#somewhere up in machias

[playitandmakeitsincere]

Ryan: Next step is to fold in the cheese. Sisky, frantically stirring: What does that mean? What does fold in the cheese mean? Ryan, scoffing: You fold it in. Sisky: I understand that, but how? How do you fold it? Sisky: Do you fold it in half? Like a piece of paper and drop it in the pot, or what do you do? Ryan: Sisky, I cannot show you everything. Sisky, still stirring: Okay, well cAN yOU SHOW ME ONE THING?

[does-not-have-milk]

i have homework to do, so here's an excerpt for an au that i'm probably never going to finish:

“–And then I get amnesia and reappear in some small village somewhere in the mountains with nothing from my past life. I wander back to Ninjago City and claim I have no recollection of robbing any driving-throughs. By season nine I’ve successfully integrated back into society but still have no idea what egregious crimes I committed, or anything from my life before. Thoughts?”

Krux hummed. “It could work. If we can find some way to excuse the rest of us as suspects from your breakout, it would be even better.”

“I don’t see why you have to have a run-in with a horde of killer bees,” Machia said. “It’s a waste of time and resources.”

Acronix rolled his eyes, folding the paper back over the easel. He hit the picture with the ruler he had “borrowed.” “Obviously it’s because the horde of killer bees is an integral part of what my character needs to go through in order to realise that he was wrong to shun his older brother Sander all those years ago for wanting to be a museum curator instead of travelling the world in a circus with him like they’d always dreamed of doing. Duh, Machia. Keep up.”

“Not to mention the metaphorical significance of a horde of killer bees,” Krux said. “The bees symbolise all the negative messages society has been forcing on the character for his whole life. Running from the killer bees is symbolic of Gander rejecting society’s hurtful conventions.” Acronix nodded in affirmation, grinning smugly. “Really, Commander Machia, I expected better of you.”

Machia exhaled. “My apologies for questioning your brother’s ingenious plan, Krux. I won’t say such foolish things in the future.”

“If– if I say your plan is good, Acronix, will you let me go?” Borg asked.

“No,” The three of them answered.

[marunalu]

So this is the only thing I will say about the latest chapter leaks. It is not clear if toga dies at the end of the chapter or not. It could be a red herring and we know with bakugou that hori has no problem with killing characters just to bring them back to life in the most unrealistic way possible! So I think togas survival has a 50:50 chance.

The thing is, hori wrote himself into a corner with the lov. He made them likeable and gave them sad backstorys so the readers will feel attachment for them, will want them to survive and have a happy ending. But this on itself would be a terrible message too. Toga and the rest of the lov are all symphatic villains and people who needed help, but from a realistic kind of view they are all still terrorists and murderers who killed or helped to kill dotzens of innocents who never did anything wrong to them. Just because their victims are faceless nobodys to us doesnt mean these werent people! When machia rampaged through multible entire citys and killed HUNDREDS of people including children, NOT ONE member of the lov tried to stop it or said something against it. Toga was stoic staring in front of her only caring about what happend to twice and killed or hurted an helpless old woman to fool ochako later on, dabi laughed like an complete maniac and just had the best day of his life, mr. compress gave an absolute fuck and shiggy destroyed an entire city with innocents on his own without giving a fuck either. The only one who seemed kinda upset about all the destruction and death was spinner, but even he didnt try to stop it or complained how wrong it was. Yes the lov members are victims of society or their own defunctional familys, BUT they are also criminals and they made their problems the problems of EVERYONE! Their backstorys arent there to excuse their actions, but to explain how and why they ended up the way they did. And the fact that so many readers try to excuse the lovs actions is actually..... quite worrisome.

When I say hori wrote himself into a corner with the lov, I mean he wrote them as likeable characters the readers care for, but he also cant just give them a happy ending and not punish them for their actions after they killed/helped to kill hundreds of people. He cant just do that! What kind of message would that be for his younger readers? "Oh yeah murder is okay, as long as youre childhood sucked!" Come on, we need to be more realistic here!

Regarding toga, the thing is even IF she survives she made clear she WONT let herself be arrested not even from ochako. And at this point she (and the rest of the lov) cant just be introduced back to society as if nothing happend. And toga made clear she is not sorry for the things she did! I think the closest thing for a happy ending toga and the lov COULD get if they all survive, is if they hide themself and live in isolation far away from society on a island or somewhere on the country side. They cant just be introduced back to society, the common people of japan will not forgive them for all the deaths and destruction they caused. Its plainly unrealistic! IF toga really dies here, Im just glad she found her piece and someone who was willing to love her for who she is and that she will hopefully reunite with twice in the afterlife, the one person who really truly loved toga with all his heart!

[stillness-in-green]

Chapter Thoughts — Chapter 385: The Impulses of Youth

Lots of this-and-that and whatever this chapter.

O  Quibble: So where did all this Detnerat stuff even come from?  Hasn’t the AFO battle moved well away from the villa, which is both where the original raid happened (albeit over a month ago, so you’d think it would have seen at least some clean-up efforts, especially of weaponizable support goods) and where AFO’s army of jail breakers, feasibly equipped with some Detnerat stuff courtesy of Skeptic and the abandoned Detnerat facilities, were warped to?

O  Poor Machia.  :(  Shigaraki would never.  Also, I see his claws are still kinda fucked up from Mina’s acid, which gets us a bit closer to saying whether the damage is permanent, though not as close as we’d be if Machia had tunneled his way here on those frail claws.

O  AFO’s inner darkness is marginally interesting.  If it’s Shigaraki/ShigAFO’s influence as AFO supposes, that would suggest that Shigaraki hasn’t permanently rid himself of VFO, since it’s VFO that AFO has that mental connection to.  However, recall that the whole reason the heroes split up Shigaraki and AFO was to prevent AFO and VFO from utilizing their mental connection the way they did in Tartarus—if that distance[1] is still in effect, there shouldn’t be any influence from Shigaraki (or VFO or the Shigaraki/VFO conglomerate) because they aren’t close enough to sense each other.

It’s possible that AFO is just closing the distance, of course, but as an alternative explanation, consider the supposition I and others have done about AFO having quirk-based impulse-control problems.  He presumably would have learned to manage those as he got older, so perhaps they’re rearing up again as he de-ages, and he’s just mistakenly blaming them on ShigAFO because he doesn’t yet realize that Shigaraki’s iced VFO?

On the other hand, that would suggest a change in his mentality, which Eri’s quirk has not been previously shown to affect—presumably personality and memory are, like AFO’s stock of quirks, considered “external” to what her quirk affects (more on that shortly).

O  Regarding AFO wiping his opponents in a cut-away, there’s a big question here of why he didn’t just do that from the start, if he always could, but I do think that at least the enormous fuck-off laser he fires is reasonable to keep in the back pocket, because it very obviously thrashes the arm he uses to fire it.  Like, you can see the specks at the center of those rings of light punching straight through his shoulder and down the length of his arm, and when he actually discharges the shot, it obliterates his arm below the elbow completely.[2]

Not exactly the sort of thing that would be anyone’s first go-to, especially when a bunch of their other powers are tied to their arms and hands!

It’s also possibly notable that AFO cites his returning youth (and the dark urges associated with it) as being how he can tap into the deeper potential of his quirks.  I would say this is fairly silly and arbitrary, but it does strike me that one of the quirks AFO has is Ujiko’s Life Force, which Ujiko himself says “decreases vitality,” so it’s possible that burning off all those extra years is actually getting AFO some punch back just from shaking off some of Life Force’s accumulated sedentary qualities.  It reminds me, too, of Aizawa equating quirks with muscles that can be exercised and strengthened.  While we’ve seen a lot since then that throws doubt on the general applicability of that metaphor, we might suppose that the muscles of a younger man are going to be generally stronger than those of the old man AFO was well on his way to becoming.

O  I feel like I said it somewhere before and can't find it again, but you know what’s really dumb?  Blowing Shinsou’s surprise advantage on controlling Gigantomachia instead of AFO.  For real, I cannot imagine they couldn’t have set up some situation where Shinsou would have been able to provoke a response.  Just put him out there and have him ask about Aizawa’s dead bestie, or have him use Hawks’ voice, since Hawks has been so good at wheedling AFO into dawdling around delivering Evil Overlord monologues.  It’s a bit silly that AFO didn’t recognize Shinsou from the start—we know he watched the Sports Festival with Shigaraki—but man, if you want to talk about a risk worth taking, Shinsou getting control of AFO is a much smarter one than Shinsou delivering Machia straight into AFO’s hands.

O  Translation Quibble: Whichever character is the one that calls out to Mount Lady as she goes over—Mineta, Hawks, one of the other students—doesn’t address her as Mount Lady; they just call her Lady. No idea why this would need to be changed.

O  Translation Quibble: I noticed the severe discrepancy this week between the official release and the fan translation of Hawks’ line about AFO’s quirks and Rewind, and asked @codenamesazanka about it.  She looked into the response the Japanese fans were having to the chapter on Twitter, as seeing the J-fan consensus is usually a reliable way to see how an ambiguous line is being interpreted in its native language.  According to that response, then, none of the English translations have gotten it quite right,[3] but basically, Hawks is goading AFO how Rewind treats AFO’s stock of quirks as an external factor, so while it can heal AFO’s body, it won’t work any changes on damaged quirks.  Thus, AFO is stuck with the festering rubbish version of Fierce Wings, not the sick red angel wings version.  (Mind you, Hawks has been doing perfectly serviceable work with that damaged version, so it’s not like it would be entirely useless to AFO.)

I notice we’re still doing this thing where “quirks” are distinguished from “quirk factors,” and continue to wonder what that actually means for AFO and Shigaraki, and why AFO didn’t just give Shigaraki whatever he needs when they were spending weeks in a cave together.  See this post for more.

O  AFO can talk about carnage all he likes, but I know good and well that Horikoshi did not just kill off anybody here, probably not even Gigantomachia.  Sorry, Hori, I’m still burned out from the heart debacle.

O  The Mineta scene is great.  I love Mineta when he’s anxious about his classmates.  And directly attracting the Demon Lord’s attention for the sake of one of said classmates is about the best thing you could ask for to demonstrate how far Mineta’s come from his early wrestling with cowardice.  (Also, saying that taking Dark Shadow will just make AFO a chuunibyou is hilarious.  Sorry, Mineta; AFO is already a huge fucking chuunibyou; Dark Shadow could not possibly make him more of one than he became the moment he decided to devote his life to becoming an IRL Demon Lord.)

