#theyre totally fighting

[neon-kazoo]

Hero and Villain go to Sky Zone

Hero dodged to the left, then quickly to the right. Bright red pillars scattered around them, and they weaved gracefully between them. They grabbed the coarse ropes of a net, and scrambled upwards as fast as their tangled limbs could take them. They risked a glance to their left and caught a glimpse of Villain doing the same. They quickly reached up, using their trained grip strength to traverse a ten foot gap in their path. They had to be faster. They had to work harder. They had to win.

Their feet hit the ground with painful reverberation, but there was no time to stop and rest. Diving forward, they crawled through the darkened tunnel, their knees sliding on the slick material as they pushed forward. Up ahead, they could see the light at the end of the tube illuminating an open plain occupied only by the spinning blades of the final obstacle.

They reached it in record time, wasting not even a second to deliberate. They saw a gap and they lunged for it. A blade came hurtling towards them and they jumped, moving forward a step before the next one came. They leapt over the following blade, clearing it just before something crashed into them from behind. Sprawled out flat, they lifted their head to locate their assailant. Unfortunately, they forgot to calculate for the velocity of the forgotten obstacle. While Villain ducked under the last blade and made it to the gap in the wall, Hero was left behind to get smacked in the head.

Dazed, Hero finally managed to stumble off the padded plain and onto more solid ground.

“That’s the most impressive run I’ve seen today,” a man in a red polo shirt congratulated, but the two finishers were already racing past him.

Seeing an opening, Villain ran past and grabbed a long pole, then dashed onto a long beam and turned to face Hero.

All around the open building, young eyes followed the two enthusiastic players.

Hero, accepting the challenge, grabbed a pole for themselves and followed Villain out onto the beam.

“You picked the wrong section. My balance is unmatched,” Hero taunted, holding up their red weapon with two cushioned ends.

Villain replied, matching Hero’s stance with their blue padded weapon, “Really? How’s your hit absorption?”

Villain swung for the ribs and was blocked, red colliding with blue in a struggle for leverage. Both opponents swayed unsteadily, their feet wobbling and their eyes scanning for possible landing zones below them.

When they inevitably both went tumbling into a sea of primary colors, screams of victory followed them both.

Foam blocks were flying five, then ten feet in the air. Blurs of red, yellow, and blue obscured the views of the children who stood wide-eyed at the edge of the pit. One cube veered far off course, hitting a young girl in the face. She and the others wisely took a step back. Oblivious to the stunned—but unharmed— child, the polyurethane war continued.

Villain was the first to their feet, and they abandoned the pit and headed for where the floor turned black and bouncy, broken by a grid of red padding. They bounced diagonally to the farthest corner where the trampolines covered the walls as well as the floor. Hero, hot on their tail, jumped between the squares at an impressive speed.

Before they could reach Villain, they were caught on the wrist by different man in a red shirt and khaki shorts.

“Hey, it’s time to go,” he said, tapping his wrist at his watch.

“What?” Hero asked in confusion, looking down at their own wrist where a yellow paper band laid.

Beyond them, Villain stopped bouncing to watch the scene unfold.

“I’m sorry, you only paid for an hour,” the attendant explained patiently.

“But- But! What about him!” Hero pointed an accusatory finger towards the villain, who looked nothing short of absolutely overjoyed by Hero’s situation.

“His band is purple. He paid for two hours.”

“What?! Then can’t I just pay for more?”

“Sorry sir, we’re full. You’re going to have to give back the socks and leave,” he spoke politely, but the corners of his mouth were frayed even with the classic customer-service smile, and it was clear he was reaching the end of his shift.

Hero deflated, knowing they couldn’t argue with the poor minimum-wage employee in front of them without compromising their morals and their public image.

“You heard the man,” Villain mocked, moving closer to the hero.

Hero’s jaw remained discarded on the floor as they reached a bench on which they could sit down and start peeling to borrowed socks from their feet.

“This isn’t over,” they called over their shoulder as they walked past a smug Villain who stood with their arms crossed over their chest.

