#the ace flashbacks start... i am not strong enough....

[neteluvr-library]

i was actually half way done with this chapter before realizing i was on chapter 4 and not 3 so that explains why i was confused bc i was like where tf did the birthday scene go?

“Who is going to stop you?” you laugh, and the sounds reverberates through his body and settles deep in his soul. He’s heard this sounds countless times in the 14 years he’s known you. It never ceased to amaze him. 

If anyone thought this about my laugh i would have to marry them on the spot *dreamy sigh*

...feels a pang of hurt as he considers the fact you didn’t think of him when reading a book so close to your heart.

He's such a sensitive baby ):

“Ah, there is it.” You cleared your throat, then continued. “He is more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.”

I LOVE THIS QUOTE SO MUCH. it's so lovely and warm. this quote plus the quote from cruel summer where vol says she doesn't know where she ends and neteyam starts are my absolute favorite. ITS SO ROMANTIC AND DREAMY AND I CANT COPE WITH HOW MUCH IT MAKES ME FEEL MUSHY ): to be so in love and love someone that you think you are the same ): I WANT THAT SO BAD IN MY LIFE...you have raised my standards for love. also i need to add pride and prejudice to my reading list but i am determined to finish emma first

“Pandora’s box.”, you thought to yourself, with a bitter chuckle.

Wow i too have a pandora's box full of memories and things i want to forget and avoid...except its in my brain

“Yeah, me and Max worried about that, but, Ace… you have weathered every storm life’s thrown at you like a champ and I think beyond this great unknown lays a future so bright it will be able to make this planet shift on its axis.”

I meant great for Atan...but Norm doesn't realize just because Atan has weathered many storms...does not mean she wants to weather another one 😭

You started poking your body in different spots and let out a small laugh at the feeling: it felt like touching soft metal.

I've always thought that the Na'vi have leathery like skin ? AM I THE ONLY ONE ??

You left the room smiling. You will make him eat his words, and you will enjoy every minute of it.

VERY VI CODED OF ATAN TO THINK THIS

“Damn, you’re hot this way, too. This is unfair, you know? But also somehow makes me feel better that it turns out I’m not into a different species altogether, just one girl.” 

I KNOW YOU HAVENT SEEN THE SUMMER I TURNED PRETTY BUT IF YOU EVER WATCH IT, LOAK IS SO JEREMIAH!!!! (if you reblog this and if any of your followers see this...please tell me im right.) AND NETEYAM IS CONRAD OHFUIEHFRFVJNVEN. and if you ever watch it andra, tell me im right too

Her stripes were somehow more accentuated than normal, and they reminded him of his own.

they are always connected somehow ): even in her avatar body, atan was meant to match neteyam. THEY ARE MADE OF THE SAME SOUL

“I don’t know you, Neteyam.”

YEAH BECAUSE WHO THE FUCK IS THE NETEYAM IN FRONT OF ATAN ACTING LIKE HE DOESNT LOVE HER WITH EVERY FIBER IN HIS BEING????

Your emotions impact her, your thoughts impact her, so you have to calm your mind.Easier said than done in your case, I fear.” 

I'm a basket case half the time so i would not be able to bond with any of pandora's animals lol

“Well, I want to be strong and capable so I can always protect you. I mean look at you, Tuk’s gonna be stronger than you soon.” 

NO HE DOESNT GET TO SAY THAT WHILE ACTING LIKE A COMPLETE ASSHAT....okay wait just realized this was a flashback MY BAD 😭 I SHOULD HAVE READ MORE CAREFULLY

Soon enough, you could taste the metal taste of blood that was lingering in the air and by the grace of whatever spirit was out there still looking after you, you felt yourself collapse in Neteyam’s arms. 

No because this was so sad ): atan just has straight trauma..but also this would a very traumatic thing to witness. like she already doesn't know her father and is iffy about him. but to see his bones abandoned in the forest like he didn't belong to anyone? ID BE SCARRED TOO...also this makes me very sad because its just *spoiler* another instance of where neteyam feels be only brings negativity to atan's life ):

OKAY ITS CURRENTLY....12:57. IM GONNA AIM TO FINISH CHAPTER 5 AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH WE'RE GETTING CLOSER TO THE JUICY STUFF.

Illicit Affairs | Chapter IV: Evermore

Pairing: Neteyam x Human/Avatar!Reader

Chapter I Chapter II Chapter III Chapter V Chapter VI Chapter VII Chapter VIII Chapter IX Chapter X

Synopsis: You and Neteyam both have to navigate a lot of painful memories on your first day in a new body

Warnings: angst, mentions of death, descriptions of ptsd flashbacks, cursing

Word Count: 6,2k words

A/N: Chapter 4 is the longest chapter I have written so far. There's definitely some fluff in there and some light hearted, beautiful moments, but it's also the darkest chapter I have written so far. There's some heavy stuff in there, so please read with caution! I wanted my characters to be well rounded and for there to be a good reason for every action they take; why the reader is a recluse, why Neteyam behaves the way he does, and why he left. There's layers to their story that will be unveiled through memories from both the main characters, so I hope you stick around to see where I plan to take this story <3 I never expected people to like it so much, and I hope you guys like what I have planned!

"I replay my footsteps on each stepping stone Trying to find the one where I went wrong And I couldn't be sure, I had a feeling so peculiar That this pain would be for Evermore"

“Am I allowed to be here?” Neteyam says, carefully taking in the new environment that he’s never wondered through before. It was small and dark, his eyes needing a second to adjust to the contrast from the bright neon orbs that illuminated the hallways. His nose scrunched up, trying to assimilate the smell, and realised it just smells like you. 

“Who is going to stop you?” you laugh, and the sounds reverberates through his body and settles deep in his soul. He’s heard this sounds countless times in the 14 years he’s known you. It never ceased to amaze him. 

You take off your Converse shoes and throw them carelessly to the side, jump on the bed and reach for the light on the other side of it, sitting on the bedside table. The lamp turns on and Neteyam finds himself having to adjust to the brightness once more. He settles on the chair that was accompanying a small messy desk, filled with papers, books and electronic tablets that had something you called a graph on it. The words “cell viability” were written on top of it, but Neteyam didn’t know what that meant, so he turned his attention to the many, many books that were displayed on the shelves above the desk. 

He’s seen some of them before, some of them multiple times, as you did seem to have your favourites. He picked one up he recognised. It was called Pride and Prejudice and Neteyam assumed it was written by a person named Jane Austen. He knew you loved this book, but he’s never asked why.

“I love that one…” you started.

“I know” he says in Na’vi. “I just don’t know why.”

“I honestly couldn’t tell you. My mum read me paragraphs from it growing up, and it’s just a book that brings me comfort. I’ve read it so many times, I’ve memorised it, so it’s like a blanket. It makes me feel safe.”

“What is it about?” Neteyam probed further.

You thought about it for a second. 

“It’s a story about two people who come from different worlds, and their journey of understanding each other and overcoming their feelings of, you guessed it, pride and prejudice towards one another and towards each other’s world.”  

He sat with this new information for a while. “So like us?” 

“Mmm, I don’t think it’s like us at all. I think it’s more about my mum and dad, or at least I think my mum thought of her and dad when reading it.”

Your words upset him, he realises in slight surprise. He looks at your figure sprawled over the bed looking up at the ceiling above you in contemplation and feels a pang of hurt as he considers the fact you didn’t think of him when reading a book so close to your heart.

“I have a quote from another book that reminds me of you, though.” Almost as if you read his mind, you turned your head towards him with a smirk and raised an eyebrow.

He didn’t look at you, a small pout erupting from his lips without meaning to. You laugh at him and smile endearingly, softly shaking your head. 

You jump from the bed, slightly wincing when your left leg registers the action, and click your tongue at him so he can move from where he was sat. He obliged and found another spot on the bed, which was now emanating the warmth of your body, and he slowly touched the blanket as if trying to commit the feeling to memory. You climbed on the chair with another small wince and found a book on the uppermost shelf. You jumped from the chair straight on to the bed and fell next to him. 

Patting the spot next to you, you signalled for him to lie down. He did, although his legs were completely off the bed, the tiny contraption barely able to accommodate his torso. You let out a small laugh, but seemed happy to have him so close. 

You placed your head on his chest, and he prayed you couldn’t hear the way his heart felt like it was trying to escape his ribcage at your proximity and warmth. You opened the book and looked for the quote. 

“Ah, there is it.” You cleared your throat, then continued. “He is more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.” 

“Get the fuck out of my room, Neteyam.”

You had just finished washing the day off when you heard a small knock on the door. Still reeling from the fight, it was taking everything out of you to muster up the strength to open that door and deal with whatever was waiting on the other side. With a deep sigh, you did so anyway. It was surprising for you to find Jake peering at you from the other side of the open door, a curious look on his handsome face. 

“Hey kid. We’re going to get going now. I just wanted to talk to you for a second before hand. Can I come in?” 

You hesitated for a second, then moved so he could enter. 

“So..” He started awkwardly. “I don’t really know how to do this.” You saw his left hand reaching behind his head and scratching his scalp with a small laugh. 

His eyes drop to a little package he was holding, wrapped in the same sort of cloth as the other gifts had been. He didn’t look at you as he spoke.

“Your mum gave me this, a couple of weeks before she passed. She asked me to hold on to it and give it to your on your 18th birthday.”

Your breath stopped in your lungs. He peered at you with a sad look and handed you the little box. A small video camera, like the ones used to record the Avatar program video logs was now resting peacefully in between your hands. 

“I hope whatever’s on there will give you some peace of mind, kid. I know life’s not been kind to you, but it’s time… time to move on, you know?” 

He got up from his spot on the bed and silently made his way out of the room. “See you tomorrow?” 

With your back to him, you gave him a nod, and with that, he was gone, closing the door behind him.

You stood like that, in the same position, with the camera in your hand for a long enough time that your left leg was starting to ache, an ache that eventually overtook the one in your soul and with that, you took the camera and the bracelet you removed from Neteyam’s hands and shoved them both in the bottom drawer of your desk. “Pandora’s box.”, you thought to yourself, with a bitter chuckle. 

You woke up with a groan, and the meanest headache known to man. Yesterday felt like you did in fact have the biggest party this world has ever seen, and the hangover to match. You scrambled out of bed, still in the dark, and searched on top of your desk for the little bottle of Ibuprofen you keep for days just like this. Today’s the day…

Norm enters your room quietly, and is surprised to see you up already. “So nervous you couldn’t sleep?” He says with a tentative smile.

“Something like that.” 

“Hey…you’re happy about this, right? Tell me we haven’t done this for almost a decade for no reason, cause you know, we can’t just give someone else the Avatar.” he says, with an uncomfortable chuckle. 

“I’m happy, Norm. It’s just a lot to take in, you know? A lot is going to have to change, and I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I don’t tend to do well with change.” you response, laughing to yourself.

“Yeah, me and Max worried about that, but, Ace… you have weathered every storm life’s thrown at you like a champ and I think beyond this great unknown lays a future so bright it will be able to make this planet shift on its axis.” 

You throw your head back and laugh loudly, “Wow, that’s a lot of trust right there. I’ll try not to disappoint.” 

If only Norm knew… knew how you have not been able to brave any storm, and how the storms, in time, turned to tornadoes and then hurricanes and then bigger hurricanes and all you’ve done your whole life is just move further in to the middle of the shelter hoping that someday they’ll just go away by themselves and when they do, there’s still some walls, any walls, surrounding you. 

You put some of Grace’s old workout clothes on and made your way to the Avatar room and properly looked at it, probably for the first time in your life. You used to love coming here as a kid, looking at the scientists in their link pods, at your mum in hers, sitting in Max’s lap and watching the brain activity, bombarding him with questions with answers you couldn’t’ possibly comprehend yet. You’ve moved away from that fascination in time. Now here you stood, about to get your own linkpod and your own brain activity analysed. You peered in the room next to it, where on a big flat metal table lay a blue body, and you couldn’t help yourself from moving closer until your breath was so close to the window in was fogging up the glass. You placed a hand on the cold glass and stared at the new you, and a small smile appeared on your face. It was beautiful, more so than you ever thought your human form to be. Your heart picked up pace in your chest and you were shocked at the realisation that the nerves that you thought only reflected fear and anxiety, also reflected excitement. 

“It’s time.” Max said from somewhere behind you.

You turned and made your way with timid steps towards the linkpod. You climbed on it and the feeling of the green malleable foam woke up a memory inside you, that you fought to push back to where it came from. Now’s not the time. It was cold on your arms and thighs as you lay in it, but weirdly comfortable, like what you would imagine water mattresses you saw in old Hollywood movies to feel. 

Max placed a metal frame of sorts on top on your own and spoke slowly. “Okay, you know the drill, Ace. You have to relax and let your mind go blank. You will be disoriented when you wake up, so take your time in there and don’t rush. Please don’t do a Jake.” 

You chuckled at the story you’ve heard one too many times, but never seemed to get tired of it. 

“We will have to run tests to make sure everything is in order. This is new territory for all of us, and we don’t know how the Avatar will behave yet, so we will take our time and do it right.” 

“Aye aye, Captain.”

You did as you were told and found it hard to relax and let your mind go blank when it was running a million miles an hour with so many emotions, so many thoughts and worries. Still, with all your might, you sat there, and cleared your mind for a split second. It was enough. 

You woke up like from a dream, feeling groggy and tired. Your muscles hurt, a lot. You winced slightly at the gentle touch of a hand, which felt like that time you touched the inside of an electrical socket and got slightly electrocuted. You felt clothes clinging to your body and hated the way the synthetic fabric felt against your skin. You took your first breath and your nose crinkled in disgust at the overbearing smell of alcohol and chloride. 

“Ace? C’mon kid, there you go, you can do it.” 

You finally opened your eyes and groaned at the intense light on the ceiling. Your eyes took a while to focus, but when they did, you saw Norm staring back at you with a smile.

“Hi.” you said, with a deep frown and groggy voice. This was overwhelming. 

“Hi back! Take it easy, alright? Me and Claire will runs some tests to make sure everything’s a-okay. It will take about an hour, I know this whole experience can be a bit strange in the beginning, so hopefully this will ease you into it.”

Norm was a man of his word, and after about an hour of wiggling every part of your body, touching your fingers to your nose, remembering names of objects and repeating it to them, among other things, you were ready to go. You realise to your surprise that you’re excited about going outside. You couldn’t stand the sensation overload that came with being in this lab, in this body. You stood up gently and removed the chords that were still attached to you. You turned around to look at the glass that was reflecting your new figure back at you, and found yourself at a loss for words for the millionth time in 24 hours. It was such a strange feeling, and you knew it would take you a while to get used to looking in the mirror and be met with this. You smiled and waved, knowing Max would be watching you from behind the glass, even though you couldn’t see it. 

Norm handed you a bag, and you peered inside to find a beige loincloth and the top Neytiri gifted you yesterday. “Go change, I think you’ll feel better in these.” 

You did as you were told. Removing the white hospital garb you had on, you looked at yourself fore the first time, properly looked. You were tall. Very tall. And skinny, very skinny. Lean was probably a better word for it, as you couldn’t see an ounce of fat anywhere on your body. You started poking your body in different spots and let out a small laugh at the feeling: it felt like touching soft metal. You were strong. The thought made you happy. You looked again in the mirror at your face. Big yellow eyes looked at you curiously. They traced your nose, and your plump lips and your white freckles, beautiful like the night sky. Your eyes settled on your hair, long and soft and dark and your arm reached behind you to bring your braid into focus. You lifted it and looked in awe at the queue and the way the tendrils were moving on their own accord. Adrenaline was coursing through your veins like water breaking apart mountains to make a canyon of your mind. 

Neteyam’s words suddenly broke through.  “You’re not going to make it.” 

Adrenaline turned into rage and you hated it, hated the boy in that moment. Hated the effect his words had on you, even after so much time. You dressed slowly and tried to make sense of the “top” Neytiri gave you. Once you put it on, you looked back in the mirror and loved the way it looked on you. You also had a newfound appreciation for the soft feel of the feathers and the beads, and took note of the contrast between it and the unnatural feeling hospital gown you were in a few minutes ago. If it wasn’t for your eyebrows and your five fingers and your soft, straight hair, you wondered if anyone could be fooled into thinking you are, in fact, Na’vi. 

“You know nothing about the real world.” 

Dropping the clothes in the bag provided, you took one last look at yourself and saw something in your eyes that wasn’t there before. Determination. The sick, stubborn determination that has always made you push out all reason as soon as someone tells you you can’t do something. 

“Tell Norm no.”

You left the room smiling. You will make him eat his words, and you will enjoy every minute of it.

You reached for the mask packs by the entrance and dropped your hand. You will never have to wear that damn mask again, you thought with satisfaction. As you stood outside, it felt again like emerging in your avatar body for the first time. So many sounds, colours, sensations flooded your being and you couldn’t even register the voice yelling your name until the person that spoke it took you by the shoulders. You hissed at the sudden contact and it shocked you. Where did that come from? 

“Angel, you there?” 

“Give her a second, Lo’ak. This is bound to overwhelm her and you yelling at her isn’t going to speed up the process.”

“I can’t believe she just hissed at me.” 

The world slowly seemed to settle around you, and you focused you sight on the boy in front of you… the boy who was now your height.

“Lo’ak?” 

“Hey, you.” The younger Sully boy gave you a big smile and eyed you intently up and down a few times. “Damn, you’re hot this way, too. This is unfair, you know? But also somehow makes me feel better that it turns out I’m not into a different species altogether, just one girl.” 

You laughed, really laughed. Lo’ak was a charmer, another one of the many many traits he inherited from his dad. 

“You’re shorter than I thought you’d be.” 

“Ouch.” You knew he wasn’t really offended, so you blew a kiss towards him and shifted your attention to the world, that you realise you have never seen before. Not properly. Its beauty left you speechless. You don’t know how you were supposed to function when all you wanted to do is just walk around, smelling the flowers. 

“We have to get going, you’re going to start your training today, and your new boss is not going to be happy if you’re late.”

“My new boss?”

