d love to hear it.+ Btw, since you brought it up, in what way could she have defeated the Sludge villain that would’ve been witty, or skillful? If you don’t have any ideas you don’t need to answer. It’s not that important. I’m just curious of the posibility.

Okay, so, this is the part that hung me up for the longest, because there are a few wildly different possible answers here.

The real truth is, if I had been writing this whole shebang from the start, this confrontation would never have happened this way at all.  Just off the top of my head, I think there’s no compelling reason AFO couldn’t have sent Toga into the hospital to activate and retrieve Kurogiri weeks ago, and with Kurogiri back in play, getting Machia would obviously have gone differently.  I would also never have disposed of the MLA as comprehensively as Horikoshi did; I would have had at least one or two instances where an MLA member who didn’t get uncovered by the HPSC in time was in a position to shift the balance in the villains’ favor—maybe one would have been with the police somewhere.

Barring a top-to-bottom rewrite of the whole arc, however? Well, I'd still say that, feeling as strongly as I do about how morally dubious this whole second war has been, even if I were telling this scene with the same components, I probably wouldn’t be writing towards a hero success because I don’t think the heroes have earned it.  The baby steps the kids have taken towards Saving Villains don’t go far enough for me to want to see the villains defeated here.  The biggest changes there would have been twofold:

1) Shinsou’s voice changer play shouldn’t have worked on Machia.

Machia has a sense of smell so incredibly acute that, if I were trying to logically explain how it worked, I’d make it a psychic ability that just happened to manifest as scent-based.  We’re talking about a guy who could track down Shigaraki after a teleport of over 270 miles, who could smell AFO’s vestige stirring from almost fifty miles away.  There’s absolutely no reason he should think for even a second that AFO is standing right outside his prison.

Now, we do know replications of AFO’s voice has an effect on Machia—we saw as much as the beginning of MVA!  But I would contend that back then, he didn’t have a big loud response to the recording, just curled up around his radio and started loudly purring.  In the scene with Shinsou, he actually responds as though he thinks AFO is there, but again, I don’t buy that Machia should have fallen for that, especially since he was woken by Hose Face’s device emulating AFO’s voice, which would have given his unbelievably keen senses enough time to register that it’s only the voice, not the man, that he's hearing.

But, with Machia up and not immediately prey to Shinsou’s ploy, the other big change I’d make with him becomes apparent.  The series has proved willing and eager to shitcan everything Shigaraki gained in MVA, but not me.  Shigaraki won Machia’s loyalty at the end of MVA, and if Machia’s cranky with AFO for leaving him behind again,[8] that doesn’t mean he couldn’t still have loyalty to AFO’s successor.

Given that his loyalty to Shigs is predicated on his loyalty to AFO, it might seem logical that AFO squandering the latter would free Machia of obligation to the former.  That’s a fair take.  But if it were me, I’d capitalize on Machia’s keen senses and what he was present for in MVA—Shigaraki saying that his followers should do whatever they want.  Hell, if the endgame likes flashbacks so much, let’s have a flashback of Shigaraki and Machia actually talking in ways that would let Machia distinguish Shigaraki and AFO.

In other words, I think Machia’s loyalty should supersede his anger.  If he gets free, his first reaction should be to go to Shigaraki, not to focus on his anger.  That way, it’s not a hero win rewarding their gross sky coffin tactics, but AFO doesn’t get quite what he wanted out of it, either.  This would be one part of focusing the narrative back on Shigaraki and his allies, rather than ruining Shigaraki’s hard work by letting AFO take over and piss it all away.

Incidentally, I will concede that, just because Machia shouldn’t have responded like a dupe to Shinsou mimicking AFO’s voice, that doesn’t mean Machia might not have responded at all—he could have rebuked Shinsou for trying to emulate Master, and that would have worked for Shinsou’s purposes just as well!  So to avoid that, I would add one more element to a flashback showcasing Shigaraki and Machia’s relationship post-Deika: have Shigaraki showing Machia a picture of Shinsou and warning him to be on the lookout for this kid, and to not respond to anything he says.

Horikoshi loves to tie back plot beats to pre-established elements, and one such element is, as I footnoted earlier, that AFO and Shigaraki watched the U.A. Sports Festival together, so they should both know good and well who Shinsou is and what he can do.  Knowing Shinsou’s SF-era capabilities doesn’t predict the voice changer, of course, but it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that, if the heroes are pushed to a point of desperation and they have access to a brainwasher, even a non-licensed one, they will try to use that brainwasher on whoever they think is their highest priority target.  Quite frankly, all of the higher-ups and key players should have known about Shinsou.

2) The kids shouldn’t have been tipped off that they were facing Midnight’s killer, or it should have come up in a different context.

Nothing interesting comes of the way the canon deploys it, thanks to Mina’s vengeful feelings having no grounding in the story, and the blunt way it’s brought up serves only to make Hose Face easy for the reader to write off.  As I said in the chapter post where he brought up “that U.A. teacher,” there’s no real reason for him to be focusing on Midnight specifically unless he has a personal reason to think she’s emblematic of the things about Hero Society he hates, or unless he was tuned in enough to U.A. personalities (knew who was teaching there, watched the Sports Festival to get a handle on its students, etc.) to realize that he was facing students he could potentially rattle by bringing up their teacher’s death.

The latter would offer a less awful read on Hose Face’s personality: He’s not bringing up the death out of pure sadism, but as a psychological tactic.  The former would give him some real characterization and motives while also giving the kids something to argue against, rather than the easiest possible reaction of, “Hay did u kno Might Makes Right iz bad?”

Alternatively, if Hose Face has nothing personal against Midnight at all, and doesn’t have an encyclopedic memory of hero wannabe high schoolers, he has no reason to specifically mention Midnight.  Even if the narrative must see her death “answered” in some fashion, it still doesn’t follow that the kids must get emotional closure for someone they lost to the undeclared war they were drafted into.  The audience can take some solace in perceived karma, but lacking a naturalistic way for Mina and the rest to connect those dots, the kids should just have to deal with him as they would any other opponent they come up against, because, surprise surprise, when you’re fighting in a war, you’re not guaranteed to see and know who’s on the opposite side of the gun that just shot down your best friend.

As another alternative, if we go with the idea that Mina was struggling with dark desires for revenge, maybe she should have brought it up!  Not as an accusation—again, she has no way of knowing she’s facing Midnight’s killer without him saying it—but just out of generalized fury with her opponents as a group, the same way Aizawa and Gran Torino hold the pain of their loved ones against Shigaraki when Shigaraki is not the one responsible for causing that pain.[9]  Maybe a more openly vengeful Mina could just freely state that her aim is to take down the PLF to avenge Midnight, only for the enemy in front of her to answer, “Midnight?  You mean that woman I killed in the woods on the day of Liberation?  Here’s your chance, then, girl.”  (Or whatever.)

Of course, Shonen Jump is not in the habit of validating heroes craving revenge, so Mina in that scenario would fail because rage would make her sloppy, same as with Deku, Iida, and so on.

So, in a scenario where Machia is up and not falling prey to Shinsou, but rather prioritizing getting to New Master Shigaraki, and the PLF is likewise loyal to Shigaraki and not AFO, I’d just let it work, because I’d be slanting this whole combat towards an overall heroic loss.  Give Mina a face to obsess over until next time but also let Kirishima get a good eyeful of it so he at least knows there’s a serious problem with his best friend and one of his hero inspirations.

Mineta would have a chance to weigh in, too, as he's a good middle ground: he's got his own anger about Midnight, who he adored, but he's also worried about how that anger looks on Mina. Mineta always worries about his classmates, but he's shared a pretty fair amount of incidental screentime with Mina specifically over the course of the series, ranging from her sweetly offering to put a harem moment into the band performance just for him to stuff like the Clockwork Orange gag, as well as more serious stuff like Mineta being the first one to ask aloud if Midnight's dead, with Mina warmly, and with a confidence it turns out she doesn't truly feel, reassuring him that Midnight's fine.

(I've said before that Mineta should have had more to do in the confrontation with Midnight's killer, but that's not just about his fondness for her. It's also about him being the first to question if the heroes didn't just make the whole situation worse, and, if Mina really took Midnight's death so hard it had her thinking about revenge, it should also have been about Mina and Mineta's shared experience surrounding that death.)

That all said, I suspect that what you really meant is, how would I have handled this scene if I had to use all the same pieces and be writing towards a heroic victory?  So let me at least touch on that.

As far as Hose Face goes, I actually think Kirishima might have been better suited to talking to him?  Like, Mina’s been friendly with people, sure, but I don’t really buy her most pivotal, “shining moment” scene being a bunch of talk about the strength of the weak coming together.  As best I recall—though do correct me if I’m wrong—it's never been shown that Mina regularly struggles with feelings of weakness or inadequacy.  It would be perfectly natural for her to do so after flubbing against Gigantomachia, to be sure, but the series doesn’t make the time to show it, so her lines about forming packs with others does not feel like a natural evolution for her arc.

Likewise, while she’s obviously been depicted as friendly and sociable from the beginning, her lines in 383 suggest that her sociableness has, and always has had, an ulterior motive: covering for her perceived weakness.  The lack of focus on her relationships from her own perspective makes that impossible to verify or even predict, so it just feels like it comes out of thin air, grabbed almost at random by the author in his attempt to find something, anything, Mina could say that would give Hose Face even a moment's pause.

Kirishima, on the other hand, has had a focus on his relationships, places where they’ve been pivotal to his own arc and the greater plot.  (I’m sure I don’t need to harp on this to you, rvg, but I’ll go over it to lay out my perception of these things.)  His relationship with Mina—the ways he’s trying to live up to her example, as well as his desire to support her when she falters—is a profound motivator for him, something we see much more explicitly and from his own perspective than we do Mina's feelings about him.  Meanwhile, while his relationship with Bakugou isn’t given that level of psychological exploration, it’s a critical factor in Bakugou’s rescue at Kamino, and we also get that bit of Bakugou specifically giving Kirishima some advice that leads to the latter’s Unbreakable mode.[10]

So like, we do get an angle on Kirishima and his sense of his own relationships with others.  That awareness allows him to demonstrate what is, I believe, the first unabashed moment of empathy for villains that a hero demonstrates in the entire series!  Specifically, I’m talking about that low-level gang mook he comes up against during his internship with Fat Gum.  That guy does a bunch of yelling about things that speak to Kirishima—fears of weakness, desire to be stronger, a need to help his “bros”—and Kirishima tries multiple times, even after being attacked, to express his understanding and sympathy for the man.

That being the case, if anyone were going to be able to make an impression on Hose Face via appealing to his sense of camaraderie and desire for strength, it seems to me that Kirishima has the better groundwork in place to sell the moment, regardless of whether he could successfully “reach” Hose Face in the way that’s being attempted with Shigaraki/Toga/Dabi.

As to the Sludge Villain, I’d probably either not have him there at all, given how much he claims he just wants to pretend to fight for a minute before getting the hell out of there.  He very much seems like he didn’t want to be here to begin with, so I can only assume that, despite AFO claiming the jailbreakers didn’t need to do anything for him but rampage, he very much did summon a bunch of them back anyway[11] for his final dramatic attack on Deku and Hero Society.

Assuming we’re stuck dealing with him, I’d probably let the Class B kids do it.   Have Mount Lady—who was there for the Sludge Villain’s rampage using Bakugou, and therefore knows what Sludgey looks like and that he can possess people—yell for people to stay away from him.  Let there be a moment of panic and confusion, where it looks for a moment like a repeat of the mess in Chapter 1 where no one had the exact right answer to deal with him, so no one’s willing to step up.

Then, in a 1-2-3 combo move that reminds everyone why Class B is said to have advanced more quickly than Class A, and just as Sludgey lunges for someone, have Yamagi use Poltergeist to manipulate him into a steel drum barrel being held by Yui, let her shrink it down to a good tight fit before dropping it, then have Juuzo soften the ground to half-sink it, top down, then resolidify the earth, trapping Sludgey for later removal.  Ta da, a neat demonstration of the next generation outperforming the old generation when it comes to on-the-fly teamwork and decisive action even when no one individual has the perfect quirk for solving a problem.

…This, of course, is assuming there’s no good way to actually get the Sludge Villain to talk in more depth about why he didn’t want to be here from the beginning and had to be threatened into doing it at all.  It would be nice if someone could broach that topic!  Maybe a quick not-too-serious handful of lines from Mineta, who has his own history of running in terror from fights he doesn’t think he can win.  But even with some sympathy, I imagine Sludge Villain would try to run away regardless, on the (well-grounded) suspicion that heroes are going to want him to go back to prison and finish his sentence, and that’s when B-tachi could step in.

So that just leaves Machia, Mina, and Shinsou.  And honestly, rather than having to power through it, I’d rather see Mina, in particular, talk her way out of it.  This draws on two things.  First, there’s the fact that she’s one of the kids who failed her Final Exams, with her and Kaminari being unable to figure out how to utilize their strengths to get out of Nedzu’s rat maze.   I’d love to see her demonstrate that she’s grown from having no plans but to brute force her way through obstacles!  Second, there’s this sequence:

This is a bit exaggerated, obviously, but the quick demonstration of how quickly and smoothly Mina is able to approach, scold, bond with, then deescalate people in tense situations is rightly portrayed as remarkable.  But where is that facility in real confrontations with villains?  Nowhere, really, save that airless stab at remarking on common ground with Hose Face and the PLF.

I obviously don’t expect her and Machia to wind up breakdancing together when the stakes are as high as they are, but Mina would have at least a bit of an opening—her encounter with Machia in middle school wherein she lied to him about where the Springer Agency is.  I don’t for a moment think that Machia’s forgotten her smell—I doubt he forgets anyone’s, though he may or may not care about them otherwise.

For this version of the scene, I’d probably play Machia as more ambivalent—tired of being abandoned over and over again by the people he’s tried so hard to be loyal for, so not immediately inclined to run off after them, open to a bit more dialogue.  He doesn’t fall for Shinsou for the same reasons I outlined above, so Shinsou and Mina have to talk Machia into acting—or at least stop him from just rumbling off to bury himself under a mountain for the next decade or two.

I don’t know how they’d go about making that argument.  Honestly, I don’t really think there’s anything in the story for Mina or Shinsou to fall back on (by which I mean earlier panels Horikoshi’s assistants can look up and copy/paste into the storyboard to accent a dramatic speech).  Maybe they could ask him why he’s so loyal to All For One and find some commonality, either through heteromorph discrimination or bias against villains.

Maybe Machia is torn on his loyalty, betrayed by AFO one too many times to want to help him but not sure where that leaves him on supporting Shigaraki.  Hearing this, Mina brings up that AFO is threatening Shigaraki right now, but also that a friend of Mina’s is trying to stop AFO/help Shigaraki,[12] so maybe Machia could help them with that and then decide?  Machia doesn’t trust her due to the Springer Agency thing, but that same experience does lead him to believe her when she says she just wants to help people, not hurt them.

That last bit has the benefit of providing an explicit reason for why Mina uses her quirk nigh-exclusively as a watery defense barrier or to take out inanimate objects: She long ago made an active choice not to use her acid against sentient people.  This would give her some room for a little motivation-establishing flashback of her own—maybe canonize that theory about her chipperness being at least in part a front!—and provide a nice alternative to the current state of Mina’s narrative, which has spent nearly 400 chapters refusing to allow her the same free hand people like Bakugou and Kaminari take with their quirks for no established reason.

This doesn’t give Shinsou much to do, but that’s okay: his moment comes against AFO instead.

I realize that Mina's fans want her to have a big badass moment, and simply talking down a confrontation is not the kind of thing that tends to get viewed as "badass" in a shounen battle manga. Sorry about that. She can still jump around and dodge a lot while giving her pitch? Maybe she could get a big badass moment later on? I dunno; that's just what I would do, and obviously my priorities for what it would be cool for the kids to do are not the same as the broader readership's.

I'm also not sure where that leaves the confrontation with Midnight's killer; I suppose that depends on how things go between him and Kirishima in this scenario. Maybe they leave without him when he tries to protest Machia accepting the temporary alliance, or maybe he's soldier enough to take the help where he can get it and worry about later conflict later. Obviously, at any rate, this is happening in a scenario where he hasn't immediately blabbed that he killed Midnight; that can come up as a nasty surprise later on.