“Sure it isn’t, just like you weren’t knocked off first.”

Hero froze, seething, but wisely chose to keep walking.

The kids were watching, after all.

[mongeese]

Very small piece overshadowed by everything else but I full almost cried at Elgin's line here. Service to others and service to a cause you believe in as service to yourself. Not working for anyone else but dedicating yourself to your work and your community because you want to, because it matters to you. So fucking true. Anyway totally unrelated hc that definitely isn't me projecting I think Elgin's butch

[Image ID: A screenshot of The Silt Verses transcript. It reads

"PAIGE stares at her. She's genuinely touched.

PAIGE: Do you do anything for yourself, Elgin?

ELGIN: (Almost surprised by the question) All of this has been for me. You know that Paige, don't you?"

End ID]

[oceanwithouthermoon]

ive come to realise that i dont actually hate kubokai, i just hate the way people write them

[jesterjaxx]

I have duntrent brainrot guys

What if we were two archetypes of 2000s boy crushes and we were emo and we had enough chemistry to blow up a small office building

[darkfoxkirin]

When Edgin and Xenk spar.

[aroaceleovaldez]

the discord brainstormed a "HoO plot but better" au where it's more focused on being the Gigantomachy + The Odyssey (like how the first series was primarily the Titantomachy + The Iliad, particularly TLO) rather than the awkward Gigantomachy + 7 Against Thebes + Argonauts juggling, and i literally have not stopped thinking about it since. someone remind me to explain it at some point because i'm obsessed with it. it's just extremely fun.

[where-the-water-flows]

something I keep coming back to, because other than 'ok but what about this canon divergence --' what I apparently really dig into is stupid world building details, is like.

how does the list of 10,000 actually uh. handle di feisheng coming back and being around again.

like he was the second ranked guy, right, Li xiangyi was top ranked, both of them "died", congratulations number 3 you're now top of the jianghu, everyone automatically moves up two ranks! ranking fights continue as normal, the three saints duel/kill their way up to the top eventually, all is gucci in the world.

except uh, a decade on, di feisheng is... actually not dead, was never dead, and also, he clearly beat Li xiangyi (because Li xiangyi is dead and di feisheng is uh, not), who was the last guy in the line of combat succession top ranked guys, making di feisheng presumably Top Ranked in terms of 'beat the guy who beat the guy [etc] who was top ranked'! no one has beaten di feisheng, therefore he is still, presumably, the top ranked guy because he hasn't uhhh actually lost a fight about that.

but it's been a decade? everyone else has spent ten years fighting the line of combat succession that forked from the guy who was number 3 a decade ago, and who does not fall into the line of direct combat succession for top rank at all, on account of the two idiots apparently taking each other out/mass rank promotion incident in the east sea.

basically: are there a lot of arguments in the jianghu about who's Actually top ranked, because like. on the one hand, fuck you, you can't walk away for a decade and waltz back in at number 1, snooze you lose, and on the other hand, fuck you, he's never actually lost! therefore he is undefeated in rank, therefore he's the top ranked guy!

(everyone gets another headache when it turns out Li Xiangyi is also still alive, because like, ok, now there are three people who have all been thought to be top ranked, who the fuck do you have to beat to be Actually For Real The Best)

[doctorbeans]

the neibelheim incident is the perfect example of why i love how cloud and zack’s characters are written. the whole game is about zack building up this rock solid foundation of morals, like his unfaltering loyalty and kindness, so that when he’s given the opportunity in the nibel reactor to catch sephiroth unawares and stop him before he hurts anyone else, he physically can’t bring himself to betray his friend and literally stab him in the back.