“Yep. Neteyam has been given the tough job of taking your lab ass and turning it into a Na’vi warrior. I have to say, I don’t envy him,  and I definitely don’t envy you.” 

“Lo’ak, shut up.” 

Well, this is going to be fun… You had a hunch Neteyam would have to train you, as Lo’ak is too young and restless and cares about the rules too little, or not at all, to do it, but hearing it as a fact made you shudder. You haven’t spent a whole day with Neteyam in years, and you didn’t particularly care for this new-and-improved version of himself. You wondered silently how this was going to go. If the last two interactions are anything to go by, you were not in for a happy time.  

“Lo’ak should be here any second. I want you to start training her right away. Maybe start with the Pa’li first, and do bow training when that gets too much. You won’t really have to teach her the language, but try to make sure you talk in Na’vi more than in English, and this way you’ll see if there are any gaps in her knowledge and address them. Neteyam, are you listening?” 

The oldest Sully sibling was only half paying attention to what his dad was telling him. In truth, he was scared half to death. He didn’t want to do any of this. This is not how any of this was supposed to go. He couldn’t be around you. He didn’t want to be around you and he most definitely didn’t want to have to teach you the ways of the Na’vi and have to put his own training and responsibilities aside for this. He has already had to teach Lo’ak whenever his parents had better things to do and he was getting so fucking tired of being used as soon as it was convenient for other people. 

He pushed the bitter feelings aside. His parents relied on him for a reason, he tried to remember. They relied on him because they trusted him, and because he fought hard to be worthy of that trust. He had no right to complain, not when he knew how much worse it could be… for better or for worse, at least he had parents to rely on him. The thought made him sad, and he felt guilt at the words he spat at you yesterday. He knew they were for the greater good, but he also knew they crossed a line, a line that he might not be able to cross back from. 

He didn’t have time to think about the consequences of his actions, as he heard a yell that pulled him out of his thoughts and he knew it was time to come face to face with his worst nightmare. 

“We’re here!”, screamed Lo’ak, and Neteyam suppressed the urge to roll his eyes at his immature younger brother. 

He made his way outside of the tent, picking up his knife and placing it on the sheath resting beneath his chest. He took a deep breath, one that got lodged in his throat.

Next to Lo’ak was a girl. The most beautiful girl he has ever laid his eyes on. Her stripes were somehow more accentuated than normal, and they reminded him of his own. It was something he was insecure about growing up, the deep contrast something his friends and even family teased him about relentlessly, but now, looking at it on her, he realised they were blind - he was blind - to have ever hated them. Her eyes were now yellow, a big departure from her human eyes, and although it was strange, just like the rest of her, they still felt familiar to him. Like no matter what body she inhabited, her soul would always shine through, always calling out to him like a moth to a flame. He knew then he’d always feel like this about her, for the rest of his life, no matter what she looked like. Fuck.

“Look at you, kid! You look like you belong already!” 

Jake’s voice cut through the tension that you felt sitting here, being eyed at like you were a new cub at the zoo. The stares made you so uncomfortable you felt like you were going to explode, and could not wait until this was no longer a novelty to anyone, including yourself. 

“Thank you, Jake. For everything. I cannot express how grateful I am that you and Neytiri, and the tribe, are so willing to accept me in the village.” 

“No problem, kid. Anyway, we will have plenty of time to discuss everything tonight at dinner, but for now I think you and Neteyam should head off. There’s a lot to learn.”

“Right.” You turned around and gave a half-smile to Lo’ak, who looked at you like you were a deer in headlights. Maybe you did look how you felt. 

You bid a small goodbye to everyone and suddenly found yourself face to face with the only person you didn’t want to see. 

He started walking without saying a word, and you followed him. You refused to say anything to him, there was nothing to say to him after yesterday. Before yesterday, you might have demanded an explanation, you might have demanded he told you what happened to him in the year he abandoned you, what lead to him leaving without a single word, how dare he forget about what he meant to you and what you knew you meant to him, how could he just forsake you like you were nothing; you would have screamed at him and told him you hated him without meaning it and hoped he would just hug you and told you he’s sorry, that he was stupid and that he’ll never leave you again. None of that came out. You were past that. He crossed a line and you knew it in your mind that no explanation would be enough, no excuse would justify his behaviour enough to satisfy you and make you forget. Not anymore. 

His back was to you as he was leading you away from the Sully tent, and for the first time in your life, you saw him for what he was. A leader, a warrior. He was lean and muscular, and his physique reminded you a lot more of Jake than a Na’vi man’s. His shoulders were broader and his arms were bigger, leading to a more accentuated contrast between them and his waist, and you hated yourself for how it made you feel, how your mouth filled with saliva you had to force yourself to swallow and how your pulse increased so rapidly it almost made you dizzy. He was taller than you, taller than Lo’ak and you knew that even in this body, he would still tower over you. You definitely hated how that made you feel. 

He stopped at the entrance to a tent. He opened the flap of the entrance and motioned for you to enter. You obliged without a word. He followed you in and closed the flap behind him. You didn’t like being in such close proximity, but you knew you’d have to get used to it, so you let it go.

“This is now your tent. Mum and Dad thought you would feel more comfortable with your own space. They also thought you’d like my old training bow. There’s a pouch for your knife that you can put around your torso and I have the knife, but I won’t give it to you until I make sure you won’t kill me with it.” 

As far as an attempt to diffuse an awkward situation goes, this wasn’t half bad. Still, not nearly good enough to matter. He sighed at the lack of response.

“Right. I think we have to get a few things straight.”

Your eyebrow raised, but you let him go on.

“I know you’re mad. I know you’re so mad you’re probably thinking of ways of sticking needles in my eyes. But I don’t care. I was given a responsibility to take care of you and to teach you. I know you think you know everything, but you don’t. I know you think you know this world, but you don’t. Not in the way you need to, to survive. There’s a reason no scientist living on Pandora has ever become one of the people. You can’t see. As my grandma always says, “you cannot fill a cup which is already full”. I know you. Your cup is overflowing. From now on, you do what I say. Pretend you don’t know me, pretend we’re not you and me.” 

“I don’t know you, Neteyam.”

He winced inside at the words. “That’s enough!” He said, forcefully. 

“You answer to me from now on and I want to make sure you understand that. Dad will skin me alive if anything happens to you. You will listen and you will do as I say. Whatever issues you have, you’re going to have to deal with them in your own time.” 

Another blow below the belt, you thought, and reminded yourself that you were here for a reason, you were here to make him eat his words, and if he wanted to play his game this way, you were more than happy to beat him at it. 

“Yes, Sir.” 

You made your way out of the village and walked in silence through the woods. You were looking at the bow in your hand, and carefully traced every mark and scratch on its surface. You couldn’t help wonder about what events in Neteyam’s life lead to each and every one of them, and vowed to yourself that you would take care of this bow with your life, if not for anything else, for the still untarnished memory of that little boy you once loved so much. Once you reached a large clearing, with beautiful lush greenery and a majestic waterfall, you thought this was definitely a much better view for training than the reagent-filled benches of the lab. You saw about half a dozen Pa’li peacefully feeding off the sweet nectar of flowers in the distance, and smiled gently at the sight. You will never get used to it, you knew. 

“First step to being a Na’vi, learning to form Tsaheylu and learning to ride the Pa’li.” Neteyam spoke in Na’vi over the soothing sounds of the forest.

“OK.” You answered shortly.

“In Na’vi. We speak Na’vi from now on.”

“Kurkung (asshole).” Neteyam shoots you a dirty look and you can’t help but smirk. “What? That’s Na’vi. Perfect pronunciation, by the way.” 

His mouth tightened in a straight line and he left you, busying himself with a Pa’li he called over. He caressed it gently and held his hand next to his eye, whispering. 

“Tam tam, Tirea, tam tam.” 

“Get on.” He spoke to you still looking at the Pa’li. 

Even in this body, the direhorse was significantly taller than you, and you shot Neteyam an incredulous look. Regardless, you made your way to the animal and with all of your might, willed yourself to get on top of it. It took a couple of tries, but you eventually succeeded. You were stronger than you realised, and you were excited to discover exactly how strong you could become in time. 

Neteyam gently took the neural whip of the direhorse and guided it to you. You took it in your right hand and stared at it in amazement. You have heard so much about this, you have seen it firsthand with Neteyam’s Ikran, but to know you will now have to make your own Tsaheylu, experience this deep bond you knew everything and yet nothing about, it was terrifying. You left hand went behind your head and brought forward your own queue. This was it. Slowly, you brought the two together, and held tightly on to the Pa’li as the new sensation overwhelmed all of your senses. It felt like all of your neurons were firing at the same time. It felt like you were being electrocuted. As the feeling subsided, you felt a breath that was moving at the same time as your own, you felt a second heartbeat that was going much faster than yours possibly could, and you tried to calm yourself down as you knew the nervousness the animal felt was mirroring your own. Neteyam allowed you a second to experience this for yourself with no interruption, and you appreciated that. He trusted you enough to give you some space, and with everything, at least this hasn’t changed.

“This is Tsaheylu. The bond. Take some time to feel her, feel her heartbeat, her breath. Feel her strong legs. You can tell her what to do, inside your mind. Remember that as you can feel her, she can feel you, too. Your emotions impact her, your thoughts impact her, so you have to calm your mind.Easier said than done in your case, I fear.” 

You felt your anger pick up and the Pa’li let out a scream and rose on its hind legs, throwing you straight in the dirt. Neteyam laughed, but came to help you get up. As you were removing mud from your face and hair and cursing all manners of profanities under you breath, you came to the bitter realisation this was going to be harder than you thought, especially with him as your teacher. 

He still knew you too well. You slapped his hand away and got up by yourself, indignantly. You jumped back on the Pa’li and tried your very, very best, to calm yourself before making the bond. The horse didn’t react as violently as last time, so you figured you were off to a better start. You calmed your mind as much as you could, like you did in the linkpod, and imagined her slowly moving forward. You smiled when she did just that, no words needed. It was hard to be able to maintain your composure when you were LITERALLY mind controlling another living being, but despite it needing active continuous effort, you felt you were doing a good job. You managed to make her go, sprint, gallop and turn, and despite the direhorse’s best efforts, you were somehow still tightly attached to its back. 

After a couple of hours, Neteyam told you to get off. He told you to follow him, and he took off, not sparing you a second glance. You followed him the best you could for a while, desperately trying to overlook how uncomfortable being barefoot made you feel. You didn’t like it at all, and more and more, you felt your heartbeat picking up in your chest and your knees shaking. You felt beads of sweat getting in your eyes and they stung, so you stopped. Your laboured breath became shallow, and your hands were shaking uncontrollably as you raised them to wipe your forehead. You felt your knees collapse under you, and you knew what was about to happen and that it was too late to stop it. 

“Neteyam, wait up.” You called after the blue boy, slight panic in your voice.

“I thought we were supposed to be racing.” 

“You win, alright? Don’t leave me alone in the woods.” 

You saw Neteyam jogging back to where you stood with a guilty look on his face. “You know I’d never leave you alone.”

He picked you up and placed you on his back. “After 16 years, have I ever left you alone?” 

“Well, you’ve been training a lot recently and I barely get to see you anymore, so I would say yes, you leave me alone plenty, more than I can say I care for.” 

“Well, I want to be strong and capable so I can always protect you. I mean look at you, Tuk’s gonna be stronger than you soon.” 

“Ugh, don’t remind me.” You pretended to ignore his first sentence and how it lit your entire body on fire. 

You walked like this for a while. You placed your head on his shoulder and peered up at the tall trees. Prolimuris were swinging on them, picking up fruits as they went along. You saw two infants following their mother and stopping on the same branch as her, where she passed them what you were sure was a tasty afternoon snack. You smiled contently at the scene, and at the feeling of warmth Neteyam provided. 

“Put me down, I want to walk! I came with you to exercise, not be carried like a tiny Pandoran baby.” 

He did as you asked, huffing at your forever mercurial temper. 

With your back still to him, you let out a laugh and started running. “Race you to the clearing in the distance?” 

He rolled his eyes, and with a laugh, stopped himself. He always gave you a head start. “Fine, but you can’t get mad when I beat you again!” 

You turned around to give him a smile as you were running and loved the feeling of the ground beneath your feet. The only place you could run around barefoot, the only time you still felt alive. 

You came to an abrupt halt when your foot touched something strange, something unnatural. You slowly looked at your feet and froze in place as the smooth pale object made your blood run cold. It couldn’t be. You stepped away from it, not leaving it from your view and slowly, deliberately knelt down next to it. You heard Neteyam coming to a halt behind you, but couldn’t bring yourself to acknowledge his presence. Your hands started digging in the ground with morbid curiosity and the sounds around you became muffled as your erratic heartbeat was the only thing you could still hear. You removed the ground around it and tears formed in your eyes at the realisation that this was indeed what you feared it was: a human skull. A human skull you just stepped on. Before you knew it, your hands were reaching for a glimmer of silver shining in the shallow grave. You lifted it to your eye line and heard yourself scream, wail louder than you ever had before. The panic that overtook you was primal, but not unfamiliar and you threw the dog tag on the ground, with enough force you hoped would bury it further than anybody would ever be able to dig. You couldn’t see properly anymore, the tears and dizziness flooding your senses and you prayed you passed out, prayed to make this stop, prayed you were back in your room where your Xanax always lay by your bedside table. In a blind rage, you were clawing at your feet, trying to remove the dirt, remove the skin that stepped on your dad’s dead body like it was a gum wrapper on the pavement. Soon enough, you could taste the metal taste of blood that was lingering in the air and by the grace of whatever spirit was out there still looking after you, you felt yourself collapse in Neteyam’s arms. 

Tag list: @nuhteyam @eywas-heir @fanboyluvr @mashiromochi

[halliescomut]

Love Syndrome III: I have some concerns

So this is probably out of the blue, but whatever. I've been watching Love Syndrome (there will be spoilers here for eps 1-4) . It is apparently connected in some way to Unforgotten Night which I could only manage 2 episodes of so....idk. But my understanding is Day worked for Kamol, the main character there. I did also read a bit of a summary for the novel, but it was quite brief. It did say that prior to the start of their relationship Day raped Itt, possibly in retaliation for something he thought Itt was going to do to Day's brother Night...regardless the point is in the novel their relationship has essentially the world's worst 'meet-cute' bc it's not cute at all, only traumatizing and awful. So this is where I'm starting with the show. Because of the structure they've set up it's not clear whether the assault storyline was changed, we're just coming into the show when they've now been a couple for 3 years.

Episode 1 I spent most of my time hating Itt because he was being so whiny, and I couldn't fathom how Day could put up with that for a day, much less 3 years, kinks aside. It ends with Day getting in a car accident, and we find out in ep. 2 that he's lost a good portion of his memory, specifically the three years he's been with Day. It's all very soap opera and very sad. I will say the actors are doing a good job because there are scenes in eps 2-4 that made me tear up.

It's never explicitly spelled out, but through their interactions and based around the trailer there's a pretty strong D/s element to their relationship as a whole. We don't get enough true information in ep 1 to really specify if this is mostly a home situation, a bedroom situation, or a whole life situation. And while we have been getting some flashbacks in eps 3 & 4 that give a little more context to their relationship, it's not a lot. But since watching ep 2, and then strengthening after watching eps 3 & 4, I've been feeling so uneasy watching Day and Itt's interactions.

Specificity aside, we know Day is the Dom and Itt is the sub, and when Day is injured (after a bit of a temper tantrum) Itt steps up in taking care of Day, who no longer remembers him, and more importantly no longer remembers his affection for Itt. Day does however, remember that he is a Dom, and so his behavior is Dominant (and also pretty domineering). His distrust of the situation, which is clearly based on what memory he does have, has him start testing Itt's loyalty essentially. Along the lines of "You say you love me, someone who loves me would do this for me" and he gives him tasks that pretty clearly make him feel uncomfortable.

Part of my thoughts through ep. 2 was that Itt was feeling used (not in the good way), but with two more episodes I've managed to (I think) put my finger on what is making me so uncomfortable. I'm not super active in kink culture, or BDSM, but I am someone who has a genuine interest in humans in all their weirdness. And while I identify as Ace, I do know that I am definitely on a specific side of D/s that puts me in a mindset where I relate very strongly to Itt....pretty sure you can connect the dots. But I do know one thing...you have to have genuine affection for a person to operate safely in a D/s relationship, sceneing is different, for that I think it requires respect of the person, but love or affection may not be required. And in general, I'll say that in encounters with Doms, mine or not there's usually an affection there. You're valued even if you don't belong to them. Watching Day continuously test Itt, asking him to do things that were clearly making him uncomfortable, talking to him very coldly, all of that is not uncommon in a D/s relationship, we all have different wants & needs in relationships, but when the affection is gone, it really just leaves Day acting like a butthead.

And it hurts to watch honestly, because Frank (the actor who plays Itt) is doing a really good job. But worse than hurting it worries me, and I finally put together why. There's continuous discussion amongst non-kink people as well as kinksters about how it is easy for an abuser to use BDSM as an excuse to abuse. It's something that subs specifically, but really anyone taking first steps into the community, gets warned about. And Day, behaving as a Dom, but without his affection and love for Itt, and also without his memories of Itt's limits, I'm worried he doesn't have the information and the connection needed to recognize that he's going too far. He doesn't know Itt's tells, his triggers, any of it. And Itt, in his love for Day, and likely his desperation to get back the Dom he loved, is doing what he's told, he's not pushing back...and man does it scare me. Full truth, I'm tearing up thinking about it as I write this.

So, outside of me figuring out what felt so off about the show so far, this post doesn't truly have a point. I suppose I'm just wondering if anyone else who might be watching was feeling the same way I was. Did you come to the same conclusion? Were you not able to come to a conclusion at all and this flipped the switch for you? Do you disagree with my analysis and thoughts? Let me know, I'm always interested in another perspective. I'd specifically be interested in a Dom's perspective if they've been watching.