O  Nothing concrete to say about Hawks losing the wings for good—and I do think he did; check out all those nice clear shots of his back, with nothing visible except a bunch of burn scars courtesy of Dabi.  Honestly, I think it probably should have happened at Deika.  What has he actually done since then that truly required that Hawks specifically be flight-capable?  He caught Lady Nagant, yes, but Endeavor could have done that; it’s not like Overhaul was going to get far if Endeavor didn’t grab him right away.  He had the combo move with Jirou and Tokoyami, but breaking AFO’s helmet could just as easily have been Dark Shadow’s work.

Honestly, Hawks would have been much better served in terms of characterization to have had a crisis of faith about what he does with his life after Deika—ruined wings, ruined reputation, an ugly reveal about his heroic idol, the HPSC in shambles but definitely not down for the count, his mother gone again, his intern having some pressing questions about the whole matter of the murder accusation, and so on.  But the narrative being unwilling to actually push Hawks on anything is, tragically, not news, so of course he only loses his wings at the very end of the story, not a point at which it would have actually mattered.

O  It’s kind of bonkers that the mini-flashback panel of the Shiketsu kids turning up with news that the UA refugees never arrived is framed as a hopeful thing?  In that it’s what Hawks’ mind goes to when he’s thinking there’s still hope?  I guess it would explain why no one asked the Shiketsu students why the hell they didn’t investigate what happened to said refugees: the story meant us to assume that Shiketsu assumed the refugees never showed because they were just never in enough danger to bother leaving U.A. at all.  No mystery there; the fight at U.A. must be going off just as planned!

Of course, given that we know good and well that communication is going on between the groups,[4] there’s no reason Shiketsu shouldn’t have been notified that they had refugees being sent their way, which puts me right back to assuming incredible negligence being committed there.  And indeed, we know that there is indeed trouble brewing in the escape cubes, so I’m really entirely confused as to why Hawks flashed to news about the refugees never arriving as a Hope Spot.

That said, I’d actually be fairly shocked at this point if Horikoshi is letting Hawks be wrong about something based on faulty conclusions, so is there or is there not a twist coming there?  Whooooo knows.  I do know that if we don’t get anything other than Death Arms’ big noble run, that’s going to be a pretty big let-down for a plot we spent some not inconsiderable time (as rushed final arc plot points go, anyway) setting up.

O  I want to say Fuyumi looking after the remedial exam kids is a nice touch, but I also wonder where in god’s names their parents are, or even their own teacher.  I could see them hanging out with each other around the refugee area if they’re all from the same school district/neighborhood, but you’d think that once the evacuation to another school starts, they’d be sent back to stay with their families until the cube safely arrives.  So maybe it’s less a nice touch and more a would-be clever nod that actually opens up a lot of unintended questions (big shock).

O  The material with AFO’s mole is deeply underwhelming.  How exactly did Gunhead even spot that guy being shifty in a windowless underground enclosure in which all the lights have just gone off?  It ought to be pitch black in there, aside from the lights from personal electronic devices.  The spy dude has some kind of energy arcing between his thumbs, but his back is to Gunhead, so what distinguishes the glow from that energy from just another cellphone screen?

Also, I notice that Bowl Cut is continuing to be treated very unsympathetically by the narrative—that huge manic grin!—despite how thuddingly obvious his internal monologue is that he’s terrified of AFO and sees his very life as dependent on doing something, anything, that he can offer up to AFO as Services Rendered when this is all over.  I suppose it’s at least consistent with the bizarre cant on the adults treating Aoyama as a complete villain for the horrible crime of being a blackmailed teenager.

Bowl Cut aside, though, AFO is implied to have at least five, possibly more, moles at U.A., so stopping only the one who’s having the most obvious panic sweats about it is not exactly resolving the problem!

The people conspicuously framed as listening to the relayed orders from AFO, circa Chapter 342.

O  It’s nice to see one of these “heroes are, as a group, getting better” plot beats actually involve a hero who failed in Chapter 1’s Sludge Villain scene, but I persist in thinking that it’d land better if the action involved heroes taking on a problem they don’t immediately believe they can solve.  Just as you couldn’t hand-pick someone better than Mina to deal with the Sludge Villain, catching falling chunks of metal seems entirely within Death Arms’ skill set, so it’s not like he’s made some incredible evolution wherein he leaps to help even in a situation he doesn’t have an immediate solution for.

O  Color me incredibly curious how Stain is going to fit into all this, seeing as he’s stuck in Kamino, on the far eastern side of this multi-area conflict…is what I would have said before the official came out and it became more obvious that the blobby dark shape off to his left side is some kind of Green Goblin-esque glider.  On the other hand, it’s not a Green Goblin glider without Pumpkin Bombs, so fingers crossed that Stain’s is capable of launching exploding shuriken or something similarly characterful.  XD

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

[1] Which the heroes magically deduced somehow.  They get a lot of this sort of thing, like the magic sensors the American jets were equipped with that let them tell that AFO’s quirks were being destroyed, or the whole business of sussing out the identities of 100K people in an underground army in a bit over three months.

[2] An excellent reason for whoever that quirk’s previous owner was to want to get rid of it!  If you don’t have rapid healing, that quirk is like walking around with a grenade embedded in your elbow.  You might survive the blood loss, if you get immediate medical care, but you sure as hell aren’t getting the arm back.

[3] Or if Caleb did, his localization is being especially obtuse and needlessly confusing this week.

[4] See e.g. the news about Dabi’s seeming defeat being radioed out to all parties, or Mount Lady being notified about AFO being on the move.

[autumn-foxfire]

Oh that. Yeah it's been a hot minute so your anons might have forgotten, but the villains never came back for Twice's corpse. It was a fear Hawks had yes, but remember this guy zoomed right back to clean up the corpse and blood. He knew for damn sure nobody found Twice. If Twice's body was missing he would've sounded an alarm about it, but it wasn't. He found the crime scene intact, and that's why as soon as he sees Toga use SPM he knew it was Dabi who must've done it, because he was the only one present and near the body. And I wonder if Hawks asking him all those questions was also partially to distract him from the body? Because he only started asking after Dabi said "with Twice around, my dream had a way better chance of coming true!" that would've made him fear Dabi realizing he could just take Twice's blood and give it to Toga. He was right too, but after he heard the League got grabbed by Machia, and found Twice's corpse undisturbed when Compress could've marble-d it, he must've thought it was safe.

What happened was that after Tokoyami left, and right before Machia grabbed the League, Dabi says in chapter 341 that that was the moment he nabbed some of Twice's blood. Idk what that anon is on, there was no blood taken from the Twice clone, it was all goop. Dabi's word choice is interesting, because he strictly says "original body" so I don't think Toga can use clone blood, or if she can, she just won't think to. She has a 30-40 minute then SPM is over.

And Hawks couldn't have found Ujiko's hideout no matter what he did. Because he only knew what PLF was planning, not what AFO and Ujiko were planning with freeing AFO's main body and making him healthy again. He had no involvement in the OFA-AFO plot bullshit, neither Shigaraki nor PLF knew about it either. It was all secret. And tbf, on Ujiko using the Double Clone idk if the heroes knew about that, but it's not important. He's captured, Miruko found the original, the Nomu with the quirk was killed, it caused absolutely zero issues for them and was cleaned up neatly. Hell, thanks to them finding the fake Ujiko before the real one, it led them to Ujiko's lab with Shigaraki's tank. Worked out fine in the end, it's not really something to bring up. I will say tho, the Jeanist revival is definitely some insanity we have no answers for. That's a fair complaint. The least Hori could've done is said the docs revived him, but he went and had Hawks say that he, personally revived Jeanist, and last I checked he wasn't a mad scientist capable of reverting Nomu death states. So what gives Hawks?!? As for finding him despite the cameras on his wings, I suppose he could've sent a feather to drag Jeanist's corpse out of the fridge or sweet talked Skeptic into shutting the cameras off for a bit to steal him. Or just taken the whole wings off and made it seem like he was chilling on the roof, facing one way while his wingless body zoomed in and out of the storage, before sneaking up behind his own wings at an angle the cameras couldn't see and carefully reattaching them.

Yeah, I thought that was what happened in regards to Hawks and Twice's body. Also it points towards Dabi's planning that not only did he go into the fight with a camera to film Twice's potential death, he also thought to bring something to store his blood just in case as well (yet this goes ignored by fandom because Dabi has to have been so broken up about his death...)

Sadly the anime never made Hawks finding Jeanist any clearer T-T In fact he was there in person for his rescue, something I don't really know how he accomplished with the cameras considering Hori had him be so careful when creating a code for the heroes. My guess is that he never really thought much about it even though he wanted Jeanist to be rescued and revived.

You're theory about how he removed his feathers to make Skeptic think he was somewhere is probably the soundest theory over how he succeeded. Makes you wonder why they kept them on his wings though when they should know that Hawks can remove them XD

Again, it probably wasn't Hori put much thought into.

[codenamesazanka]

Shigaraki dies, and goes back in time. To the day OFA was transferred to Deku…

[part 1] [part 2]

rough idea/summary [part 3]

(no longer the day OFA was transferred to Deku. days later.)

•

So the stuff about AFO engineering his whole life was real. Midoriya Izuku exists for real. Then this means Shigaraki's 'dream' wasn't a dream - he had seen the future, he had lived it, and everything he witnessed was real.

His League exists. Twice is currently out there somewhere, paper bag over his head. Compress trying to achieve his ancestor's dream. Magne trying to live free, Dabi plotting to kill Endeavor, Toga's a brat on the run, Spinner in his room. All that, and—Machia's still waiting for AFO to call him back. The orphanages that produced Overhaul still up and running. ReDestro and his army ready to rise up.

It's strange to think that Shigaraki could just leave all this behind. He was meant for a different fate. The system this world has built probably wouldn't have rejected Shimura Tenko, if AFO hadn't gotten involved. Who was he to reject the world, then, if so? A crying brat, throwing a tantrum over a lie.

But his League still exists.

someone having trouble, being in pain or going through something hard and difficult, it’s only right to give them a hand… When someone is in trouble, it’s just natural to want to help, right?