  

But does that mean you think Midnight’s killer should totally get away with it scott free and suffer no consequences?

Hnnnngghh that’s a tricky one because I am an unabashed MLA stan and villain supporter and therefore deeply biased about this.  Like, I don’t think soldiers should be put on trial for killing enemy soldiers, no, even high-ranking officer-types.  Obviously it’s different if they attack civilians or are otherwise breaking the codes surrounding conduct during warfare, but I do think Hose Face killing Midnight was basically a soldier killing someone he perceived as another soldier, with no undue cruelty or misconduct.

However, obviously the series itself—and the state authority the PLF is openly trying to tear down in-universe—would disagree with me!  In that context, I can’t even really call the guy “a high-ranking officer” because that would, as mentioned earlier, convey more authenticity to his position than his government wants to grant him.  As far as they’re concerned, he’s probably more like “a key figure in the recent anti-government actions carried out by the terrorist group calling themselves The Paranormal Liberation Front.”  People like that tend to get executed in prison a few years after their short, perfunctory trials.

I suppose the problem for me is that the series wants me to believe that the MLA is Very Bad and they all deserve to be Locked Up Forever, whereas I want more nuance from them than that?  Even setting aside the probable cult upbringing, I have significant trouble unabashedly blaming the PLF for their actions because the series has done nothing to convince me that less drastic avenues for change are available or even survivable for them.

This was a huge issue with the hospital attack sequence, but it applies to all sorts of the setting’s problems: Other than, “Insist that victims of oppression should focus on providing a good example to future generations,” what methods for addressing inequality does Hero Society have?  I want to know what the villains should have done, what they could have done, about systemic inequalities and repression that would have been effective against a government that employs agents like Lady Nagant and Hawks.

The picture Nagant paints is of a society waging a war against anyone who sought to change the Hero System, a war that many people who sought change never even knew they were already in.  The examples she provides of her targets are, of course, corrupt heroes and would-be terrorists, but what her HPSC President said was even farther reaching: that the purpose of her killing was to “preserve hope and faith” in heroes.

The HPSC legitimately does not seem to believe that any system other than the current one is feasible for maintaining stability, and that any attempt to shake or besmirch that system is no different than throwing the country back into the chaos of the advent of quirks.  What’s a few missing activists or tragic accidents compared to that?

Horikoshi seems desperate to have us pretend he never told us that the government his protagonists are defending actively grooms assassins to enforce the status quo, but that’s not a genie he can put back in the bottle.  I see the current events of the series as, in some form or another, basically inevitable because of Hero Society’s active, even violent resistance to change.  Midnight’s death for that cause is thus something I have tremendous difficulty thinking of as a crime that needs to be punished.

Does that mean I think Hose Face should get off scot-free?  Eeehhhhhhhhnnnngh I hate to say it this plainly, but…

Maybe it does?

The thing is, I know that Hose Face is, canonically, a quirk supremacist trying to violently overthrow the rule of law.  In real life, I have no sympathy for people trying to institute fascism, regardless of whether they’re using legal mechanisms or armed force.  But in the fictional world of BNHA, I have nothing but disdain for the way the MLA has been turned into a caricature of themselves in this final arc.  In that sense, my dissatisfaction with Hose Face’s treatment is really based on the ideal version of him and all the rest of the MLA I have in my head—the MLA that’s allowed to have nuance behind their extremism, the one overflowing with members motivated by their lived experience with the flaws in Hero Society, with a generous helping of radicalization from the fact that they’re a cult as much as they are an army.

BNHA has scrapped all that potential and left us with nothing but naked quirk supremacy to fill the void.  In an endgame that’s trying so, so hard to sell the readers on Saving Villains, that’s just poison to the story’s themes, and my villain stanning comes directly from that issue: demanding consistent treatment for the characters whose tragic backstories we haven’t been permitted to see.

Hose Face is clearly a bad person—heck, I was headcanoning him as a hard-edged, ruthless killer even when all we had to go on was him killing Midnight, long before he showed up to espouse open quirk supremacy and gloat about killing a schoolteacher, so it’s not like I ever thought he was a super nice dude or anything!  But I guess I just have trouble with the idea that the current system deserves to be the one to decide his fate, when it has, to all appearances, gone to extreme lengths to stamp out any perceived threats to itself, to the point that the narrative itself is now openly delegitimizing everyone who might otherwise offer cogent critique.

It would be different if we had never seen the dark side of the status quo and the villains really were all just shallow, two-dimensional monsters.  It would be different if the narrative had shown us legal, nonviolent and effective avenues for protest and change.[13]  It would be different if Hose Face had killed some rando uninvolved civilian.

As it is, though, Midnight was a combatant for a terrible, terrible status quo.  She might not have been using lethal means herself, but she was defending a demonstrably lethal, openly acknowledged as repressive, system.  I just can’t find it in myself to demand justice for the fact that she died for it.

But with all that being said, I also don’t think Midnight is a bad person.  She never knew about the government assassins, after all; she’s a member of the system she grew up in, the same way the kids are.  She presumably never saw the extent of the system’s flaws because she was never victimized by them.  At the end of the day, she still deserved to be properly mourned and remembered and it is a crock and a crime that we never got to see her funeral.

If anything, I think Midnight’s funeral would have been an excellent setting for a scene where the protagonists start asking questions about how things came to this, what went wrong and where, that their teacher had to die.  What is it about Hero Society that’s led to tens of thousands of dissidents, and why haven’t they ever heard of this discontent before now That would have given us considerably better set-up for a nuanced PLF, an opening to talk about Shouji’s experience of heteromorphobia, foreshadowing for Lady Nagant, and, to bring this back on-topic, the opportunity to really show Mina struggling with everything that happened as set-up for her later confrontation with Midnight’s killer.

  

Tumblr, How Does That Work?

Honestly I was expecting some sort of notification about your answers if and when you replied to me. Is that not a thing?

Making my reply a fresh post, or just posting replies in the comments section of the post you originally commented on, would not have notified you without me specifically tagging you, which at the time Tumblr wasn’t letting me do.  This problem seems to have cleared up, so you should have gotten a notification about this post going up because of your name being tagged at the very beginning!

What you see for people answering asks depends on a few things. If you send asks anonymously, you won't get a notification if/when the person answers them; you'll just have to keep an eye on their blog. If you send them with your name attached, as you did originally for me, I could choose to answer those asks privately, sending my replies back to your Inbox, or answer publically, posting my replies to my blog. Either way, you'd be notified!

For this round of responses, if I'd just replied to your reblog in comments as you did with my original post, or reblogged your reply with a reply of own instead of staring a new post, you’d have gotten notifications about either!  But I don’t want to put this much wall ‘o text on my followers’ dashboards without a cut, so I haven’t been responding directly, for which I apologize.

(Disclaimer: Notifications can be configured in your Settings menu; you can toggle them on and off for loads of stuff! You might wish to check what you currently have them set for rather than just taking my word for it.)

On the topic of cuts, I mentioned at the beginning that the cut option is hard to find on mobile, but just for reference, it looks like this in the post editor on desktop:

It's the same icon on the mobile post editor, it's just on the far right of the bar of icons along the bottom of the app. My screen cuts it off, so I have to scroll the bar over to find it.

Like I said, the Expand dropdown button Tumblr instituted a little while back has reduced the need for this somewhat, and you can certainly do whatever you prefer, but as I believe having the Expand dropdown automatically clip long posts is still an optional configuration in Settings, I'd feel better about reblogging from you directly if you put the bulk of your reply under a cut.

  

Don’t know what “blorbo” means. Kinda sounds like a demeaning term, but I’m going to assume it’s not.

Sorry, it’s not intended to be demeaning!  It’s just a slangy affectionate term for “character you really like.”  In my experience, I’d say it also has a connotation of protectiveness or self-identification, though I can’t speak for the whole of the internet.  I like plenty of characters, but I wouldn’t call them all my blorbos, just the ones that I really and truly love and want to explore/share/defend their honor to the death.

  

Thanks...? Is, is that a compliment?

(Re: my telling rvg that we seemed to have similar issues with the way Mina was being handled, but they were more willing to do the mental legwork on her than me.)

It’s mostly just an observation, but not a critical one!  As someone who’s very ready to read into the canon every little drip of information the canon will give me And So Much More, I have a tremendous amount of fellow-feeling for people of like minds, even if our taste in characters is different.

    

Buried At The Bottom, Why Kaminari Is A Worse Character Than Mineta, Yes I Said It And I’ll Say It Again

>>I have observably positive feelings for about a third of Class 1-A and only particularly negative feelings about Deku and Kaminari. What’s up with Kaminari?

My irritation with Kaminari boils down to two main things—and forgive me, I know you didn’t ask about Mineta, but Mineta’s pretty important to my feelings on Kaminari being what they are, so he’s a part of this answer.  This is all going to be pretty openly dismissive of Kaminari, as a fair warning, on top of being based on not-exactly-rigorous familiarity with the student material, so apologies to anyone who likes him and finds him an enriching, valuable character. But man alive, that is not me.  And but so:

1) Kaminari is a watered-down Mineta, with watered-down versions of all of Mineta’s flaws, but because he’s watered down, the growth he experiences stands out less than Mineta’s.  More on this in a second.

2) Despite Kaminari being a redundant character who brings virtually nothing to the table that other characters don’t do better—with the only things that are unique to him going underdeveloped in canon—fandom loves Kaminari.  (Disclaimer: I obviously don’t spend much time in the hero-fan circles of the fandom, so this is just my perception.  I’d be curious to get your perspective of Kaminari’s relative popularity, rvg!)

To hit the second point first, Kaminari has a more conventionally attractive cute anime boy face than Mineta, so Kaminari’s pushing of his female classmates’ boundaries gets mostly ignored, while Mineta gets so many fics written about him dying that there’s a dedicated Dead Mineta Minoru tag on AO3 with almost 350 hits. 

Fandom built a whole tottering edifice of fanon about Traitor Kaminari despite the howling absence of compelling evidence in the manga[14] for, so far as I can tell, the sole reason that people wanted the cute anime boy to have crunchy angst.  Then, when the actual traitor reveals landed (first the fake-out and then the real one), fandom deemed Hagakure an ungrateful bitch and Aoyama a whining coward.

So like, the fandom discrepancy is what pushes me over the edge from the bottom end of neutral into active dislike.  But I would be awfully close to it anyway for the whole “redundant-ass character who contributes nothing to this story we couldn’t get better from someone else” thing.

Kaminari being kind of leery and unpleasant about his female classmates would be a lot more glaring if it weren’t stacked up against Mineta’s actual sexual harassment, even though Kaminari is a frequent co-conspirator!   

Kaminari has a brief tussle with fear at the beginning of the war arc, but it’s neither as sustained nor as convincing as Mineta’s frequent wrestling with cowardice, present from USJ all the way up through his terrified confrontation with All For One.   

Mineta is frequently, openly envious of his classmates, a whole extra flaw that Kaminari never demonstrates in more than fleeting glimpses.   

Kaminari’s quirk is redundant next to the other high offense types in the class.   

Kaminari’s personality is not distinct enough to add anything irreplaceable to the classroom dynamic.  That’s not to say he brings nothing to the web of relationships amongst the students or the ways the class as a whole reacts to the events of the series, just that what comes to mind for me is mostly extra layering to existing dynamics, not anything truly original and unique to him.  Which would be fine—I love extra layers!—if he were contributing more as a character on literally any other fronts.

I can think of only two things that Kaminari uniquely brings to the table, but both of them are mentioned once and then never come up again.  Firstly, he’s the only one in the class to voice open admiration for Stain, a willingness to admire cool traits in Villains that never leads him to any interesting conflicts with people (classmates or otherwise) who hew to the more standard flat refusal to consider that a Villain might have or express positive aspects.

The other thing is less about Kaminari himself and more about how he’s one of three places where the story brings up the idea of people using their quirks for non-hero jobs and then refuses to develop that premise.[15]  It’s interesting worldbuilding, but as far as I’m aware, it’s never directly shown—everyone we see using their quirks (legally) in the series is doing it as a hero.  We never get much sense of what other options there are for quirk use because heroism and villainy are the only contexts we ever see it in!  This would be a little annoying on its own, but I also find it undermines a lot of other established facts and characterizations.

(Bear with me and I promise I’ll loop this back around to Kaminari.)

My interests being where they are, the biggest problem for me with the fuzziness about the legality of quirk use is that it leaves Destro and the MLA with no coherent cause.  They want free quirk use, but are they really so incredibly averse to just getting a license that they’re willing to become terrorists over it??

You could argue that naked quirk supremacy is what the MLA is currently after, and that’s obviously incompatible with the laws as they stand, but Destro Classic is never really framed as a quirk supremacist, so why did he so virulently despise the quirk use prohibitions if all they really did was require people to get a license to use quirks in public, no different than a driver’s license or a permit to serve alcohol?  Sure, you get small clutches of people sometimes with that kind of “any government oversight is bad government oversight” black-and-white thinking, but the original MLA was a powerful enough force to stand against the government for years, which doesn’t exactly scream “a handful of malcontents” to me.

Rendering the MLA’s cause mindbogglingly asinine is my biggest problem with the “other jobs can get quirk-use licenses too” tidbit, but there are also things like how totally invisible the entertainment or sports industry is.  That would make perfect sense if quirk use is illegal in those fields—people want to see cool superpowers getting used, so industries that bank on public attention dollars but can’t have their celebrities use their quirks are going to decline when they can’t compete with industries/celebrities that can.

If quirk licenses can be gotten for all sorts of jobs, though, then why have sports and entertainment become so invisible?  If “frivolous” fields like those are not aren’t seen as “contributing to society” enough for quirk use permits, then which fields do?  Why does HeroAca!Japan still mostly look and behave like IRL!Japan if quirks are in use in “all manner” of industries?  And if it isn’t the case that heroism—a dangerous job which sometimes gets people killed and which generally requires cultivating a socially demanding public brand/identity—is the only path to being able to use the special power you were born with to earn a livelihood, why does every single middle-schooler in Deku’s class and countless other classes across the country want to become a hero?

I just feel like the way the world looks and operates, the kinds of repressiveness described by even the heroes, the structures that drive people into heroism and villainy alike—the former because they don’t see any other viable way to achieve the happiness they’re looking for, the latter because they can’t become heroes but still have desires that their quirks could help them achieve—all of that makes much more sense in a world that has super powers but has tightly restricted their use to a single job class of person.

So, tying back, obviously that’s not a fault of Kaminari’s, but he is the character where that gap is most apparent.  If there aren’t many lightning heroes because lightning is in high demand in other industries, it would shed significant light on who Kaminari is as a person if the manga would tell us what those other industries are. 

What other paths could Kaminari have chosen?  What’s so much better about those other industries that people with quirks tailor-made for heroism,[16] in a society that worships popular and powerful heroes, are so willing to choose those other industries instead?  Why did Kaminari not make that same decision?  What does heroism mean to him personally that he chose it when so many others in his situation did not?

Kaminari could present a huge in on that angle of the worldbuilding, but instead he’s a complete dead-end.  Mineta’s motivations are base as hell, but at least we know what they are!  Further, it tells us interesting (uncomplimentary, but interesting!) things that people like Recovery Girl and Deku hear said motivations from Mineta’s own mouth, and shrug and accept them as perfectly valid.

And that’s just his professed motivations!  His final exam scene actually drops an early hint about the admiration for Deku he’ll later wholeheartedly declare in the 1-A vs Deku fight!  I don’t remember Kaminari ever getting anything a fraction so revealing; he just coasts through the story contributing nothing unique or meaningful.  He’s hardly the only 1-A character with that particular lack of depth—Sato, Sero, Hagakure and Ojiro are all similar blank slates in terms of their motivations or histories—but then, none of them are a fraction as popular as Kaminari is in the fandom as I experience it, either.

So to sum up, I dislike Kaminari because he’s a wishy-washy nothing of a character, a generically Inoffensive Anime Cutie Boy adored out of all reasonable proportion compared to more compelling and equally underdeveloped classmates alike.  Mineta is, by any measure, more problematic, and it's even worse that U.A./Aizawa are so blasé about him, but, at least from where I’m standing, he’s still more layered, more compelling, more dynamic, and speaks in more interesting ways to the world around him than Kaminari ever comes close to matching.