[kittydemon9000]

Alright so I know Literally Nobody asked for this but the idea of leaguers having differnt armor types, speeds, and strengths is so fascinating to me so here’s an entire post about my headcanons about it, staring the Main 7 since they’re the ones we see most and have the most evidence for. 

Also, please keep in mind that this is completely made based on memory alone and it’s been a bit since I last saw the show. If I missed something or remembered something wrong feel free to correct me or add your own thoughts.

Also also, I made a chart (the chart is based on the strongest for the leaguer, not out of all of them, ex: Top Joy’s strongest is different from GZ’s strongest)

First off, the leader of Silver Castle himself, Magnum Ace, a Baseball Leaguer. Right off the bat(hah puns) I immediately knew his arms would be the strongest points. He seems to have been created with him being a pitcher in mind and his 44 Sonic has clearly been shown to posses a lot of power which he would need the strength to handle. There’s also how he was shown to be a decent hitter in Gold Arm’s flashback, sending every ball into the outfield. As for his weakest points, they were also pretty easy. The joints are a bit of a constant with all of the leaguers I showed, but the fins are because they seem to be rather thin and probably can’t hold up very well under pressure. There’s also the shoulder joints, which I wasn’t able to put on the diagram, since as shown during the end of the series, if Magnum repeatedly pitches his 44 Sonic without rest the stress on his shoulders start to cause them to break down, to the point where he was forced to sit out for the next few days for repairs. Speed wise Magnum is nothing special and in my eyes pretty average amongst the team.

Next up, we have Mach Windy, a Soccer Leaguer. Similar to Magnum, I knew almost immediately his strongest point would be his legs since, y’know, soccer. Everything(physical) we see coming from Windy is almost always centered around his leg strength and speed. This is outright said when Silver Castle is resting after some baseball training and Magnum tells Windy(I shit you not) “We believe in your leg.” There’s also his Mach Spin which depends entirely on his ability to kick to ball at an extremely high speed. There’s also a scene when trying to help Gold Foot during the Forced Retirement Arc where his kicks a ball of solid rock without any issues. The scene also brings me to why his head is a strong point. Heading is also something Windy has been shown to be able to do, and referencing the Forced Retirement Arc again where he head butts the aforementioned ball of rock. For speed, as mentioned before, when it comes to running Windy seems to be the fastest amongst Silver Castle. The weakness I feel is pretty self explanatory since soccer doesn’t really require use of your arms unless you’re a goalie. There’s also how in the Jet Setter episode Bull sees Windy loose an arm wrestle almost immediatly with Ryuuken, but that might just be since Ryuuken is ridiculously powerful. As for durability, he seems to be not very strong, instead having lighter armor for more speed.

Speaking of Ryuuken, let’s talk about the Karate Leaguer. As you can see, his strongest part is his armor, aka almost all of him. As a karate leaguer, Ryuuken was probably created with the intent of being able to take a lot of hits. There’s also the running joke of a member of another team attacking him with all their power and him not budging and saying something along the lines of “I feel nothing.” Strength wise, we get a taste of his crazy power is during his first spotlight episode where he was practicing kicking with Windy, to which he accidentally broke the stone wall surrounding the field. He then unlocks more of his power when rescuing Ruri from the factory, but we don’t see his real power until the Forced Retirment arc. There we got to see when going to rescue Magnum, Windy, and the Gold Bros how he opened a literal chasm into the ground with a single punch, though I can’t remember if it was rock, metal, or both, but that’s still pretty impressive, and that was before he unlocked his Heart Kit in the Death Football Arc which only increased his power. And then during the OVA when the Fighter Brothers try to fight Windy’s new team and they use their pitch, a pitch that nobody had been able to hit before, Ryuuken straight up punches it with seemingly no backlash and getting a home run all because they made him mad.….maybe it’s a good thing Ryuuken is so innocent and calm. Speed wise, Ryuuken seems to be on the slower side of the team, however I do think Ryuuken(alongside Juurouta) would have the best reflexes. This one is completely headcanon and I don’t have much proof, it just makes sense to me.

Next up, we have Bull Armor, a Football Leaguer. His armor and helmet are easily his strongest parts, for mostly obvious reasons. Multiple times throughout the series he is seen tanking blows that would normally knock another leaguer to the ground, most notably when he’s Silver Castle’s goalkeeper in soccer and catcher in baseball. However, his durability seems to be different from Ryuuken’s since he is still moved by the attacks but can bounce back from more. His durability seems to be pretty tied to his strength too since he is one of the only leaguers who has been shown to catch Magnum’s 44 Sonic. There’s also how when he was first introduced he stopped and lifted a truck much larger than himself with relative ease in order to stop it from hitting a young boy. His speed however is admittedly a bit harder to figure out. He seems to be much larger and heavier, however as shown when he lost control in his past he still has the ability to charge down opponents at a speed in which they can’t properly evade, though it’s up for debate whether they were trying to properly evade or trying to reason with him.

Juurouta, a Kendo Leaguer, is next. His durability is more basic compared to the others, mostly focusing around his Armor Armor(no that was not a typo). Said Armor Armor also seems to be protecting the joints which may or may not be intentional, but I’m going with it. His fins share the same logic with Magnum, as do his joints with everyone else. His strength mostly seems to be localized in his arms, which makes sense since he is a kendo leaguer. His strength was first shown in comparison to the others when he was the first person to hit Gold Arm’s Genocide Screw with a hit(discounting Bull since he technically kicked it). There’s also how in the Arctic he was able to cut down the  blizzard machine, however that spent all his energy. Speed wise I think he’s in a similar i boat to Ryuuken: slow overall, but incredible reflexes.

Now, Top Joy, a Basketball Leaguer, was a fun one to do for no reason more than I like the character. Strength wise, nothing very impressive, he show much. Durability though….it’s not the best. The only points that seemed to be able to hold up were his arms(sort of) and feet, and they’re less based on actual proof and more on logical thinking but I digress. Hand and arms because he’ll need to be able to catch balls thrown his way, but they’re still relatively weak compared to other members of Silver Castle. I highlighted his feet because they would probably be needed to make they don’t break once Top Joy lands after jumping high. If they were weak the repeated slamming into the ground would cause them to break and then Top Joy(and any other basketball leaguer) would be relatively stuck. But where I think Top Joy shines is his speed and maneuverability. As he has demonstrated many times throughout baseball and soccer games alike, his spring legs can be used in a variety of situations, from avoiding attacking players to catching balls that would normally be too far out of reach. And there’s also the possibility of using the force from the spring to propel himself faster when running, thought it’s unclear if he does this already. However, they are not without weakness. As shown in the episode with Gebara, they are easily damaged when seemingly a single coil is damaged and prevents him from walking without assistance from his teammates. There’s also his recording equipment and speakers which, while functional, seem like they would also be damaged rather easily since as someone who has worked with recording/video equipment, I am all too aware of how fragile it can be. Also another note, Top Joy also seems to have an incredibly high pain tolerance. When the members of Section X give him a warning shock with the shock circuit, he pleads with them and says how he “doesn’t like punishment,” implying this has happened before. There’s also his questionable relationship with his past team and much later in the Death Football Arc when he flat out says “I’m used to pain,” which in concerning to say the least.

And finally, last but most certainly not least, we have GZ, a Hockey Leaguer. Similar to Ryuuken, GZ has been shown to be incredibly powerful and being able to take a lot. There are three times where his power is shown. First is barely a day after he joins their team when he defends his teammates from attacks that would normally knock them off their feet(sans Ryuuken). The second time is when he’s babysitting the kids and survives an avalanche that took out another group of hockey(?) leaguers with barely a scratch. And then in the OVA where he’s able to deflect almost all of Garret’s dive bomb attacks without took much trouble. This is undoubtedly a combination of some hockey leaguers being incredibly defensive(like Thunderbolt) and his reformatting which led him to be a mercenary. We don’t seem too much from GZ in terms of strength, so I’m going to say he’s just a little weaker than Magnum. Speed though, that one was a bit hard to figure out. Main because of his boosters. His boosters give him an enormous speed boost, fast enough to get ahead of Garret who was literally flying and dive bombing, and on the ice without as much friction it only increases his speed. However, the few times we see him running, he seems to be slower than the other Silver Castle members, likely because of his weight and how he was meant for ice, not land. 

TL:DR, From most to least

Durability: GZ, Ryuuken, Bull Armor, Juurouta, Magnum, Windy, Top Joy

Strength: Ryuuken, Bull Armor, Juurouta, Magnum, GZ, Top Joy, Windy

Speed: GZ(with boosters/on ice), Windy, Top Joy, Magnum, Bull Armor, Ryuuken, Juurouta, GZ(running), but Juurouta and Ryuuken have the best reflexes

[pins-and-needles-and-gears]

[Toby pokes his head in the bathroom window with a cheese board in his hand]

Toby: Hey. Cheese? 

[Natalie takes a piece]

Natalie: Thanks.

Toby: If you don't mind me asking... What is this all about? I mean, you are one of the most strong, independent, non-locking-themselves-in-a-bathroom-on-Thanksgiving people I know. Why... Why are you so upset about us moving?

Natalie: Maybe I just need you guys more than you think.

Toby: Is this about more than us moving?

Natalie: This is good cheese.

Toby: Nat?

Natalie: Yeah?

Toby: Do you think I should've become a Ghostbuster?

Natalie: I think you made the right call, buddy.

[Leo enters the bathroom through the window]

Leo: Hi.

Natalie: Hey.

Leo: Are we still friends?

Natalie: Hope so.

Leo: Good. 'Cause get this. Doby almost adopted a baby. Crazy, right? Poor guy's going through some stuff. He actually tried to rope me into it. Can you imagine me being someone's dad?

Natalie: I'm pregnant.

[flashback to Leo and Natalie in the bathroom at Toby and Nico's house:]

Leo: W... What happened? Did I pass out? 

Natalie: Not exactly.

[a few seconds earlier:]

Natalie: I'm pregnant.

Leo: Are you sure you're not just putting on weight?

[Natalie punches Leo; later:]

Leo: Oh, yeah. So, um, you're pregnant.

Natalie: Yeah.

Leo: Huh. Looks like nobody told your boobs.

[Natalie punches Leo again; later:]

Leo: What happened? Did I pass out?

Natalie: Oh, my...

Leo: Please stop hitting me!

[There's a pause]

Leo: Are you sure you're...

Natalie: Well, no, not positive. I'm a week late. But I'm never late; it's a point of pride with me. I'm going to go see the doctor on Monday to find out for sure. Until then, not a word of this to anyone.

Leo: Not even Cody? I mean, it's probably his. I've spent years training my boys to swim the other way.

Natalie: Cody and I haven't had sex yet. If I'm pregnant, you're the dad.

Leo: That's... wonderful!

Natalie: Huh?

Leo: I'm gonna be a daddy!

[Natalie passes out]

Natalie: Leo, why are you so happy about this?

Leo: Because this is perfect. I want to be a dad.

Natalie: This is not good news. I'm starting to date someone.

Leo: Yeah, but if Cody weren't around...

Natalie: It doesn't matter! I am not ready for kids. I'm not stable enough for kids right now, and never, in a million years, will I ever think of myself as worthy of having kids. Leo, I can't have a baby.

[Leo and Natalie are at a bar]

Leo: Okay, one scotch for me, one iced tea on the rocks in a scotch glass for Mommy.

Natalie: Stop it.

Leo: Sorry, sorry. Keeping it secret. Oop, I think I gave you the wrong one. 

[Leo goes to take the glass off of her, but he can't]

Leo: Here, let me just... Give it to me. Drop... let go. Take it away from you.

Toby: Well, we should go. We have to get to We B Babies so that we can register for our shower.

Nico: No can do. Um, I have a big project that I'm working on. This is the Gunderson's house in East Meadow. Last year, they had the most visited Christmas display in the tri-state area. But not this year. You know why? Because the Ol' Ghost King has come to town, and he brought his two friends: Mannheim... Steamroller. Game on.

Natalie: [retches]

Jane: Are you okay?

Natalie: Yeah. Uh, it's just, um... I hate Mannheim Steamroller. Isn't there anyone else you can use?

Nico: Come on! Who am I gonna use if not the Steamroller?!

Natalie: I don't know. AC/DC?

Nico: AC/DC? Nat, do you have any idea why they call them Mannheim Steamroller? Because they rock... so hard, so festively, that steam comes out of your brain. As it melts.

[Toby, Jane, Natalie and Leo are at We B Babies. Toby is looking around]

Toby: Okay, first on the registry... nipple butter?

Natalie: Uh-oh.

[Toby picks up the tub, and looks at it confused]

Jane: As people breast-feed, their nipples stretch out, like, four inches and get all dry and cracked. The nipple butter stops the bleeding. 

[She looks at Toby]

Jane: I don't think that you and Nico will need this...

Natalie: [to Leo] My four-inch nipples are going to crack and bleed?!

Leo: Yes, but while the baby is gnawing on your bleeding nips, look what she'll be wearing.

[He holds up a baby dress]

Nurse Ann: Well, Mrs. Ouellette, I'm sure that you and your husband...

Natalie: Uh, he's not my husband.

Nurse Ann: Oh, I'm so sorry. Your boyfriend then.

Natalie: He's not my boyfriend.

Nurse Ann: Oh, bozhe. All right, well, I will just cut to the chase. All right, we're ready? Good. You are not pregnant.

[Natalie gets up excitedly and hugs Leo. Leo returns the embrace, but as soon as she can't see his face, it falls into a mildly upset one. Then, he forces himself to smile as she pulls away]

Leo: Look at all these babies. Isn't it crazy how, now that we're not having one, babies are cute again? Look at that one.

Natalie: I'm good.

Leo: No, I'm serious. Look, look.

Natalie: Damn it. That thing's cute as crap. [whispering] Screw you, baby.

Nurse Ann: Natalie, we ran some tests last week,  just to be on the safe side. This is going to be difficult for you to hear…

[Nurse Ann explains something to Natalie with a lot of incredibly long medical terms]

Natalie: ...and the gist of it is… I'm actually pregnant? 

[Ann nods]

Natalie: Uh, great. Uh, well, I mean, um, not-not great. I mean, I've not been sure that I didn't want kids, but if it has to happen to someone...

Nurse Ann: Natalie, is there anyone you can talk to about this? Perhaps a close friend?

[Natalie imagines her friends finding out this fact]

Liu: You need comfort food. Fried chicken, mac and cheese, mashed potatoes. Open your present, I'll work on these shoulders. Okay, just breathe, relax, eat your chicken. Come on, eat, breathe, open it, breathe, open it, eat. Nat, why are you so tense?!

Toby: [sobbing] And here I've been going on and on about Nico and I having kids. Oh, I am such a bad friend!

Natalie: It's okay.

Toby: You have to punch me in the face!

Jane: Have you thought about adoption?

Natalie: Um, well…

Jane: Do any chronic or life-threatening illnesses or disabilities run in your family?

Natalie: Uh...

Jane: What was the date, duration and consistency of your last period?

Leo: A priest and a rabbi walk into a bar. No, a barbershop. No, a post office. No, it's two priests. No, it's two ducks. No, a priest holding a duck. And he's Polish. The priest, not the duck. Actually, the duck could be Polish, too. Doesn't matter. Yes it does. The duck's not Polish.

[There is a pause]

Leo: Pratfall!

[He falls]

Leo: Ow…

[hasgudagudadoneanythingwrong]

I am out there for the whole gudaguda crew, they are the reason I still play the game probably because I laughed so fucking hard at gudaguda one and Nobu wanting to turn the holy grail into a bomb and the fourth ascension implying that she's inviting you to fuck? Everything was so hilarious and they had these serious moments too as the series went on further. Final Honnoji was wonderful too from Chief retainer Mash to Avenger Nobu, to Hijikata commanding the mini nobu squad while chowing down on chilled pickles! And Mori. OH MY GOD MORI.

I cannot wait until the next gudaguda where I will expand my shitpost roster with Mysterious Ranmaru X, who I only can HOPE aids Mori in being an absolute himbo. The fact that in 5 Nobukatsu gets everything he deserves only makes it better!

I have been deprived of any Okita for too long and now I can only imagine she and berserker Nobu will form an absolute dumbass unit and watch tv making stupid commentary on other type moon properties with Medusa and Artoria somewhere in the background.

Though here is the big question. WEN MONKEY?

Oh you and me there buddy, Gudaguda is the only reason I'm even still involved here and by god is it keepin me here. And yeah! There is so much Mori family bonding time in Gudaguda 6 you're gonna be so happy, Ranmaru X is basically one of the main forefronts and Nagayoshi is a very prominent party member.

Honestly, no complaints about 6 besides having a bit of difficulty keeping the names straight (there's a lot of important names that start with Ta-) and kind of same with 5, but I think 5 might've been impacted pretty heavily by reading it off machine translations. Still though, go in with a pencil and paper for the names for at least the first few episodes, it'll help a bunch.

That said, (I'll keep the spoilers to a minimum) 5 did suffer a bit from not knowing how to properly balance the upbeat seriousness of "getting shit done" and the dramatic seriousness of "incredibly emotional turn of events" leading to both instances feeling really out of place and hard to take seriously?? But while it was hard to take the actual incidents seriously they both had really strong impacts so please just assume both points (you'll know exactly when) are like. actually legitimately serious, I know I took the first for a joke until it was revealed it really wasn't a joke and so uh, yeah fair warning there lol

Honestly, I'm pretty surprised Toyotomi Hideyoshi hasn't shown up much yet? I believe in Redline/Koha-Ace(?) he's implied to have been in the previous HGW, and we've seen other instances of him in :RE flashbacks I believe, so I know he has potential to be summoned as a servant in some regard there, I just don't know if Gudaguda 2 established that as never gonna happen due to something something final boss of the event/cause of the singularity. But, I don't know if whatever happened there's enough to stop 'em from making Monkey properly summonable (or at least an NPC), so we'll have to see. Gudaguda 4 was all-in on the warring states, 5 was more for just shinsengumi, and 6 was mori but especially tosa people, so i could see an event focusing more on just the retainers now that we got Ranmaru X and Nagayoshi being buddy-buddy siblings. We'll have to see though.