His League was out there.

Doesn't matter... if you stamp out my hatred. Even if I wind up hollow… Those guys... the Villains need a Hero of their own.

So Shigaraki will find them.

-

It was Stain that brought the members of the League to him, but they were criminals already, living in the same underworld. Sooner or later, by fate or by intention, their paths would've crossed.

All except... Spinner.

-

One day, out of the blue, Shuuichi's brother knocks on his door and tells him there was someone looking for him. Some kid about his age, white hair, red eyes, non-heteromorph. Shuuichi's brother sent him on his way, because... well.

His brother doesn't say anything, but there's no need. Shuuichi has no friends; no school stuff, no job, no income, nothing that anyone would need to come find him for. He hasn't bother anyone - can't, if he never leaves his room. If someone knocking at the door, it's probably some prank the neighborhood kids are playing on the family, or a desperate scam an old classmate is trying to pull (though Shuuichi cannot remember any classmate that matches the description his brother gives).

After that, the day go on as usual. Shuuichi games; watches the news; eats cup ramen, goes to bed.

Then he wakes up in the middle of the night (for him and his messed up sleep schedule - for everyone else, it's mid morning) to a guy his age, with white hair, red eyes, sitting in his room, browsing his shelves of games.

(After the initial freak out, it's a cutscene out of Shuuichi's wildest chuunibyou dreams.)

The guy calls himself Shigaraki, and asks Shuuichi, point blank, if he believes in time travel.

Shuuichi drops the spoon he's been holding as a weapon (as simple as throwing knives, but much less effective). ...................What is this?

Do you?

Shigaraki doesn't seem like the type of guy to have much patience, so Shuuichi answers honestly.

…In light novels and stuff, there's always someone with a quirk that lets them time travel. Or lets other people time travel. I dunno about real life, but scientists are always saying that quirks are unpredictable, and some of them even say that things like this - I mean, like time manipulation - might happen soon.

This is clearly some awful prank someone is playing on him. Hide a camera, make fun of the NEET nerd, try to make it go viral. But there's something about Shigaraki that seems strangely serious, sincere - the way he seems to be actually listening to Shuuichi, the way he's interested in what Shuuichi is saying.

(The way that, though his chilly blank expression is unchanged, Shigaraki's eyes seem to have lit up a bit when Shuuichi mentioned light novels. Like they might just trade titles about the ones they've read.)

...Is that why you're here?

Shigaraki says, Something like that.

And even though he already so badly wanted to, Shuuichi has to ask: You expect me to just believe you?

In this, Shuuichi was expecting that time travel trope - the giving of knowledge of the future, proof and evidence that this was all real. But Shigaraki did none of that.

…If you want. You believed in me, before, but... Shigaraki paused. I didn't get to make good on it. This time, I will.

Something about the way he said those last words made Shuuichi shiver. A twinge of somehting lighting up in his heart.

We were... friends, Shigaraki says, before I came here.

Do you want to be friends again?

shigaraki time travel fix it AU idea... save me, shigaraki time travel fix it AU idea

[lunarifie]

Rewatching Ninjago

(With no context other than the episode)

Hands of Time 5-6

Zane: Pixal, give me a danger analysis. Pixal..? Can you hear me?

Im gonna be devastated if Pixals gone or trapped somewhere

Cole (kicking snake samurais off the roller coasters tracks): You dont have a ticket- aaand YOU dont have a ticket! And YOU dont have a ticket!!!

Nooooo

Kai saw his fathers blacksmith symbol… :(

Kai I promise your parents arent helping the time brothers😭

LLOYDS ACTUALLY SO GOOD WITH KIDS?!?!?!

Like that one time with the purple ninja kid at the hospital and that one kid who was fascinated by his dragon

And right NOW, asking this kid his name to ground the kid in a stressful situation, then popping the kids bubble gum with two straws to make nun chucks and then giving the makeshift nunchucks to the kid 🥺

Lloyd: Ninja! Sound off! Is everyone okay?

Cole: if you mean okay as in ‘there sure are a lot of them’, then yeah! Im okay.

Hfbdjfbfjdbf

Lloyd: Hang on… has anyone seen Jay?

Kai: No… now that you mention it, he wasn’t with us when we arrived.

Cole: You know, for once, itd be great to go into battle with a full team.

Kai: Well dont tell us!?!? 😒 Tell jay! Its his fault he didnt tell us he was going WHEREVER

NFNSNFNDNR

How do the ninja forget their own members so easily.

Day of the departed with Cole, now this 💀

Nya: Im sure Jay had a good reason for running off…

Aww thats actually so sweet.

Ed (bulldozing samurai snakes): I HAVE THE RIGHT TO REFUSE SERVICE TO YOU!!!

Edna (sweeping the snakes with her broom): I don’t think they saw your sign out front dear! ☺️

Im not joking in the slightest when I say I would die for Jays parents.

Im being absolutely serious they are everything to me

Jay: Mom! Dad! Are you okay?!?!?

Edna: Oh, well. Now I’m very late for my quilting circle!

I literally adore them

Krux: I suspect you CAN make the apparatus, you just don’t WANT to.

Cyrus Borg: … Alright fine! But you cant make me!

My man, why didn’t you keep up with the lie 😭

They would have believed you if you just kept saying you couldn’t build it because you didn’t have the right materials

I forgot Acronix gets a crush on Machia

A TIME BLADE?!?!?

OMFG I FORGOT THATS LIKE A THING THIS SEASON. RETRIEVING THE TIME BLADES EVERY TIME ONE DROPS.

I forgot there were 4 time blades too.

This is just like season 1 and the fang-blades all over again

Snake samurai commander: Vermillion warriors, were leaving, take the builder now.

Jay: HA. Vermillion warriors? Really? THATS what theyre called????

Jay, theyre gonna kidnap your dad, and you’re LAUGHING.

NO. KIDNAPPING ED IS ONE THING BUT YOU KEEP YOUR FILTHY FUCKING HANDS OFF OF EDNA

EDNA NOOOOOO

I think Ednas scream was the most heartbreaking noise ive ever heard in this show.

THEY FORCED HER TO LEAVE WITHOUT HER PURSE. 😤

How dare they.

The fact he still calls his parents mom and dad after everything 🥺

Jay: Gotta form my dragon- Come on Jay, you can do this… You can do this.

He sounds so scared :(

He must feel so guilty since he promised he’d protect them.

Edna: THERES MEATLOAF IN THE FREEZER HONEY!!!!!

I love edna sm 😭

Nyas so smart

Putting a temporal scanner on Zane when he was rebooting :)

Jay: Ughhh I JUST promised you guys I would protect you. And now theyve taken mom!

Jays dad is so supportive 🥹

Ed: Just remember what we say in the scrap metal business, “keep your emotions under control and focus on the problem at hand.”

Jay:…

Jay: Do they actually say that.🤨

Ed: Its a surprisingly harsh business son.

THEY WERE GONNA GIVE JAY A MOTORCYCLE BIKE FOR HIS BIRTHDAY 😭😭😭

I LITERALLY LOVE THIS FAMILY

Now theyre gonna have some father-son bonding time by rebuilding it :)

…

Does lego ninjago forget Ed and Edna.

Istg if they dont have Jays parents in newer seasons im sueing.

Vermillion Warriors: Its too fucking hot! I hate it.

Edna: SEE! This is why I wanted my purse!!! I keep a bottle of water in there!!!! HYDRATION IS IMPORTAAANT!!!!!

Cole: I dont see the time blade.. but they have JAYS MOM?!?!?

HFJDJDNFJ the way he said ‘mom’ got me 💀

Edna (getting kidnapped): Oh hi Nya! Its so nice to see you!

Gotta be on good terms with ur sons girlfriend

Ed: Now, Jay- theres a speed limit…

Jay: MOMS IN TROUBLE.

Ed: Aaand there are times where its okay to ignore it!

Cole yelling out Jays name in slow mo is so funny

OH OH OH I REMEMBER THIS

Jays my favorite character ofc I remember anytime he does something cool

Everyone: (in slow motion)

Jay: Its like you said, never give up.

Ed: Well- that was until I saw everyone slow down to a snail’s pace

Jay: And thats why we modified the bike.

Jay: (FUCKING ALTERS THE BIKE SO HIS POWERS TRANSMIT INTO IT AND HE CAN RIDE THROUGH THE SLOW MO FORCEFIELD AT A NORMAL SPEED)

Kai and Cole: Way to go Jay!!! Talk about a come back!

Jay (unable to stop): SORRYILEFTYOU BEFORECANTSTOPPLEASEHELPMYDAD GETTHEBLADESEEBACKYOUATTHE TEMPLE

hfnsnfnsjrndjsjnd

Vermillion warrior: waddles to the time blade :D

Lloyd: (fucking air kicks him)

HELL YEAH THEYRE OUT OF THERE WITH THE TIME BLADE

Zane: (stabilizing the port wing on the jet)

Cole: YOU CALL THIS STABILIZING?!?!?

Zane: IM TRYING!!!

Cole: TRY HARDER.

Cole leave him alone 😭

Lloyd: We got the time blade! We finally caught a break!!!

HFNSJFNSJF

THATS SO TRUE

i remember them failing to retrieve every single fang blade

Oh how theyve grown 🥲

Nya (trying to show off her bf): Ha! did you guys see Jay take off on that bike? He was like- greased lightning!

Everyone: …

Nya: What? He had grease on his face… and hes the lightning ninja??? Aw come on, you would have laughed if Jay said it!!!!

Kai: No. no we wouldn’t.

Ed: I uh, I thought it was funny Nya. 🙂

Nya: … thank you Mr Walker.

Jay really is rubbing off on Nya :) hes making her more relaxed and carefree

Love that

Zane: Be careful Jay, the time blade is a powerful weapon.

Jay: I AM being careful 🙄 (does the exact opposite)

JAY HAS A STUFFED ANIMAL?!?!?!?!?

Mr. Cuddlywomp 😭

Thats the cutest fucking name ever

I bet Edna sewed and stitched it for him 🥺

This is actually great timing bc i was JUST writing a fanfic about Jay when he was rlly little and Mr. Cuddlywomp is a perfect addition

Jay: A stuffed toy I USED to love, hes totally lame now though-

Cole: We know you still sleep with him. :)

Jay: AND I DONT CARE WHO KNOWS. Mr. Cuddlywomp… (hugs the donkey/horse stuffie)

MISTER CUDDLYWOMP HAS A WIKI

Jays an animal jam gamer confirmed

Huh. Good character consistency I guess.