(…Kaminari’s thing with Jirou is fine.  Perfectly reasonable character relationship building material.  I just don’t count it one way or the other because it’s a self-contained relationship dynamic that has no bearing on the way either character engages with the broader world/system the series’ overarching narrative is challenging.  They motivate each other in small ways, but that motivation doesn’t lead them to truly grow or change as people, only to overcome modest internal confidence hurdles blocking them from things they already wanted to do anyway.)

--

And that's it! Thanks for forging through, good lord, over twenty pages of this, rvg and anyone else who did! I hope you were at least moderately entertained, give or take my blatant Kaminari slander. See you next time, and enjoy the Footnotes.

---------------- FOOTNOTES ----------------

[1] We’re not shown any personnel or drugs or anything, but I assume they’ve been keeping Machia drugged since Jakku, same as Kurogiri in between interviews.  It’s the only thing that worked on Machia before, so why wouldn’t they have more on-hand?

[2] Despite watching the Sports Festival with Shigaraki, natch.

[3] I would like it if he would do that with a lot less insufferable power scaling bullshit, you understand, but I’m spotting the comic its plot arc here.

[4] Outside of, say, the Persona games, where the MCs can change ability sets by swapping out what companion spirit they’re packing, but even that doesn’t make them specialized for status effects, merely capable of using them.

[5] Interestingly, while Bakugou fought off the villainous sales pitch with as much verve as he brings to all his fights, if he had fallen off the righteous path there, we might have observed that his pridefulness was explicitly fostered by the people around him giving him excessive praise for his powerful quirk and ignoring his resulting violent arrogance.  That is to say, Bakugou would have fallen under the same, “Villains are created by the failures in their society,” pattern that BNHA applies to all of its sympathetic villains.

[6] There was one other instance, but iirc it was an error in the translation C.Cook had done for the BNHA databook.  It would not surprise me that he was being less careful or was more pressed for time when translating the reams upon reams of text in one of those.

[7] At least until the fifteen-thousand-strong mob shows up.

[8] Which frankly should be all he’s sore about.  As others have pointed out, Machia’s anger about being abandoned is kind of incoherent.  Yes, AFO left him on the battlefield, but he didn’t exactly leave him to rot in prison forever.  The moment AFO made his big push, he sent people to spring Machia, so in what sense exactly does Machia think AFO abandoned him?  If it was just the last straw after a string of abandonments from both AFO and Shigaraki, the manga could have stood to make that much clearer.

[9] AFO and Ujiko created Kurogiri out of Shirakumo—as a babysitter for Tomura, yes, but Tomura didn’t choose that.  And as to Shigaraki’s very existence trampling on Nana’s memory and causing All Might pain, well, Shigaraki didn’t ask to be brought into the world, abused by his father, neglected by his family, and then raised by a supervillain, did he?

[10] And speaking of Unbreakable, compare how explicitly we’re shown Kirishima’s growth and the foundations of it with how the inspirations for Mina’s attacks are relegated to passing mentions, not direct depictions.  She just casually tells Kirishima that his Unbreakable inspired her Acidman, and likewise only internally reflects on asking Bakugou and Todoroki to teach her their training method, which let her develop her Max Power Acidman Alma move, without so much as a single scrubbed in doodle depicting said training assistance.

[11] Somehow.  The story is unclear on whether he disseminated threats, contacted them directly, or just used the combination of Search+Warping to drag them all back into his presence, and that last option in particular runs into complications given the limitations of both quirks.

[12] In this AU, we would have gotten to see the class have an actual discussion about Saving Villains, prompted by the way the reveal about Aoyama solidified Deku, Shouto and Uraraka’s desires to help their respective villain foils.  The class would carry that resolve forward not only for those three villains alone, but also Shouji for Spinner, Kirishima when talking to Hose Face, Mina, here, with Gigantomachia, etc.

[13] None of the things I can think of that might be considered evidence of protest meet all the criteria.  The original MLA became violent, Harima Oji was a lawbreaker and also ineffective in the long term, the small group that yells at Endeavor and the rest in Chapter 311 is not portrayed as linked to any broader efforts to unseat “fake heroes,” and the group that “condemned” the newscaster Miyagi Daikaku was ineffective and didn’t even seem to rise to the level of open protest.

[14] "His grades are poor but he namedrops a Hemingway novel! He must be concealing the fact that he's actually super-smart!" "He's doing a Liberation salute! He must be the traitor, even though the Liberation salute uses the other hand, and Kaminari has been using finger-gun gestures to fire off his lightning attacks since at least the License Exam if not earlier, and the League had no connection to the MLA at the time when the traitor was most active!"

[15] A blurb about Kaminari in, iirc, one of the volume extras, Suneater’s flashback to a teacher telling his class that they can “make fine use of their quirks at any number of jobs,” and Uraraka’s early mention that she’d considered “getting permission” to use her quirk to help with her parents’ construction business.

[16] See the previous discussion about the kinds of quirks that are popularly accepted as “good hero quirks.”

[itsclydebitches]

I was reading through the notes on the Theodore post (some of the responses are just down right mean to you and I'm sorry you have to deal with that) but it seems to me like an issue the rwby fandom has is dealing with structural critiques (like character introductions relative to story arcs) and respond with in-universe reasoning. These are two seperate frameworks that get confused too easily. Thing X didn't happen because it the story has rule Y, but why did the authors make rule Y?

Thanks, anon 💜

The sad thing is that these comments are downright tame compared to what some fans will put on your posts and in your inbox. In the past month I’ve seen two people express a desire to post their own critical takes about RWBY, but are wary to do so because they know it will draw far worse than this. I read through Number1yangster’s response and they rely entirely on insults there, not evidence to back up their reading of the story. The “argument” here is that I’m stupid and incapable of thinking or reading because that would “cut into the time [I] spend complaining.” Most people don’t want to put up with that kind of nonsense, not just because it’s obviously unpleasant to read, but because it circumvents the entire purpose of posting metas in the first place. Outside of just venting for that emotional release, fans share takes about a show in the hope of finding like-minded individuals and engaging with different perspectives. As RWDE posters constantly emphasize, we are looking for evidence to support more positive readings of the show because we want the show to be good. If you can point us towards moments where the show establishes other dust companies so we don’t have to assume that Team RWBYJNOR decimated the dust trade by destroying the SDC (another debate recently), or if you can point us towards moments where Theodore was established as a trusted ally so that we don’t have to assume that Ruby foolishly put all of Remnant in the hands of a potentially dangerous stranger… then please do! I often forget things, misunderstand things, or am simply persuaded by another reading, but that’s contingent upon others being able to point out my mistake, or persuade me towards their interpretation. But fans like Canonseeker and Number1yangster aren’t interested in having a conversation. It was never about discussing RWBY, or being able to back up their stance because they can’t back up their stance. Not without ignoring basic counters or relying primarily on their own headcanons. That’s why whenever someone says, “Please show me where this happened in the story” or point out, “You’ve entirely ignored the evidence I laid out. Why won’t you acknowledge this?” they turn straight to insults instead. They’ve got nothing else and that sucks for the fans who wanted an engaging discussion or, baring that, just want their posts left alone if others aren’t willing to approach them respectfully.

Anyway, you’ve hit the nail on the head there, anon. If I could get the entire RWBY fandom to understand anything—really understand it—it’s that this is a fictional world where the writers have complete control over everything that happens in it. There is not a single thing in RWBY that acts as a true barrier to the writers, especially as a webseries unencumbered by the restrictions of a network and as a show already notorious for playing fast and loose with its rules. Any problem with the story is something that come about because of a choice the writers made and the underlying criticism of all this is, “Why did you choose that?” I’ve used this example before because it’s a fairly common occurrence that spans multiple fandoms, but has been re-popularized lately by BNHA. Basically, the problem with giving women superheroes scantily clad outfits that obviously serve to sexualize them. The RWBY fandom are akin those that go, “Momo has to be scantily clad because she creates objects out of her bare skin and Toru has to be naked because clothes ruin her being invisible, duh. Clearly you’re too stupid to pay attention to what the show tells you,” entirely missing that the criticism is asking why the author designed things that way in the first place. It’s a sci-fi story with fantasy elements. There was nothing stopping Horikoshi from just introducing futuristic outfits that allow the high school girls to pull objects through the material, or make the outfit invisible to match the person. Or giving them superpowers with different rules to begin with! Why can’t Momo bring out any object just through the palms of her hands? Why can’t Toru make the things she wears invisible too? Writers are the gods of their story and their choices tell us a lot about what they want to prioritize.

RWBY chose not to introduce Theodore despite the ability to do so only being limited by their own imagination. Qrow could have been exchanging letters with him since the Fall. A shady side character could have showed up at the bar, delivering a verbal message from the head of Vacuo’s inner circle before sneaking off again. We could have gotten flashbacks to him during the pre-Beacon days. Ironwood could have invented a short-term communication device that’s good for one message, resulting in a quick but crucial check-in. Ozpin could have had a conversation with the group where he shares insight into his friend and everyone debates if, after Lionheart, they can still trust him. Anything could have happened! But so many fans are inclined to go, “But that couldn’t have happened because RWBY doesn’t do flashbacks like that, and Ironwood never invented that kind of device, and everyone was mad at Ozpin back then, and—” ignoring that, obviously, other aspects of the show would have to change to accommodate this. It's the exact reason why Number1yangster dismissed by idea to just make Theodore a part of the original meeting, claiming that this couldn't have happened because headmasters rarely attend... even though Ironwood is right there. If he can be an exception, why not Theodore too? Or why not make it so that the headmasters do unusually attend, but Lionheart couldn't make it this time for whatever reason (potentially setting up his future reveal as a betrayer)? Things can and should change to accommodate the additions that are going to improve the story as a whole.

That’s how writing works and many other times RT has demonstrated that they understand that. In Volume 4 how do we learn about Jaune getting new armor? We’re dropped into a fight where he’s struggling because he doesn’t have his sword, the group goes to a blacksmith that’s been created solely to provide Jaune with this update, there’s a scene wherein he dons the outfit, and there’s a conversation where we establish that this was made from Pyrrha’s armor, highlighting the character and thematic importance of this. If Jaune had just shown up in Volume 4 with a new look and critics wondered where in the world he got all that, there’s no explanation for this, it just randomly appeared… others would have started insisting that it just wasn’t possible to show that evolution on screen, there wasn't time, Jaune was too busy doing his job as a huntsmen to show you how he got his armor... even though the canon demonstrates that of course writing a journey that answered the audience's basic questions was always possible. Many fans approach RWBY like a historical event, something that happened the way it happened and only a delusional idiot would think they can change the facts of these real people going about their real lives, rather than approaching it like the malleable, fictional work it is, where if something doesn’t make sense, it’s because the writers failed to make choices that would lead to a cohesive story.

Case in point: my Jaune example doesn’t account for the fact that the show never explains how he got the armor in the first place. Pyrrha was killed up on the tower while Jaune was blasting off in the weapon locker. There’s no indication that someone like Qrow picked those pieces up, there’s no explanation why Jaune would get it over Pyrrha’s family, and none of this even takes into account that everything but Pyrrha’s headpiece disintegrated after Cinder's attack. Even when RWBY is working to set things up and follow through on the questions the audience might have, it’s an attempt still riddled with holes.

At this point in the series, eight years in, we have a wealth of examples where RWBY fails to meet basic writing expectations and the commentaries are riddled with admissions that they forgot this, should have done that, admit that this was confusing, that they couldn’t stick to their own rules here, etc. We have both textual and Word of God evidence that these writers frequently fail to craft a story where the audience can follow along without buying bonus content of dubious canonical status, spending time in fandom communities going, "Wait, can someone explain this to me?" or just throwing up their hands because no one has an explanation for this, good luck thinking up one yourself. It really shouldn’t be a hot take anymore to say that RWBY is often missing crucial pieces like “Did not establish Theodore as a character,” yet many fans remain too enamored with the version of RWBY they've headcanoned to just admit that yeah, the writers made a mistake. Again.

Other than emphasizing that RWBY is a fictional construct that the writers have complete control over, the second thing I'd want the fandom to learn is that acknowledging a story's flaws doesn't bar you from loving it. A lot of fans act like if they ever gave any ground to criticism and admitted that RWBY is less than perfect, they'd lose their Allowed To Enjoy RWBY card. It's like they're convinced that this thing they enjoy comes with the requirement of never ever saying anything bad about it... and to some extent, they're right. Because the fandom has rejected criticism to such an extreme that you're immediately ostracized from major portions of the community simply for voicing any criticism, no matter how mild. What was the recent Reddit drama if not evidence that, if given the chance, many fans will permanently cut anyone critical from the community? Fans know that if they were to ever commit the great sin of going, "Hey, that RWDE blog has a point" many others would turn on them and the part of their RWBY enjoyment stemming from community interaction would be irrevocably changed. Some fans just need to learn that you can love something while admitting to its flaws; others I think would be happy to do that if the rest of the fandom hadn't made it clear that this approach comes with social consequences. A part of me really gets why many fans double down on praising RWBY and rejecting discussion out of hand. It's a way of distancing themselves: a witty jab with eye-roll emoji proves to everyone reading that you're not anything like the "hatedom," but a legitimate discussion shows that maybe, just maybe, you're giving those opinions a fair shake... and we can't have that, can we? That means you're a hater. That means you're probably out on twitter harassing RT. That means you're someone the rest of the fandom needs to reject because having you around would just ruin all the "real" fans' fun. So you head on over to the RWDE corners of the Internet and yay, people are happy to discuss RWBY with you again, but entering those groups has now "proven" that you were never a true fan to begin with. It's a lose-lose situation unless you agree to never entertain criticism in the first place. And if you know that agreeing with a take might lose you your circle of online friends, lose an audience you've worked hard to develop, and result in a whole slew of hate in your inbox... yeah, safer and more enjoyable to just agree with the crowed and reiterate that RWBY is flawless. Better that than deal with the alternative.

[leviiattacks]

Two Faced | Chapter Ten

↳ levi ackerman, the very person who was about to kindly behead you by a surprising turn of events manages to become your loving husband? you would be elated if this was true love, but it’s all thanks to a mysterious magic spell that your life is spared, for now at least.

pairing :: duke!levi x duchess!reader genre :: royal au ??? (at this point idek) angst, fluff, slice of life etc ?? word count :: 4k author note :: haha.... wowww it's been long since i last updated. honestly my physical and mental health have just been horrible... that's about it, i lost a lot of motivation but if you're still reading i am very thankful and i will try to deliver the story well. i tried my best but writing whilst sick is very tiresome :-) tags :: @patience-is-here​ , @chwlogy​ , @a--nonymousse​ , @imkumichan​ 

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Keeping yourself cooped up within Levi's estate and never daring to step a foot outside should have been what you had done. Blackmailing him to keep you confined within the walls of your bedroom would be much better compared to the problem you have to resolve now. Perhaps if you had done so you wouldn't have collided face first into this muddle.

Jean fiddles with the ends of his button up, he doesn't take the chance to glance up at any of his superiors. He's either much too embarrassed or has nothing noteworthy to start off with.

Erwin chooses to call the shots seeing as neither you or the Viscount by your side wish to begin.

"You both understand why we're here. Correct me if I'm wrong?" The Commander looks between you, Jean and your unfortunate excuse of a husband. Suddenly it looks as if the gears and cogs in Jean's brain move without warning.

Offering a demure nod you expect for him to follow in your footsteps and do the same only he stands there looking between you and Levi.

"Wait...The two of you are? A couple?" Stunned isn't the word, Jean's completely flabbergasted.

"If you figured that out this late, I do not understand why Erwin sees you remotely fit for my team." Levi's beyond insulted at the fact he's only just understood the situation.

Jean, now more intimidated than ever before straightens his back and coughs clumsily, "Sorry." He murmurs chestnut eyes making contact with the hardwood floors.

The Commander's laced hands sit atop his desk, elegant fingers moving similar to honey on a spoon. He sighs not out of fatigue but pride. Whatever plan he's come up with has to be decent at the very least, his body language is telling you that much.

"We have a number of possibilities we can choose from. We owe that pleasure to Mr Kirstein here." Erwin offers him an almost cynical smile, you can't help but gulp thinking about how this is essentially your fault. With all the constant training sessions and team building tasks it makes sense for Jean to have completely forgot about your unspoken rule. Solely blaming him is incorrect.