[itsclydebitches]

Hey Clyde! I'm not sure if you've been asked this before but why do you think the writers chose to have Cinder... cry? One one hand, I thought that scene was supposed to be a breaking point but on the other (and looking at the following episodes), did she cry to guilt Watts into helping her? I was already a little confused with that choice before but now I'm even more so.

Hey there, anon!

Yeah, it’s a messy scene, more because of what happens after it than because of the scene itself. No, I personally don’t think this was a calculated move to get Watts to help her. We could delve into whether Cinder is currently the kind of character to pull off a manipulation like that  — I’d say not  — but the main takeaway is that she doesn’t need to do that. Watts is ready and willing to get back to work, together. 

Well, the others may or may not be dead, but Salem will definitely be back and until she returns we need to figure out what to do. Cinder has no motivation for convincing Watts to work with her because Watts is already willing. It’s only when she starts suggesting more idiotic, ill-thought out “plans” that he tells her precisely why she’s failed in the past, but even post-death threat he doesn’t express any reluctance about working with her. Watts doesn’t say a thing between getting dropped back on the roof and Cinder shedding that tear.  

We admittedly do get some kind of emotion from Watts after he’s brought back onto the roof, but I read that more as a, “Holy shit I nearly died” reaction and not a “Oh no I’ve hurt Cinder’s feelings” one. If he was at all moved by her crying, he doesn’t show it. Watts doesn’t care. He said what he said and he stands by it. 

Rather, I lean more towards that first reading: “I thought that scene was supposed to be a breaking point.” Other critics were right to point out that Watts’ general accusations of her never having a plan/working with others are ridiculous —  we watched whole seasons of Cinder weaving intricate (by RWBY’s standards) plans with the White Fang and Roman —  but he’s right that she’s a mess now. Between throwing herself at Raven and then throwing herself at Penny, her “plan” of “Just be more powerful and win” is garbage. It’s not enough to be strong, you have to be smart too, and for the first time since Volume 3, Cinder seems to get that. This is also the volume where we get her backstory, a flashback to a time when she was powerless, and if we’re seeing those memories now, it stands to reason it’s because Cinder is thinking about them now. That was her past and, wouldn’t you know, it looks a lot like her present. She’s tortured by Salem, failing to seize the power she wants, and now Watts lays it all out in one neat, vicious package. He’s right. I’m a failure. Cue collapsing on the roof and having that dam break a bit in the form of a single tear. 

I, personally, was really intrigued by this development, simply because Cinder lacks development. The concept of her re-acquiring the patience and intellect she had in earlier volumes after regressing was a good one. Here’s a woman who craves power, finally achieved some (Amber’s Maiden powers), and in doing so expected everything else in her life to fall into place. When it didn’t  — when she was still losing fights and remained under Salem’s thumb  — she devolved into an impatient, crazed villain, creating a cycle where she was bound to continue losing so long as she acted this way. Watts’ accusations finally snap her out of that, with the added bonus of this “friendship is power” theme. RWBY strongly pushes that only those who work together can hope to succeed (Salem wants to divide, the Ace Ops supposedly couldn’t work as a team well enough to beat Team RWBY, etc.) and now here was Cinder re-learning how to rely on her allies. No more trying to shake Emerald when she wants to help attack Penny, no more ignoring Watts’ “we need a plan” to run off after the powers on her own, Cinder is finally ready to play smart again and that’s achieved largely though having a team she can also rely on, just like she did back in Volumes 1-3. That time when she won. If Team RWBY wins because they support and love one another, what’s going to happen if the villains start, well, not loving one another, but becoming evil friends? Why, they should become quite the force to reckoned with! And that’s presumably what we saw in Atlas’ HQs: Neo, Cinder, and Watts enjoying being evil together. They’re trading compliments, Neo is skipping through dead bodies... the villains that work together win together. 

The problem is... absolutely nothing comes of this. Cinder doesn’t actually get smarter, everyone else just gets dumber. This entire plan hinges on snagging the Relic and the Relic, in turn, hinges on Neo. Does Cinder do anything to trick or convince Neo that she’s truly reliable this time? No, Neo just goes stupid and hands over the Relic. Again. So Jinn gives Cinder all the information she needs and after things actually go well via teamwork  — Cinder distracts Team RWBY while Neo sneaks up  — she destroys that advantage by kicking Neo off the edge and burning Watts. Cinder’s success doesn’t even last a whole episode. Sure, she gets away with the Relics, but what she actually wanted, the Maiden power, is lost to her because it ended up being a 3v1 battle. If only Neo was around to fight Weiss while Cinder went after Penny! Funny how you self-sabotaged yourself. Again. 

This scene, like so much in RWBY, is fine on its own, but falls apart as the story progresses. Cinder’s revelation didn’t actually change her character, so fans are right to ask, “What was the point?” Well, the answer is that the point was lost, what the scene set up was quickly dropped, but the other way to approach this is to assume there must be a different point to the scene. Enter the “Cinder is sympathetic” reading. I’m not going to deny that this exists regardless of what else we might take away from the moment  — it’s hard to have any villain cry on screen and not question how much we’re supposed to feel for them. That’s something I’ve criticized regarding Raven  — but some fans have come to the conclusion that this is the scene’s only purpose. Which, when the story drops the other purpose, makes a certain amount of sense. This volume we watched Hazel suddenly sacrifice himself for the boy he was torturing, Emerald get buddy with the girl she was just trying to murder, and Ironwood go full, evil spotlight villain. Volume 8 made HUGE missteps when it came to flipping the moral divide, with the villains suddenly meant to be friends and the friends (including the Ace Ops) meant to be villains. It’s understandable that fans would wonder if Cinder is meant to be a part of that flip. Did you include her crying solely to try and convince me she’s not that bad? At least, not as bad as the evil Ironwood? And many fans are, rightly, upset about this attempt to pull on their heartstrings. Regardless of what else that scene might have been attempting to do  — whether this really was setup for Cinder’s development that the show failed to follow through on  — we can’t ignore the inherent problems in spending this much time (crying + backstory) making an unambiguous villain look all woobie, while simultaneously avoiding that work in the previously morally gray/heroic characters. Which isn’t to say you shouldn’t have sympathetic villains, that you shouldn’t introduce that nuance, but rather that RWBY is developing an awful habit of putting that work towards the wrong characters. Everything in a story is interconnected, so it’s frustrating to watch Cinder cry and go, “Wait, am I supposed to feel bad for her when she is, essentially, crying over her failure to kill the heroes?” while simultaneously watching a show that, when a former hero was maimed, betrayed, and facing an impossible decision went, “Nah. You shouldn’t feel bad for this asshole at all. He’s evil.” Which is it, RWBY? Why am I encouraged to feel for the Definitely Bad characters, but discouraged from feeling for the Morally Ambiguous ones? There’s a disconnect here which encourages fans to approach the scene with a less than charitable eye. Cinder’s scene appears to be doing at least two different things, both as a means of developing her character, but between what happens later in the volume and how other characters are handled in comparison to her, both attempts fall flat. 

[victorie552onepiecespeedrun]

Reading One Piece pt 337: Brothers

Chapter 585

Thoughts:

- Volume 60! (And year 2010. Man, I feel old)

- huh, character page looks totally different. There’s no Shanks, for once, and it looks like the whole volume will be  a Flashback Fest.

At least we know where each of Straw Hats are. Look at that:

Neat (except that Zolo nonsense)

- aww, Magellan and Hannyabal on the cover. I hope Magellan is doing better now, he wasn’t well after that break-out

- wow, humble beginnings of a Gum-Gum Pistol

- lol

- but it’s so nice they train together :)

- children so strong :D

- Narration kicked in, they mention Trash Mountain

- “Another city lies even father north but a huge stone wall blocks the road” wall? *intense Trump flashbacks* put it back, I don’t want it

- “Look! The trash is here! Let’s go treasure hunting!” – Supernatural fandom

- so city is more miserable than a trash mountain?

- “Trash hunters patrol the street” I’m starting to think living in the jungle is a better deal here

- lol, our boys did the “three kids in a trenchcoat” trick :D

- “And in the middle of that, surrounded by a high stone wall, is the highland, where the royal family and the aristocrats live.” Wow. Now I’m thinking Attack of Titan

- “This is the Kingdom of Goa. Thought to be the most beautiful land of the East Blue, it is spotlessly clean. It is considered a successful example of a society where everything unnecessary is removed.” Lies, all of it, aristocrats are still here. Give it a century or two and they’ll have their Red October :(

- so Windmill Village is in the Goa Kingdom but is super isolated? Good for Luffy I think, he had few years of normal childhood

- our kids are wreaking havoc. I kinda wish they didn’t go to the city, especially as CD are supposed to be here too

- “Sabo? Sabo! Wait! You’re alive! Come back home!” “!!” …what?

- “Who is that guy?” “Must have mistook me for somebody else!” LIEEEES give me the drama

- back in the jungle. Now Sabo is facing an interrogation :D

- “You sure you want to have secrets between us? TALK” THE DRAMA

- ! :D

- “You’re the son of an aristocrat?” “I am.” “…so?” …children these days

- “Both my parents are still alive. I’m no orphan. I wasn’t even born on Trash Mountain. That guy back there was my father.” Then why… are you here, Sabo? I mean, how did it even happen?

- “Why would an aristocrat run off to live at Trash Mountain?” right?

- is that a flashback inside a flashback. Did I fall into Naruto Universe

- oh, parents with ambitions. Horrible

- A knife? Yikes

- “All they care about is wealth and status. Not me! If I can’t marry a girl from a royal family, I’m no better than trash. So they forced me to study and take lessons every single day. Then they’d fight if I couldn’t learn fast enough. I was just a nuisance in that house.” so he ran away. Children in One Piece are hardcore

- “I may not be an orphan but I’ve always been alone. The aristocrats look down on Trash Mountain but it’s still better than that suffocating highland, living a strict regimented life year after year.” A golden cage, you say. It’s great Oda put it here but it’s weird to hear all this from a 10 year old

- but it explains the top hat :D

- “I want to see the world and write a book about it! And navigation is the one thing I like to study! Let’s get strong and become pirates!” aww, little Nami protoplast :)

- “You don’t have to convince me! I’m gonna be a pirate and win, win, win! I’ll be famous all over the world! I’ll prove my life’s worth something! No matter how many people in the world don’t approve of me, no matter how many hate me, I’m gonna become a great pirate and show them all!” oh Ace            

- “I won’t run away from anyone! I won’t lose to anyone! I don’t care if they call me a villain! I’ll make the whole world know my name!” is that me or does it sound like Zoro. Luffy really knew who he wanted in his crew, huh?

- well, what are your convictions, Luffy?

- “I want to be…” yes?

- …

- they didn’t tell us. That’s super rude

- but apparently it was funny

- whoops, they all want to be captains :D

- “We’ll decide our future in the future” famous last words, Ace

- excuse me, is that alcohol

- yep, it is

- “If you exchange cups, it makes you brothers.” !

- “When we become pirates, we may not be on the same ship together but the three of us will always be brothers!” this is great

- “No matter where we are or what we do, this bond will never be broken! Starting today… we’re brothers!”

- and so they were brothers

- beautiful montage of their lives together

- honestly, it looks like a good life

- wait, what is it

- Give Sabo back! Bluejam!” “Give him back? What nonsense is this? Sabo is my son!” …what

- HOW IS THAT… NO I DON’T CARE JUST LEAVE SABO ALONE YOU TRASH PARENT

- “I left of my own free will!” “You be quiet!” Where’s Robin when you need her to snap someone’s neck

- now you want to hurt my boys!?

- “Please, don’t hurt them! They’re my precious brothers!” “Sabo!”

From 0 to 100, as always.

rOP 336  rOP 338

[rhetorical-ink]

Haikyuu!! Observations: Ushijima x Sakusa, Ft. Komori and Tendo

**SPOILERS FOR ANIME ONLY’S BELOW**

Okay, am I about to dive into a lengthy post about why UshiSaku may be endgame in Haikyuu!! and how Tendo may be the best wing man for it all? 

Uhm, yes. Yes, I am, so bear with me. 

I’ve been stewing on this for a while now, so there’s a lot to cover in this post.  Let’s dive in!

Ushijima and Sakusa’s Parallels

Okay, first things’s first -- let’s talk about Ushijima, Sakusa, and the parallels the Manga has made with them. Starting with their views of Shoyo Hinata.  Let’s begin with Ushijima. While the stereotypical characterization of Ushijima is to make him completely stoic and unfeeling, Ushijima DOES have emotional responses, especially in the manga -- for example, his reaction on the court to Hinata is MUCH stronger than I believe the anime shows:

This is developed further in the Shiratorizawa vs. Karasuno match -- as Ushijima struggles with the fact that Hinata is not a skilled player -- he just has natural athleticism and his actions are half “luck” and half the gutsy collaboration of his actions alongside the “reckless” and “wild” other players of Karasuno.

This idea of “luck,” interestingly enough, will come back with Ushijima nearly 200 chapters later...but we do establish here, that Ushijima is the type of person that admires and respects strength, and efforts that are backed by natural talent and disciplined training. It’s only natural that Hinata frustrates him, because at this point in the manga, Hinata and “disciplined training” aren’t exactly words that go together (more on that below).

Verrry similarly, Sakusa has no room for people who lack discipline, though his “discipline” relates more to personal health than just physical preparation for a game. This comes in direct focus in a flashback during the Black Jackal vs Adlers game, when it shows Sakusa first meeting Hinata. Unlike Ushijima, it doesn’t seem like he “hates” Hinata, just has absolutely no desire to be around someone that lets themselves get sick...and he only allows himself to be open to Hinata as a teammate after Hinata expresses that he has indeed grown up since High School. 

The manga also points to parallels of how they handle defeat, showing both Ushijima remaining proud and quiet after their loss to Karasuno, only quietly declaring to Hinata and Kageyama that he would “beat” them again --

While with Sakusa, he’s more vocal in his musings about losing, in Chapter 368 stating that it would hurt more to be pitied, especially when you did all you could do, and still suffered a defeat. Itachiyama losing their setter could be viewed as “bad luck” in the final set, but Sakusa points to luck not having so much bearing as just it being the result of fate and unstoppable forces in the moment. Ever the realist, Sakusa...(again, more on “luck” below). 

Sakusa objectively presents the fact that they lost in very simplistic, albeit nihilistic terms, and similarly, Ushijima doesn’t shy away from using objective information and putting things in simplistic terms without hyperbole. This can be seen through his conversation with Goshiki below. 

Ushijima and Sakusa’s “Type”

So, if we’re going to even possibly ship these characters together...does it work? It becomes clear, through the manga and anime, though that both Ushijima and Sakusa admire players who are powerful, can present a legitimate challenge to them, and therefore spurn them to become stronger players, too. 

Both Ushijima and Sakusa are portrayed as incredibly strong right out the gate in the manga, which makes sense as both are in the Top Three Aces for high school volleyball. However, unlike Kiryu (the #2 Ace that is depicted as more down-to-earth, friendly, compassionate, and relatable to our other protagonists), both Sakusa and Ushijima have “colossal protagonist” vibes -- seeming larger than life, incredibly stoic, and emotionally distant to others on their team, even if they are around them constantly. 

And then, concerning Sakusa...there’s the infamous Chapter 394. 

If anything has established what Sakusa’s “Type” would be, it would be these two panels. Ushijima is checking off all of the boxes for Sakusa: Understands personal hygiene? Check. Someone offering Sakusa a challenge as a competitor, and motivating him to keep moving forward and practicing? Check!

Chapter 394 answers many questions, and points us to the observation of: 

Sakusa’s “Pining”

Furudate, we see Sakusa lazer-focused on Ushijima from the other side of the court...you’re not fooling us:

Hey, remember where the mystery of Sakusa and Ushijima’s relationship began? Waaaaay back, after the Shiratorizawa match, after the Fukurodani/Nekoma matches; at the start of the National Japan training camp that Kageyama attended in Chapter 209. 

A camp, where it was noted by Karasuno, that Ushijima had been the chosen representative of their prefecture for at least the last year.

And who is the first person Kageyama runs into at this camp?

And the first thing Sakusa states isn’t a proper greeting, it’s not about how they beat Shiratorizawa...it’s how the team “somehow” beat WAKATOSHI-KUN. 

The next time we get interactions from Sakusa, he immediately jumps on the offensive, DEMANDING to know who the player was that led to Shiratorizawa’s downfall:

It’s interesting that Kageyama implies the “entire” team was responsible for Ushijima’s defeat on the page before this one below, but of course, Kiyoomi does not pick up on this. Then, leave it to Komori to come in with the save. Again, tying Kiyoomi to being a “realist,” which will come into play below.

So, it isn’t until Chapter 394 that we learn about Sakusa’s long-standing history of playing Ushijima in various matches, developing this competitive rivalry with him that has been going on since middle school. Ushijima is literally the one obstacle that he finds himself unable to surpass; the one piece of the puzzle he can’t put into place yet.

It’s no wonder the fact that someone defeated him irked him so much. 

We get a little more context from Komori on Sakusa and Ushijima’s rivalry, and more on the flashback on their Nationals loss which will tie into my last point. 

Motoya Komori

I would be remiss not to bring up Motoya Kamori’s role in all this.

I think it’s verrrrrry interesting the route Furudate chose with Komori, specifically in revealing that he’s Kiyoomi’s cousin. 

This makes a LOT of sense, considering how closed off and antisocial Sakusa is. It justifies not only why Komori is so keen to stick by Sakusa’s side, despite his seeming apathy towards his presence, but it also justifies why Kiyoomi even sticks with Komori: he really doesn’t have a choice. Komori’s family.

Side Note: Ever get the impression that Komori and Kageyama could be a fun friendship/pairing? I mean, the top setter and top libero? Komori seems genuinely friendly with Kageyama, both at the training camp and when they see each other at Nationals, commenting on Sakusa being out of his element...

...Juuuuust a crack pairing side note! Spread the word! Now, back to the post!