The water and fire siblings being too consumed in work while Jay, Cole, and Zane goof off is a dynamic I need more of.

Jay: Ugh, I dont get those two, we FINALLY get a victory and they choose to celebrate by nerding out instead of doing something cool?

Jay: OH! Lets run at each other and see if the time blade will slow us down!!!!!!

Look at Lloyd 😭😭😭 hes so proud of his victory

I love those small moments when Lloyd acts like a kid. Look at him! Hes getting all excited and waving his hands around to explain everything!!!

Lloyd, honey, I love you but maybe apologize to your mom about knocking her tea to the floor accidentally 😭💀

Krux: You were not given permission to use the time blade. Because if you KNEW how to use the time blade. YOU WOULD NOT HAVE LOST THE TIME BLADE-

Vermillion warriors: ….

Vermillion warriors: On second thought, maybe we DIDNT lose the time blade….

Acronix: You use the time blade, LOSE the time blade AND LIE ABOUT USING AND LOSING THE TIME BLADE.

Hfndntehdjsjthe

Love when the villains are absolutely hilarious

Jay and Cole are best friends, they do the stupidest shit together and if that isn’t true friendship then idk what is 💀

Cole: Sounds to me like someones earned their black belt in being a wet blanket.

Lloyd: Whats that supposed to mean!

Zane: I believe Coles intent is to describe you as a blanket that has become wet, but not for the purposes of putting out a fire, but rather to extinguish our enjoyment.

Thank you Zane ☺️

HNFJDBFBEJR its so funny that Wu said the EXACT SAME THING lloyd said.

Word for word.

And the ninja still called Lloyd a wet blanket and listened to Wu intently.

The snake samurai are here.

Zane: Ive run a fourth-level analysis, it appears the snake warriors have returned.

Jay: Oh really?!? i could have told you that with a third-level analysis. OR A NO-LEVEL ANALYSIS.

I love how the ninja refuse to call the snake samurai, vermillion warriors.

Jay: oh wow, they went from unarmed snakes to weaponized vermillion warriors really really fast!!!

Kai: Doesnt matter! We can take- Wait. (Holding back a laugh) THATS what they’re called???? Vermillion warriors????

Love Zane explaining WHY the writers chose ‘Vermillion warriors’ as the snakes samurais name.

Makes me think that some writers thought ‘vermillion warriors’ was a perfect name while others thought it was stupid 💀

Kai: Remember Mrs. Grumbiller? The babysitter we used to have?

Nya: The old mean one?

Kai: Yeah, remember what we did when she tried to put us to bed?

Nya: absolutely.

HELL YEAH SIBLING TEAMING LETS GOOO

Nya and Kai: (trip the snake warrior off the floating island)

Jay: Oh man, whatever they paid Mrs. Grumbiller, wasnt nearly enough.

UGHHHH WHY CANT THE BOUNTY GO ONE SEASON WITHOUT BEING DESTROYED!?!?!?!?

Misakos such a girlboss

I love when they use their elemental dragons

NO LLOYD GOT SCARED

HES FALLING

YES KAI SAVE HIM

Shit.

FUCK YEAH NYA COMING IN CLUTCH

Wait that isn't nya????

Who's in the samurai x suit then?????

Lloyd: Well, samurai, whoever you are, thank you.

Nya: THANK YOU!??!? SAMURAI-WHOEVER-YOU-ARE STOLE MY SUIT!!!!!!!

Jay really IS rubbing off on Nya 😭😭😭 I've never seen her this loudly and hilariously angry

Kai (holding a hurt and weak sensei): TELL ME WHAT THE SYMBOL MEANS.

Like dude give Wu a break 💀

Acronix: look at the little boy pretending to be a big hero...

Why do they have to keep reminding me how young Lloyd is. 🥲 it's sad

I actually get excited during Misakos fights she's so cool

...

You cannot be telling me that the time brothers are beating ALL the ninja even when they're NOT using the time blades powers...

Like are you kidding me?????

FINALLY they beat the time brothers

GOD FUCKING DAMMIT

I actually hate Machia now.

This is just the fang blades all over again

AAAAND they take Wu.

This is when Kai gets in his real ‘im gonna kill my dad’ arc isn't it.

[itsnothingofinterest]

So I apologize if this sounds conspiratorial, but is anyone else getting the impression that the anime is trying to make the villains less sympathetic?

Because going over all the adaptational changes made this season in my mind; it feels like a lot of them tend to put less focus on them and taking away some of the reasons people care about them while putting a lot more time and focus on the more conventional protagonists.

I mean just the arc shifting in general has had an effect on an anime-watchers perception of the villains as I discussed previously; showing them as rich & powerful threats to all the heroes hold dear before MVA, which had the chapter where they’re shown poor and financially struggling cut completely (with the exception of the scene where Kurogiri & Shigaraki discuss Machia, because it’s intimidating).

Plus there’s just what’s stretched out forever and what’s rushed through to consider. Like, Joint Training adapted about 2 chapters per episode and was given anime-original content, and the Endeavor internship arc was similarly drawn out (I remember hearing form someone who keeps better track of this than me that 1 episode was a single chapter). To say nothing of the Shirakumo reveal and a freaking filler episode also going before MVA; well it really starts to look after a point that they’ve been intentionally trying to give MVA as few episodes as possible to justify all of it’s content like crazy. I mean this last episode covered, what 5 chapters? Technically 6 with the intro.

And speaking of chapter 220 being cut; I remember reading a meta somewhere about how you normally don’t see villains eating together (unless it’s to show off how glutinous they are) because it’s a really humanizing activity. Along with everything else in 220, that chapter being cut not only lost us Shigaraki eating his crackers, but also Mr. Compress’ sushi subplot. This could mean the sushi at the villains’ villa at the end of the arc might be cut too, completely removing that humanizing element.

Actually, a lot of the cut content seems to remove the humanizing elements that any of the villains have; Redestro’s funny commercial, his emotional murder of Miyashita, Giran refusing to give up the League, the League killing racists, the League hanging out together, Spinner’s motive rant, Curious explaiing Quirk Counselling and the effects it had on Toga, Redestro crying for Curious, & Trumpet rallying the MLA to avenge her just off the top of my mind. But they devote all the time in the world to Endeavor’s pity party.

And do I even need to mention the OP, which feels like it almost has less villain content than the Summer Camp/Kamino OP, or the ED, which was written for Deku & Shigaraki’s dynamic but had Hawks & Endeavor visuals applied to it.

Why they’re doing this, I can’t say; maybe someone somewhere felt the villains aren’t as marketable for whatever reason, or maybe they’re trying to avoid the war arc’s controversy ahead of time by enticing people into liking Endeavor & Hawks more and the League less through allocation of screen time. But at some point, it just starts to feel intentional, y’know?

[haleigh-sloth]

Izuku and tomura for the duo bingo game! (Man, it's so much more fun when you can include dynamics that are not ships. Bonus duo: Dabi and Toga!)

I got a bingo!

Comedic potential alone is absolutely worth it. They can make each other worse because nothing will ever change Midoriya’s impulsive personality and Tomura’s tendency to just not give a shit what people around him do.

Everything else kinda speaks for itself. I do feel a lot of people sleep on it as in, they ignore small details and only pay attention to the obvious stuff—and ONLY because the manga is making you focus on them now as just a hero and a villain. Butttt little details here and there looking at their characters separately throughout the manga (because they’ve been separated vast majority of the time) and seeing how it all led up to now is just 🤯. For me at least. There’s more there than just red and green and hero who wants to do good thing. People need to look at Tomura a lot closer imo.

They DO need to sniff each other through the door first and be introduced in an environment where neither of them has the upper hand. Perhaps a park somewhere.

Almost a bingo!

I enjoy their occasional banter when Toga is teasing Dabi and he in return is being an asshole to her. It’s funny.

It’s complicated because they’re just two very fucked up people in desperate need of help because even though they’re both painfully aware, neither of them really acknowledge how fucked up they really are.

They do make each other worse. I feel that way about all of the League. Aesthetically amazing. Blue and yellow.

Better in fanfic because imo there’s nothing much to canon characterization beyond a couple of touching moments. I think the touching moments mean something in the sense that, if someone is really down and out of themselves (Toga) a certain someone cares enough to follow and make an attempt at cheering them up (Touya). It shows there is some solidarity in recognizing how sad and, well, hopeless they really all are. Because they are. That being said, I don’t view it as more than that. Keep in mind during the war arc when Toga was about to jump off of Machia and Compress told Touya to say something to stop her, he said he straight up didn’t care. So, his tender moments are certainly circumstantial if you ask me. They’re there inside him but they aren’t taking precedent over everything else he’s got going on. The sibling dynamic they have in a lot of fan fictions I’m sure is fun to explore. But “Big Brother Touya” doesn’t vibe with me in regards to Toga. This is also where I see the potential. The manga could have gone a certain way with them to explore their relationship more, but it didn’t. So the potential is a lot better in fanfic imho (potential for a closer relationship I mean—I very much prefer canon as is).

I would love to see a semblance of a normal friendship between them though at the end (I feel that way about all of them though).