whereas cloud follows his sorry ass straight to the reactor, takes zack’s sword, and stabs that bitch without hesitation. he SKEWERED that man before he even said a word to him, and the only thing he had to say was “you killed my mom, fuck you”

even after cloud absorbs zacks personality and memories, he doesn’t pick up zack’s sense of mercy and morality, cloud operates under the assumption that the people he is fighting won’t give anyone else a fair shot, so why should he play fair. its one of my favorite things abt his character and i don’t think zakkura writers give enough attention to how much zack and cloud would argue if they ever had to work together post-game. like, cloud is full of rage 24-7. he was ready to tear shin-ra apart with avalanche for the smallest amount of gil. when tifa lets slip that johnny might rat avalanche out, cloud is ready to shank his ass. he tries to attack sephiroth almost any time he sees him, hallucination or not. where zack is very trusting and moral, cloud does whatever he has to in order to keep him and his friends safe, even if his friends don’t approve. he very much fights like someone who has only ever fought for survival and its such a good bit of writing

[ardentpoop]

they're actively trying to kill me again

[marz-likes-palaces]

i need to start to live blog fucking bitb just to talk about whatever the fuck is kian doing right now. what the fuck. why is he jorking it from his sleep. what.

[stuck-in-the-ghost-zone]

OKAY. OKAY. WINTERS FAMILY TORMENT NEXUS. as i've said before this is all REALLY vague rough outlines bc i wanted to bounce it all back n forth with u. but. what i have:

>winters family (mark & ashe & fridged mom/wife) live in a location hit by the simurgh

>mark is at work when she arrives. something horrific happens at home. maybe his wife is injured or hurt, but not killed. ashe (7/8/9) triggers. whatever his powers are, they. do Not help heal his mom. in fact the opposite.

>mark tears back home asap instead of leaving as soon as he hears her song, actively choosing to stay in her effect zone for his family. finds newly triggered baby ashe & the rest of that scene.

>theyve spent too long in the affected zone to be allowed to go free, especially since ashe triggered from it. mark nukes his whole past life & ashe's to escape without undergoing all the protocols. he spends ages doing shit work to support him & ashe bc theyre both legally dead, ends up working for overlord, manages to get enough of a fake past to get through cauldron background checks & get powers? it'll pay so much better than the grunt work he's doing now & he has to support ashe (powered)(legally dead)(would probably be executed if anyone Found Out)....

anyway to me the trickster is like. the endgame of this specific simurgh rube goldberg. somehow it doesn't end horrifically, for once! but it gets. bad. the fact that they're simurgh survivors is always looming over their heads. its why mark fucking freaks out when ashe joins the wards. literally have nothing more specific than this though u gotta help me put meat on these bones!!!!! STOP "being responsible" and "doing work" and stuff START thinking incessantly abt nhw ashe!!!!! i don't even know his powers bc i have no clue how he triggered!!!! augh. god. them..... mods torture that blonde man in the most narratively satisfying and fucked up way possible!!!!

QUIT YOUR JOB JOIN MY EMO WARDS !!!!!!!!!!!!! god dude god dude I'm gonna be thinking about this all fucking DAY . who needs to be responsible and have a job. not me!!!! FUCK !!!!!!!! dude im just. thinking abt mark being at work getting the notice to evacuate and starting to hear the song and. bc it's important to me that he's a little bit of a coward. it takes him longer than he will ever admit to decide to go back to his family. he definitely hesitates and hates himself for it because. what if he had gotten there 10 minutes earlier! who fucking knows! he never will!!

god man I'm just thinking about. that scene where they're in the hospital waiting to hear back about noelle and the person (ai?) at the desk is giving them the rundown of all the containment procedures and handing them paperwork and asking them if they can pay for the medical care. how fucked up would that be to hear after you're in the midst of losing everything. mark winters the universes most hated man. I looooooove the satisfaction in thinking about that snap decision where he goes from "relatively normal if a little emotionally repressed but otherwise does his best suburban dad" to "my wife is dead and my son is fucked up and there's this fucking sound in my head that won't go away I'm about to erase everything and break several laws in order to get us out of here" and how that eventually leads into. supervillain. it's just soooooooo. sickos haha yessss the downfall of this fucking miserable blonde guy. when do you think he consciously made that choice. he heard "you're never going to get out of here and live a normal life again" do you think he just . sat with that for a while. ashe unresponsive either due to shock or fear or the trauma of triggering/whatever his powers are and mark just has to sit there. by himself. like what the fuck am I gonna do now. auaghghghghhhh I need 2 make him so miserable forever. fuck that guy i hate his ass (<< me when I lie)