Komori becomes our main expositor about Sakusa in Chapter 394, noting how osbsessive compulsive he is, especially in finishing anything he starts. It’s just an odd choice for me, to make Komori his cousin. True, it goes against the stereotype that all family HAS to look or act like each other, and it does make sense to why their friendship is so strong. 

It’s just a move that Furudate hasn’t pulled the entire manga, and it comes right at the end of the series...and it disrupts Furudate’s tactic of giving us characters in “pairs” that, as some reactors have noted, are ripe for instant shipping. 

Coincidentally, right as we start to make connections between Sakusa and Ushijima. It’s almost as if Furudate sank the Komori x Sakusa ship with revealing their relationship, just in time to reveal the answer to our mystery of why Sakusa refers to Ushijima in such a familiar way...and let that ship sail. How poetic.

Also, if you wanted to know WHY Komori is so good at being a libero, look at this page below. I mean, if YOU had to practice non-stop with the Top Ace in the nation, receiving his spikes, you can only imagine that you’d be amazing at the sport. 

I also like how this page points out how, despite Sakusa also having a physical trait that makes him stand out -- like Ushijima -- in contrast, it seems Sakusa’s “oddity” was instantly accepted among his peers and he didn’t face much resistance to it. Of course, this also could be because Komori notes Sakusa wasn’t close with his “much older” and “much busier” family. 

Tendo’s Friendship

And, tying this all together, of course, is Tendo’s involvement. 

I love chapter 176 and this part of the anime, where we actually get backstory on Ushijima. I love that Tendo is pretty much his “true” friend in this series, as he actually is one of the few at Shiratorizawa to take the time to ask questions and get to know Ushijima.

Chapter 176 is a big source of material for people shipping Tendo and Ushijima together, and I’ll be honest -- until Sakusa came into the picture, I was right there with you all. Tendo shows genuine concern and sincerity in his conversations with Ushijima off the court, and on the court, he’s practically the ONLY character on Shiratorizawa’s team, and in the whole manga (other than Oikawa) that calls Ushijima out and isn’t afraid to tease him. 

Of course, in the end, Tendo is just as impressed and in awe of Ushijima’s raw athletic talent. It’s likely this page that fuels a lot of the ship:

And, even later on, Ushijima borrows Tendo’s words to reveal to the team how much he’s enjoying the match, much to their surprise and Tendo’s delight. 

So yes, Chapter 176 I believe started the UshiTen ship, and it does become more compounded in the infamous “Boy Ball Arc” before Spring Nationals, as we learn in Chapter 210 about Tendo and Ushijima’s friendship off the court in more detail; one example being them sharing Shonen Jump magazines...

...and another being that they hang out during the practice matches, with Tendo being pretty much the only one talking to Ushijima in a casual setting. 

I’d like to point out that while some see this in Chapter 214 below as a “ship” moment, I did start to question if the two were just friends when Tendo likens Ushijima to a “monster” like Hinata and Kageyama. To me, this banter reveals that Tendo, ironically referred to as a monster himself, doesn’t put himself in the same league or category as Ushijima. This is also reflected in how Tendo notes he’s not pursuing volleyball after high school, but hopes that Ushijima ends up becoming famous and interviews him as his best friend.

And this leads to the final point, which I think cements Tendo’s status as Ushijima’s best friend...but nothing more. Maybe. Perhaps. We’ll see.

We get the reveal in Chapter 395 that during Ushijima’s first few years post-high school, he didn’t constantly keep in contact with Tendo. We know this because Ushijima hasn’t mentioned his trip to the United States to Tendo, which had happened three months prior. So some time has passed there.

Of course, that doesn’t mean Tendo hasn’t kept caught up on Ushijima’s Pro Volleyball career, as that’s his reason for calling Ushijima in the first place. 

I like that Tendo offers Ushijima advice and genuinely asks how his family is doing, specifically his father, whom Ushijima went overseas to visit with his father. Even if it has been a while since they’ve talked, you can tell that they are close enough friends that everything seems to pick right back up where it left off for them, which is true for many real-life friendships, and I appreciate Furudate giving us that here, and expanded on more years later, below.

I love this page of Chapter 402. Especially Shiribu’s little crush of Ushijima, as he “shhh”’s Semi.

Not only because it reverses Tendo’s original prophecy that it would be himself interviewed as the famous Ushijima’s friend, but also that it cements their friendship. I mean, Ushijima flew to PARIS for the interview. I know that in itself could be considered shipper fodder, but the fact that they identify as best friends...it just fits them so well. And I could see Tendo talking with Ushijima on late night phone calls to talk him through his dating, or lack thereof, woes.

Also, let it be known these men are the most stylish in Haikyuu!! They should work with Asahi. 

Also, also, Tendo’s favorite food is chocolate ice cream. That should have been all the foreshadowing we needed for his future career, right? ^^

Black Jackals vs Adlers

So, that leaves us with the meat of the UshiSaku ship: the Adlers vs Black Jackals match, and the final chapter 402. In Chapter 394, we establish Sakusa’s backstory and the potential pining he’s done for Ushijima the last ten years of his life, starting with this page:

Again, tying back to being “lucky.” I like that despite how Ushijima couldn’t comprehend where Hinata attained all of his athleticism and lamented how half of his plays were just “lucky” and a combined effort of him and his teammates, in the end, Ushijima admits here that he himself is rather “lucky” he won the luck of the draw athletically and was born with a particular trait that made him excel in the game (that being lefthanded). Sakusa, incidentally, falls into the same category, though he doesn’t quite admit it as such. 

I like that we see these two actually interacting side-by-side, as equals, a visual I think Furudate designs intentionally. Unlike Tendo, who doesn’t situation himself in the same realm as Ushijima, Sakusa positions himself right in the same sphere, of the “Monster Generation.” 

By the end of Chapter 394, Sakusa reflects on his own “luck.” In how he is lucky to have been given life -- reflected with a picture of Komori, his family -- to have met people -- reflected by Ushijima specifically -- and to still be playing volleyball -- reflected by his old high school setter, whom went on to play in the Division 1 league after his own injury. His views of “luck” are all represented in ideally, the people that mean most to him...and Ushijima is one of them. 

Sakusa also describes his “Ideal Last Game,” which could be represented by the game being played in that moment. It’s beautiful that someone who is so germaphobic and hyper-obsessive with controlling the atmosphere around him (who he comes in contact with, how he finishes everything he starts), is also so content and at ease on a volleyball court, where nothing is in his control but his own body and the contact he makes with the ball. And it also helps that he’s surrounded by amazing players, like Ushijima, here, to keep him rising to the next challenge --

-- which ends up coming his way in the very next Chapter, as Ushijima (coincidentally right after Sakusa) has his “moment” of reflection and growth put on display. Of course, Sakusa isn’t “finished” with catching up to Ushijima yet, as his cousin snidely reminds him with a laugh, here. I love that we see Ushijima smile, though, at Sakusa’s effort. 

Speaking of “Effort,” that ties into later in Chapter 400, when we have Sakusa’s own high school banner for Itachiyama put on display. It’s a simple motto, that goes alongside Shiratorizawa’s in “Be Strong.” I also like here, that in contrast to Chapter 395, when Ushijima was smiling at Sakusa, who couldn’t bump his spike, in Chapter 400, we have Sakusa getting the spin off of Ushijima’s hand, and as he lands, he gives a little smirk to a disgruntled Ushijima. 

LITERALLY, these two have only truly smiled during a game at each other. Sure, each have scowled and showed irritation and drive towards facing opponents, but have we seen them “smile” at another in the midst of a game? Not really, unless you count Sakusa getting that service ace before Atsumu Miya in this same game...

Speaking of Atsumu Miya, we’ll talk about him a little bit below. But for now, I like that Sakusa describes that there’s no “room for anything that disgusts me” on the court in a pro volleyball game. Everyone is at their fullest potential and peak physical condition, just like Sakusa, and they all have worked diligently to get to that position. 

We don’t get much other UshiSaku crumbs post Chapter 400, although, I would like to point out that Furudate, when drawing the National Japan Olympic Team, placed these two right next to each other. You know...for no reason, I’m sure.

And yes, I would be remiss not to mention this tiny panel -- the last we see of Sakusa or Ushijima or Atsumu Miya, I believe -- as it’s Sakusa that digs up Oikawa’s insane serve. I just LOVE the smile that Ushijima has here as Sakusa digs it. Because unlike Sakusa and Atsumu Miya, Ushijima knows exactly what kind of player Oikawa was in the past, and no doubt knows the kind of plays he could pull off...so I’d imagine he’s proud that his teammate dug up this serve right off the bat. 

I know there are a lot of people that ship AtsuSaku, and I won’t deny you that Furudate has laid out crumbs for them as well...but I sort of view Miya with Sakusa the same way I view Tendo with Ushijima at the end of the day: as best friends. I definitely think that there is a hilarious friendship angle with Sakusa and Atsumu Miya -- but I think it’s Ushijima that is the player Sakusa is always going to try and beat and surpass...you could argue, very similar to the dynamic between Hinata and Kageyama in their rivalry...albeit, I think Sakusa’s hints more deliberately at something more...but that’s just my opinion.

In the end, I find it interesting the decisions Furudate makes to show us these characters and specific interactions at the end of the series; specifically, showing Ushijima and Sakusa’s backstories back-to-back, and with all the little glances and panels of them near or looking towards one another. But hey, shippers will see what shippers want to see, right? 

I do think that Komori’s panel here in Chapter 394 is pretty telling, though: 

Sakusa has identified Ushijima as someone he wants to beat and surpass, and he’s not going to stop until he does. And if there are feelings beyond that...well...he’s not going to stop until “he’s satisfied” with that, either. 

At least, according to Chapter 378, Ushijima’s already got his flu shot.

I hope you all enjoyed this little dive into this bizarre pairing in Haikyuu!! I’ve wanted to break this apart for a while, and now that the manga is over, I hope to do more of these types of posts with other pairings. Until next time, we can celebrate the ship that is UshiSaku (and KomoYama/KageMori -- pass it on!) with fan fiction and fan art to our heart’s content! ^^

[recentanimenews]

OPINION: How I Discovered Haikyu!! (And Myself), Thoughts From a First-Time Viewer

  Haikyu!!'s final season just began, and for years I have been meaning to start watching. Now seems like a great time to rectify that, so I've finally caught up and am eagerly awaiting the next arc to see how the Karasuno Crows fare.

  I decided to track my thoughts on everything that happened — something of a time capsule from before the main cast joined together all the way to them competing in Nationals.

    As a baseline, here is everything I knew about Haikyu!! before watching Episode 1:

It's a popular sports anime about volleyball

The main character is the orange-haired kid, Hinata

They're going to go to Nationals. Not sure about the details, but I know they’ll make it into the tournament

  I actually watched this with someone who has seen it before. She didn't spoil anything but occasionally gave insight I may not have otherwise realized at the moment.

  Episodes 1-6: Joining the Team

    For the first part of the show, we largely follow Hinata's perspective. As I assumed going in, he's our generally underachieving but unfailingly energetic sports boy who hadn't met anyone who loves his sport as much as him until now. Specifically, he meets Kageyama, one of the best setters in the prefecture.

  I started to notice that the storytelling’s actually pretty good when the newly assembled Crows get a practice game with the 4th ranked school in the prefecture. It gives them someone challenging so the main cast can see what they’re up against but also gives them a team close enough to their level that they have a real chance of winning and also keeps the truly powerful foes hidden for later arcs.  

I also really appreciate that during the games, the characters try out new things, but are never truly sure that anything will work. It adds some experimentation and uncertainty to every game.

  Episodes 7-10: Crows, Assemble

    The rest of the main cast joins up with the existing group, forming the core rotation of players and major characters in the show.

  One of the new characters, Asahi, showcases one of the show’s strong points for me. He's the team’s ace, but both he and Hinata grapple with performance anxiety. As my watch-along partner put it, Hinata’s anxiety comes in waves, mostly during games, while Asahi’s is more of a constant background hum.

  As someone who has struggled with anxiety most of my life, I heavily identify with Asahi’s backstory, even down to not going for the spike in the final play of his flashback game due to thinking about how pointless it was since he wouldn't get it through.

  Episodes 11-13: Crows versus Cats

    Karasuno gets its practice game against their rival school, Nekoma. Both teams have fallen from grace in recent years, so this is the Crows’ chance to prove they can crawl their way back to the top and test out their teamwork and strategies from the previous arcs.

  At this point, the mind games aspect of each match starts coming through. Both teams try to figure out how their opponents think so they can react faster, while also trying to hide their own tells to keep their opponents guessing.

  When Hinata first started closing his eyes to make his special fast attacks with Kageyama, I joked that his power-up was going to be just ... opening his eyes. It turned out I wasn’t far from the truth. It doesn’t work immediately, but all of the Crows start polishing their weaknesses to make for a more well-rounded team.

  Episodes 14-16: Preliminaries Round 1

    As the boys go into the Interhigh Tournament, people whisper about the “Flightless Crows.” They proceed to absolutely crush their first opponents.

  The show follows the girls’ volleyball team for a bit, too, amping up the emotions at the end of the first round by cutting between the girls losing while the boys breeze through their sets.

  It’s a bit unfortunate the girls are beaten so badly just to show that the boys have grown, especially since they don’t end up getting much screentime for the rest of the show outside of being in the stands or otherwise supporting the boys.

  Episodes 17-26: Daito and Aoba Jousai

    After getting through the first part of the tournament easily, Karasuno is up against two powerhouse teams. First: Daito, a school with defense so amazing it’s called “The Iron Wall of Daito.” Second, Aoba Jousai, the school that many of Kageyama’s peers, including the setter he looks up to, enrolled in.

  They manage to steal a win from Daito, but ultimately lose to Aoba Jousai.

  The ending of this arc was when I realized I was truly invested in the show. For one, my watch-along partner and I were silent during many of the plays instead of joking about anime tropes like we had been in earlier arcs. Second, during one of the final scenes of the season, the entire team went out to eat after the game and we just silently watched everyone slowly start eating and then mutually begin crying.

  Episodes 27-36: Season 2

    As we start Season 2, there is a very clear and welcome difference almost immediately — the animation and camerawork are a lot better. Neither were bad in Season 1, but now they’re on an entirely different level. As my watch-along partner put it, there is some very naturalistic movement in some of the scenes.

  Also, this is when the team got a second manager, Yachi. I seriously cannot think of a character I have more personally related to in an anime than Yachi. She is a nervous wreck that is constantly apologizing and gets spooked by every little thing, even as small as someone talking to her. She outright views herself as “Townsperson B,” from when she played that role in drama club. I turned to my watch-along partner and said, “I’m in this picture, and I don’t like it.”

  Meanwhile, in the actual plot, my watch-along partner pointed out that while the team started developing specialized skills at their summer camp, the majority of their training seems to be devoted to getting down the fundamentals of every part of the game, then practicing them constantly. Like how Nishinoya is normally the libero and is almost exclusively receiving, but after seeing an opponent’s strategy, wants to learn to toss so he can replicate something he previously lost against.

  Episodes 37-44: Prelims

    The show uses the prelims as an opportunity to shine in two new ways. First, if a player is injured, they're checked to see if it's serious, then given a proper medical exam off the court. No powering through a concussion.

  Second, since main characters are no longer guaranteed to be on the court for the entire game, the cast expands to include other members we previously haven't focused on.

  My watch-along partner mentioned Ennoshita, Daichi's relief player, a few times throughout the show, so I knew he was going to be important eventually. But to give an idea of how little he impacted things until this point, when he was called in, I exclaimed that they were putting Steve McBlandman in the game. Despite that, he really does get to shine on the court. He’s a nervous wreck at first (join the club), but he’s also most likely to take over as captain once Daichi graduates and proves himself to be a reliable teammate by the time Daichi returns.

  Episodes 45-50: Rematch

    In terms of storytelling, there’s not much to add for this game. The two teams are established factions and we know the stakes, so it’s more of a puzzle to see who can find new strategies during the game and outthink the other team, which is made harder by the rivals bringing in a totally new player referred to as "Mad Dog."

Eventually, Karasuno wins, ending Season 2 with a promise that the finals of the qualifiers for Nationals will be the start of Season 3. Due to knowing a few details ahead of time, I already know a single game will be the entirety of the season.

  Episodes 51-57: Final, Part 1

    As both teams step onto the court and warm up, we are reminded that our heroes are pretty much all nervous wrecks, with most of the team in various stages of being curled up on the ground or asking for nausea medication. And, honestly, I was too. By the time the game hits set four, I wanted to grab my inhaler.

  The Crows are up against Shiratorizawa, a team with Ushiwaka, a player so strong that early in the game, it took three blockers and a libero just to return his attack, and later on he managed to dislocate a blocker’s finger with a spike.

  Episodes 57-60: Final, Part 2

    Full Disclosure: I was so invested in this game and the following season I actually forgot to take notes, so everything from here on is a second watch!

In my opinion, everyone gets to shine by the end of the game. Nishinoya sets up a full team synchro attack with his libero toss, Tsukishima is the only person whose blocks come close to keeping up with Ushiwaka, and so on.

  Episodes 61-65: Winter Training

    The first half of the season starts with some of Karasuno’s players being invited to special training camps. Hinata, being too impatient to accept that he hadn’t been invited, infiltrates one.

  Since he wasn’t invited, he’s not allowed to play, leading to him needing to watch the players and game instead of the ball for once. As a result, he starts learning to read peoples' tells and building an intuition of how to move, rather than just relying on instinct.

  Or, as I said to my watch-along partner the first time around, Hinata has reached his ultimate powerup: thinking.

  Episodes 66-70: Downtime

    In the interstitial time between arcs, the team has a practice game against Date Tech again so the Crows can get used to playing together after being apart. We get some character moments, like all the third years going to a shrine on New Year’s, and when the team arrives in Tokyo we finally get a bit of Kiyoko’s backstory.

  It’s hard to pin down what exactly about it worked, but it felt really nice to see the third years all going to a shrine together in their final months before the end of high school.

  And with that, the Spring Tournament, a.k.a. Nationals, begins.