[makeste]

To be fair, fire is also Hawk's weakness. Apparently. Probably. He managed to survive that though

indeed he did! as BnHA characters tend to do.

my journey of realizing that fire doesn't do jack shit to BnHA characters was a slow one, but it was eventually settled pretty decisively.

ch. 1 - "tree guy is a cowardly piece of shit!! 'fire is my weakness' FIRE IS EVERYONE’S WEAKNESS, ARE YOU A HERO OR NOT"

ch. 267 - "guys. we’ve been over this. fire is everyone’s weakness. just. I’m not quite sure people like Hawks and Kamui Woods actually grasp that. do they think normal people catch on fire and they’re just 'oh, this is actually all right.'"

ch. 267, pt. 2 - "DAMMIT DABI FIRE IS HIS WEAKNESS"

ch. 267, pt. 3 - "and how the hell do you still have eyebrows, Hawks. how are you still even alive, let alone sexy. is fire your weakness?? is it really??!"

ch. 271 - "first of all, why is Dabi suddenly twenty feet away from them. and second, would you just look at how ridiculously intact Hawks fucking is. Dabi really was microwaving him on the defrost setting only huh"

and last but not least, this long-overdue epiphany following chapter 278:

but BnHA has always been so weird about fire attacks, acting like they only ever just singe you a bit. Bakugou in the sports festival trying his sunday best to goad Todoroki into roasting him alive. Shouto in the Joint Training arc being all “hahaha well if you insist, Tetsutetsu, but this’ll end a whole lot worse than just a few burns for you!” and Tetsu being all “LIMITS ARE MADE TO BE BROKEN!!” as though they were talking about lifting weights, and not Todoroki doing HIS BEST IMITATION OF THE SUN. Endeavor blasting ATTACK AFTER ATTACK at Tomura only for him to laugh them all off like they’re the equivalent of Enji shining a flashlight on him. how come Hawks’s hair is fireproof but not his wings?? HOW DOES HE STILL HAVE EYEBROWS. how come no one ever passes out from smoke inhalation or lack of oxygen. how come Kamui didn’t perish on the spot and is still stubbornly clinging to Machia’s leg despite doing his best impression of the Gavle goat only pages earlier. you know what, I think actually had it backwards this whole time. fire isn’t everyone’s weakness; FIRE IS NO ONE’S WEAKNESS. fire shows up and is laughed out of the room. long ago the four nations lived together in harmony. then nothing changed when the fire nation attacked.

and I stand by this lol. Nagant spontaneously combusted from the inside out, and her beautiful eyebrows are still unscathed. Touya accidentally cremated himself as a child and all it did was turn him evil. Tomura was incinerated somewhere between 5 and 16 times during the War arc and barely even seemed to notice. there is very little doubt that all of the characters who got blown up in this week's cliffhanger will also be fine.

basically, fire does nothing, and you are pretty much safe from death in BnHA unless you (a) are a character in a flashback, or (b) are sporting a very comfortable-looking cape, and Tomura is standing a few feet away eyeing you unsettlingly.

[stillness-in-green]

Chapter 353 Thoughts

These are belated, but also, extremely extensive. I have a lot of thoughts about this chapter. A couple of those thoughts are even positive! I wish more of them were, but I have a lot of issues with, for example, the continued lazy handwave of just how many heroes are still active, and the even lazier characterization shortcuts at a time when the narrative themes would seem to demand that no villain just gets dismissed as Bad because heroes can't be bothered to ask basic questions about their motivations.

Hit the jump.

I am so unbelievably weary of the heroes always having all the people they need to do any given thing.

Fighting literal thousands of trained warriors scattered in bases all across the country?  No big; the heroes have more than enough people!

All the heavy hitters ran off to fight Machia?  Well, they won’t stop him, but the split in their forces still won't have enough of an effect for the PLF at the villa to turn the tables.

Heroes dead or resigning in mass numbers up against a resurgence in villains?  Eh, whatever, there are still more than enough no-names to fight off near-High Ends and explicitly station "dozens" of heroes everywhere they could possibly be needed!

Seriously, why even bother with the “heroes resigning” angle if it’s never really going to matter that they’re short-handed?  Why can’t I watch the heroes have to struggle to overcome a problem with the people and resources they already have on hand, rather than all their plans always coming together to drop them perfectly timed reinforcements and all the cannons and spare prosthetic limbs anyone could ever ask for?

And you know, it's not like the general shape of things would even have to change overmuch to make things seem marginally more dire!  One simple thing would do it: skew the age range.  If ever so many heroes are dead and/or gone, then just show us more students. 

We already know students have been involved in professional actions, so why do we only ever see the UA kids—and only the ones we know, at that?  Why not show some of those briefly-glimpsed 2-A students?  Do literally any third years exist at UA other than the Big Three?  Where have the Ketsubutsu and Shiketsu kids been in all this?  Maybe make some of those background characters obvious teenagers instead of obvious Pros, and that'd help address the number issue.

Then too, you could get some more drama out of their relative inexperience or insecurity.  Of course, some of the window on that is already gone, since presumably even students whose classes weren't getting attacked by villains on the regular have now all had work studies, internships, and whatever their parts were in the raids on the PLF—but even still, the mass reduction in the numbers of Pros, on top of the shifting tide of public opinion, would by rights have a psychological impact.

Instead, we're continually stuck with the Class 1-A kids, a smattering of whatever Bs help the story, and a periodic shot of one of the Big 3 somewhere, and then a pile of Pros, never failing to have just enough people to succeed at whatever they're doing, and my god, it's so boring.  Thank god for Toga proactively lassoing her would-be love interest through a portal at the last second so we got any shake-up on this at all. 

Cripes.  If Hose Face's judgment is that the heroes were only pretending to be scattered and without unity, what does it say about what the villains are facing, and why should I believe Horikoshi when he tells me that no, really, the heroes totally are stretched thin!

And like, okay, having a bunch of people stationed to protect Machia, that's a totally fair call.  It's incredibly obvious that AFO would want Machia back on the field, and that the heroes would really, really not.  But what did Hawks and co. have to sacrifice to station so many people there to guard Machia?  What or who did they have to make the strategic choice to leave underdefended?

We know the police numbers are a bit thin where Ujiko is being kept, so is that going to matter?  Is a villain detachment going to show up to spring Ujiko?  What about Kurogiri?  Is Spinner going to run into enough opposition to stop him, especially since it's been made so repeatedly clear that All Might and Hawks weren't really planning for Spinner, much less a mid-sized-kaiju Spinner?  (More on him in a bit.)

And, if AFO is really so S+ Intelligence, did he foresee any of these calls?  It remains deeply weird to me that we had All Might saying he predicted AFO would throw everything he's got at Deku/One For All a mere handful of chapters removed from AFO saying he never puts all his eggs in one basket; he always has multiple possible routes to take to get to the same end.

On the evidence of the manga, I'm forced to assume that Hawks just tacitly ignored All Might's opinions and arranged for there to be back-up in multiple locations. If the task force had just taken All Might's word for it, Machia and Kurogiri's locations would have had whatever the standard complement of security is and no more. But then why let All Might even have that big triumphant moment about how they totally predicted that AFO would bring his army with him?

And if AFO is so S+ Intelligence, did he in turn predict what the heroes would choose to prioritize? Will there be a single area that he targets that the heroes didn't already guess that he would? Seriously, for a villain who we're constantly told is such a spider at the center of the web type, AFO certainly never seems to have counter-moves of his own prepared for when he takes the field.

Alternatively, are the attacks on Machia and Kurogiri's locations not AFO's work at all, but Skeptic's?  Does that mean AFO is actually giving Skeptic a relatively free hand to manage the PLF's resources, rather than dictating their deployment: you handle your people and I'll handle mine?  If that's the case, who on the hero side has got enough of a handle on Skeptic's tactics to try to outmaneuver him?  The heroes haven't even managed to disable his communications network!  Come on. Stop just telling us the heroes saw everything coming every chapter and make them have to work for something for once!

OKAY, with that rant out of my system, let me move on.

I like Mineta nodding in tearful, vehement agreement to Mina’s comment that Todoroki got the job done. 

My favorite aspect of Mineta is that, while he’s prone to envy and poking fun at his classmates, he’s actually extremely invested in them, to the point that he’s reliably one of the most emotional in any given scene involving a previously endangered classmate turning out to be okay.  He’s the one bringing the get-well-soon gift at the hospital; he’s the one who hugs Bakugou; he’s the one who’s always in tears about someone the class was worried about turning out okay. 

It always baffles me somewhat to see fans of the students expressing confusion that Mineta cared about X Student whenever something like this comes up—like, guys, it’s always been that way, even very early on, and it’s only gotten more prominent as the class has gotten less safe.

On Hose Face:

Nice to see he's got eyes under that mask.  I wonder if we'll see what he actually looks like under there?  I'm so curious about that big trunk appendage he and Lunch Rush have.  And what's with the headphones?  I remain interested in anything Horikoshi's got to give us on him, and any of the rest of the Advisors, and I hope they'll do anything at all interesting with the page-time they're obviously coming up on.

However. 

What in god's name was up with that transparently obvious nod to Midnight?  Surely Midnight was not the only hero Hose Face's group had to overcome the day of the raid, and in the time they've been active since?  Why call her out specifically?  What's the in-character motivation for highlighting that specific death?  While it's easy to imagine Midnight was a fairly divisive hero, I would hardly expect "schoolteacher" to be the part anyone taking issue with her would focus on.  So is it rather UA in general that Hose Face has a beef with?

Or is it, as I suspect, not that he's got anything against her personally, but rather that none of the UA kids have any way to know who killed Midnight unless her killer just says it out loud within one of their earshots?  Is the only reason he made that comment because Horikoshi could not come up with a single more credible, more elegant way to get the kids that knowledge?  Like, it couldn't even be deployed as a battle taunt next chapter??

Right now, it just looks like a brute force way to get Mina and Kirishima psyched up for this fight, because god forbid any student should have to engage with Liberation ideology intellectually when we can just throw a body count at it and use that to write it off. 

As if Shigaraki Tomura doesn't have a body count!  As if Stain didn't have a body count! And yet, Tomura is seriously engaged with as someone who needs help despite his crimes; we're allowed to have heroic characters acknowledging that Stain had a point despite his methods. Why can't we get the same for anyone from the MLA, especially when their point is apparently so compelling that tens of thousands of people across the country and across generations have found it worth dedicating their lives to?

And I don't know; maybe Horikoshi will surprise me, and Hose Face will lay out some actual accusations against Hero Society that Mina and Kirishima will be called upon to respond to, something that will even get us as far as the "cool motive" part of, "Cool motive; still murder."  Maybe.

I feel like we particularly need that here because what we have right now are two members of the three pairs who failed the practical portion of their mid-term exams, who couldn't think their way out of what their teacher/principal threw at them.  Mina and Kirishima had a good(-ish) tag team moment against Gigantomachia, so what new challenge will this bring to the table for them?

More importantly, is whatever it's got in store worth killing Midnight for?  I mean, hers will still be a death that serves no purpose but to motivate other characters' development,* but will at least be good development?  I have my doubts.