Raising your arm above your head to intervene you make it known that you're aware of Levi shooting you a look of warning by returning it. It's best he knows you don't care for anyone's opinion let alone his.

"Permission to speak Commander?"

Your request is agreed to immediately with the wave of  Erwin's hand.

"It's my fault for not reminding Jean. I'll take the blame, I hadn't even told him the full story concerning me and Levi."

Levi doesn't enjoy your defense in the slightest. "I don't expect my wife to fling herself at other men and allow for them to snoop around gathering the details of our personal lives."

Scoffing you shield yourself with your arms over your chest.

"Oh dear husband. If you want to get personal do tell me where my family is?" It's an inside joke only Levi will be able to understand.

"If you call those people family your standards are disgustingly low."

"Maybe that explains why I settled for you."

Again, other's opinions are not at the forefront of your priority list. Regardless it's quite enjoyable pushing Levi further into a corner with that sentence. You see the internal struggle play out within him. Jaw clenched, hands balled together. He doesn't have an appropriate response

Jean bursts out unable to hold it in any longer, chest trembling with every quake of laughter that ripples through him you have to shove him with your elbow. For a Viscount his etiquette sure is nonexistent.

"My word, the two of you sound like..."

Levi stares at him most probably expecting something along the lines of "An old married couple."

But, no. It's nothing anyone in the room expects. That includes you.

"It's as if you're unhappy with each other..."

Not a noise is made after that. Jean isn't mistaken, your heart is miserable. You've never had many relationships to begin with, whether it be familial, romantic or platonic and for someone such as your husband to treat you the way he does - it feels futile having to navigate around the complexities. Even if he isn't really your husband it's disappointing to reflect on your marriage so suddenly.

Feeling your face droop a little you bite your bottom lip with your teeth. Hearing the truth from someone you barely expect to hear it from has an effect on you.

You're so caught up analyzing everything it takes you a minute to even register Levi grumbling and lunging forward pilfering the collar of Jean's shirt.

"Every day you prove to be more and more pathetic than I expect." Levi turns to look at you after that. His stare bores into you but he doesn't come off threatening, you assume his last remark is directed solely at Jean.

When he turns back only glaring at Jean now with even more tenacity than before. He's ready to snap but Erwin has clearly had enough of the unwanted altercation in his office.

"Enough. The both of you. This is most bothersome." At the Commander's orders Levi is silenced although it takes all of his resolve to do so.

Finally bothering you take a good look at Jean. He's calm in an incredibly out of character way.

Is this not the man who trembled in his boots the first time he and Levi came into contact? It's almost as if he seems pleased with himself for drawing out such a reaction from his Captain.

Erwin shuffles through stacks of paperwork on his desk. The man needs an assistant at this point. You doubt you could find anything in that haphazard pile. Edges of crumpled paper poke out uncomfortably and Erwin becomes increasingly annoyed when he can't locate what it is he's looking for.

Just as you're about to ask if he requires any assistance it seems he's found what he's been looking for, that's if his eyes are any indication of the relief he feels.

"This." He holds up the paper, all eyes in the room are trained on it. "Under normal circumstances would not have to become an option."

"But these aren't normal circumstances?" Jean's thoughtless question is irksome when the answer is so obviously staring him down in the face.

Nonetheless Erwin nods incapable of losing his cool over something so minor.

"Sign to confirm to my proposition."

The document he places onto the desk isn't what you imagine, you can practically feel the dread climb up your throat once you're done scanning it. Jean's full name placed right next to yours in bold lettering has your stomach lurching. You don't have to read the rest to understand the new circumstances you've landed into.

To make matters worse Erwin places two rings down right in front of the both of you.

A pot of boiling hot water is what you've been thrown in.

Are you supposed to be some sort of replacement for potatoes? What's Jean in this scenario? Carrots?

"It is troublesome to have the two of you put on an act to be involved with one another but I see it as our safest option." Erwin notices your parted lips and slacked jaw. "You need not worry this isn't a marriage contract, you're simply acting."

There's no path out of this pot, you and Jean will simply have to deal with the prospect of being boiled alive.

Ah, you forgot to mention who would act as the hot water but you're sure the suspect is obvious.

Even right now Levi's fury radiates off of him, it's unclear if he was given the details of the Commander's plan beforehand but if his furrowed brow and pursed lips are indicators of the truth he must have had no idea.

Your suspicions are confirmed to be correct once Levi reaches forward plucking the paper away, it just so happens he's snatched it away the very moment Jean leans in to get a closer look at it.

"I was never informed of this."

Erwin gives him a guarded smile. "Do you have any jurisdiction over what I think is best?" Is his freezing reply.

"Yes. When it concerns my wife and another man - Correction. I meant boy."

Jean's taken aback by the subtle jab and shamefacedly shoves his hands into his pockets.

You watch the scene go down with a perplexed look the entire time. Levi's frustration seems to be legitimate yet he has no logical reason for it to ever be present in the first place. Unless he has a plan which outperforms the one you've just been given he's doing this all for nothing.

"I assure you your wife is in safe hands so long as you stop interfering."

Levi's about to bark back until he catches your confusion. He's become aware of your tilted head and telling expression and only then does he silence himself permanently not before sighing deeply, muttering an expletive under his breath.

 "I’ll sign it.” That seems to be Jean’s indirect way of asking what your choice will be.

“I... will too.” Is your hesitant reply.

Levi only becomes avoidant after that. Half way through Erwin explaining how you and Jean have to look believable Levi just ups and leaves without a word. Perhaps you've hurt his pride but for what he's done to you it's a small price to pay and so you do nothing to make amends. He has no reason to feel uncomfortable, you aren't really his wife, you're essentially strangers. Does he even know your favourite colour? Your favourite food? Your favourite pastime?  

You doubt he does.

Jean and you are rather successful with your act. It feels pleasant having him brush your hair out of your face occasionally or lovingly place a hand on your forehead to check if you've come down with a fever. He laces his fingers with yours when others are around and when they aren't he lets the act go. It's satisfying having a cooperative partner.

Naturally Jean is still a tease, even now he makes the odd suggestive comment or two in passing but you can't say you hate it. In fact it excites you to think of a response that borders the edge of teasing and simple fun between friends.

The increasing openness between the two of you is enough for the cadets to deduce that he's most probably the noble man you wed in secrecy.

It's only been a few days since yours and Jean's newfound behaviour, thankfully you haven't been flooded with questions just yet. The higher ups sit nearby during breakfast, lunch and dinner keeping watch over the cadets. It leaves you able to eat and drink without having to handle the constant inquiring of your comrades.

However, you aren't as lucky today. A meeting's taking place and after yours and Jean's convincing act Erwin deems it safe enough to leave you unattended for a short while.

Of course it doesn't go according to plan because when you're involved when does anything ever go according to plan?

The cadets are flocked around your table at dinner as soon as they notice they've been left to their own devices. The opportunity to sit down without everyone invading your space is barely provided to you. Krista is sat to your right leaning into you rather animatedly, Annie has made herself at home sat across you which in itself is completely out of character and slightly unnerving, Annie never and you repeat never concerns herself with you.

"Why did you and Jean hide it?" Armin hovers over your shoulder as per usual. He can't be blamed for naturally being inquisitive and it does give you the opportunity to lay out the foundations of your plan. Now's your time to muster up one of your rehearsed responses.

"It would interfere with work." You respond immediately wanting to appear natural. Pondering on an answer for too long would raise suspicions.

Armin makes a sound of approval and shuffles into the seat next to Krista, that is until Ymir can be overheard telling him to move if he knows what's best for him.

"I have a question." Says a voice across the table, you don't have to look at the blonde parallel to you to know it's her.

For once Annie’s initiated a conversation with you, she’s not particularly great at keeping her intentions discreet. Maybe she doesn’t care if you can tell what she’s up to? But if that’s the case her plan isn’t all that foolproof, there's no way you're to let any details slip away.

Sharply inhaling waiting for what it is she has to say you find that her sentence never comes. Instead she shakes her head and murmurs a "Never mind.". You don't even have the time to ask her to stick around, she's already rose from her seat taking her unfinished plate of food with her, you let her go assuming she feels unwell.

"So how'd you two meet? Jean already told me earlier but I'd like to hear your side." Reiner's taken Annie's empty seat and his gaze is unwavering. The trap they've set up is a clever one. Surveying the hall for Bertholdt you know he has to be observing too. The two never operate alone.

You suddenly hate Reiner. For whatever reason he and his trio are endlessly obsessed with you, they've caught onto something that's for sure but you don't know what it is and now they've completely ensnared you with a backhanded trick. There's no way out of this, you have no idea what it is Jean said to Reiner, the chances of you providing the exact same answer are slim to none.

"My memory is really fuzzy, I don't think Jean gave off much of a first impression so I've forgot." Your horrible excuse doesn't fly by, everyone simultaneously narrows their eyes in disbelief. What you've said isn't convincing at all.

Husband and Wife yet you've forgot how the two of you met?

Fidgeting with the ring adorning your finger the cool metal isn't doing a great job at alleviating the pressure of the situation.

"Jean said the two of you hit it off almost instantly. Who's being dishonest?"

Reiner's either lying to catch you out or he's saying the God honest truth and right now all you can do is hope and pray for a miracle to sweep you off your feet. Mikasa and Jean still aren't within view. At this point you're hoping for Levi to save you, it doesn't matter how so long as you escape unscathed.

"Hey, I think we're just making her anxious with all the questions." Armin is quick to side with you, deep down you know he only does so due to the respect he holds for his Commander. You thank the Heaven's for Erwin's admirable smile and commendable leadership, it seems to be the only reason Armin believes you and Jean.

"Or she's lying." Reiner's resting his head in one of his palms, he's still boring holes right into your frame.

Your eye twitches, this is all unnecessary and uncalled for, whatever it is Reiner wants out of you it better be worthwhile.

He still eggs you on. "You walked out of the Captain's quarters. I saw you."

Standing up and leaning forward you plant your feet to the ground as firmly as you can you.

"And if she did what's it to you?"

Fighting the urge to sigh in relief you've never been happier to hear Jean's voice but something's off. His breathing sounds heavy - like he fought his way to get inside. Turning only then do you notice Mikasa standing by him. She looks equally as exhausted. There's been some sort of a struggle.

"You think it was funny getting Annie to guard the door?" He heaves and runs a frustrated hand through his hair.

"And you think hiding secrets from the rest of us is any better?" Reiner's adamant there's information that the both of you are hiding, he's not wrong but that doesn't change that he's challenging you unprovoked without a reasonable motive.

"We're hiding nothing." Unlike you Jean is sure of his words, he's confident speaking up and he seems to be able to pull off the role of a protective husband perfectly.

“I came out of the Captain’s quarters because he had access to hot water. He said I could use his shower. That’s all it was.”

Reiner quirks an eyebrow upwards and is pleased with your answer. God you’ve said something incriminating haven’t you? It's not incriminating per se but it's without doubt malleable and easy to twist.

“Jean, you were okay with your wife doing that at the dead of night?” Reiner's still leading the interrogation.

“I was the one who suggested it.”

“I don’t believe you’re a couple." If it were Reiner who said that you wouldn't care much, after all it's pretty clear he never believed it but to your displeasure it isn't him who's spoken. Ymir's lopsided grin is all knowing and you're beginning to lose your footing in this argument any second now if any more people start to side against you.

If Ymir disagrees that almost certainly means Krista has her qualms about you too, you've observed beforehand that Ymir tends to speak for Krista on occasion. This happens to be one of those times.

Krista timidly raises her hand and Ymir gives her an approving nod encouraging her to speak.

"I don't like the conflict going on but it is suspicious..."

"Why have I only ever seen you two hold hands?" She asks.

Ymir slings her arm over Krista's shoulder affectionately. "Yeah, I tell Krista I'll marry her every day of the week."

Mikasa mumbles something unintelligible, Ymir gives her a look of warning but Mikasa doesn't seem to care. Instead she repeats what she has to say loud and clear.

"Stick to only speaking when Krista is involved."

Krista holds Ymir by her arm so she doesn't get up, she knows how she gets when she's been provoked. Even if Krista has her suspicions it isn't worth Ymir gaining a permanent penalty point on her record.

Thankfully Armin cuts in. "There's no solid evidence to show they're lying and even if they are the Commander's most probably told them to. Don't you think there's a reason? Leave it be if that's the case. I trust him with our lives."

"We have a right to know." Annie's returned and insists to keep this back and forth going.

Just as you're about to fire back Jean takes a hold of your waist, you look down and seeing his large hands planted securely around your frame has your stomach bubbling with anticipation.

"What are you— "

And then he kisses you, he doesn't ask and instinctively your arms move to whack his chest but you stop yourself in time. You realize it's for the sake of your plan not falling through and so you gently place your hands on his shoulders attempting to ground yourself. It becomes increasingly difficult when you sink deeper into the kiss than you'd like to admit. Blood rushes to the tips of your ears and the thumping of your heartbeat makes it difficult to articulate any thoughts, all you really know is that you like this, whatever this is.

Jean's hands don't feel like they were made to rest against your back, they feel slightly out of place as if he's a key and you're an unmatched lock. In spite of that the circles he comfortingly rubs into the sides of your waist are appreciated, you almost forget you're in a room full of people until you're flooded by cold air.

You've been dragged off of Jean and something in the pit of your stomach has you wishing Levi isn't responsible for the interruption.

To your relief it's just Hange, they're glowing in mischief, the grin on their face shows they aren't mad. They might even find this entertaining.

"Well I be damned... maybe they weren't bluffing?" Connie's been persuaded by the looks of it and Krista's busy whispering to Ymir, you hear the faint sound of the word "Romantic" escape her lips, she's equally as convinced as Connie.

Hange smacks your back light-heartedly and looks to the door for a second. "We leave ya' both for a while and you decide to give everyone a show?"

Erwin's stood by the doorway with a humorous smile playing at his lips, Levi however is anything but amused, he glares at you with murderous eyes, he looks like he's ready to end your life then and there but you know he won't dare do so and for a second you feel braver than you ever have before. Without much thought you grab onto Jean's forearm.

"Me and my husband will get going now!" You allow your gaze to loiter when you get to Reiner. He grunts an apology and you're oh so tempted to ask him to repeat himself but you'd rather not instigate anything.

With that said and done you and Jean leave after giving the performance of your lives.

Slowly but gradually the sky outside becomes dark.

The will to sleep left your body long ago. It's by pure luck that you even manage to catch three hours of rest. Training is the only available distraction and dying out in battle isn't favourable by any means, your boredom may as well be used resourcefully - Strapping yourself up in your ODM gear is the best option.

A quarter way through your warm up you can sense a presence behind you, the leaves rustle and the wind feels noticeably quieter. You'd bother to turn around to see who's intruded but Levi's snuck close enough for you to be able to smell his perfume from where you're stood.

"Feel disrespected? Embarrassed even?" You jab at him knowing it'll rile him up, you don't face him not wanting to give him the pleasure of seeing your face.

"Watch your mouth." he warns sharply.

Rolling your eyes you go about your business, it stays that way for a few minutes. All the while Levi stares at you darting from tree to tree, his scrutinizing gaze scalding you repeatedly.

"Y/N!" He yells at the top of his lungs.

For some unknown reason you automatically stop and lower yourself to the ground

"I have something to tell you." Comes his tense follow up. A finger of his latches onto one of the leather straps on your back.

You can't believe he's still denying the undeniable.

"You can wait till tomorrow. I'll be going to bed."

Levi doesn't seem to care for your cold response and proceeds with no warning.

"I'm jealous." His voice shakes. The grip he has on your harness doesn't let up. With your back turned to him you're still somehow able to detect the very obvious crack of pain.

Levi, jealous?

Gritting your teeth together you feel deceived.

How much longer will you have to tolerate Levi's push and pull?

“May I ask, what he is to you, my love?”

Your breathing grows heavy, tensing up you're completely shocked by the term of endearment that falls from his lips. You haven't heard it for so long, Levi sounds eerily different.

You hate to admit it but a flicker of foolish hope lights in your chest.

"Levi why would you ask— "

"Why don't you call me Lev anymore?" He whispers sounding strangled. You can't take it anymore and hesitantly look his way.