    After going through over 70 episodes of Haikyu!!, I can say with absolute certainty I’m sticking around until the end. I skimmed over a lot of details so every section wasn’t a page long (and even then the first draft of this was over 4,000 words), but every game is filled with strategy, mind games, and experimentation.

  Outside of the games, the show does a great job of building up the cast so the rivals are well-realized characters in their own right. Not the most complex in anime, but more than a wall for the main characters to climb over.

  All in all, the show is absolutely worth the watch. It'll take a while to get through, but it's also easy to pick back up if you need to stop partway through.

  What are some of your favorite moments in Haikyu!!? Are you watching the second half of the newest season with me? Who is best boy? Let me know in the comments!

    Kevin Matyi is a freelance features writer for Crunchyroll. He's been watching anime for as long as he can remember, and his favorite shows tend to be shonen and other action series.

  Do you love writing? Do you love anime? If you have an idea for a features story, pitch it to Crunchyroll Features!

By: news+feed@crunchyroll.com

[whimperwoods]

29-Day Whump Challenge - Day 22

Day 22: Deafened || Punishment

Back to Kyle! This one takes a bit to get to the whump/prompt, but I just... needed him to get some soft easy time before he was straight back into bad memories.

Previous Kyle installments: doesn’t want to be put down, drugged, concussion, branded (shower flashback)

Prompts by @yuckwhump

Challenge tag list: @inky-whump​

tw: stress positions, tw: chained, tw: prisons, tw: neglect, tw: exposure to cold; tw: drugged, tw: needles

*****

Kyle was grateful that he’d been left alone for a few hours, wrapped in blankets and with his audio book playing.

He was also grateful when Hank came back and didn’t look any different than he’d looked before.

The man smiled, his face a mix of cheer and concern that felt familiar even after so short a time. He set a tray in Kyle’s lap, with a grilled cheese sandwich and a bowl of oatmeal that was at least half fruit and nuts.

Kyle smiled tentatively.

“Yeah, I know,” Hank said, his eyes twinkling good-humoredly, “We’re out of soup. Oatmeal is good for you, anyway.” He sat down in the chair by Kyle’s bedside and propped his feet up on the edge of the bed, letting Kyle feed himself.

He was grateful for that, too.

Hank’s eyes stayed on him as he ate, but he was relaxed and easy, and it didn’t feel like being studied.

“Thanks,” he said quietly, meeting Hank’s eyes for a moment and then looking back down into his bowl.

“You wanna talk about it?” Hank asked.

Kyle’s face burned. He did and he didn’t. He took another bite of his sandwich, to keep from having to answer.

“Not like that,” Hank said, “Just - I need to know enough to help, yeah? If you can’t shower on your own with your head like it is, we can do something about that. If it’s something else going on -” he shrugged, “We’ll work it out.”

“It’s, uh - something else,” Kyle answered, “It’s uh - maybe a lot of something elses. But you don’t have to worry.”

“Eh, what else am I gonna do while we’re parkin’ it here in the safehouse?”

“I’m -” Kyle started. He didn’t know what he was. “If you’d caught me - just caught me, no injuries, no rehab, me at full strength and just captured - what would you have done with me?”

Hank frowned thoughtfully. “Hard to say. It would have depended on what you did. As it is, we’ve still got some things to work out.”

Kyle pushed his oatmeal around the bowl, not quite making eye contact. “Would -” he cut himself off, but this was Hank, so he made himself find words he was strong enough to say, “What kind of things are on the table? Or would have been?”

Hank’s gaze intensified. “What do you want on the table?”

He took another bite to buy himself more time. The sandwich and oatmeal were good individually, but the longer he ate them the less convinced he was that they were a good combo. Maybe with different cheese. Or different bread.

He could still hear the boss’s voice in his head, enraged and half growling, promising him all the punishment he’d have earned with the enemy if he’d gotten caught, delivered first, before all the punishments he’d accrued with the boss through his failures.

He suddenly felt his appetite leave him.

He put down his spoon.

“Right now, I just wanna know what to expect. What - kinds of punishment should I be expecting? Theoretically.”

The boss had chained him up by his wrists and left him there until every joint in his arms felt ready to pull apart and burst into flames. The thought of it sent an acing throb through his wrists and shoulders, and he couldn’t look at Hank.

Hank sighed. “Well, you’ll definitely need to be in a real jail while the decisions are being made, but I’m gonna make it real clear in your paperwork what kind of things we’ll want ‘em to do to make sure you’re not in danger from the other prisoners. There’s - we’ve got some sub-populations that aren’t exactly the biggest fans of - ah - where you came from.”

The boss had thrown him to the ground and kicked him, snapping his fingers and whistling for other people to join in until Kyle’s whole world had been hard, bruising, rib-cracking impacts and the effort of protecting his head as feet struck him from multiple angles at once. Being dragged across the ground to a cell to await the boss’s punishment next had made him feel like his ribcage would rattle apart.

He blinked at Hank, confused.

“I’m not - I’d rather you didn’t end up in solitary. That’s bad for people. So we’ll try to keep you in general population, but in a safe way, you know?”

The boss had kept the cells ice cold. Sometimes when he was in a foul mood after a big loss, the boss’s first punishment had just been making them all stay there, freezing and numb and hungry, promising this was what had awaited them if they hadn’t crawled back to him, promising that they’d have to live here if they failed him again. He’d been cold to his bones. Hungry to his core. His oatmeal was still steaming faintly on his tray, and he found his hand grabbing for the spoon again, even as he knew he couldn’t eat until he knew more.

“If I -” Kyle started, “If I were still trying to fight. If I got - if I hadn’t been injured but I hadn’t escaped. If you’d brought me down -”

He didn’t know how to end the question. He stared desperately into Hank’s eyes.

“Straight to jail,” Hank said, “Probably solitary confinement, so you could be kept away from any allies in there.”

Solitary confinement. That was bad. Would have been bad. He tried to convince himself that sounded bad, because it made things make sense.

The boss had slid a needle into his arm, and his whole body lit up with fire. He’d been dizzy and disoriented almost immediately, and the boss’s voice had growled in his ear that this was how they’d make him talk, before they threw him away. He’d thought that meant - he’d never known what that meant. He’d felt like there was fire in his veins. He’d cried, his face streaming with tears and snot, and the boss had barked questions at him, and he’d known better than to answer.

“Will I be questioned?” he asked, then corrected himself, “Would I?”

“Yeah. I can be there, if you want. We’ll make sure you have a decent lawyer. It’s - you’re supposed to have one, but there’s not a great track record of those kinds of things around here, so our team’s gonna be careful. You’re gonna be alright.”

“A lawyer?”

“Yeah, the, uh - there’s stuff. It’s illegal but we’re not - we’re a minor team. We’re gonna make sure you’ve got a good lawyer and we’re gonna -” he blew a raspberry. “I hate it. But we’re the team that’s bringing you in, and we’re gonna insist. We’re - there’s stuff in the pipelines. I hope one day you’ll help but right now - Don’t worry. I’m gonna make sure you’re alright.”

“It would be - regular jail?”

“Or they’d have to go through us. We don’t have a lot of pull, but we’ve got enough for that.”

Kyle’s brain hurt. It hurt. This didn’t make - it wasn’t - but it did make sense, and that made him feel like his throat was thick and he couldn’t breathe. Hank was - Hank. And the boss was - what was he? Kyle’s head throbbed.

“I - I think I need a nap,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

Hank smiled gently. “You just get healthy. We’ll keep you here as long as you need to be. I’m pretty stubborn about that kind of thing, and the higher-ups know it.“

He believed it. He believed it, and he thought he might cry again, and it was a relief for Hank to take his tray away so he could curl onto his side and go to sleep, where none of this mattered and he didn’t need to know anything.

Hank had seen his brand. Hank was still here. Nothing made sense, and his head hurt and he was safe, and in the quiet he cried again, because everything was so far beyond what his bruised brain could handle. There was before and there was now and nothing made sense.

[sleepless-in-starbucks]

Well since you wanna talk about your boi (or enby) Remy, this is a polite request for you to rant and rave about him! ~💙

AN EXCUSE TO YELL ABOUT MY BOI YOU SAY

Let’s begin simply: 

I LOVE REMY

*Coughs*

It’s good to get that off my chest

Gonna put this under a cut because honestly? I need an excuse to rant long and hard about Remy

And when I say long I mean looooooong

I’m starting with your point boi (or enby)

Because I know I’ve said it before

But I adore!!!!! Remy!!!!! As all the gender orientations!!!!

He’s a good boi! A good gurl!! A great they!!! An outstanding neopronoun user!!! The BEST genderfluid person!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(What? Me self-projecting??? Unheard of)

Anyways sorry sorry canon Remy

He is!!!! A sassy boi!!!!!!

He has attitude!!!

He has style!!!!!

He will tell God to take a nap while running on two minutes of sleep over one week of not and a coffee with ten-shots of espresso!!!

He does!!! Whatever he wants!!!! My boi!!!!

Have you SEEN him he’s such a GOOD LOOKER

Remember that one video where Thomas wanted to know why he couldn’t sleep and it did the flashback to when young Thomas neglected Remy

And Remy gave Thomas That Look

Y’know

The titled down glasses

The Look

Oh my goodness

What a boi

I don’t know if he ever does anything objectively gay in the videos but he has Strong Gay Vibes and that’s not just because his host is gay

He is a Sass Ass

Remember when he was in the tik tok

Good-bad boy

He is a good-bad boy

But is he a good-bad boy that knows I loVE HIM

Also do you remember the fall video he was in

He was so aesthetic for that

I’m sorry have I said he’s pretty enough yet????

He’s so pretty

His sunglasses

His jacket

His general look

It all works so well

HIs use of little petnames!!!!

You know ‘babes’ and ‘hun’

It’s great

It’s amazing

I love it

I love him

Slyly slips out of canon lovin’

Do y’all know about our lord and savoir star-loving!Remy?

It is important that you do because he

is

P E R F E C T

The moment!!! Where he takes off his sunglasses!!! To look up!!! Where the stars are reflected in his eyes!!! Sparkling shimmering shining!!! Aweful!!!

And maybe he knows a lot and maybe he knows nothing but he thinks he could stay there forever!!! Watching the stars!!! Quietly, darkly, no sun, no light but those!!!!

And my favorite hc Remy aside,,,,,,, have you met all of him????

Have you met flirty!Remy who trades smooth words paired with winks and smirks and petnames that sound like honey when he lets them drop off as if he doesn’t know exactly what they mean

Have you met easily-flustered!Remy, who dresses cool and tries to be slick but falls apart at a sweet word, who melts under a soft touch, who’s got shades to try and hide part of his face even though he can never fully cover that blush

Have you met soft!Remy, who says sweetheart and sugar with adoration in his tone, who can offer hugs and run fingers through hair with the best of them, who’s warm and smells like a bitter-sharp sense of home

Have you met best-friend!Remy, a snarky fucker who offers great dvice that’s hidden under sass while he braids hair or eats all the chips in the house

Have you met awful-good-student!Remy who never studies but passes every class with flying colours, or have you met nerd!Remy who wears shades to hide the shadows under his eyes from three consecutive nights of cram studying just to learn a bit more about his favorite topics

Have you met rebel!Remy who spray paints buildings and yells viva la revolution for kicks

Have you met a pastel!Remy in pinks (a colour y’all know I love to see him in) and blues and purples with golden stars stitched into his jacket and his sunglasses in the shapes of hearts

Have you met dumbass!Remy who is, let’s be honest, just Remy

Have you met ace-and/or-aro!Remy, who is still flirty and snarky and excellent

Have you met Remy, in all his forms, happy and sad and canon and AU and dancing and smiling and laughing and loving and p-e-r-f-e-c-t

Have you realized that I am a little obsessed with him

[flamingo-writes]

Pain isn’t that bad, is it? — Zoro x Reader

Female reader implied

Summary: The scars on your back tortured you, constantly bringing back the haunting memories attached to them. And Zoro’s claim that back scars are to be ashamed of didn’t make you feel better. However, Zoro soon realises his mistake. 

Word count: 1.6K words

A/N: This started as a drabble, but I got a littlebut carried away. Also, the lesson within this drabble is quite important. 

Warnings: PTSD implied. Also implied sex, no smut tho. 

“Scars on the back are a swordsman’s shame” The words lingered on the air like a thread tying around your pride and squeezing it mercilessly, as you stared at the handsome man before you.

You’d been flirting with him for the past hour, sharing drinks and exchanging experiences and stories. And up until now, you found him quite attractive. Until his last sentence broke the charm.

“Really?” You asked, feeling the scars on your back ache. “How so?”

“One must never let their guard down, and never turn their back on their enemy” Said Roronoa Zoro proudly.

Flashbacks from the time you failed to save your little brother slashed the wounds open again, And the burn you got on your back seemed to be ablaze once more. But instead of blood flowing out of them, it was regret.

“I see” You muttered and took one big sip to your drink, hoping that the bitter taste of the alcohol softened the pain from the time you got hit by twelve arrows while protecting your little brother. And how those twelve arrows didn’t mean shit when a single arrow hit your baby brother, killing him a couple of minutes after the incident.

You finished your drink in a rather suspicious and quick manner. Zoro even noticed your sudden change of attitude. For someone not usually interested in casual affairs, you’d managed to catch his eye and spark his curiosity upon someone like you, you looked like a strong warrior with a secret behind her eyes.

“I’m sorry, I have to go” You murmured calmly and walked out the door, afraid that if you looked back, you’d see the two demons who sketched curses all over your back. Afraid that they’d grasp at you and pull you down.

However, the only grasping hand was Zoro’s.

“Wait” he said holding your arm delicately outside the bar the two of you were. “Is something wrong?”

“I was hoping to take you with me tonight, after all, you said you and your crew were leaving tomorrow, right? But now I realise, I’m no good for you”

“What do you mean?”

“I may not be a swordsman, but I do have scars on my back, and I’m ashamed of them” Your voice left a tingly regret in Zoro’s guts, as he looked at you, hoping that you’d make eye contact with him.

“[Name]...” He breathed.

“Don’t apologise. I don’t need people to look down on me. I’ve been looked down at for a long time, and I’m sick and tired of it. My scars ache, but they remind me that I’m alive, and that I’ve been through hell twice and still lived to see the sun rise again...” You pulled your arm, breaking free from his grip and stared into his dark eyes one last time before you turned and walked away, trying to keep the tears in for a little longer.

“Wait” Zoro once again grabbed you, this time by the hand. “I’m not gonna look down on you. I’m not the sort of guy who pities others. I’m sorry for whatever happened to you, I didn’t mean to put you through that again...Also, you don’t have to take me seriously, I’m just some other guy in this world…”

“I don’t think you’re some other guy” You cut him off. “You’re quite something, Roronoa. You’re the man who will surpass Mihawk. I have enough reasons to take you seriously. Besides, I told you, I am not a swordsman. I’m not ashamed of my scars because of what they are, I’m ashamed of them because they’re reminders of two big mistakes that cost my my brother, and my pride”

Once again, you tried to break free from Zoro’s grip. And this time, you didn’t meet his eyes. You couldn’t. The threatening tears were dangerously close to falling. And the very last thing you needed was to seem weak before such a strong presence like his.

In a split of a second, a thousand thoughts went through the swordsman’s mind. You’d been the very first person to get his attention ever since he first left home. Something within you attracted him like a moth to light. It made him feel stupid, constantly reminding himself of the stupid cook who was always behind girl’s bones.

As he felt ashamed of himself for flirting with a girl —knowing that if anyone in the crew found out, they’d tease him with it for ever—, he also felt ashamed for causing you so much trouble. Just as well, a sudden urge grew in his chest. An impulse, demanding him to act. However, being the disciplined swordsman that he was, he stuttered for a bit. He gave in when he realised he was going to regret it, not following his instincts, tomorrow when he set sail with the rest of the crew.

He pulled you towards him, and quickly grabbed your face with his free hand, pressing his lips against yours.

The spontaneous act made your mind turn blank for several seconds. And during those seconds, you weren’t aware of the fact that you’d kissed him back and were locking lips with him. Just as well, tears finally fell from your closed eyes.

It wasn’t until you became aware of everything once again, you broke the kiss, not pulling back, as the hand holding yours before the kiss was now on your waist, holding you close to him.

“I-I...Wh-why are you..”

“I don’t know” He answered leaning closer to kiss you again.

When you kissed him back once again, his chest rose with pride as his arms snaked around your body and squeezed you closer to him. Feeling his strength all around you sparked a fire in your stomach, eager to grow wilder, and prompting a soft moan from your lips, as Zoro swallowed it, feeling that same fire spreading in him.

“Ah” You gasped, breaking the kiss once again. “Did you not hear what I said?” You whispered close to his mouth, as your breath hit his mouth, making him crave another kiss

“Yes, I did. And I don’t care” He said looking you dead in the eye, the kind of eyes you see on a depredator before attacking its prey. “You caught the attention of the man who’s gonna become the greatest swordsman alive, you really are something. You’ve done something anyone has done before, I cannot let that chance slip away” He said as the words got out of his mouth without being previously thought, making him realise they came from the same place this sudden urge came from, and instead of fighting it, he decided to go along with it this time.

~

As you lied on your side, deeply asleep, Zoro gazed sleepily at your back, noticing the many scars you’d told him about last night. He hadn’t had the chance to see them, and didn’t feel the need to. But now, with your bare back facing him, he paid close attention to the burn scar in the middle, and several smaller silver scars all over your back.

With his mind still fogged with sleep, he stretched his hand and very gently caressed the scars, sending shivers all over your back. Slowly, very slowly, you became aware of his warm touch, and as you woke up, you realised he was tracing the scars.

“My town was being invaded by pirates. Several of them were throwing arrows at us…” You broke the silence, catching Zoro’s attention.

“You don’t have to tell me, babe” he purred, the husky sleepy voice doing something to you, making your body vibrate in anticipation.

