#when he came back to be saburo again

[megaclubdiolis]

Michinaga's costume evolution

[akkivee]

can’t believe they just highlighted ichiro and kuukou’s hand size difference and matching rings set up in one swoop like that lmao

[teenytinytippy]

Some cute Hypmic headcanons I thought of at 3 A.M

(Spoilers ahead for some characters!!!)

Ichiro

Used to kiss his younger bros goodnight when they were little kids. Now he does it now and then when he thinks they're asleep (Sabs caught him in the act, though).

King of Bisexuality.

Jiro

Had a small crush on a tomboy he met at the orphanage. They used to play football together. One day, she got adopted, and he never saw her again.

Saburo

Has a little music box given to him by his mother when he was a baby. It's the only clear memory he has of her, so he holds it dear. It's also the source of his fondness for classical music. Nobody knows where he hides it, though.

Samatoki

Used to do Nemu's hair after their mother passed. As a result of this, he's very good at styling hair.

Also used to sing to his sister, mostly to calm her down during his father's violent outbursts. He sometimes hums to himself while thinking of her.

Jyuto

Had a gay awakening when he was a teenager. An upperclassman approached him so cunningly and lifted his chin with his hand while questioning him about something, similar to how Jyuto questions guys now. He still thinks about that boy from time to time.

Rio

Went to the U.S. when he was 3 years old and stayed there with his father's family for three years. His father is Irish-American.

Ramuda

He's intersex, as are most of the clones created after him. Some of them, however, appeared to be fully male.

Likes collecting fashion dolls from time to time, and has four custom ones: one of each Fling Posse member and another of the former owner of Empty Candy, Hanabi Maijou.

Has convinced his teammates to cuddle with him in bed.

Gentaro

Is on the Autism spectrum while his twin brother is not.

Is interested in FlingPoly fanfiction.

Ramuda gave him a boudoir doll as a present once.

Dice

Got a nosebleed after seeing Ramuda in a peculiarly cute outfit. The image stayed in his head for quite a long time. (Inspired by what Dice's new stage actor said in the cross talk, after seeing Ramuda's stage actor in costume for the first time)

He sometimes purrs unvoluntarily. Gentaro and Ramuda tease him for it.

Jakurai

Has sung Yotsutsuji to sleep on some occasions. He also did that to Hifumi and Doppo one night.

He was very popular with the girls back in the day, and word got out that he had a huge crush on someone. Hitoya even teased him for it. Little did he know that Jakurai's crush was Hitoya himself.

Hifumi

Was very effeminate growing up. He especially liked to play with his sister's necklaces and other jewelry.

Doppo

Cried when Jakurai sang them to sleep that one night.

He stims by drawing circles on the floor with his finger, something he has done since pre-school when he was alone. When he's angry or frustrated, he does it with his middle finger.

Sasara

Had a funny, contagious laugh when he was a baby or so his mother would say. Everyone who heard him in passing would smile or laugh as well. Maybe he was a comedian from the very start, after all.

Rosho

Learned to talk before he learned to walk and could say very complicated words and phrases for a toddler.

Rei

He can whine his hips pretty well.

Ichiro is the one who resembles him the most in his youth.

Sometimes, he sees himself and his wife/baby mama in Rosho and Sasara. He would never admit that to them, though.

Kuko

Can dabke and taught his teammates and also Ichiro how to dabke.

In the rare times when he feels like crying, he either meditates alone or next to someone he absolutely trusts, which, as of right now, includes his father Shakku, Hitoya, and Jyushi. The latter two were confused when it happened but felt more at ease and honored after Shakku explained this to them.

Jyushi

Sometimes does nail art on Kuko's nails.

He fluctuates between masc and femme styles on the daily. Kuko once mistook him for a young woman passing by when he came to the temple to greet him.

Hitoya

Was a big fat baby who grew into a skinny child.

Is actually swole.

Will become a father of girls (and the best father anyone could have).

Otome

In her teenage years, she would use poetry as a means to vent her frustrations. She would also go on to dedicate poems to her ex-husband and, later on, her first son Dice.

Was absolutely smitten with Dice in his first years, insisting on doing the motherly affairs by herself, much to the maid's dismay.

Really wanted a daughter and was seriously thinking about giving Dice a little sister before everything went down with her marriage.

Ichijuku

She and her sister would often wear matching bows to school in her younger years.

Lets Nemu adorn her hair with ribbons and flowers during their outings. She secretly loves the look, even if it looks messy.

Nemu

Was a premature child.

Is not good at styling her hair since it's something her mother and brother used to do for her. Sometimes, she unknowingly self-soothes by stroking it.

Was interested in ballet at some point in her childhood.

Queen of Bisexuality.

Honobono

Is a pretty good dancer and gymnast. She used to do ballet and acrobatics in her youth.