His eyes are filled with tears "I'm sorry my love, I don't know what went wrong." you falter for a second not knowing what to think.

At that moment the flicker becomes a flame.

The man who stands right before you is meant to be dead, never to be seen again. By all accounts this should be impossible, but Lev has always been a fighter.

Bitterness stings your heart, the wounds you've collected are still fresh but despite your body's protests you don't flinch when he gently takes a hold of your wrist, bringing it closer to his mouth.

"Lev...? Is that really you...?" You ask desperately.

The warm kiss he presses against your pulse point provides you with the answer you've been longing for.

[kpop-zone]

The Lady in Red | Jennie

Mafia AU | Meet messy/Strangers to lovers | “Are you sure this is legal?”

Warnings: blood, death, anxiety symptoms

Wordcount: 3,373

A/N: The gif is kinda flashy, please tell me if that’s a problem for someone, then I will switch it out!!

“I guess I don’t need to tell you that his infiltration into the ‘circle of trust’ was unsuccessful.”

Seungyeon chuckled sadly next to you and you turned around with a shaky sigh, not being able to look at your patched-up colleague in the hospital bed any longer.

“When will we finally manage to take them down?!”

You growled while angrily kicking the chair that was standing next to the door for the police officer that would have to be there 24/7 for safety reasons from now on.

“I’m starting to believe that we will never be able to. The Kim Clan isn’t the most powerful criminal organization in the city for no reason. Their network is bigger than we could have ever guessed when we started to investigate them and the mastermind behind all this seems to be a ghost. I mean we have no idea what The Lady in Red even looks like. Five years of thorough investigation and there are no clues about her, except that she has to be the most ruthless person on this planet considering that none of her subordinates dare to betray her...”

Seungyeon buried her face in her hands in defeat but you instantly shook your head. You couldn’t let The Lady in Red win; especially not after all the blood, sweat and tears that you had put into this case. You had become a detective to make this world a better place. You couldn’t let the biggest criminal of this city get away.

“Let’s wait till Jihoon wakes up. Maybe he remembers something.”

You tried to sound hopeful although you weren’t even sure whether Jihoon would wake up at all. You had found him in front of the police station this morning, drowning in his own blood after he had joined the Kim Clan almost a year ago to investigate undercover. He had been the great hope in your team. No other cop had ever managed to be a part of the clan for that long before, making you think that you had finally achieved a breakthrough. A foolish hope that made you feel like a failure now that you were standing in front of his hospital bed.

“Do you really believe that?”

Seungyeon replied doubtfully and you huffed in frustration. Of course, you didn’t believe that. With his injuries, you could be glad if Jihoon would ever be able to walk and talk again. But it was too hard to admit that you had hit another dead end; that Jihoon’s sacrifice had been in vain. Angrily, you clenched your fists and closed your eyes in order to calm down again, but it felt like you were riding a roller coaster. Your heart was beating out of your chest and your head was spinning, making you feel nauseous. You couldn’t bear to look at your half-dead friend any longer.

“I need to get out of here.”

You uttered breathlessly before bursting away. Blindly, you stumbled through the hallways, bumping into people left and right before eventually reaching the underground parking. You just needed to get away from those bright lights, the sterile smell, and the constant beeping of Jihoon’s heartrate monitor that seemed to be making fun of your obvious incapability to catch The Lady in Red. This was all your fault. If you were a better team leader, Jihoon would still be making his bad jokes that had always made night shifts more bearable in the past in some way or another. Tears immediately started to pool in your eyes when you thought about the possibility of never being able to hear your friend’s goofy laugh again that had managed to make everyone join in even when his joke had been terrible. What had you done? How could you have allowed him to go undercover?

In hopes that you could flee your bad conscience if you were only fast enough, you hastily unlocked your car before diving into the driver’s seat. It still seemed like your head was spinning in circles and the extreme ringing in your ears didn’t really increase your fitness to drive, but you didn’t hesitate a second before starting the engine and backing out of the parking space full speed.

You just needed to get away.

A loud collision, however, cut your escape short and forced your car to come to an abrupt halt, causing your body to be painfully pressed back into your seat by your seatbelt. For a second, you stared ahead dumbfounded as you tried to understand what had happened until a roaring voice managed to rip you out of your state of shock.

“You idiot!! Use your eyes!!”

A man yelled and you realized that you must have rammed another car. Frustrated, you huffed because your day really couldn’t get any worse before exiting the car reluctantly. A tall man dressed in a suit came rushing towards you and judging by the crimson color of his face, he seemed to be nearly exploding from anger. Subconsciously, you took a defensive stance, ready to parry off a punch in case that he would decide to physically attack you. Just before the man could reach you, however, a loud, high-pitched whistle suddenly made him stop. Like a well-behaved dog he froze and turned around to look at the source of the noise.

“Junho, where are your manners?”

A mysterious voice asked, and you tried to look past Junho in order to catch a glimpse of your savior. You could only see a pair of red high heels and slender legs emerging from the car that you had rammed before a breathtakingly beautiful woman eventually got out of it. Against your will, your eyes automatically started to scan her from head to toe and you had to stop your jaw from slacking. She was simply stunning. Something about her was mesmerizing although you didn’t know whether it was her piercing gaze that seemed to be sharper than a knife, the way she moved her body so gracefully or her clothes that screamed ‘rich’ to you. Of course, you had managed to damage the only car that cost more than your annual salary out of all the junk cars in this parking garage... Remorsefully, you looked to the floor when the woman walked closer to you, figuring that you should probably show respect to her as money usually equated power where you lived. As soon as she was standing in front of you, you opened your mouth to give the most heartfelt apology that you could come up with in order to save your own neck, but the sound of her voice put an end to your plan.

“Are you ok?”

The woman asked and to your surprise her voice wasn’t filled with anger or annoyance, but with concern instead. Confused, you looked up and you realized that her feline eyes appeared to be a lot softer now while scanning your face worriedly. Automatically, your hand reached up to touch your face and you discovered to your surprise that your cheeks were tear stained. In embarrassment, you quickly used your sleeve to wipe away the remainders of your breakdown just a few seconds ago and cleared your throat to sound more or less poised.

“Yes. I’m sorry for ramming your car. I’ve been incautious for a second.”

You pointed at your cars that were surrounded by bits of red, broken glass, but the woman didn’t avert her gaze from you.

“I don’t want you to worry about the cars right now. Are you sure you’re ok? That was one hell of a collision. Are you hurt?”

Her reaction caught you off guard and you stared at her speechlessly. Why wasn’t she yelling at you? Was she that rich that she didn’t even care about her car anymore?

“I-I...yeah...I’m fine.”

You stammered, causing you to facepalm yourself inwardly. It seemed like you were trying to do everything in your power to prove that you were a complete idiot.

“I’m glad to hear that. I was worried for a second.”

The woman smiled softly, causing you to feel weak in your knees. If she would continue looking at you like that, you could not be held responsible for whatever rash action of yours it would cause. A blush started to spread in your cheeks as the two of you simply stared at each other and you frantically tried to come up with something smart to say in order to save your face. Once again, however, the woman beat you to it.

“I’m Jennie by the way.”

She introduced herself while holding out her hand and you quickly wiped your right palm on your pants just in case that it was as sweaty as it felt.

“I’m Y/N.”

You shook her hand, feeling how the touch caused a tingling feeling in your stomach. Embarrassed, you wanted to pull away again, but Jennie kept holding on to your hand a little longer before allowing you to loosen your grasp.

“It’s very nice to meet you, Y/N. I hope that we’re not the reason for you to be late to something, you seemed to be in a hurry earlier.”

For the first time, Jennie averted her gaze from you to assess the scene of the crash before calmly looking back at you as if her multimillion won car wasn’t damaged. You expected her to finally scold you for your lack of concentration that had caused this accident, but Jennie didn’t seem to blame you for anything. Instead, she patiently waited for you to reply to her assumption, so you quickly shook your head.

“No, don’t worry. I don’t need to be anywhere. I just...”

You trailed off because you didn’t know how to finish your sentence. I just needed to get away, because it’s my fault that my friend is probably dying, and I couldn’t bear to look at him anymore? It wasn’t like you could blindside a stranger with a confession like that. Your head immediately started spinning again when you thought about Jihoon and your eyes roamed around the parking garage as you thought about your answer before focusing on Jennie again. As soon as your eyes met, you felt how her serenity had a soothing effect on you and a sense of calmness spread from your chest to your whole body. Somehow her intense yet gentle gaze seemed to draw you under her spell, and you opened your mouth without even being aware of it.

“I just had a really bad day because my friend was hospitalized because of me.”

You blurted out, feeling how tears immediately started to pool in your eyes. Ashamed you turned your head to the side to hide your emotions, but a sensation on your arm caused your gaze to dart forward again. Jennie had reached out to you and was now patting your arm encouragingly.

“I’m sorry to hear that, Y/N. But I’m sure your friend wouldn’t want you to torment yourself. I don’t know what you did, but you don’t seem like you would have wanted your friend to be hospitalized.”

She tried to cheer you up and you nodded hesitantly. She was right. Jihoon wouldn’t want you to blame yourself for what had happened. He was a dedicated detective and it had been his decision to go undercover.

“I-I think you might me right... Thank you.”

You stammered perplexed, wondering how it had been possible for Jennie to calm you down that fast. You loved whatever she was doing to you though and you sighed in relief when your head started to feel steady again, causing Jennie to smile at you widely, seeming to be genuinely happy that she had been able to help you.

“Well, now that this is settled, let’s take care of this mess?”

Jennie giggled while pointing at your cars.

“I feel very guilty for this accident. Junho was driving too fast; you couldn’t have braked in time. Please, let me invite you for a coffee to apologize and we can discuss how we want to handle the costs.”

She continued and your eyes widened in shock. This was not how you remembered the accident; it had definitely been your fault. You simply couldn’t steal any more of Jennie’s time after causing her so much trouble, even if you wouldn’t mind talking with her all day long.

“Aren’t you here to visit someone?”

You asked hesitantly, not wanting to be the reason for her to miss visiting hours.

“Ah yes. I’ve been very unsatisfied with the way how one of my dear friends has been... taken care of. So I came here today to do it myself. Some jobs are better done by yourself, you know? But I’m confident that Junho will be able to get the job done as efficiently as I would have done, right?”

Jennie looked at Junho who had grimly stood at the side till now and simply nodded in response. Satisfied, Jennie grinned before giving you her attention again and wordlessly asking you with a slight movement of her head to agree to her offer. Not being able to resist her charms, you sighed in defeat and locked your car again.

“Ok fine, one coffee.”

You agreed, causing Jennie’s eyes to glint in excitement.

“Great! Junho, go park the car and then go upstairs. I know that you will take proper care of my friend. I don’t want any more...complications. I want everything to be clean and neat. Let’s give my friend what he deserves.”

Jennie smiled sweetly and you felt your heart flutter. It was endearing to see how much she seemed to care about her friend. Happily, you looked at her before following her back into the building to grab a coffee in the little café for visitors on the first floor. It didn’t even need you a minute to figure out that Jennie apparently was a master of distraction. The way she talked was simply captivating and you almost didn’t think about Jihoon at all. Your conversation flowed with ease right from the start and it seemed like you had known each other for years already. Together you sat down at a table, each with a steaming hot cup of coffee in your hands and Jennie immediately propped up her elbow on the table to rest her head on her hand in order to look at you attentively.

“So what do you do for a living?”

She asked curiously and you straightened up proudly. You loved your job and it made you really happy to talk about it.

“I’m a detective.”

You stated, causing Jennie’s expression to change like expected. Most people were impressed when they heard that you were a detective and wanted to know more about your work.

“A detective? Wow. What kind of cases do you work on? Is your job as exciting as in K-dramas or is the movie industry just lying?”

Jennie raised one eyebrow suspiciously and you giggled in response.

“Well, I’m afraid my job is not quite as spectacular as in K-dramas, but there are definitely more boring jobs. Right now, I’m working on a really interesting case for example. We’re investigating the Kim clan; you might have read about it in the news maybe. It’s a huge criminal organization with a ruthless leader. We only call her The Lady in Red.”

You started to chat, feeling how you suddenly had the urge to talk about all your built-up frustration.

“The Lady in Red?”

An amused smile played on Jennie’s lips as she curiously tilted her head to the side, and you chuckled.

“Yes. We don’t know a lot about the leader, not even her name. But over the past years we have accumulated some bits of information about her. We’ve managed to catch some of the criminals that worked with her and although none of them ever betrayed her, they revealed little details. For example, we know that she often could be found wearing red lipstick or a red trench coat. And in combination with the trail of blood that she leaves all over the city, we eventually started calling her The Lady in Red.”

You felt a little embarrassed to admit the ridiculous nickname that you had given a serial killer, but Jennie seemed to be very intrigued by your story.

“Is this top-secret information? I mean, can you even tell me all this? Are you sure this is legal?”

She joked, causing you to laugh off your embarrassment.

“As long as you’re not a journalist...”

You narrowed your eyes to fake mistrust and Jennie put on a serious face.

“No, don’t worry. Your secrets are safe with me, I promise. I’m just a simple businesswoman, not a journalist. I own a little company and try my best to survive.”

She crossed her fingers to underline her statement, causing both of you to crack up. After calming down again though, you had the urge to know more about this seemingly perfect woman in front of you. Considering her expensive clothes and car, you doubted that her company was as little as she described it and you were genuinely interested in learning what it took to get all the way to the top of the food chain.

“You own a business? That’s impressive! What kind of business?“

You asked, but you shouldn’t get to hear her answer right away. The moment Jennie inhaled to start telling you about her life story, the screens of both of your phones on the table suddenly lit up, indicating that you had gotten a message.

“Excuse me.”

You excused your bad table manners before picking up your phone to check the incoming message because you were technically still on duty and obliged to be reachable. Unless someone had been murdered, however, you didn’t plan on working today after the events of this morning, so you simply wanted to skim the message before giving Jennie all your attention again. The content of the text message was very short and comprehensible at a glance though, managing to instantly knock the air out of your lungs. As if you couldn’t trust your eyes, you read the text over and over again in disbelief, hoping that it’s meaning would change eventually. But the cold, harsh words stayed and mercilessly slapped you in the face.

Jihoon is dead

The three words were simple, but that didn’t make their impact any less destructive. An intense pressure seemed to crush your chest and your eyes started to burn immediately. How could this be? How could he have died so quickly? He had been stable when you had seen him just a little over half an hour ago. Helplessly, you looked at Jennie who was smiling at her phone before meeting your eyes. Her expression changed in a split second and she was quick to leap to her feet to walk over to you.

“He’s dead.”

You managed to choke out before a loud sob tore from your throat as your tears began to fall in a rapid pace. Without hesitation, Jennie wrapped her arms around you to pull you against her body and you clung to her in need for comfort while your whole body shook violently.

“I’m so sorry, Y/N.”

Jennie said on a loop while rubbing your back in circles, attempting to get you to calm down again. Her gentle touch and soothing voice prevented you from completely breaking down and you tried to remember her words from earlier. I’m sure your friend wouldn’t want you to torment yourself. You repeated this simple statement over and over again in your head to allay the weight of the guilt that was pressing down on you. No matter how much you tried though, you weren’t able to completely erase the ugly voice in your head that told you that this was all your fault. Nevertheless, you were glad that you had Jennie by your side right now. You hoped that her serenity would manage to save you once more, so you held on tighter to her in an attempt to allow her strength to prevent the darkness in your head to seize you.

Who would have thought that joy and sorrow could be so close together?

[thusspoketrish]

Play Pretend (Part 1/5)

TRIGGER WARNING (PLEASE READ THE TAGS. PLEASE READ THE TAGS. PLEASE READ THE TAGS): Depression. Suicide Attempt. Suicidal Ideation. PTSD. Poor Coping Mechanism.

Harry Potter & Astoria Greengrass; Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter; Astoria Greengrass/Draco Malfoy; Astoria Greengrass/Others; Draco Malfoy/Others; Harry Potter/Others

Content: Friendship. Forced Marriage Arrangement. Unrequited Love. Falling Out of Love. Falling in Love. Betrayal. Friendships. Breakups. Mental Health Issues. Apathy. Flatmates. Acceptance. Positive Thinking. Therapy.