I THINK . I NEED TO SIT FOR A WHILE AND FINISH THESE NEXT COUPLE CHAPTERS AND PROCESS A LITTLE MORE BEFORE I MAKE A SOLID DECISION ON ASHES POWERS. but you knowwwww it's gonna be some fucked up horror shit. it has to be. it has to be something fucked up enough that mark forbids him from using his powers and keeps him . at home isolated for his own good. but not TOO fucked that he wouldn't be able to join the wards.

actually speaking of. HOW THE FUCK DOES HE JOIN THE WARDS. I know mark basically fucking erased their whole identity and everything but. there's noooo way the prt would let this kid join them. right?????? right????. how the hell would that even be a possibility with all the precautions in place for simurgh survivors. THEY EXPLODED THAT ONE CAPE GUYS HEAD BECAUSE HE STAYED IN PROXIMITY FOR A LITTLE BIT TOO LONG. maybe it's unofficial. maybe he never Officially joins them but he sneaks out while mark is gone and meets the boys somewhere and they become friends out of costume first. and then they learn about his powers and ashe is like "I can help!" and helps them like. as a rogue or something. but hes never registered as an official cape. is this anything. im thinking about him so much what the fuuuuuck have we done. what have we done !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[triglycercule]

killer should know about dumb video game meta stuff ike i-frames and animation cancels and critting amd breaking out of bounds and use it to his advantage in fights. maybe he learned it from chara in something new as a silly little thing to try out because theyre already teaching him all this bullshit on killing so whos to say a video game character cant learn a player's cheats?? he's already interacted and collaborated with a player before i think its fair he knows tricks on how to cheat undertale's fighting system

everything's all fine and dandy in a fight against killer (no it isn't) until you see him glitching around and somehow phasing through your attacks. he looks ridiculous but it gets the job done

[foccaccia]

rereading animorphs and once in a while marco will say “people dont understand the word ruthless. they think it means ‘mean.’ its not about being mean. its about seeing the bright, clear line that leads from a to b. the line that goes from motive to means. beginning to end. its about seeing that bright, clear line and not caring about anything but the beautiful fact that you can see the solution. not caring about anything else but the perfection of it.” and then repeat it, over and over, "i can see the bright clear line and i know she can too" as he tries over and over again, as he tries to lead a group of his friends to kill his own mother, who is host and slave to the leader of a race of parasitic slugs who have so much genocide and incomprehensible crimes on their hands its impossible to describe in a succinct post

and then they go to school the next day and giggle about cinnabon, play video games, and steal back a doodle saying "cassie ♡ jake" from another students house. bc theyre all like. 13 years old. and the second they stop having to carry the weight of a species and a war on their shoulders, theyre really fucking written like 13 year olds k.a. applegate did such a good job with this series

[riordanverse-ship-polls]

Will a ship blog reblogging a pol of said ship skew the results?

That's perfectly fine! Reblogs are expected, and I tag each poll with the ship in question, so it's already expected that said poll will reach that specific ship's community.

Our only request is that you don't campaign for specific results - so no encouraging specific votes or telling people what to vote for to achieve a certain goal. Just reblogging to a ship blog is perfectly fine!

[tadpal]

but seriously if you're taking inspiration from emma for your story/characterisation and you DONT make them good friends who seek eachother out constantly . then you've simply missed the point

[clonehub]

nobody can talk to ridge about fighting for the republic once he's succesfully escaped it, he's gotta be probably the most critical of the republic government out of all the clones. saying "our purpose [as clones] is to fight!" will get you "who told you that? The Kaminoans that 'bred' us for money or the government that won't pay us and won't let us vote?"