“I tried protecting my brother, and got several of them in my back…” You continued ignoring what he’d just said. “And when we got back to fleeing, a single arrow got him on the neck, he died almost right away...The burn was made by Fire Fist”

“Wait, Fire Fist Ace?” His eyes now wide open with surprise as what was left of sleepiness quickly discipated like smoke in an open field. 

“I asked him to. I’d been sold as a slave shortly after my brother’s death. He came across the pirate ship that bought me, and he set me free. He didn’t want to hurt me, but I begged him to burn that horrible mark on my back…To be honest, I’m quite grateful. I rather have that scar than that horrible thing reminding me that for a while I was reduced to an object...”

“You’ve been through a lot” He purred, kissing your back and burying his face on the back of your neck.  “You’re stronger than you seem, and let me tell you, you do look like a tough girl”

“It’s the pain what’s shaped me to who I am today...back then I was miserable, but now I realise how much stronger I’ve become because of that…” The whisper somehow carressed Zoro’s ears.

“Pain isn’t that bad, is it?” Now, it was his voice carressing your ears, tickling your stomach. 

“Once you’re past it, you realise life isn’t as bad. It reminds you that you’re alive, and that you’re human, and how we only have a single chance to make the most of it…”

You could feel Zoro smile against your skin, as he proceeded to kiss your neck and shoulder, every now and then nibbling on your skin, sending shivers through your body. You slowly rolled on your back, as Zoro kept kissing your skin. Synched with your movements, he got on top of you. Feeling his weight on top of you brought back the memories from the fiery night you shared.