SUMMARY: Fate boasts a strange sense of humour when a severely depressed Harry finds himself convincing a drunk Astoria Greengrass off the ledge of Waterloo Bridge at three in the morning. The events that follow after are an exercise in strength as Harry finds himself relearning how to cope, forgive, and love alongside the blossoming of new friendships.

Thank you to @starlitsilvereyes for the beta!

====================

At approximately 2:07 AM, Harry Potter shoves his arms through his black wool coat before wrapping his Gryffindor scarf tightly around his neck. He shoves on the misshapen scarlet mittens Hermione knitted for him several years ago, realising he could summon a better pair as she’s improved greatly since Hogwarts, but finding that these reminded him of a better time.

Finally, he shoves his wand up his sleeve before wrenching the door open and taking the steps down from Grimmauld two at a time, the door slamming shut behind him with a finality. As he breathes in and out sharply, white puffs curling outward from his chapped lips, Harry looks skyward. The moon is heavy and hangs low tonight, full and beautiful as swirls of snow begin to gently fall. It’s dark, and beautiful, and it hurts to look at.

Harry had spent the entire day cleaning Grimmauld from top to bottom. Not that this mattered as Harry has found that no matter how much he cleaned or remodelled the house, he was incapable of penetrating its doom-and-gloom atmosphere. But he had cleaned to the best of his ability, and had arranged all his necessary documents across his office table several hours ago. He carefully placed each note facing upward, the individual names of all his friends in his spidery scrawl. He had even left notes behind for the Dursley’s, though, not imparting a single kind word, as seen in his other letters. He had left the Gringotts keys of the Potter Vault behind in Ron and Hermione’s name and endowed a small trust to any future children they may have. He had left the deed and keys to Grimmauld and the Black vault to Teddy and Andromeda.

Harry doesn’t think he left any stone unturned.

He had been planning this for months. Had made the nearly 40-minute walk from Clerkenwell to Waterloo Bridge nearly every night for the last three weeks, simply staring out at the water, yearning. It would take nothing, he thought, to sit on the ledge, cast a simple spell to increase his weight, and fling himself over the edge. And at three in the morning, it wouldn’t be hard to do this uninterrupted.

A numb sort of blankness overcomes him as he rolls his shoulders and makes his way through the quiet roads, onto the high street where the slow crawl of busses and cars creep past. Harry’s vision is a tunnel of black and white images flickering in and out of focus as he sets himself on autopilot. He could do this route with his eyes closed.

It’s not that Harry thinks he deserves to die. He’s simply come to the conclusion that he wants to.

He’s tired, much too tired from the debilitating numbness that’s crippled his entire existence. He’s remained frozen in time since dying and coming back to life in the Forbidden Forest. The experience has left him immobile, like a statue, weathered by the storm called time but never feeling the effects of it no matter how long he holds his breath, patiently waiting for something to come along and happen. He was waiting for the spark of life to feed his blood as it had during the war, and nothing, no reason or rhyme, has been able to replace it. He had quit the Aurors, had isolated himself from the pitying expressions of friends and family, and had shrunken himself on the outside to reflect what he felt on the inside—absolutely nothing. He was nothing, a lingering afterthought in his own mind, something ugly and broken with a piece of its soul missing. He couldn’t stand to live with that knowledge any longer.

It was no one’s fault, not directly. Harry’s never been whole, not as a child curled up and forgotten in the cupboard under the stairs; not as a child, shaped into a sacrificial soldier, not as a twenty-three year old man, alone, shrouded in the dark cloak of night, ready to end his life.

The black and purple swirls of fog and clouds paint a pretty backdrop for the breathtaking view of the Thames, the London Eye, and Parliament from Harry’s position on the bridge. It’s the only time his vision shifts to full-colour, when he’s standing on the bridge, hands gripping the cold railing as he peers over, his glasses sliding slowly down his nose. He uses a mittened finger to push them back up, a hollow laugh escaping him as he reaches deep down inside of himself to search for a feeling, anything. He wishes for even a fissure of panic as he places both hands on the railing again, wondering if 100kg added to his feet would successfully prevent his ability to kick back up to the surface.

A harsh wind whips by, and with it carrying a whimper. Harry turns, his gaze sharpening, harping on an elongated figure further down the bridge perched on the railing.

He turns back to the water, staring out at the inky black waves. He shouldn’t care.

The whimper turns into full on sobbing.

He shouldn’t care. He doesn’t.

Then, there’s a horrible scream of anguish that pierces the quiet, the sound full of devastation. He blinks several times, pushing his glasses up again. He may not have the ability to care for his own well-being anymore but he still...he still seems to care about others.

With a sigh, Harry walks to the centre of the bridge, noticing a lone figure down the road walking towards them before abruptly stopping and turning away from them.

Harry ignores them, and instead approaches the person perched on the railing. He can see that the person is wearing a black, long-sleeved ballgown, tiny sparkling beads of emerald green, gold, red, and silver shimmering in the moonlight, taking the shape of exploding fireworks across her bodice along the back of the dress. It’s beautiful, and Harry gasps when the woman turns to face him.

He’s seen this woman before, has seen her pretty pale face at the Slytherin table at Hogwarts. Her long black hair whips across her flushed face, mascara-tinged tears sliding down her cheeks. Her red lipstick is smeared across her lips and down her chin, piercing blue eyes unfocussed as she sways side-to-side.

“What do you want?” the woman asks miserably, her voice slurring, intoxicated. Harry steps closer to her, as if she’s a wild animal ready to leap away from him. The woman’s lips turn down into a terrible wound of a frown, misshapen by the smeared lipstick. “Did he send you?” she cries.

“No,” Harry says, not knowing who she’s talking about as he slowly approaches her. “Why don’t you come down?” he asks, extending an opened hand.

The woman’s gaze twists from Harry back out to the dark depths of the Thames. Harry inches closer.

Another whimper escapes her. “He doesn’t love me,” she cries, her body shaking as she weeps.

“There are people out here who love you,” Harry says, wincing. How many times has Ron and Hermione said this very thing to him over the last year?

“But not him!” she shouts, her shoulders trembling, the harsh winds whip her hair. “I’ve tried everything. I’ve even given him all of me, all my love, all my hopes and my bloody dreams, and nothing. Nothing I do makes him look at me…at me...as if,” the woman breaks off, a trembling cry escaping her before she shouts, “Why...why not me?”

“He doesn’t deserve you,” Harry says, his voice carrying on the winds, tone firm. A small spark of indignation is felt in his chest. This woman, this woman is suffering, and it’s fuelling a knife-sharp sensation alongside his slow-beating heart. He wants to touch her, see if he can pull her grief into him, see if it’ll help him feel his own, for once.

The woman tilts her head back, a wail escaping her. “I don’t deserve him! I can’t help him, I can’t even bloody keep him. I’m useless.”

“Stop it, don’t put yourself down like this. He doesn’t deserve you...you’re stronger than this pain, this numbness you’re experiencing, and you know it. You know you can do so much better than him, that your life and your hopes and dreams outweighs whatever the fuck you think he sees when he looks at you. You don’t need anything from him, not when you’re this strong,” Harry says, shaking his head. He doesn’t know where these words are coming from, they feel foreign to his own ears. A part of him wonders if he wished someone would say this to him. “What’s your name?”

The woman draws in a shaky breath before she answers in a tiny, strained voice, “Astoria. Astoria Greengrass.”

Harry nods, now remembering her, remembering where he’s seen her name lately. “Come, Astoria. You have so much to offer the world. You’re strong, but sometimes even the strongest among us have bad days, but that doesn’t make us worthless,” Harry says, the feeling in his chest swelling, lighting him on fire from the inside. Harry gasps. “You’re worth fighting for, you’re...let me...let me fight for you, Astoria, until you can fight for yourself. Please...please, take my hand. You don’t have to do this...you don’t have to do this alone.” He’s now beside her.

A wicked wind whips past them again, the snow falling now coming down in thick, fluffy sheets. Astoria huffs out another sob before she turns around, her hand stretching out.

Harry clasps it, pulling her forward. She wraps her arms around his neck, digging her face into this layered scarf, clinging to him like a lifeline. They both sink to the ground as she weeps. The cold stings the trail of tears on Harry’s own cheeks.

She smells like the cold, along with lingering scent of bergamot orange and rosewood. He knows it's a combination of scents he'll never forget as he cradles her against his chest before quickly opening his coat to wrap around her shivering form.

All the while, feeling more alive than he has since the day he died.

[whereflowersbloom]

Changes.

It’s a rare Saturday afternoon off. Conner is sprawled across the sofa, his head resting on a fluffy cushion. Raven sitting next to him, wearing comfortable summer clothes, leaving her legs bare. Conner was watching the movie with half-closed eyes. He’s unusually exhausted. But everyone was out. They’ve been working around the clock, non-stop for weeks, busy with missions. It’s the first time they’ve managed to arrange their time off in a long time. He wanted to make the most of it, but Raven didn’t want to go out today. It’s a lazy day, spending it in the Tower’s living room. Watching old movies, Raven recommended and insisted he must watch them. Classics. ‘Gone with the wind, The wizard of Oz, Casablanca’ among other tittle.

Conner tried to focus on the screen. They were halfway Casablanca, but got distracted by Raven’s hair. It looked almost magical in this light. Her dark hair, shinning like the night sky. Her hair was slowly turning a dark purple shade, almost indigo with the sunlight hitting it. Conner was quite intrigued about her hairstyle as well. He’d seen braids before, but never this intricately. She did notice Raven had changed the way she styled her hair lately. He secretly wanted to ask what made her change it. He liked it nonetheless. Whether she let it cascade down her shoulders or in a ponytail, or this elaborated braid. She looked dazzlingly beautiful to him, all the time.

Raven felt Conner’s eyes on her. She was intrigued why he was so absorbed watching her? Was there something on her face? She’d only eaten popcorn like him, and he was clean, well groomed like always. Impeccable she’d rather admit. She couldn’t ignore his long, unblinking stare any longer. She was about to ask him if everything was okay when he unexpectedly broke the silence.

“How do you braid hair?”He asked all of a sudden, rubbing his neck, when he saw Raven’s baffled look. Tilting her head to one side, blinking several times, processing why he was so interested in her hair now.

That was not what she had expected. She consciously touched her French braid. It wasn’t her usual hairstyle, she felt heat burn her cheeks. Donna had been watching recently videos about hairstyles. She became seemingly so engrossed in trying new hairstyles, specially braids on her dark hair now that it was long enough, and growing even longer, down to her lower shoulders. The Amazonian had mentioned it would suit her. Donna being the persuasive person she was, Raven didn’t have the heart to say no. Also, she decided, perhaps it was time to try a different look. Instead of braiding just the three strands, you take hair with it as you go down. After hours and hours of practicing, Donna finally mastered it. It was different. The first time she felt strange. But she found some benefits, her hair didn’t get in the way while training or cooking. It was rather practical. Kori found it looking regal. Did Conner not like it? It was the first time he mentioned it.

She didn’t know how to explain. She had only done it a couple of times. “Uhmm, well.” she shrugged the twine from her hair and untangled the braid, slowly, with her small hands. Her midnight tresses were quite long, so it took some time. Maybe because she was so self-conscious of Conner’s curious, steady gaze. She felt her heart hammering in her chest, her breath coming in short. She was overly, awkwardly aware of his gaze on her face as the strands started to adorn her face. She gulped and wished he stopped staring, counting the heartbeats in her mind. But in the back of her mind she’d rather have him look at her with those beautiful baby blue eyes, sparkling with interest and mischief, as always, asking her to read him books, or having a long conversation about her hobbies, even video games he occasionally played with Beast Boy. She bit her lip hard enough to draw blood, but thanks Azar it healed fairly quickly.

Conner felt heat creep in his neck, and not because of the sun, or the hot summer weather of Jump City. His stomach always did somersaults like the kids in the park, or Nightwing did while training, whenever he looked at her, his feelings flowing so freely like a river, his feelings for her deepened and strengthened with every passing day. He couldn’t decipher it, but it made him feel things he knew he shouldn’t feel for a friend. He knew he shouldn’t, wasn’t supposed to but he genuinely, wholeheartedly liked Raven. She appeared to be troubled by his question.

He cleared his throat, attempting to get back her attention. He pronounced her name quietly. “Raven.”

“Oh. Sorry.” She jumped slightly, snapping out of her trance. “You take three pieces of hair, like this” she demonstrated it and started showing Conner, imitating the way Donna did it, if she remembered correctly. “And as you are braiding, you add hair from both sides and continue. Follow my fingers.” Her breath choked as, abruptly took a strand of her hair and twirled in thoughtfully around his finger, observing it meticulously, seemingly not aware of his actions or his effect on her.

He looked up, smiled warmly at her, the way he did, resembling a child with new toy and nodded. He hesitated for a moment but muttered cheerfully. “Do you mind if I try it?”

Her violet-blue eyes widened. Conner wanted to braid her hair. The idea of his hands close to her face? Her stomach was in knots. No. That was an absolutely terrible idea or not? Calm down Raven. Nothing to worry about. It’s just hair. She has no idea why he’s so fascinated by it, but they are friends. If Donna can do it. What’s the difference? He wouldn’t just tangle up her hair as a prank. He wasn’t Garfield. No. Conner was innocent, honorable, respectful. He was different, like her she imagined sometimes. “Sure, go ahead.” His hand brushed her fingers lightly, with such softness. It sent a tingle of goosebumps up her arm. Their eyes locked, and the powerful connection, felt like being struck by lighting. Blue eyes meeting violet. Both were blushing furiously.

Raven shifted her body, so she was sitting cross legged in front of him, on the sofa, with her back towards him.

Conner took the log hair in for a moment. Admiring how soft and beautiful it was. He breathed in the essence, lavender, jasmine and peppermint. He has dreamt about how it would be to play with it, run it though his fingers. Her head in his lap, she was humming a song he never heard before. He’d absentmindedly started imitating her as well, while twirling the hair around his long fingers. He casually asked her about it. She told him it was an old song her mother used to sing to her. It brought some fond and happy memories.

“Don’t mess it up.” She teased him, giggling softly, but warning him at the same time. A boyish smile spread across his face. She confide him her precious memories. He felt special for a moment. Like he was needed, trusted with such things, he could guess not many knew about. His hands brush her hair gently, over her shoulders, unintentionally touching her delicate pale neck.

“No promises.” he said in a playful tone. He continued to play with her hair, trying to copy her fingers, when she had shown him. Braiding hair sure wasn’t easy.

His fingers caressed her cheekbone as he took a strand of hair. Raven held her breathe. What was he doing? Did he cast a spell on her or something, turning her completely speechless? She was the sorcerer here. Not him. She felt Conner edge closer.

“I’m almost done...I think.” he whispered anxiously. He didn’t need to, but it felt appropriate. The moment felt too intimate, for some reason. Something was changing between them. Perhaps because this was unusual in a way he couldn’t point. Sure, they were close friends, had normal interactions, but this felt intimate, private, almost romantic. They never touched or got close this way before. It was a new experience. Conner furrowed his eyebrows involuntarily, he started to hate that word. ‘Friends’. It didn’t cover entirely their bond. He didn’t want to be only Raven’s friend. Friends certainly, positively didn’t left you breathless and wanting more. He’d rather not talk to any of his other friends and simply kiss Raven senselessly. As he dreamed almost every night for months now.

He seriously had to stop daydreaming about her. But he found himself incapable of stopping. He did not want to, if he was honest.

Raven stretched her neck, yawning momentarily, then she looked over her shoulder. He’d suddenly stopped braiding, and instead of saying anything, she felt him staring at her again. Those blue eyes studying her again. She felt strange, the way he looked at her. That’s not the way friends do it. Not the others. Except a certain vigilante. But that was too complicated.

But when she gazed at him cautiously, she was surprised by their proximity, his lips merely inches from hers. And that look on his face. Conner flustered? No no no. She hastily created more space. And realized maybe he’d feel offended or hurt.

“Sorry, you surprised me.” she mumbled, avoiding his eyes, hand grabbing the end of the braid and tying it quickly. It was adequate, he did a fairly good job.

“No apologies.” he said blushing, shaking his head. He didn’t want her to worry or upset her. “I was distracted.” He confessed, ruffling his hair.