I further remain somewhat confused as to why this character beat is going to Mina. It's not like the set-up is completely absent? Mina is the one who confidently declared that Midnight would be fine when her classmates worried; Mina was among those who found Midnight's body/were there when she died. Sure, okay.

But Mina doesn't, to the best of my recollection, have much prior relationship with Midnight. Mina isn't the one Midnight expressed specific confidence in during the mid-terms. Mina isn't the one Midnight entrusted dealing with Gigantomachia to. Mina isn't the student Midnight was thinking of at the very end.

That's all Momo. So why is Momo—whose plot for this entire series has been about learning to trust her gut and utilize that intelligence and flexible quirk of hers quickly, on the ground, in the moment—stuck doing support for a girl who can't be bothered to remember her name instead of being out on the field? Hell, if Momo was there, we could even have something go drastically wrong, and there'd be someone there smart enough to roll with it and come up with something. Indeed, I'd expect that to happen because it's where I've been expecting her arc to be leading all along.

Instead, it's Mina and Kirishima, and I just don't know why it's them. As with so many things about the current set-up, I'm desperately hoping that it's still the early days, and things will still go to hell in interesting ways that will require some more ingenuity from our ostensible lead characters.

What's the escort mission Kirishima mentioned?

Where could he possibly have been escorting someone to in the ruins of Jakku?  And why do I get the extremely exhausting feeling that it's just going to be another tiresome case of the heroes always managing to have all the pieces they need set up in advance of when they need them, while the villains are scrambling to keep up, but for some reason I'm supposed to see the heroes as the underdogs in any situation ever?

What's up with Sero's "…"? 

I've seen it proposed that it's just a comic beat because he's one of the ones who had to get cartoonishly overpowered to show how strong Todoroki was?  But the official translation of Ojiro's line doesn't feel like it leads into that?  Nor can I chalk it up to someone who was a little closer to Shouto feeling that brother fighting brother is not something that should be cheered for, regardless of which brother came out on top, as Sero was neither in Shouto's hospital room in Chapter 298 nor his makeshift dorm room in 342. 

I really have no clue what to make of it, but it strikes me as potentially interesting, especially since Sero strikes me as a bit more sensible and canny than Sato or Ojiro.

(I also liked it because it felt like a very brief part of the chapter that broke up the hype parade of heroes prematurely celebrating a victory I remain unconvinced they're having to work very hard for.)

Kunieda is very nifty, even if I think he is making some extremely questionable fashion choices vis a vis where he puts a shirt collar and coat lapels.

I like his big creepy red-black flowers.  I do wonder what the motivation is behind "proving his utility to AFO."  A materialistic desire for the things a victorious AFO can offer?  The ideological zeal of a True Believer? Fear that he needs to keep himself on the Demon King's good side? 

I thought Dictator's phrasing on a similar note was odd back when we got him. He talked about the security he'd gain by bringing Deku in, like he was in some kind of danger if he didn't, be that a threat to his life or a loss of something he valued. I was frustrated back then that Dictator was such a transparent villainous caricature that an exhausted Midoriya Izuku felt no need to follow up on that hint—here's hoping Kunieda gets even a little more engagement!

While we're in the Kunieda scene, let me add that Aoyama would make a more convincing Aesop's Bat if he'd ever actually wanted to be on AFO's side to begin with, or made a choice to come clean to the heroes because he thought it'd be more beneficial to him, as opposed to him being discovered inadvertently through no choice or action of his own.  His lack of agency continues to undermine his potentially interesting situation.  Well, at least him peeking out from behind the ever-delightful Fat Gum is cute.

Spinner's section hurts my soul. 

God.  The hand reaching for his face, not with AFO's usual forceful, commanding dominance, but more a terrible, and terribly gentle, intimacy. Spinner's small, regretful smile.  God. 

My flailing about the way Horikoshi drew AFO and Spinner in That One Panel aside, I liked Spinner's outside viewpoint on Dabi, and how you could say he's just wrong about it—Dabi's pretty flagrantly gunning for the murder-suicide with Endeavor, after all!—but at the same time, that very desire has driven Dabi to survive, does fill him with passion and purpose in ways Spinner has always had to look outside himself to find even a semblance of. 

And maybe Spinner was doing and would have continued to do better with his feelings for Shigaraki, but circumstances, as well as Shigaraki and Spinner's own flawed decisions, have split them apart from each other, so Spinner can't really fall back on his feelings for Shigaraki either, at least not and feel at all good about it.  I sympathize, because I am also in quite a lot of pain over it.

I consider myself about halfway to being right on the money about Shouji when I called this back in November, but there are a lot of caveats in place before I can consider myself remotely happy about it.

I've written a fair amount about my concerns about Shouji foiling Spinner, but it occurred to me recently that there's a worryingly large chance that my fears are exactly on point, and the reason for it will prove to be a cultural thing. 

To wit, my Western individualistic lens says that, no, it's not Shouji's job to wear a mask his entire life to save ignorant people from nothing worse than passing discomfort.  In a more community-minded society like Japan, though, would the perspective be different?  I have a sizeable concern that we're going to get Shouji's choice lionized, that the message will be, yes, choosing to make people uncomfortable when you could easily make a "minor" sacrifice like wearing a mask when you go out is breeching meiwaku, so Shouji is correct and kind and noble, and the heteromorphs raising hell because of the way they're pre-judged are just being selfish.

I desperately want Horikoshi to prove me wrong on this.  I hope he will.  But good god, Shouji thinking about how proud he is to be in the same class as a kid putting himself through the meat grinder because of Family Duty is not filling me with confidence.

Shouji. Shouji, you are carrying the weight of one of the only Societal Issues in this story that Horikoshi would have a really hard time trying to somehow make All For One's Fault. Please, please, please address that issue with a response that doesn't boil down to, "Hurting people is wrong. Just because people mistreat us because of their baseless prejudice doesn't give us the right to make trouble over it. All we can do is try to prove them wrong and suffer in silence in the meantime."

All my thoughts on Dabi and his glowing circle can be found here.

All except one: "Vmmm" is certainly not a very biological-sounding sound effect, is it?  I looked up the Japanese sound effect there (it transliterates to kiiii) on manga SFX translation site The Jaded Network, which suggested that the kana there typically represent a high-pitched squeaking or screeching sound, as of a chair being pushed back when someone stands up or a car slamming the brakes.  That definitely sounds more like a sound ice could plausibly make than vmmm, but as before I remain mostly content to just see where the story's going with whatever's going on there.

I love that AFO is so known for mindgames that Hawks is like, "Oh, here it fucking comes."

About which a post on Chapter 354 would probably be a more appropriate place to expound.

That's what I've got for 353. What do people think: should I keep doing these chapter posts? I obviously (very obviously) won't always have this much to say, but I've been getting more asks of late about current events, so I can try to keep up these big round-up posts if there's interest.

I'm not super into the prediction game—I'm much more interested in observation and reflection—but I suspect I can usually muster up at least a few talking points. And I'm not completely unswayed by the modest bragging rights available when one notices+publically comments on a weird discrepancy months before the manga calls active attention to it. (For what of the manga remains, anyway.)

Let me know! Or that one anon can just keep messaging me asking for my chapter thoughts; whichever works.

(* Which I only can't call a fridging because most of the characters who've had really strong reactions to it thus far have also been women.)

[autumn-foxfire]

Inside me are two wolves. One wants Hawks to have been given orders to kill Twice to help out the HPSC with their ReDestro clone, but he ignored them despite the risk from prolonged delay. The other wants to stick with Hawks making his own choices to tie into how he's someone willing to do what no one can, and he doesn't need the HPSC telling him Twice was dangerous and needed to be taken out, he knew that first. More than anyone, even Shigaraki or Geten or Dabi's immense firepower or Toga copying quirks. Or any other unknown in the MLA. Machia. Even the Nomu.

Especially because Twice believed that even if the original him died, the clone him would live on. And that's exactly what happened. It's exactly why Hawks didn't even let the clones runaway while bringing down the knife, if it wasn't for falling off the balcony that clone could've lived. Hawks could've heard that story from Twice. It may even be well-known to Twice that's how his quirk works, hence why it was a fear of his. So the thought of being ordered to kill Twice to save the HPSC from their own stupidity of holding a meeting with ReDestro and a single hero and cops with guns? And not evacuating all those elderly higher-ups and President when the battle began? Their fault really = illogical to me, if killing Twice doesn't dissolve the clones he makes.

But if it does do that, hypothetically because Hori is running on implications over solid statements, then it's super funny to imagine Hawks thinking "hmm any minute now these guys are going to send me a secret code to kill Jin...yep there it is" as a compromise between "he KNEW himself" + "got orders on top of it" because we all love Hawks coming to his own murdery conclusions instead of waiting for the HPSC to big-brain the most dangerous villain and tell Hawks who it is so he can gasp like an anguished maiden from a Victorian spy novel who didn't see it coming. And it's FUNNY if we go with Wolf Option A because Hawks knowing but still ignoring them and going back to visit them and seeing smoke pouring out the windows like "whoops, guess they're dead now, yay I'm free" WHICH IS ACTUALLY WHAT KINDA HAPPENED IN CANON???? Whether it was his fault or not the guy didn't care???? Lmaooo, I always point this out when people try to say Hawks cares about the HPSC like they're the only family he has for raising him and my guy, did you miss the blindfold ending? That's no family, that's an institution + did you miss the ice-cold looks and snark he was giving them during his debut arc?

I was under the impression that his clones did eventually fade after his death because I don't think any major damage had been done to the redestro clone at the HPSC, it faded because Twice died. Now I'm not so sure anymore T-T

Personally, I prefer that Hawks never received orders to kill Twice at all because that matches up with how he tried to take him in alive despite it all and it was Hawks humanity and hesitance to stop a villain with force that allowed him to run amok somewhere else and cause so much damage to people. Even if Hawks wasn't particularly close to the people in the HPSC, he probably still feels guilt about how they died because he was "too slow" (a reappearing theme with Hawks really, he's his harshest critic outside of that portion of the fandom).

[amber-gimlet]

CS1 ended on a very amusing note for me.

Alisa was a unit I had basically only fielded when forced to, but suddenly I got her Heavenly gift craft and the Criminal master quartz in Roer so decided to try using her properly.