Zoro made his way to your lips and kissed them slowly, passionately, with the full intention of tasting your body once again, thinking how he could easily get addicted to it, and at the same time, conscious that he was going to leave in a couple of hours. And he wanted to make the most of the little time you two had left.

~~~~

Please, don’t forget to leave feedback!! It keeps me motivated! Also feel free to leave prompts! 

[neverwatchedonepiece]

648-649: "Making a Sortie! The Legendary Hero Usoland!" and "The Fierce Battle Coming to the End! Lucy vs Chinjao!"

*looks into the camera like in The Office*

The fight between Luffy and Don Chinjao is finally over! I think after what happened, Luffy might have found a new friend. Law also made a stressful phone call to The Krusty Krab Sunny and ordered delivery of one ship to Green Bit.

Zoro and Franky have teamed up with Sol at Resistance HQ in Flower Field, and if Usopp keeps perpetuating his fantastic bullshit, the entire Strawhat crew will be elevated to God status in the Tontatta tribe.

Slightly worried about Law and the Strawhats stuck on Sunny but I’m seventy percent certain they will pull through and won’t be captured by any Donquixote family affiliates. (The thirty percent left over remains a huge, nagging doubt.)

Luffy’s Tough Love Fight Therapy

The Colosseum showdown between Luffy and Don Chinjao picked up at the start of episode 649.

The action was fast and furious. Luffy pulled out all his quick moves: jet pistol, jet gatling, jet stamp gatling. All defended against by Chinjao. The crowd went wild. It was one of the greatest matches the Colosseum had ever seen! Some cheered for Lucy. Others cheered for Chinjao. The atmosphere was electric.

“You’re quite a fighter,” Don Chinjao said.

“Yeah, you’re strong too, as I thought,” Luffy answered. You know. Being honest as he is.

Don Chinjao totally overreacted. “WHAT U SAY? STRONG? U TRYIN TO INSULT MEH??”

Luffy was, quite rightly, bewildered. “Wtf, all I said was that you’re strong?”

Apparently, this was a grave insult to Don Chinjao. A huge kick in the ego. Chinjao had been much stronger before.

“I’m no better than a wolf without its fangs now. A skin-headed man without his drill. A brat like you can’t understand how miserable I feel living my life like this. I’m frustrated, disappointed and sad. But you can never understand.”

I laughed when Luffy yelled, “How can I understand? You keep messing with me without explaining anything!” (He’s just saying what we were all thinking, right?)

“You really want to know why I’ve become like this?”

“No, I’m not that interested.” (Lmao! We meet again, harsh Luffy.)

“Well, I’ll tell you before you die, since you insist.” 

Don Chinjao is one of those old dudes that is TELLING you that long and rambling story even though you have showed zero interest and have been glancing at your watch for the past half hour.

Suddenly, Luffy the Fight Therapist was unwilling and open for business.

According to Chinjao, Garp punched his head in thirty years ago. Literally. As in Don Chinjao once looked like Dan Akroyd from 90s sci-fi comedy, Coneheads. 

That was until his resplendent, pointy napper met Garp’s fist.

The whole flashback was hilariously weird. Turns out Chinjao’s drill-like bonce was the only means to access his remote family treasure vault under an ice sheet. Once Garp took away the key, Chinjao fell into a deep depression. Heartbroken, he retired from piracy, a lifeless shell, just idling away time.

That was kind of sad. I felt for Chinjao then. He’s like the model of the old, proud working man who suffers a physical injury, can no longer work and slips into anger and depression. Since Chinjao knows and values nothing but strength, wealth and power, he cannot and will not see another way forward. Unlike Luffy, Don Chinjao got his ass beat and never found the strength to crawl out of the gutter and retrain.

Instead, he decided to lay the blame for his misfortune squarely at Luffy’s feet.

Luffy, naturally, was outraged. “Wtf are you talking about? Grandpa and I are different people. Look, mate. I’m busy. I’m gonna win Ace’s fruit at any cost and become the Pirate King. I have no time to be your therapist.”

Then Chinjao made two Big Mistakes.

Wow, Chinjao has Really Specific Taste

Mistake #1?

Chinjao laughed off Luffy’s chances at becoming Pirate King. The reason was typical crotchety old man talk: “the media lionised you worst generation squirts and it emboldened you. But none of you are strong enough to sail across the sea *we* fought on. After Whitebeard’s death, I ain’t expecting much. The only guy who looks good is Blackbeard Teach.”

At the mere mention of Teach, Luffy’s eyes became two circles.

“If I had to pick one, it’s him. But anyway, if you’re only good enough to compete against me, just give up!”

Oh, Chinjao, I thought. Ohhhhhhhh, you just goofed. You goofed big time. You do not mention Teach in a positive light within Luffy’s earshot. You just do not. Teach was the asshole who captured Ace and handed him to the Marines. He shares Public Enemy Number One status with Akainu. Tell Luffy you believe Teach will become Pirate King and your fate is sealed.

Mistake #2?

Chinjao’s fighting style is kinda lame. People who spin during fights in shounen anime are always fodder (the one that sticks out is that spinning top guy in the HxH Heaven’s Arena arc.) This was not his mistake. It’s just a side thought.

The Teach comment pushed Luffy’s buttons. But what Chinjao said next was even worse.

“You’re not too bad but if a guy like Rayleigh chose a brat at this level as the flag bearer for this generation, he’s not as smart as he used to be. The Marines were smart when they squelched the most evil one of the lot: Ace. That man had demon’s blood in his veins. Do you think you can beat the Marine admirals, the Yonkou and surpass Roger? That’s impossible!”

Demon’s blood? Most evil one of the lot?

*cue Kill Bill red-mist music*

“Stop whining over one punch!” Luffy yelled, as he wound up a Thor Elephant Gun attack. “I can’t count how many times I got punched by Grandpa!”

When the attack connected and that spike popped back out of Chinjao’s head, I laughed like a drain. Luffy hit Chinjao so hard, he turned the clock back thirty years.

I’m sure Chinjao will be ecstatic. Take the L with good grace, mate. Your conehead is back! Go and wreak havoc on the high seas again. Recoup that treasure. The world is your oyster!

Up on the balcony, Bartolomeo still has not revealed his connection with Luffy. Cavendish is still throwing a strop. Bellamy is lurking in the shadows, clearly in two minds about his new assassination mission. And Burgess, thanks to Cavendish and his big mouth, knows that Luffy is Lucy.

Thanks, Cavendish.

(And Burgess really does walk around chortling and flexing all the time. He’s like an evil All Might.)

Thus the Legendary Heroes of Green Bit were Born

This cast reunion based on Usopp’s total bullshit was so much fun.

I loved Usopp and Robin’s expressions when the Tontatta took them to their airport. They were starry-eyed. And so they should’ve been. It was a miniature version of a proper, fully-equipped modern airport. I wouldn’t be surprised if the place had Duty Free, passport control and Starbucks concessions.

But it was not a holiday destination Usopp and Robin were flying out to. The entire airport had been overtaken by a military operation. Cub, the yellow bee squad leader, and Bian, the pink bee squad leader, reported for duty. Usopp picked up the bee planes and kept saying, “I wanna show this to Luffy.” (They are such good pals, it warms my heart.)

Unfortunately, Usopp and Robin were too big to travel by bee plane, so they had to take the local number 20 bus to Dressrosa. The buses were cute, vulpix-like foxes with huge, fluffy tails you can sink right into for a comfortable ride.

While they made their way through the tunnel, Master Roshi - the pervy little Tontatta chief - emerged from Robin’s cleavage. He bore dire warnings. “I should tell you because you will risk your lives for our cause.”

Usopp was thinking, “I ain’t gonna die for you but go on...”

“Doflamingo has been causing our tribe a lot of pain recently, but our connection with him goes way back before the last decade. Nine hundred years ago!”

Then the narrator interrupted and I was like, “So you’re just going to leave it there when I was about to get Doflamingo family history? I am not at all mad about this. No, sir. Not one bit.”

The action cut to Flower Field, where Franky and Sol descended a secret stairwell. Said stairwell led to the Resistance Army HQ! Some soldiers ran up to Sol and addressed him as “Captain”, so Sol is a Big Deal in the Resistance.

Franky was like, “Why are all these small people swarming me?”

Sol explained. The Tontatta people were called fairies in town, how they moved faster than the human eye could detect and how they were immensely strong. Franky put two and two together and realised one of them stole Zoro’s sword!

And guess who reached Flower Field before Franky? Before any of the other Strawhats!

That’s right. It’s our boy Zoro. (So proud he learned to follow directions.)

Zoro, hilariously, had made himself at home and was watching Luffy vs Chinjao on the big screen TV. He was absolutely fuming. Why hadn’t Luffy told him there was a fighting competition? THE BETRAYAL. Will he get over it? Probably.

He must’ve been distracted by the fight, as he completely forgot 

Then some intelligence scouts ran up. They had a report for Sol. “We already know what our enemies and Sugar are doing!” (Sugar? Who dat?) “And with the battle close at hand, some legendary heroes have appeared at Tontatta: Usoland and Robiland. They have brought with them Luffyland, Zoroland, Namiland, Sanland, Chopperland, Fraland and Boneland.”

Franky and Zoro exchanged a Look. They knew instantly Usopp was on the bullshit wagon again.

“Um, I think I’m Zoroland,” Zoro said. (Lmao, better get into character quick.)

“And I’m Fraland. Nice to meet you!” Franky added.

It was round about then that Zoro remembered that Nami, Chopper and Brook were in serious trouble back on Sunny. He now wants to skip the battle (he doesn’t yet know about) and rescue the other Strawhats.

I wonder how this will go? Wicka did say she would let Zoro go back to Sunny once he’d taken her back to Resistance HQ. But Leo and the others back on Green Bit were suspicious of Robin and Usopp escaping. Will they let Zoro go or will he have to fight the battle first? Hmmm... I’m fifty/fifty about this.

God damn it, Caesar

*curb your enthusiasm music kicks in*

Meanwhile, back on Green Bit, Law was under heavy bombardment. Fujitora took a step back in this episode and Doflamingo stole the limelight. The cool music from Enies Lobby (as I call it in my head. I have no idea what the real title is) played as Doflamingo pursued Law. 

As Doflamingo was about to land a finishing blow, Caesar shrieked, “OI, JOKER! Before you kill Law, I need you to take something back for me. Law took my heart and I don’t know what he’s gonna do with it!”

Doflamingo looked round like, “Wtf... are you talking about?” And while he was distracted, Law shambled his way out of trouble.

Doflamingo was furious. FFS, CAESAR. I bet he wanted to say that but couldn’t. Gotta keep your cash cow scientist happy..

Please send help. Our art teacher has locked us in class.

Unfortunately, Law didn’t have time for a breather. He had an urgent phone call to make.

While Nami, Chopper and Brook were brought up to speed on the Humans Turning Into Toys situation by Giolla, the ship’s DDM rang. Chopper hilariously ignored Giolla and answered the call (she was maaaaad).

It was Law. He said, “Is that Nami-san?”

To my disappointment, Chopper did not answer, “No, this is Patrick.”

“I don’t care what’s going on over there,” Law said. “Listen carefully. I need you to sail Sunny to Green Bit right now. I wanna leave Caesar with you guys. No time to explain. Bye!”

Okay, so I added in the “bye” part. Law abruptly hung up.

I like how he has faith that Nami, Chopper and Brook will be able to handle the situation, but their weapons have been rendered usless by Giolla’s Art Art Fruit power. I have no idea how they’re going to get out of this one (and I’m keen to see Oda’s creative solution).

The shitshow that is Law’s current existence continued once he hung up. Doflamingo is Doflamingo. He caught up with Law again near the end of episode 648. With that slasher smile, he shot Law with a string bullet and demanded to know who Law had called for help.

Doflamingo must be confident he has Law where he wants him because he spilled the beans on his diabolical plan to snare Luffy. “Give me back Caesar’s heart already. It’s so meaningless for you to keep hanging on here. Strawhat has already walked into the trap I set. He’s fighting in the gladiatorial contest at the Colosseum. Tough contenders from all over the world come to fight in it. Outlaws only. It’s a deadly competition. When someone loses, it’s a one way ticket to hell! He will never come out of the Colosseum alive! It’s the end of your alliance, Law. Just give up!”

I wonder if Law will use the heart as leverage. Maybe he’ll give up Caesar’s heart to escape, regroup and stop Doflamingo the old-fashioned way: with Tontatta military might. (Doflamingo better not kill him off...)

Don’t worry, Chinjao. Luffy will beat you until you feel better! :D

[romy350-romyakari]

So a quick question I have for you. (May not have a short answer) But what do you think Gula's personality to be like? What kind of strengths and weaknesses does he have? Beyond the obvious he's logical and reserved and clever, more in-depth traits that make his character fuller and more like a real person. I'd like to hear some of your deep analysation if you don't mind.

This has take long enough and I want to post it now. [Will edit this maybe later bur now I finish the visuals lets get down to this]

Oh boy

You call it

Everybody prepare bc this may have take me awhile but be ready for my analysis at some level of him.

Warning: this is kind of my personal view of all and may sound weird at some level but I am trying to make sense to all of them (Foretellers in general). I elaborate this in my way to plan some fanfics and to do so i kind of take my time on try to analyse what I had.

You may want to go straight to Conclusions but I point out too circular thoughts at the beginning just for the sake of think of this a bit more

Analysis of Gula:

Cold headed and one of the most clever and quick to catch up stuff that may be happening. He is between the Master of Masters apprentices one of the youngest and has a special friendship develop with Ava, the youngest between all as it seems.

This is the basic we know and I want to put as a base for what I will dive at some point and ramificate to them all in a light way just to reference a bit.

Observations:

Out of my obserbations between one of the strongest things the Master’s apprentices share is their faith that the Master is right.

Back on the scene where Ira confronts them and they acknowledge a nightmare roaming the scene cuts to a flashback which different from the present it has a warm and familiar vive. The Master hold them together, they would laugh and be somehow unite, but the present just will reveal how little they may actually know each other, most of them.

The fact that Ira doubts who to point as most of the other and the rest of the movie with the exception of the bond between Gula and Ava.

Why I point this? This is something special, Gula doesn’t seem to be close to anyone except Ava. He trusts her almost to a degree as his faith for the Master but on a friend to friend way, enough to reveal her and talk about his role completely and openly on his weakest moment .

+ He can care under his masks

Gula didn’t really like his role tha much I think. He didn’t even want the Master to disappear the way he did. But let me add my point on how he came to the conclusion he just wanted things to be the way they were before by summoning KH.

He seems to be usually quick to find a solution or reasoning with whatever he has in front of him but as time passes and he hasn’t been able to succeed as any other task he may have been previously assigned. Even with his best he may have feel the stress of all falling down as I guess, every passing day and thing going worse is clear sing that he hasn’t fuli hir role as his own expectatives. He only show his weak side on the moment he feels can’t deal with it alone after months.

+ Stress if you allow me to say.

It may be me but his minimum expressions show that he didn’t like the whole “Trust no one but yourself”. He may have let it pass about Invi, Ira and Aced but the fact it include Ava may throw him off been one of the closes person he had aside the Master. He wanted to trust her and he did, even if he constantly try to remind himself his Master words.

When he got lost and no more choices left for him to take on his mind there was the last plan: Summon Kingdom Hearts may lure the Master back, right? He would not let them fall intro such foolish actions, right? or so I think may be what pass through his mind or some nature of that. To everything fall since he in no able to fulfill his role.

+ Pressure which equals at rushed actions.

He may be one of the most precise and calculative between the 6 but, he at the end even if he is the genius one he does make mistakes. Like maybe talk a bit too much into the detail sometimes, he is young so understandable he rushes a bit too much sometimes, some few times really. When he slip the fact that Invi talk him into leaving Aced’s alliance he cover any mistake fluently and so naturally that I think he may know how to handle when he wants to clear stuff is he kind of messes up at this point but he could also play the facts though if you pay attention you can tell when he say something he didn’t need to on the moment. He sure knows how to keep an act if is need.

+ Effectiveness though minor struggles on the way

Gula is a boy who keep closed to others if people don’t try much to reach to him as I guess. Ava and the master seem the type to like to know the others but I think Ira, Invi, and Aced been young adults dealing with whatever is their duty they may have let pass the young one if he wanted to approach them or not, they would not mind. My faint guess is that he doesn’t show much of his true self to other and keep the cold headed manner since is what he may feel is expect to him and may be easier than show vulnerability of his own thinking and feeling at personal level, he may show it sometimes to the Master but I guess not that much since he may want to be probe at the others level been one of the youngest.

While I feel Ava been the most reachable one may have reach to him and with time build this friendship bond they have. The only scene I saw Gula drop his ‘mask’ was when He sincere to Ava and how he feel, how pointless his role seem or how much of almost a failure he got to be in a subtle way, he could no more and share with her what has been burdening him. But she could not help him because it go against her moral, he respect that and tae his mask up and wish for her the only thing the others didn’t say to him.

+ A mask over other mask

A/N: personally at this point I am sobbing a bit inside ; ;

But even after all, even if she turn him down, she is still his friend.

So i will touch the mobile game since I doubt their last conversation was that but his will be a bit more lighter so we can reach my conclusion. I can just assume a bit here and arrange facts but maybe is me trying to understand him.

After that on Back Cover I believe that wasn’t their final talk and may had another talk before the war but at this point I assume a pre-stress state creeping on them.

Gula may have go off with his plan but I don’t think he remember he badly even after that. He keep his believes strong towards his plans which I personally feel may be his attempt of ‘desperate try’ to get the Master to come back to all of them.

He may feel he can’t do anything about the end at this point.

In this moment on the timeline I assume pretty much each foreteller has fall in osme hole of pre-stress with the Keyblade War already on their heads. Which I assume took the drastic change I perceive on the story previously and at the war. Al is ending and I am not an expert but is the only thing I could think. Kids weren’t acting as kids too at this point in some cases because they were as well exposed to this opriment part of their story, fights between wielder became frequently and so all fall apart till it reach its end.

And the reborn.

He did try to wear his mask till the end and he did.

But it wasn’t over there as you know from the Epilogue on the Dark Seeker Saga. So let me one last time before reach the conclusions, there is so few left from me repeating stuff like crazy and to the best resume I can give and is more simple but I want to point this out before dive into it.

He got back to life, but even so you all hear him ask Luxu a reason why would he not include Ava. The bond of this two is a special thing I think the Master didn’t mind but will always be something to the matter, because they care about each other and if Ava’s out I have high expectation for him to want to know what become of her.

Hear me right here, the Master may still be important to them but Gula was expecting the Master to appear, maybe a childish thing that he would save them all because he was always hold in high regard by all of them but I think his faith may be starting to shake on a slightly not solid ground. Ava didn’t help him bug did give her an answer and even so is still his friend as so he to her.

Friendship has proved to be a factor that can get you to change views or who you choose to ally so I suppose he may play along but may not let this down, still this is a faint though with all going and and I first write most of the important remarks for this before this semi rambling part, sorry about that.

Conclusions:

Gula is a teenager that has got big responsibilities, may wear a mask ver the real one with his cool headed demeanor. tuns down companionship but if you get to actually know him you may notice this is just one side of his personality.

Weighted with the responsibility to stop an inevitable betrayal, and torn between his master’s orders and the believe one of the few he trusted till he could not longer wanted to do it all alone. shows weakness and vulnerability only with the ones he trusts and can keep appreciating said trusted people even if they are not up to help him on the moment. Loyal to some degrees.

Slips and messes up but tries to keep the control of the situation even so, flexible as the situation calls. but will always to be reasonable unless he is really into do a thing on his way, so kind of stubborn I will say.

Sassy when it calls and also probably honest s needed, a mechanism to comebacks or protection maybe but mostly used to handle situations.

May have his reasons to be so close and reserved. Life is not always fair you may guess.

At the end he is just a kid would may have been happy with the few he had before all this mess start to fall down and deserve a better guidance on social skills. He means no bad but truly would be more understood if there could have been time to work with his reserved ways and mistrust to the world in general out of his closed circle of people he trusted.

He is clever but still just a kid handed down a responsibility of something bigger than him.

He as the other may have get this to work if they have know at some good portion each other and had a light weight of trust. But that wasn’t the case this time.

He is a piece on this game after all where he still may remain for a while while, or who knows?.

Okey so I finally end this mess, I did some doodles but most of all I wanted to go around this thing I may overthinking and so. i truly love gula for the many ways you can read though him slowly and maybe I can help but wish happiness for him or so I hope, because he as the others deserve a chance to learn many thing out of dutty and be more than just a piece of something that was set to be.

I don’t think he means bad but I wish he could have learn more, maybe if he were to connect with others he would have archive some progress with his way to be, I believe it may had to do with past experience but out of all, I wish i could know more on what he think out of all of been back. If he goes full change of banc I am going to cheer for him and even the other as sobbing, is just maybe that I see him and the other as humans as possible gets me soft but I wish each of them could work on their own issues with the time flow on them and encounters in the future

Geez I suck at this and just may go in circles but I think it maybe was good to remak.

Thanks for getting this far if you read all!

[shewasanamericangirl]

screamin bout zi-o 36

i had fun doing this last week, so let’s make another screencap post! of course, i said that, and then it took several days to upload all the pictures because tumblr just stops fucking working sometimes. anyhoo! it’s yuko kitajima roast hour. image-heavy and spoiler-heavy, naturally.

so ginga blew everyone up and they ran away to a sewer it seems.

honestly that theory makes as much sense as anything else on this booty ass fuckin’ kamen rider show

i was just like...he isn’t

but then he was

swartz: she could step on me in those red pumps and i’d say Thank You

hora: i regret so much right now

uhr: *shonen anime character walking down the street pose*

then over quartzer plays and im starting to feel a little lost because i don’t get to hear about the episode according to woz’s book? hello??

yuko’s still out gettin her spa treatments and shit, god only knows how she got the money for all that, and somehow she never crosses paths with the cops or anyone who recognizes her from the news?? uh

honestly yeah?? a queen deserves to look GOOD. her theme music is eerily sexy, i need an mp3 of it right now

don’t get me wrong, im well aware that swartz is being a suck-up to try and get yuko to help with his plan to seize ginga’s power, but damn im kinda shipping swartz with yuko now too...i mean, he WAS looking at her while doing the sexy ice cream thing last week. what flavor ice cream would yuko be? black cherry chip maybe?

(headcanon: woz tries apple pie ice cream and declares it a crime against both apple pie and ice cream alike--but he still eats the whole coneful)

hora and uhr get ZA WARUDO’D down the stairs by swartz

we were all uhr right here

yeaaaaaah she just doesn’t want to fight ginga

tsukuyomi’s a mood. someone put a band-aid on geiz’s forehead pls

ok woz i get that if you’re looking for a despotic ruler to follow that yuko is likely a better bet than sougo, but you’re missing an important detail: if yuko actually had a shot at becoming queen of everything, she’d already have one of you in tow, and you would most likely hate each other.

...majou means “demon queen” in this case, not “witch”, right?

aaaaaand this...is the moment when yuko started making me very uncomfortable. the way she responds: “yes...i do remember. it’s you.”

and sougo’s face just lights up--my guy, she could so easily be lying. she didn’t say one thing about the band-aid or the playground or anything that’d indicate she’s actually sougo’s crush.

like...if not for the fact that sougo had such a crush on the seifuku girl, it wouldn’t be all that major a memory. it likely wasn’t for the girl in question--just a happy sunny day cheering up a lonely little boy. a beautiful memory, yes...but memories fade.

can someone please explain to me why woz’s characterization is all over the place in kiva arc? are you pro-yuko or anti-yuko, woz? i don’t understand what’s going through his pretty head at all honestly. he gets pretty taciturn in the scenes he’s not inhaling pie, but then at times he seems to think yuko’s cool aaaaaagh i don’t know

junichiro: meowing, just wanted an excuse to cook lots of food

sougo: “yay, uncle’s cooking!”

woz: [deadpan monotone] “yaaaaaaay uncle’s cooking...”

ive had enough of this evil bitch honestly but when she points it’s still Good Shit

ridiculous move name, but also an awesome move name

and turning to stone to heal up while the sun’s clouded over? very cool

denied

i noped so hard at this part. like...i really do feel protective of sougo. yuko doesn’t give a damn about him, she just doesn’t want him to get in her way.

nope. no. nuh uh. you two step away from each other right now.

YOU CANNOT MAKE BABIES WITH AN IDIOT FETUS

ok but in all seriousness, do you want time jackers? because, im calling it now, letting oma zi-o go in raw is how you get time jackers.

yeah im pretty sure miho would’ve kept at it if she’d lived, and yuko...shes not gonna listen to sougo

thank you for the much needed reality check furry man

so she’s a...fu-joshi? 👀

☝☝☝

yuko wears such fabulous shoes

was anyone surprised at this point that yuko was the real killer? i sure wasn’t. not after all the obvious lies.

i love her leitmotif. i need it. where do i download

SHE DIDN’T PROMISE SHIT

hey kids! it’s time for *mashes play button* la-la-la lies! yeah, tell me that you love me! la-la-la-lies! look deep into my eyes! la-la-la-lies! say there’s no one else above me! i’m the king of fools, cuz baby, you’re the queen of actually very hurtful and manipulative lies!

that’s such bullshit

now im the last person to be like “don’t play the dead mommy card”--i practically keep that card in the hello kitty wallet my dead mommy gave me. but i bet you yuko’s mom is just fine (aside from living with the trauma of knowing her daughter’s a murderer and pathological liar).

sougo,,,,,pls

thank you tsukuyomi. god sougo really needs a chaperone with yuko around, he’s way too dumb and thirsty.

GUESS WHO’S BACK. BACK AGAIN. fortunately, it seems swartz and woz have been just standing there watching him for the duration of the rain shower.

lest we forget (because i didn’t screencap it), when zi-o took the brunt of ginga’s attack earlier, it sent him flying. now, that’s a human body, which has some ability to absorb force because it’s mostly pretty soft and fluid. yuko’s manhole cover almost completely absorbed this blast--she barely shifted her weight on impact. is it just that she’s THAT ripped? 

then The Boys rider kick ginga to oblivion. rip ginga, you didn’t have a personality or a character arc, we never even saw you un-transformed--you were just a cool looking plot device with pretty attacks. but for that much, we appreciate you!

swartz looks so pleased with himself. he must not have watched the preview for this episode.

YOINK! gotta love how swartz doesn’t look surprised so much as puzzled.

sure am glad kurowoz took his other self’s advice and kept an eye on swartz

i love it so much how woz just has these magic scarf powers and it needs no explanation? hell, he can fly and time travel and make people fall asleep and he’s super strong too, with no explanation? and he’s the comic relief? ALSO HE’S REALLY HOT? woz is a being to behold honestly

speaking of super strong and really hot, yuko is KILLING IT in that gown. i mean...i guess that’s the intention. killing it. cuz she’s a homicidal maniac. haha.

she’s so good at pointing. yuko could be a prosecutor in shuichi kitaoka: ace attorney. (FUND IT)

yuko throws her manhole cover at the boys (rude!) and next we see geiz holding it. a shame we don’t get to see him snatch it out of midair. or did woz catch it and just hand it to him? we may never know.

zi-o. listen to geiz, zi-o. use the fucking watch. just use the watch, zi-o. you seriously plan on just letting another kiva go on a killing spree? do you not get by now what she’s capable of?

thank goodness zi-o has his retainers to make wise decisions so he doesn’t have to.

please note the placement of mars on ginga woz’s suit. very important.

I Love You

lmao

WHERE IS YOUR MANHOLE COVER NOW

my favorite character gets a beautiful rainbow final attack. i feel so blessed.

i mean...protecting all mankind would probably include protecting them from people like yuko. just sayin.

is it bad of me that my immediate thought right then was “at least woz’s attack wasn’t what did her in.”

this shot, especially in the context of the church, definitely gave me pieta vibes--albeit reversed somewhat.

weirdly enough, woz does an outro instead of an intro this episode.

at this point while watching, i said to shylax “you know what this calls for? pie!” but before i could finish--

--PIE! cmon sougo, it’s time to gobble up your feelings!

fucking woz, i swear, you have pie in your mouth and pie in your right hand and pie on your FACE and when your overlord expresses how miserable he is you just go for his uneaten pie with your empty hand.

...is it normal to eat pie like this in japan? because the only times i’ve seen americans make this much of a mess eating pie is when they’re toddlers.

oh hey, what do you know? looks like sougo’s first love wasn’t a violent crazy person after all. she also wasn’t yuko.

sougo’s just an idiot who will mistake any older woman who rubs him on the chin and calls him cute for his sailor girl.

previews!

i blame joshua kiryu

how eloquently this one line sums up not only kamen rider zi-o but kamen rider decade as well. that’s it, that’s the show. that’s the clusterfuck we will inevitably get whenever toei decides to make a kamen rider crossover.

LOOK AT THIS! TSUKUYOMI REMEMBERED SOMETHING! who is she smiling at? is it her dad? is that swartz behind her?! omg baby tsukuyomi is so CUTE!

“a team”. uh huh. is that what the youth are calling it these days? cuz when i was a wee lass, i believe they called it “fucking”.

so what have we learned this week?

very little about ginga

sougo does not remember faces all that well

before sougo dates ANYONE that person should be fully vetted by junichiro, geiz, tsukuyomi, and woz because CLEARLY HE CANNOT SAFELY CHOOSE A PARTNER FOR HIMSELF

i still really like yuko as a character, if not as a person. same as i enjoy junji ito manga, but would be very upset if most of it happened in real life.

swartz loves a woman who can kick his ass

what the fuck are manhole covers in this world

i can’t wait for baby tsukuyomi flashbacks! that, and more tsukasa.

[crapitskizaru]

Hi there! Im not sure if you've done this already but I was wondering if you could do some head cannons/scenario about how marcos s/o would comfort and help him after pops and aces death and the payback war? Thank you, I really appreciate your work and the time you take to answer this and everyones asks :) Much love and happy thoughts sent your way! x

Warning: angst?

He was the love of their life. He was the only one that ever mattered, both now and in the past. He was the one who saved them, when they most needed it, when they thought the sun will never shine on them again. And now, he was the one who needed saving.

They glued the lunette to their eye, one more time. A faint frame of the tiny island was already visible from afar, and it was enough for them to finally let go of the returning fear of miscalculating their location on the sea, or simply being wrong about Marco's alleged locus.

How much time has it been? Two months? Two, restless, gut-wrenching, horrid months of constant search and blind guesses. He had to be there. He just had to.

"Please," they mouthed. "Wait for me. Just a little bit longer."

The sails of the tiny boat fluttered in the wind, and soon they found themselves dripping with nervous sweat, as they finally set their foot on the island's beach.

Am i really going to find him here? Is he okay? Will he talk to me? Is he even alive?

“Marco!” despite the shout, words soon mercilessly vanished in the strong wind. They grabbed the emergency set from the deck - food and water supply, a pack of matches, flashlights. They took a deep breath when their hand hovered above the first-aid kit and prayed, literally prayed that it won’t be necessary. 

An anxious snaky feeling of guilt and disappointment writhed in their gut when their search of the island started. Brief but still horrid shots of flashbacks appeared dangerously vivid in their mind when it involuntarily conjured up the memories of the War. Marco left as soon as the sounds of battle had worn down. Disappeared, vanished into thin air. Abandoned them, just like that.

How could he? 

They gritted their teeth with remorse while struggling to cross the island’s forest. Although the sun was still set high in the sky, the leaves successfully prevented the warm beams of sunlight from shooting from the sky to the cold bottom of the woods. But that wasn’t the worst thing. 

Silence. Deep silence took over the surroundings, waring their senses for the incoming danger. Spending the last weeks on nothing more than sailing, the sudden calmness was more than dreadful. The sea never turned silent. Whether it was for the soothing manner of how the waves crashed against the ship’s side, or the constant fluttering of the sails in the wind, or even the faint creaking of the wooden mast, it was never this quiet.

They flinched when a dry twig broke in half under their foot. Their rather adventurous, broad imagination already came up with more than a thousand, brutal scenarios of how they might die here, and no one will ever get to know about it. Because how? Their former crew was either dead, at the verge of breakdown, or drunk out of their minds, trying to finally end their mourning. No one cared about anything else, simply because it was still too early to move on. 

“I’m going to find you, Marco,” they muttered, and with a reassuring fix of their backpack’s strap on the shoulder, they wandered off deeper into the forest. 

Ten hours. It took ten hours to find the complex of caves, meandering and writhing underneath the forest’s grounds. The dryness of their tongue already shifted from horridly annoying to mild numbness, the courtesy of the last bottle of water being saved for Marco, in whatever condition he remained. Sweat completely managed to drench their clothes, making them both sticky with exhaustion and cold at the same time. 

They called out his name once again. Hours of constant straining of their sight and hearing let them know about themselves when black dots started flickering in front of their eyes. If he’s not here, they might as well lay down and wait for death to come and get them. 

Suddenly, a faint glimmer of blue shot somewhere deep within the darkness of the cave, and died down as fast as it appeared. Their legs didn’t even wait for a command, as they hobbled into the new direction, eyes focused on the tiny point where the blue light last shone. 

“Marco!” 

They recognized him, even despite his crooked posture, as the man was pressed tightly against the stone wall, arms wrapped around his legs and eyes staring blankly into the void. The sight itself made them shed tears of both joy and unbearable pain when they crouched down beside him; it took four sprinkles of water against his dry cheeks for him to finally focus his gaze. 

“Why did you come?” 

His voice was lifeless, dull, like the whole energy had been literally sucked out from it. It was the voice of a dying, miserable shadow of a man. 

“Was I supposed to leave you? In a time like this?” they asked, hand darting to palm over his chin and caressing his drained lip with affection. And when he flinched from their touch, there was no such thing on Earth that could stop the waterfall of tears from flowing down their eyes, onto the stone-cold floor of the cave. 

“It would be better for everyone, yoi.” 

“Not for me.” They beat themselves up internally from how shaky their tone sounded. That’s not how a person who’s supposed to be strong talks. 

Without being able to trust their own voice, they just pushed themselves against his side, head resting on his shoulder and fingers entwining with his. Although he didn’t reciprocate the gesture, it was okay. He was alive, safe and sound, which was already more than enough. 

“We’re going to get through this,” they squeezed their eyes shut, trying to ignore the pungent smell of their bodies and the cold cave, overgrown with moss. How Marco managed to survive in such place, they had no idea. But the most important thing was, from now on, he’s not alone. “Together.”