Raven raised her brow, wondering what caught his attention, placing her chin on her palm. “What’s on your mind?”

Conner paused for a moment, considering telling her the truth. He decided it wasn’t the right time. Sighing deeply, he didn’t have the courage yet to declare his feelings for her. There was no way he could reply saying I was daydreaming about kissing you, the way you deserve to be kissed. His heartbeat increased around 40 beats more than average. He had an idea. He smiled mischievously.

“It’s a secret.” He winked teasingly, praying his cheeks didn’t heat up and thanking she didn’t possess superhearing like him.

Raven’s eyes widened. She snorted softly, and she rolled her eyes. “You’re ridiculous, Superboy.” The dark haired girl threw some popcorn at him and he chuckled loudly, it was so natural. “I’ll find out eventually.” She said, faking indignation and folding her arms as she closed her eyes.

“You will.” He said optimistically, reassuring her, a confident smile on his face. A promise for the future. ‘One day Raven’ I’ll tell you all those things I’ve bottled up. Those things I want to have with you. He told himself in his mind.

Anither konrae oneshot 🙈🙈🙈🙈💙💙💙💜💜💜

@grassfour

[waifstarion]

I don’t think there is any harm in the baby Jack posts as he is in canon a baby, we only ever see him from age 0-3, it’s his 4th birthday next month. Never in canon has it stated Jack is autistic or coded as such, those quirks we see are canon as an angel not fitting in on earth, Castiel does it all the time. I believe it’s only really Gabriel who doesn’t have this issue as he’s been on earth for a very long time. I have quite a few traits in common with Jack from another condition that is not autism but overlaps, along with others (my condition sadly is very hard to diagnose for this reason, so a lot of people are often misdiagnosed as something else) I don’t post how angry that makes me as people are appropriating my condition and babying my traits (even if I do need help sometimes dressing myself right) If people are happy making Jack a baby then they should be allowed to post that. Jack only aged himself up after Kelly told him the world was unsafe, now Chuck has gone there’s no reason why Jack wouldn’t deage himself back to a toddler to finally experience playing on swings, slides and all the fun things with Castiel and Amara by his side. In a way too, the baby Jack is also a coping mechanism, in canon Jack left and Sam and Dean never seen him again, Sam lived at least 40 years without seeing Jack ever again and even in heaven, Jack wasn’t there 😭😭😭 so to draw or headcanon a small child who may need Sam to cut off the crust on his bread sandwiches, or Dean to read him a story and it be Game of Thrones or something... then that’s how that fan is coping with the true sad ending of Jack’s arc. We know he is with Castiel, he’s happy but Sam and Dean never learned that until after they died.

we would consider him a baby age-wise, as he is never older than three. however, seeing as he was born in a body roughly the age of eighteen, give or take a couple years (based on sam giving 2000 as his fake birth year when he was in the hospital and the cut line from 13x06). jack is never mentally an infant. he may have had the mentality of a younger child in his early episodes, but it doesn’t take too long for him to reach the mindset of a teenager. even at the end of the show, his mental age is probably around late adolescence or early adulthood (though that is up for interpretation). while he may be a baby in a very literal sense of the word (ie age-wise), he is not a baby in his mental state or appearance, which is what truly matters.

jack’s autism coding is all up to interpretation, however, i very intentionally use the term coding due to the fact that it is never outright stated in canon. coding typically isn’t confirmed within the actual show, otherwise i would have simply called it canon. another prominent character with autism coding (which was confirmed by ben edlund in the s6 commentary) is castiel, who just so happens to be a strong basis for jack’s character. many of the other angels are seen exhibiting neurotypical behaviours. angels such as naomi, balthazar, metatron, and many more do not display the traits that cas does. significantly, misha has said in numerous interviews that while his initial intention was to portray cas as something unhuman and unaware of human customs, not a single other actor did the same. as a result, this left cas as the odd one out, firmly establishing that this behaviour is just cas being himself, not an inherent side effect of being an angel. furthermore, the angels frequently make comments about cas being an outlier who doesn’t fit in, and make comments about it being a fundamental difference (eg. coming off the line with a crack in his chassis) rather than a learned behaviour. circling back to the autistic coding of cas and jack, it is never outright stated that either one is autistic, however there are traits that lead people to believe they are. this post does a good job of illustrating some potential autistic coding in jack. while it may not be intentional, it is certainly there, and a very prevalent interpretation within fandom. i'm sorry to hear that people infantilize your condition. i respect the fact that you make the personal decision not to make angry posts about it, as that is your prerogative. however, it is also mine to make a post about a pattern of behaviour i (and others) have noticed in fandom. the intention of my post is to encourage people to notice such patterns, and to draw their attention to it as there could be many people who never considered it from this point of view.

i never said they aren’t allowed to post it. on the contrary, i reblog posts about it on a semi-frequent basis. that being said, i find that there is a difference between sometimes posting about it versus exclusively portraying him as a baby and never talking about him as a person. in my post, i very clearly stated that it was about people posting it constantly and exclusively portraying him as an infant, which was my phrasing verbatim. it can be fun to portray characters in different ways, but in my opinion it becomes a problem when you constantly erase his character and backstory just to be a prop for a ship or your favourite character.

as for him wanting to deage himself, he has never indicated that. quite the contrary, he has been bothered when he is not taken seriously or seen as incapable. he wants to be capable and independent. it doesn’t make sense for him to want to limit himself mentally and physically so he becomes entirely reliant on those around him. he would lose essentially all of his autonomy, and i doubt that would be enjoyable for him. if he wants to go on a swing or a slide, no one’s stopping him in his current state. he can do plenty of the typical fun things while still being in his current form.

as it is, i don’t think that jack would be yearning for the stereotypical ideal childhood. no one jack has been around has had a normal, stable childhood. the bros, cas, rowena, etc all had abnormal and unstable childhoods. he was very briefly in his mother’s childhood heaven and that’s about the extent of it. even then, her heaven just consisted of her house with her dog. jack had a house and a pet, which he could easily view it as similar. even the tv shows we know he watches (clone wars, the walking dead, and riverdale) all seem to deal with people who do not get to experience real childhoods. he may not even be aware of the extent he is missing out on. even if he is aware, he may be perfectly fine with that and content with the memories he has already.

citing sam and dean’s preferences in and of itself is endemic to the issue of the constant baby jack posting. to be blunt, i don’t really care about what sam and dean want him to present himself as. they made little to no attempt to care for him as it was, so why should jack sacrifice his autonomy just so they can get some enjoyment out of it? in the finale, they barely even noticed his absence. you mention sam living forty years without him, yet he couldn’t be bothered to include a single photo of him in his house. jack shouldn’t have to change himself to make people happy. he should be himself, with complete autonomy, and loved for that. there is no true sad ending of jack’s arc. he’s happy with cas, just as you said. cas loved him unconditionally and was the only one who believed in him the entire time. cas wasn’t fazed when jack was an adult instead of the baby he had anticipated. he was happy to be with his son, regardless of what form that took.

the way cas and jack operate heaven is also left largely up to interpretation. all we know is that sam and dean are now there in the same place of them. it can easily be interpreted that they are all spending time together if that’s what you so please. it could very well be amara, cas, or another character that runs heaven. we don’t even know if there is anyone who needs to be in charge. it may run autonomously at this point and allow for jack to go off on whatever little hijinks he pleases

there are ways to write about tfw and jack post finale without erasing his personality and turning him into a prop. the entire issue is the fact that jack keeps getting used as a prop, and his tag consists almost exclusively of content where he is used as an accessory for other characters. all i’m asking is for people to stop constantly infantilizing him and to take the time to portray him as a fleshed out character sometimes.

[hopetwink]

Fic Analysis: Yellow Somethings

Yellow Somethings by @kidcarma

I’ve been in a creative rut lately, so one of the things I’m doing in the meantime is analyzing my favorite fics written by friends and/or acquaintences. This work was one of the first that came to mind, so it’s the first one I wrote an in-depth character analysis for. 

Some people tell me I’m scarily good at psychoanalyzing both fictional characters and authors, so I’m harnessing that ability here in hopes it’ll give both you guys (and maybe also me) a greater appreciation for these well-written works. 

So yeah, enjoy!

When I first read this work, one thing that immediately stood out to me was the dialogue. Good dialogue can stand on its own. If we cut out everything except the first exchange of dialogue between Hinata and Komaeda, the strength of this dialogue becomes evident.

“I hate you.”

“I can live with that.”

As any skilled writer knows, well-written first lines are crucial to the allure of a story. The first line must not only be an enticing hook, but an informative and non-expositional string of words that give the reader a strong sense of the work as a whole. It instantly sets the tone for a piece, allowing us to get a sense of where the characters are now, and what direction they’re going in. 

The author’s choice to make the first line a piece of dialogue tells us they want to plunge us headfirst into the story. In fanfiction, which cannot exist without source material to draw from, it’s safe to assume one’s audience already knows a great deal about the canon lives and fates of the characters the story explores. It’s a nice shortcut that lets writers avoid having to excessively recap the events of the canon storyline, but the way this particular author makes use of this shortcut is significant. The intensity of the language they chose to use serves another purpose--to give the reader exactly what they promised the fic would contain in the summary, notes, and tags, and knock anyone who isn’t ready to read it off balance. 

In less than a hundred words, Komaeda confronts Hinata with intensely negative feelings that most people wouldn’t hesitate to take at face value, and Hinata makes it clear that regardless of if Komaeda truly hates him, he has no intention of abandoning him. 

‘Hate’ is a funny emotion; you can’t hate someone and be indifferent to them at the same time. To hate someone is to care about them, though even the mere suggestion that we care for the people we hate on some level is uncomfortable and counterintuitive. So yes, Komaeda’s telling the truth, he does hate Hinata. I don’t think he holds Hinata’s past against him; that would not only be unfair, but go against Komaeda’s efforts to promote and embody hope. Lingering on a past full of despair instead of looking towards the future does nothing to further the great cosmic goals of hope. 

Komaeda wouldn’t hate Hinata over something so broad and vague; no, the reason Komaeda hates Hinata is simple: Hinata’s the only one who isn’t fazed by Komaeda’s delusions, and he refuses to give Komaeda the dignity of rotting away in peace. 

In taking care of Komaeda, Hinata forces him to confront every last ounce of shame in his body, because somebody decided he was worth keeping alive, worth helping to heal and protect, when that goes against what he thinks with every fiber of his being. He has to sit helplessly and watch as Hinata emotionally strips him down and sees what he believes to be the ugliest parts of himself, the ones that he genuinely would rather die before willingly showing them to someone else, and being subjected to such humiliation at the hands of someone with good intentions is too much for him to bear. 

The only remotely empowering emotion he can cling to at the moment is bitterness, which enables him to find little ways to resist Hinata’s attempts to nurse him back to health at every turn. 

We see him try to reclaim some leverage in their power dynamic when he attempts to psychoanalyze Hinata and determine the reason he hasn’t given up on Komaeda yet through quips like “you do this because you feel bad” and “is it because the image of my dead body lives on in your mind.” Komaeda cannot allow Hinata to see him be vulnerable, because if he does, all the effort he put into building an impenetrable wall around his heart over the past fifteen or so years will have been for nothing. 

This feature of the fic is only made more poignant by the fact that it’s written from Hinata’s perspective--we don’t see what Komaeda is thinking or feeling, only his words and actions. But we see Hinata’s, which brings me to another underlying message: sometimes love isn’t gentle. Sometimes love isn’t soft and sweet, or pretty. Hinata loves Komaeda, even if he himself doesn’t realize or understand it. Because if he didn’t, he wouldn’t bother. He would’ve simply walked out of Komaeda’s hospital room the first time he refused to take his medicine. And he didn’t do that. He would never do that, not to Komaeda.

Hinata’s love for Komaeda is reflected in the yellow flowers he leaves next to his hospital bed, and that is why we catch a glimpse of his frustration when Komaeda breaks it. But in a way, this is a good thing--as Hinata begins to open up about his emotions, the pair move further away from their cycle of codependency and towards something closer to a symbiotic relationship. Perhaps someday, instead of needing to need each other, they will be able to love each other with no strings attached. 

This is what makes Komaeda’s decision to replace the flowers in Hinata’s vase much more significant than it appears on the surface--not only is it a gesture of goodwill and apology, but a sign that Komaeda is finally taking initiative in their relationship. No longer will Hinata have to carry both of their burdens; Komaeda is willing and able to reciprocate the love and effort Hinata has selflessly given him. 

The fic ends on Hinata doing some much needed introspection, and eventually coming to the conclusion that he isn’t happy with the way his life has turned out. Because, despite everything he’s been through, all the knowledge, talent, and skill he’s gained, and the external validation he’s received from his friends, it’s not enough. What Hinata wants is a purpose beyond caring for Komaeda. One day Komaeda will be fully recovered and then Hinata will have no other meaningful task to do, and nothing to distract himself from his inner turmoil. 

What Hinata needs is to see himself as inherently valuable, and he’s incapable of doing that until he learns to forgive himself. Right now, he’s not ready to accept his or Komaeda’s forgiveness yet, but deep down he knows that’s the only way to pull himself out of the pit of self-loathing he’s buried in.

Perhaps I’m reading too deeply into this clean, clear-cut fic, but I highly doubt the author went into this scenario with little to no knowledge of both Hinata and Komaeda’s mental predicaments. The underlying whispers of each character’s desire to love and be loved, to feel something--anything--when they’re too numb to care, is not a dynamic that an unskilled writer would be able to execute so gracefully. 

At the very least, Carmen has quite the natural aptitude for extracting the real life emotions they and others around them experience, and at the most, they have done extensive research involving both outside sources and (multiple) character studies. Regardless of whether either or both are true, I’m extremely impressed at how well they’ve managed to nurture the seeds of creativity in their mind, and I look forward to more opportunities to explore their works with in-depth analyses.

[melkstudio]

How will RO react if they see that MC is looking at them with a look full of love and adoration?🥰🤗

So, my depression has been acting up lately, but after a little sugar I feel so much better! I'll be writing a short scenario for this one, as a treat for Christmas c:

Under the cut because it’s sort of long:

Hazuki: 

When he catches you staring, he freezes. His body processes what that look means before his mind; heart races, face flushed red. He blinks in rapid succession, a hand on his neck trying to soothe, to calm this nervousness that still takes over him when you're near.

But why…?  The question is unfinished, but the thought remains. Why should I hide this?

This feeling that wells up inside me, that I don't want to part from you for even a second. You give me the nicest gifts, dear, all these things that I thought would never be for me, I have because of you.

This single thought is enough, enough to make his expression change without him even noticing. A soft smile plays on his lips, half lidded gaze sent your way. This moment is only for the two of you, one that you'll share many times more.

Masa:

They're not used to this. Not used to loving gazes, to even the smallest displays of affection, to taking your hand in theirs, to your knuckles brushing when you walk. Perhaps this is why, when it happens, they are so entranced, yet so conflicted.

The slightest touch, a loving gaze, no matter how short sets their heart ablaze.

This time, too, their body betrays. Face reddened, their mouth forced into a thin line, because they're still not used to letting you see beyond their walls, to letting their feelings manifest freely for you to see. But the heart aches for it, yearns for understanding, these things they so often finds herself incapable to show.

"I love you, too," they whisper the words, and leave before you can see what a mess they have become. Later, they will show you what they mean.

Without even noticing, they turn away from you, the smile released when your eyes are no longer staring into theirs. They feel their eyes water, but it's not guilt or remorse, this beating in their chest, this warmth that has taken over them.

Klaus: 

They relish this, this intimate moment the two of you share. The loving gaze you offer only to them, the gentle smile that speaks of all you say not aloud. And their heart is aflutter with only this, because this is a moment they could only dream of, a dream they often fought themselves to forget.

They match your gaze, offering a smile of their own. Fingers caress your face, the skin cold but pleasant as it slides down, to stop at the back of your neck.

So forward, perhaps so because of their time forcing themself away from others, for too many reasons they wish not to remember. In this moment though, they can forget easily, lost to the color of your eyes, to the soft skin they traces circles on.

They don't notice, they don't think of it, of the way their body leans closer to yours, their lips on yours.

Embezzled in their aroma, on the sweetness of their kiss, there is nothing else to worry about, not right now.