This lead to a hilariously powerful Alisa who was super fast and had an almost zero casting delay, especially for fire magic. So she’d just spam crit-capable heatwaves on the boss until she ran out of EP.

What was funny though was that she was SO fast and her cast delay was SP short that she would literally cast somewhere around 12 heatwaves without anyone else getting to act. She often ran out of EP before running out of turns.

I never even used her insanely busted crafts except in utmost emergencies.

My lineup for the shadow monster was Emma/Alisa/Rean/Fie and my lineup for everyone else just replaced Emma with Millium, whose only job was to keep alisa alive and topped up on EP with items.

Machias would probably have been the better choice there, but hey, if the same build is possible in CS2 I certainly am planning to do it again because its super fun.

[pocketramblr]

how his hair do that, 5 options

the following is a crack fanfic in five parts, each section on the same premise but not same continuity. also, very spoilerish

bnha manga spoilers below! very recent leaks below! very spoilery!

Better than a charcoal milkshake v 1

--------

When the heroes first attacked, alarms blaring, compound up in chaos, Dabi snuck away. He let the others pour out of the doors and down the stairs, and crept backwards, turning and running once he was certain no one would notice him.

Not that it would matter much if he did, but why waste the energy on killing them too? He’d need all his firepower today.

Dabi tore through the halls to his room, making it there and slapping his card against the scanner. No time to lose, not when he knew he needed to take care of a few more things before locating where Endeavor was in this heroes’ mission.

He kicked open his bathroom door, hands occupied with carefully pulling the black wig off his head- snagging that on his staples was just the worst, and he couldn’t have blood messing this up today.

Not yet, at least.

Under the bathroom cabinet he grabbed the bag of powery charcoal. It was supposed to be used for some beauty purpose or another, something about enriching hair that didn’t even work- but it would work to darken his white locks.

He poured it on, barely bothering to lean over the sink and keep it from going everywhere. As a final test, he once more wet a bit of it, the color seeping from the hair as it dripped.

He already knew it would work, that’s why he had intercepted so much of it before the quirk cultists could offer it to Toga or Hawks or whoever, but his heart was racing with both nerves and pure excitement.

Finally. The day he’d burn it all down, and make them see why.

He left his door open as he ran back out into the hallway, making a beeline for where he left Hawks. First things first, take care of that, then find Endeavor.

--------

Better than a charcoal milkshake v 2

--------

“Hey, put me down by that camping supplies store. And Skeptic too.” Dabi ordered, surveying the carnage of Jakku and glancing over at the man hunched over his laptop.

Said man looped up sharply at that, frowning and spitting that he wasn’t going to do that or something.

Dabi didn’t really pay attention to that.

“Where?” Gigantomachia asked, still rumbling forward towards whatever he smelled. Two masters or something.

Compress cleared his throat and translated for the currently blinded giant. “It’s at 4:05 o’clock, I’d say thirty feet forward.” He then looked over at Dabi, mask as unsettling as any of them. “You’ll be carefull too, on your personal mission?”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.” Dabi waved him off, snagging Skeptic by the back of his shirt and tugging as Machia scooped them up and placed them on the pavement.

He ran inside the evacuated store, mercifully empty and not decayed, and started looking for the bags of charcoal.

When he found one, he tore it open. Charcoal fell to the floor, and he ground his boot down into it.

“What…” Skeptic seemed without words, for once. Good.

Dabi tore off his black wig, tossing it aside. He wouldn’t need it anymore.

“You wear a wig??”

“Yeah.” He started to scoop up handfuls of the charcoal, rubbing it into his hair. “Hey, go grab me some water, and then go set up the cameras. We got a show to put on.”

--------

Stinky dumpster boy

--------

“But my good name?” He sneered the word and all it implied in the world of false heroes, “is Todoroki Touya.”

With that, he dumped the water over his head, and it streamed down over his face, filthy.

The dirty water, practically mud, stung the places on his face where his skin was barely stapled together, and Dabi was reminded of why he didn’t bother with showers anymore- the pain.

But now his true colors- literally- were revealed and it was all worth it. All the truth was out, and the truth had always hurt him.

Shoto, who seemed to be trying to juggle first aid on like, five different people with two random heroes he didn’t know next to him, gaped.

“Come on, I know my face has changed, but my own family should still be able to recognize me, yeah? But you never did. You never did, Todoroki Shoto.”

Dabi suddenly found himself encased in ice.

Ah, this again.

“Yumi’s is colder.”

Shoto’s jaw dropped, then he glared. “Stand back.” He said as he stood up. “He just dunked water on his head, to cool him off I bet. If he is Touya, his body never could handle his own heat. If he’s not… those burns come from somewhere at least.”

Ok, now Dabi was offended.

“What do you mean, ‘if I’m not’?” he demanded. “I just revealed my white hair? I know that’s what the picture on my shrine looks like, you never even looked at that?”

“How do you even know what your shrine looks like?” Shoto sounded dangerously close to judgmental for a little brother who was probably as emo as Dabi had been at his age. “And wait, that cup of water was supposed to wash out your hair? What, do you never bathe or something?”

Ok, now Dabi was really offended.

“Of course I bathe! I just have to sponge bath, because I don’t know if you’ve noticed from having your own scars, but when they take up most of your body and are killing you they end up controlling a lot of your life!”

Ugh, asking him if he didn’t bathe. He’d understand that asked of Shigaraki, sure, but him? Shoto had gotten close enough to smell him, at least.

“Um, sorry to interrupt,” the hero in blue, the one that was tending to Eraserhead, raised his hands. “But uh… do you want some help with that?”

“I’m fine, don’t want to cool him off too much so he can fight longer.” Shoto shook his head.

“I was talking to him.”

“Oh.”

“What?”

The hero waved his hand, bubble of water pulling up from the ground. Then he pointed to his own head. “I can take care of that? At the very least it’ll be cleaned out and um, whatever color it should be?”

Dabi stared at him. Shoto stared at him. The other hero in green stared at him, and the one who’d offered help started to sweat noticebly.

“Eh, sure, whatever.”

The hero nodded, and the bubble of water floated over to him, disappearing in his hair.

The bubble floated out a couple of time, murky brown and black with ash, dirt, oil, blood, anything else he’d never thought about too much. It would wring itself thin, much dropping, and return to cleaning.

Finally, his hair was mostly white and thoroughly soaked.

“Thanks.” He called over.

“Yeah.” The hero answered, still frantically trying to help Eraserhead with his free hand, which he’d gone back too as soon as he thought Dabi was distracted. Buying time.

The other hero was on his fourth facepalm.

Shoto just looked contemplative.

Endeavor, one of the ones receiving treatment, sat up but looked like he was going to pass out.

Well all right then. Time to really start- the hair snafu didn’t matter. They were all going to die that day anyway.

--------

Weirdest commercial I’ve ever been in.

--------

“We’ll be dancing in hell together, Todoroki Enji.” Dabi finished his speech with a sneer.

The watching heroes were all stunned silent, mouths open, eyes wide. The revelation must be sending them, like it would all who were watching Skeptic’s broadcast. This would burn it all down, perfect.

“I don’t understand…” Enji managed to say, spitting out a bit of blood.

“What, you don’t understand how I survived, or how I hate you so much I’d hurt innocent people over it? Because that second part is exactly what you did, take out all that self-loathing and insecurity, rage at your shortcomings and condemn children not born yet to them. Guess it’s a family trait.”

“No, not that,” He waved a hand. “I mean, I totally get how you’re a wreck, even if all of your other siblings managed to not become mass murders, I mean- I don’t understand, how did that pint of water wash out all of your hair dye? Aren’t you better funded after the Deika merger, can’t you afford proper hair coloring?”

“I was also wondering that.” Shoto admitted.

“Same.” The hero in blue nodded. The hero in green facepalmed.

“Water?” Dabi repeated, then looked at the can he’d tossed aside. “Oh, no. This isn’t water- it’s a momento of the only true hero.” He bent down, picking up the can and studying the image on it.

“Stain was right, you know.” He mused. “About hero society being rotten. So rotton, so full of fakes, that there was only one that deserved the title. He just got the wrong hero, guessing All Might.” Dabi snorted at the very idea. “No, the only real one, the pure one, the one that defines heroism, the only one with a kill count higher than me- for all the dear old man and his biggest fan Hawks tried, of course- is Wash.”

“… Wash?” Shoto cocked his head. “Wait, like, Wash, Wash?”

“The one and only. That’s how this Official Wash’s Hair Washing Serum, the only product that can wash out all dirt, dye, and any other kind of grime, in just one go.” He shook the can around so they could see. “What, you all thought I could just magically lighten my hair from black to white in the space of one fight?”

“No,” Shoto said, like a liar, and then he threw a glacier at Dabi, and the fight was on in earnest.

--------

Old news

--------

“And now you’ll see who I really am, who you’ve created.” Dabi poured the bleach over his head, giving it a moment to sink into the hair before he shook it out, grinning wide enough to tear his staples.

The heroes on the ground and the few tending to them stared in shock.

Then Shoto gasped.

“Hawks?”

“What? Where?” Dabi whirled around, looked up, because he was really sure he had managed to make sure that pest wouldn’t be flying or fighting again, but well… he’d thought that once before and been wrong then.

“No, you- you’re Hawks, you dye your hair black when its in Dabi mode, and its that beachy yellow blond in Hawks mode.” Shoto nodded to himself.

Blond? Dabi tugged at a lock of hair, and huh. It did seem more yellow than white.

“How could he be Hawks?” The hero in green demanded incredulously, before the hero in blue grabbed his arm and pulled it back to holding down Eraserhead for bandaging.

“The burns and staples are part of the disguise,” Shoto explained. “Fake, and misdirection. You were trained from young childhood to be a hero, sent to join AfO and the league as a spy, where you gained a fire quirk and decided to switch to the villains’ side because you hated the life you were forced into.”

Dabi stared at him.

Shoto stared back.

Enji stared at both of them.

“How are you so smart and so stupid at the same time?” Slipped from chapped, burnt lips.

Shoto looked offended at that.

“I mean, you’re half right, yes that’s what up with Hawks, yes he was sent as a spy, but I knew and I killed him at the compound. And not, like, in a metaphorical way.” He added when he saw something spark in Shoto’s eyes. “Literally. I’m not him. He is completely separate person and body than me and I totally literally killed him.” Or like. Close enough. “And like, thirty other people who were completely innocent.”