Miwa: 

This is so often the case, that she hides the yearning behind the teasing smile that plays on her lips when your eyes meet. She can't help but laugh at your adoring gaze, at the way it makes her feel; this feeling not foreign, but that she had given up on indulging.

It's so satisfying, to be lost in your eyes, too, to let her feelings bare. This warmth that travels through her body as she moves closer, fingers finding yours, laced together for as long as this moment can last; after all, it cannot be forever, but it can be enjoyed even once it passes.

Once known, her feelings could no longer be contained, and she takes every opportunity to make them know. Brushing your hair behind your ears, helping you dress and letting her touch linger on your skin, her hand holding onto yours for a moment longer when you say goodbye.

The smile widens, it softens when she recalls, and, lost to this moment, she draws ever closer, her lips on yours. A gentle kiss, that speaks of all that she hopes for the future, a future that she can only envision with you.

Bonus Konoe:

Konoe rarely notices, rarely reciprocates. It's not a matter of distaste, at least not anymore; she simply finds it difficult to understand you, to know what each look means, your subtle touch that makes her skin prickle, her heart beat just a little faster. She can't put a name to these feelings, so she assumes it's like all the other times. Just another lost soul looking for support, for guidance, and the pride she feels because she can help you, soothe you.

"Do you need something?" she asks. This single question that holds no gentleness, because she has left the facade that so much energy took to maintain so far behind. And when she notices your face contort, hurt, she frowns. "Oh."

Konoe looks away, at a loss for words.

"I…" She breathes in and out, still not knowing what to do. This is confusing, so complicated, but she hates the thought of being apart, so she remains beside you, hoping one day she can settle on what this means. This slow, budding feeling that has taken hold of her heart, that has made her go against all she has ever known. "Do you want to go take a walk together?"

Only this she can give, at least for now, a little of her time, her support and presence, and hope that this is enough to satisfy you. But one day, in the future, she knows things will fall into place.

[fortune-fool02]

Not the Same

Vampire Caesar Zeppeli x female reader

Warnings: Angst, possessiveness

I had noticed there was very little for vampire Caesar and thought this would be a good idea. Also, the art below belong to @deathbewrryyy​ who is an incredible artist so please give them credit for this amazing art piece! 

Please enjoy.

Ice cold fear tightened around in her veins, digging their thorns into her flesh and scraping down her bones. Her nerves shook under her skin, making her entire body shake despite her best efforts to keep it still. 

Shadows danced against the stone walls, making the carvings in them appear to be moving out the corner of her eyes. A coldness hung in the air like a cloud of smoke, nipping and chewing away at her exposed skin. Despite her fear, [Name] pressed on, she had to. She needed to find Caesar and get him out of this place. She got separated from Joseph and Lisa Lisa, and now she had no idea where she was, leaving her no option but to continue going forward to find the blonde Italian.

She wanted nothing more than to hold Caesar close, to feel his arms around her in that loving, warm embrace he gave her. To see that sparkle in his emerald green eyes that put stars to shame. To hear his voice... Shaking her head a little, she pushed those thoughts aside for the moment, there was more important circumstances to dwell on at the moment. She could think all of that when they got Caesar out of here safe and sound.

The corridor led her to a door. A quick look around told her that she was alone and she carefully reached out and touched the handle, turned it and pushed a little, and the door opened. Darkness greeted her, not a single glimmer of light flickered in the room unlike in the corridor. 

Something about this set her on edge more so than before, she was unable to see three steps in front of her in that room, putting her at an immediate disadvantage if there was something else in that room. No, she shouldn’t continue this way. The smart thing to do would be to- 

Her thoughts were cut off by the sound of movement, so quiet that she just about heard it. Her heart drummed against her chest, a fresh wave of cold fear washing over her but she stood her ground, she couldn’t turn and flee, not when Caesar needed her. She took a calming breath to soothe her racing nerves before stepping into the room. 

“Remember your training. Remember their advice.” she thought to herself, playing Lisa Lisa’s, Joseph’s and Caesar’s advice to her over in her head. Taking a quiet breath, she focused her Hamon through to her hands, emitting a soft glow that chased some of the darkness away; enough to let her see in front of her. And she wished she didn’t. 

Not five steps in front of her was a hunched figure, his head buried in another figure’s neck, low sounds heard from him. The soft glow of her Hamon seemed to catch the figure’s attention, drawing his focus away from the corpse and to her; her heart dropped at the sight of him. 

Golden blonde hair that were soft to the touch and pushed up slightly from the headband that dawned two small feathers. Eyes that should have been emerald green now glowed a crimson red with a hunger like that of a starved animal; the pale pink birthmarks sitting just under them on his cheekbones. Death pale skin smeared with dried blood that once trickled down the sides of his head. Fresh blood staining his lips as he hissed at her, revealing fangs behind his lips. 

No. T-This was true...This had to be an illusion. No matter how her thoughts clashed and screamed at her that this was not real, she knew it was. They were too late. Caesar...

Before she could react, Caesar hissed at her, lunging forward towards the new source of blood, hunger clouding his mind. This new thirst that plagued his body was unlike anything he has ever endured before, he needed to feed. He needed to taste the blood beneath her soft, delicate skin. 

[Name] turned on her heel and bolted, she was not going to attack Caesar but she was not going to let him kill her. “Caesar! Please, stop! It’s me, [Name]!” If her words reached him, he didn’t show it as he only chased after her, refusing to let this source of fresh blood escape him. Pushing off on his foot, he tackled her to the ground roughly, pinning her down and leaning down, inhaling her scent. 

“Mmm, so sweet...such a wonderful aroma...” His tone held a slight hiss to it that made fear coil around her like a spring. There was such hunger in his glowing eyes, even though he was feeding only seconds ago. Her attempts to free herself were fruitless against the blonde, his newfound strength easily overpowering her.

“Caesar, look at me. Please, remember me.” [Name] spoke, no, begged. She didn’t want Caesar to become the monster those things made him, she knew that her Caesar Zeppeli was still in there. And she was going to reach him. Her [Eye colour] orbs looked straight into his crimson red ones, searching for any glimmer of the man she loved. 

“Of course I remember you, dear, sweet cara.” Those words struck through her chest, releasing a new sense of cold fear coursing through her. One hand came to rest on her cheek, his touch colder than ice and making her flinch at it, gently caressing it as if she was a prized possession. A twisted fondness in his eyes as he looked at her. “How could I forget you? You are my everything, aren’t you?” 

His voice was laced with this unsettling softness yet his eyes held that glow, a predator taunting his prey. She was perfect to him. She was everything for him. After all, she was his lover, his darling, his cara, his everything. No one in the entire world could love her the way he did, appreciate her beauty and kindness the way he did. She belonged by his side, no one was even close to being worthy of her expect for him.

Now, with his newfound powers, he could protect her far more than he ever could before. He was no longer bound by human morals and weakness, no longer bound by humanity. No, he was so much more now. How could he have been so blind beforehand? 

His hand continued to caress her soft skin, so warm under his icy touch like a gentle candle flame. Beautiful. Simply beautiful. Even with the fear in her [Eye colour] orbs she called eyes. 

“Oh cara, don’t look at me like that.” he spoke softly, leaning closer to her. “There is no reason to be afraid of me, after all, I would never harm you.” With that, he leaned closer to her neck, pressing soft kisses along it and leaving faint smears of the blood from his lips. Her heart raced as he did, her pulse lightly beating against his lips and a spark of hunger rushed through him. 

Her scent was nothing short of intoxicating. He was incapable of functioning with her, and not just because of her blood. He needed her. Every inch, every bit of her, he needed it. 

His fangs inched in his mouth before he sunk them into her delicate neck, tasting her crimson liquid. The second it touched his tongue, he couldn’t stop the moan he made. It was incredible, unlike anything he has ever tasted before. So rich with flavour, warm and sweeter than any fine wine he has drunk. 

A pained cry escaped her lips as he drunk, trying to push him away from her but unable to get him to budge, powerless against him, feeling he drain her blood from her. He pulled away, the crimson liquid dripping from his lips a little before he licked it up. 

“Wonderful. You are so delicious, my sweet [Name].” He leaned close again, this time, locking their lips together. Hunger in his lips as he kissed her, one hand pressing her shoulder down to keep her in place and the other holding her cheek. Her lips didn’t reciprocate, instead, she wanted to pull away from him and run as far away as she could; despite her earlier desire to aid him. 

She knew her Caesar. She knew the man who had taken her heart and protected it, cherished it as he cherished her. This...thing was not her Caesar. There was no trace of the man she once knew, only this twisted warped monster who looked like him. 

He pulled away, the taste of her own blood sprinkled on her lips from the kiss. “C-Caesar, please. This isn’t who you are. Please.” Her voice was weak, strained with fear. He looked at her as if she was nothing more than a prized gem. Something to cherish but as an item rather than a living being. And that terrified her. A smile lifted his lips, a cold smile that was foreign to his features. 

“Oh cara.” His ice cold hand gently caressed her cheek, the action was almost loving, “This is who I am. I am more free now. And I am not going back.” His glowing crimson eyes pierced through her, taking in the fear carved into her face. “Don’t look at me like that. We finally have our wish.” 

He leaned in close again, lips brushing softly against her cheek and pressing a soft kiss on it, sending small goosebumps along her skin like that of a winter’s breeze.

“We are going to be together...forever.” 

[angstyaches]

A1, B2, B5 for Rin!! She’s my favourite out of all your OC’s!!!

(same anon):  I was the anon who asked for Rin. I’m fine with either Charlie or Shayne as the caretaker

A1: “Are you okay? You look pale”

B2: “You should sit down before you fall over”

B5: “Is the room spinning or is that just me?”

Anon, thank you for choosing these lovely lines for my lovely girl! The requests I’ve been getting for Rin have really helped me flesh out her character and her story. Sorry it took a while for this one; I tried to include a bit of Rin’s friendship with Katie without taking away too much from the Sick.

CW: toxic friendship, bullying (?), conflict, fainting, blacking out, anaemia (mention/implication), illness/deficiency

Rin panted as she began to sprint, despite knowing all too well that Katie, who was up to bat, hadn’t hit the ball far enough for Rin to make it to home base. Rin had once seen Katie hit the ball into a ditch so some of the more adventurous boys in the class had to climb through briars and nettles to get it back. And now, she was incapable of getting it a yard behind the catcher before dropping the bat and running to first? She had to have done it on purpose, so Rin would never make it to home.

Katie had been trying to pull all kinds of crap since Rin had made an effort to care less whenever Katie or the other girls said anything sly about how loudly she spoke sometimes, about how much time and effort she must put into her hair, about how close she’d gotten to those boys recently, about how she must have switched to a push-up bra lately because didn’t her boobs look so much bigger these days?

Rin cursed under her breath and slowed her pace as a guy on the opposite team carried the ball to home base and tagged it.

She spun around breathlessly. Her eyes took a second to focus, but she just about made out Katie reaching second base and coming to a stop. She was staring at Rin, the ghost of a smile crossing her face.

Rin should have gone straight over to sit down with the other players on the batting team who’d been sent out, but instead she stormed across the pitch, weaving between the fielding players and watching that smile drop from Katie’s face.

Hadn’t she always known it would come to an end like this? Hadn’t she known there was a reason she’d kept her true self from Katie throughout ten years of friendship, for fear of the mockery and ridicule that would pursue?

“What are you doing?” Katie demanded as Rin came to a stop in front of her. “You’re out.”

That, right there – the aggressive explanation, the assumption that Rin was only still there because her head was so high in the clouds that she didn’t know how the game worked – was what really boiled Rin’s blood these days.

“Yeah, I know that,” she yelled. Her chest heaved and ached with the effort of catching her breath. “I’m out because you only hit the damn ball two inches from home.”

“What?” Katie scoffed, glancing at the fielding girl hovering by second base. “You think I did that maliciously? Not everyone’s out to get you, Corinne. Now go sit down, before you embarrass both of us like you bloody always do.”

“I don’t get embarrassed, K,” Rin laughed, indicating towards the few fielding team members who had already turned around to see what was going on with them. “I think what you mean is that I’m always bloody embarrassing you.”

“Hey!” came a yell from the side-line. Miss Malloy was waving her arms, shooing Rin towards home base. “Johnson, get off the field, now!”

“Rin?” Katie asked, frowning and peering at Rin’s face. “Are you okay? You look pale. I’ve tried telling you to go get checked for anaemia -”

“I’m always pale, I’m just pale,” Rin said, her mouth going dry. “Stop trying to make me think I have all these things that are wrong with me, K. It won’t work anymore, alright?”

“Johnson!” yelled Miss Malloy. “Last warning, or it’s a demerit!”

Katie folded her arms, her face neutral as Rin tried to give her one last glare. She felt like she was going to burst into tears as she turned around, the grass swaying a bit. God, she felt awful, like something had whacked her over the head. A deep-set ache was settling in low in her stomach, but that didn’t explain the fact that from the knees down, her legs seemed to have turned into sandbags.

She made it over to the other players on her team. Shayne was among them, though he’d left a considerable space between the other members and himself before sitting down in the grass.

“What was all that?” he asked, scratching awkwardly at the back of his head as Rin walked up to him.

“It was nothing, alright? God, I hate this game,” she said breathlessly. She suddenly felt like she wanted to go to sleep.

“It’s just P.E. Who cares?” Shayne told her with a shrug. “You should try not giving a shit.”

“Oh, like you?” Rin snapped, spots dancing in her vision. “And how many calories have you burned today exactly?”

“The hell is that supposed to mean?” he asked, with an edge of genuine hurt.

“Oh - oh, my god.” Rin immediately pressed her hands to her face. Her head was throbbing so hard she could barely think. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, babe, I – I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I – I feel really weird.”

Rin leaned her hands against her knees. She could physically feel her heart skipping beats against her ribs, stalling the pulse in her neck. She should not have been this exhausted from the amount of running she’d done.

“Uh, Rin?” Shayne asked. “You should sit down before you fall over.”

Rin whimpered and sat down in the grass, drawing her knees up to meet with her elbows and cradling her face in her hands.

“Shayne?” Rin’s limbs felt like lead, and she was very glad she’d taken his advice and sat down. She hid her face behind her knees to try to stop the dizziness, but she felt like she was being pulled by a tide. “Babe, is – is the room spinning or is that just me?”

“Well, we’re outside, for starters.” Shayne shifted closer, putting a hand on Rin’s shoulder. “Rin, can you look at me, please?”

Rin tilted her head to look at him, still holding it up with her hands and her knees. She felt like she’d swallowed a paperweight as she saw him frown and blink in concern.

“What?” she whispered weakly. “Do I look... anaemic?”

“Well, I was gonna say you look like a vampire.”

“I’m always pale –”

Shayne shook his head. “Nah, not like this. Shit, you look like you’re gonna pass out.”

“Mm–” Rin felt something like a tearless sob get stuck in her throat. “Mmhmm.”

Shayne was quiet for a second, still holding her shoulder. “I don’t like this, Rin, I’m – I’m gonna go get Miss Malloy. Want me to find someone to sit with you?”

“No,” she whined. The ache in her belly grew heavier, seeping into her lower back. Her head swayed to the side. No, there was nobody in their P.E. group she’d have wanted to come and sit with her like this. She’d have liked Charlie, but he was in a different class group. A few weeks ago, she might have asked for Katie, but the thought made her feel nauseous now. She hoped Katie came nowhere near her while she was like this. “Shayne, don’t - don’t go.”

“Fuck, Rin, I don’t know what else –” he said. His voice sounded shaky and muffled for a second. “– to do, okay? Here.”

Rin peeked out from under her hands. Shayne had pulled off his P.E. jumper, even though it was December and too cold to be out in just a polo shirt. He’d rolled the jumper up and placed it on the grass.

Rin frowned and let herself slump gently to the side. She rested her cheek on Shayne’s jumper and then tucked her chin towards her chest. The grass was cold, but the makeshift pillow was warm, and it was so much better being horizontal than vertical. Blissful, even.

She was vaguely aware of Shayne saying something, but her ears rang and her head spun and everything – the tickling sensation of the grass against her ankles, the slight breeze on her face, the distant thwack of ball hitting bat – was too much for her senses. All she wanted was to sleep, but even that seemed like too much effort, so before Shayne could come back with the teacher, she let herself simply black out.