Or close enough, he really didn’t bother to keep track, but thirty sounded like a big number. Especially of murders.

“So then who are you?” Shoto asked.

“What, you don’t recognize me, little brother?” He almost growled it, feeling very tired of this all of a sudden.

“Little brother?” Shoto repeated, eyes wide, then narrowing. “Wait, how…”

“Oh not again.” Enji muttered.

“Not again?” Dabi asked. “Wait, you actually managed to drive one of the others to this too? And cover it up? Man, Enji, you’re more rotten than even I knew then!”

“One of the others?” Shoto looked around wildly. “What are you talking about?”

“I was talking about how Shigaraki also randomly showed up and called a first year student “little brother”.” Enji looked back over at Dabi. “What were you talking about?”

“Shigaraki did what?” The pyro looked over his shoulder, finding the villain looking absolutely stoned on the ground, almost as vacant as some of the unconscious heroes, with a curly haired student laying bloodied nearby, staring up at him. “Wait, which student is his little brother?”

“Midoriya, apparently.” Shoto shrugged.

“Midoriya?” Dabi almost choked on the name. “As in, the green bone-breaking kid? Isn’t he like All Might’s lovechild or something?”

“That’s what I said too!”

“I mean, his hair was also lighter when he showed up today.” The hero in blue pointed out to his fellow in a voice that would have been too quiet for Dabi to hear had everyone else not gone silent as well.

“And bleach boy tried to do the same thing with the bleach, yeah. Here, I’ll tie this off, you go take care of Bakugo.”

“I’m Todoroki Touya!” Dabi snapped. “Or I used to be called by that name, anyway, before you nearly killed me, Enji. Let’s just- get back to fighting, yeah, I’m going to kill you.”

[thunder-spriggan-sorciere]

Hey

Hey guys

Yeah you guys. @weneedasprigganspinoff @emily-nightwalker @sprooknooky

You wanna see a sneak preview of my WIP Wahl fic?

Here it is! A snippet of the first chapter. I hope you like. Just curious what kind of response a fic like this will get.

William…

William…

What was that? A voice calling out to someone? It was soft as a summer breeze, fainter than a dying fire, as if the speaker was a great distance away. Something about the sound made Wahl want to run towards it as fast as his legs could carry him, though it made no sense. He didn’t know anyone called by that name, and the voice in his head was not familiar.

Oh well, what did it matter now? His number was up anyway.

Wahl’s processors slowed his perception of time down to a minute crawl, a last ditch attempt to give him a chance to formulate a counter measure. His final moments trickled away like sand in an hourglass, and nothing useful sprung to mind. A notification appeared in the corner of his vision, informing Wahl that the attack’s explosive nature was due to the presence of mercury fulminate. Huh, so the human had used elements from his own blood to fuel the spell. There was irony in there somewhere. The master alchemist brought down by his own trick.

Wahl unleashed a static-filled rasp as the damage reached his voice modulator. Strands of red lightning nipped and licked at him like a living creature. Maybe it was alive, who the hell knew? Its bloodied fingers dug deeper and deeper into his body, blasting him to pieces from the inside out. By the gods, it hurt. Wahl hadn’t felt pain like this since… since…. Never. Machias didn’t have pain receptors, they couldn’t feel it. He’d taken damage before and welded himself back together without batting an eyelid. So why did Wahl now hurt so badly he wanted to scream and cry?

The lacrima that powered him, hidden deep in his torso, shattered into pieces. Only milliseconds left. Wahl’s armoured plates were falling from him like autumn leaves, brackets and welds and joints buckling and fragmenting. His spinal column became detached, head lolling uselessly. Error messages frantically shrieked for his attention, and Wahl’s personality settings swung from one extreme to another. Well, the meat-bag had really done for him. The last emotions the Machias’ felt before the world became cold were a curious mixture of rage, awe…

William…

…and inexplicable grief.

There! Let me know what you think, I’m curious. When I’ve finished the whole fic I’ll start publishing chapters. I’ll also link the chapters onto my blog. Also, I’m probably gonna change the name of this blog soon to better for my vibes, in case of confusion.

[mazhenfang]

I have been reading fanfics for over half of my life, but have never actually written one. Until now, apparently... Here's a completely unnecessary Arcana fanfic starring Valerius and Lucio, because they're assholes, and I love them.

Title: Red

Rating: Gen

Category: M/M

Fandom: Arcana

Relationships: Lucio/Valerius

Words: 1180

Summary:

‘Lucio has been very quiet so far…’ Valerius thought, a sudden dread coming over him.

Lucio finds a way to keep himself entertained during boring council meetings.

“... and the grain imports from Kahala are running late, again. Juno.” Valerius looked up from his notebook and indicated a young woman three seats down to left. She blushed when he caught her eyes, looking away quickly.

Valerius lifted an eyebrow at this reaction. Juno was a young apprentice on the court, whipsmart and logical. This reaction was… Not outside the bounds of possibilities.

“She’s your fan, Val,” Lucio had said in the dark hallway before they went into the meeting. Valerius had mentioned his plans to give her more responsibilities, and Lucio had gotten that look in his eyes before dragging him into the dark hall. Valerius had expected that he would need to shoo Lucio away, they were going to be late at this rate. But to his surprise, Lucio just leaned in close, kissing him gently on the cheek.

Valerius blushed slightly at the memory, barely managing to stop himself from looking in Lucio’s direction. He had work to do. And he needed to discourage whatever thoughts had reddened young Juno’s cheeks when he looked at her.

“Juno, pay attention,” he snapped, clapping his hands to get her attention. There, that stopped her blushing. “I need you to contact the dock master and find out where our grains are, do you understand?”

She nodded quietly, her reaction slow and the blush coming back before she looked down to focus intently on writing something in her notebook. Valerius sighed. Lucio was right, as he usually is in these matters. She was a “fan.” He would have to figure out a more effective way to get that idea out of her head. Later. There were still matters to handle.

He looked at his notes. “Lady Shara, there was a disturbance in the market square yesterday, and the guards are still trying to figure out the cause of it.” He looked up at Shara, and he was shocked to see her staring at him with a completely unashamed and entirely unprofessional smile. He blinked for a moment, not sure how to respond to that, and a bit uncomfortable. What the hell was going on, today?

He cleared his throat. “Right, please assign specialists as necessary to complete your duty, Lady…” He trailed off as he noticed Lord Machia look away from him, blushing. And Lord Anis, next to him, smiling knowingly at him. Valerius scanned around the whole table, looking at the faces of all the nobles and administrators sitting at the large table with him, and every single one of them was staring at him with some variation of blush or cheshire smile far too reminiscent of Lucio’s when he knew he had won…

‘Lucio has been very quiet so far…’ Valerius thought, a sudden dread coming over him. He turned quickly to Lucio sitting at his right. Sure enough, the man was lounging in his chair, feet on the table, hands behind his head. And he had that stupid /handsome/ smile on his face as he stared at Valerius. His smile widened as his eyes traveled slowly down Valerius’s face, stopping at his lips in a way that never failed to make Valerius’s cheeks heat up.

Wait a second… He looked closer at Lucio, his eyes narrowing as he realized there was something different about him, today. Something he hadn’t noticed before in the darkness of the hallway. He looked closer at Lucio’s lips. His very red lips.

Lucio blew him a kiss, and Valerius’s hand quickly came up to his cheek where Lucio had kissed him /so gently/ before the meeting. His hand came back with a streak of that distinctive pomegranate red. He could feel himself blushing deeply. He turned back to look at the collection of nobles and court administrators in front of him, and they all conveniently had somewhere else to look as he glared at all of them.

“We have work to do, here, people! Or am I the only person left in Vesuvia who knows how to be professional?” He picked up his notes and proceeded to hand out more duties and take more reports. If he gave shorter deadlines than usual, and assigned certain smiling nobles to more difficult tasks, no one dared complain.

...

Valerius stood, collecting his paperwork as the rest of the room left more quickly than usual after the end of the meeting. He felt a hand come to rest on his lower back, and he finally looked back at Lucio with a glare that he knew had lesser men shaking on the floor if he did it right. Lucio just smiled up at him. His lips were even redder; had he reapplied his lipstick?

“You messed it up, Val,” he said, a whine edging into his voice.

“Everyone was distracted, Lucio,” he said, an exasperated tone in his.

“That’s just cuz this shade of red looks really good on you, bestie. Of course they were distracted.”

Valerius rolled his eyes at the moniker, but he couldn’t help the small smile at the corner of his lips, or the annoying way his cheeks heated up. The endearment was silly, but he liked it, and Lucio knew it. “I’m going to have Nadia give the morning brief, tomorrow,” he said threateningly.

“Oh no, that just won’t do,” Lucio said, the hand on the small of Valerius’s back pulling him firmly down to sit on Lucio’s lap. Valerius yelped as he fell into Lucio’s arms, throwing his own around Lucio’s neck to catch himself as he lost his balance for a moment. Lucio just smiled at him, those red lips the center of Valerius’s vision as he stared, transfixed.

Fuck, he just gave Lucio what he wanted.

That smile widened, and Lucio leaned in, his forehead against Valerius's as his voice went low in a way that landed heavily in Valeriu’s stomach. “Noddy won’t do, at all, Val. This shade of red would clash with her complexion. But it looks perfect on you.” He closed that small gap, kissing Valerius on the lips, gently but firmly. He pulled back, and there was a predatory gleam in his eyes that Valerius didn’t get to see often, and god was it working for him. “I was right,” Lucio said, reaching up to run a finger feather light against Valerius’s lips. “This color is perfect on you.”

Valerius glared up at him, fully aware that his horrible blush ruined any pretense of anger. “If the color looks so good on me, then you better apply it liberally and quickly, or I swear to god, you will never get to put it on me again.”

Lucio’s pale silver eyes lit up like fireworks, his smile huge as he stood up in once smooth motion, carrying Valerius in his arms. “I know the perfect closet!” he said triumphantly as he practically danced to the door.

“You better not take me there, Lucio! Lucio! Bedroom!” Lucio just smiled. He won today, and Valerius absolutely didn’t care. When Lucio wins, Valerius usually does, too. He smiled, the dark red color on his lips matching him perfectly.