Was the type of girl who would absolutely destroy her dolls while playing with them.

Yotsutsuji

Sleeps in a fetal position.

Is pretty quiet when sneaking in. He even startled Jakurai once.

[seraphimcollections]

fading part. i

pairing: johnny silverhand x reader

summary: mortal enemies from birth. the devil and the angel, good versus evil. you, the prodigy netrunner and hidden child of the Arasaka global empire. him, rebellious outcast and infamous rockstar of Night City. Sworn enemies with the odds stacked against them, but fate is fickle thing.

warnings: gun violence, murder, blood, kidnapping, grooming (not by johnny), rockstar behavior, angst angst angst! sexual implications, eventual smut, slowburn, secret enemies to lovers, fluff.

a.n: hey everyone! thx for the love and for your patience. luv ya!

word count: 2.8

masterlist

//…memory shard detected…[uploading]]]///…[year 2010]]..//..memory upload [complete.]///

The days started like any other. The gentle pinging of the alarm clock summoned the curtains to slowly pull away from each other, letting in the sunlight. You groaned at the sudden intrusion of the warmth of the sun, burrowing deeper into the 1000 count sheets that clung to your frame. You tried your best to hide from the beginning of the day, but you knew your AI companion wouldn’t allow it. Tomie materialized first as a disembodied voice.

“Good morning, Hina-san,” she said cheerfully.

You sighed as you rolled onto your back, finally letting your eyes crack open. Your long dark hair pooled underneath you as you laid there, sleep still creeping at the back of your eyelids. The rest of the room came to life, the gentle LED lights illuminating the marble floors.

“Morning, Tomie,” you sighed, a hand running over your face.

“The weather is superb today in beautiful Osaka, temperatures sitting at 23 celsius. The itinerary for the day includes breakfast, grilled mackerel, pickled vegetables and steamed rice. After breakfast, Sanada-san will pick up where you left off…”

Your mind wondered as Tomie listed off the rest of your day like she did every day. There wasn’t much divergence from your daily schedules which usually consisted of sustenance, hours upon hours of lessons ranging from history, homemaking, advanced quantum mechanics but your favorite, netrunning. This came all too easy for you and it was almost an escape from your mundane life. It came to you like walking, something that your uncle was impressed by, but he’d never show it. By the age of 12 you had already cemented yourself as one of the best, something that even your stoic uncle could find pride in. A nameless prodigy. All because of this namesake. A name that every person on this godforsaken planet knew of, either fondly or with despair, but a name they knew all the same. Arasaka.

It was a name that held great power, a name tied to a megacorp that had it’s hands in practically everything. From what you knew from your uncle Saburo, the corporation dealt in corporate security, manufacturing and banking -- and that’s all he would explain. Saburo practically raised you after your mother passed in complications with an unknown sickness that befell her days after your birth. It was a tragedy that brought mourning looks directed toward you whenever you dared ask about your mother. But just like everything else, that’s all you knew. Even when you tried to pry answers from your servant staff, it was always the same:

“Ah, Hina-san, unfortunately that isn’t for me to say…”

Perhaps a few years ago you would have swallowed these empty answers and carried on with your day but now, as the days rolled helplessly into the next, you could feel yourself getting restless. It was hard enough that you hardly ever got to leave the giant yet empty penthouse you’ve called your home for as long as you could remember, bad enough that you couldn’t do anything without being supervised. Again, in the beginning, having servants follow and fulfill your every whim didn’t bother you, but just as these unanswered questions began to eat at you, so did these instances.

You sighed as you swung your feet over the edge of the bed, letting them hit the chilled white marble. You raised your arms above you, letting out another groan.

“Tomie, start the shower please,” you said tiredly.

“Yes, Hina-san.”

You could hear the shower start from the connected bathroom as you settled onto your feet. You sighed as you stared over the city of Osaka, the tall skyscrapers aflame with giant advertisements. You stared down to the street, squinting to see if you could spot the people, only to find small specks. How could it be that every little speck down there had their own lives, their own hopes and dreams? Their own freedom to make decisions? You sighed as you looked back over the glittering skyline. There’s so much world out there, and yet it all seems…far.

“Hina-san, the water is at the temperature you prefer,” Tomie snapped you out of your thoughts.

You turned and walked into the connected bathroom, steam misting up the shower glass and vanity mirror. You stripped yourself of your cotton pajamas, leaving them in the hamper before stepping under the water. The warmth coaxed a groan from you as the water poured over you. You stood under the waterfall, letting your mind wander. Your mind felt somehow heavy, clouded.

“Tomie, run a diagnostic, please,” you ran your hands through your locks, before stopping to stare at the palms of your hands.

“Are you feeling unwell, Hina-san?” Tomie said, programmed to sound concerned.

You shook your head, “no, I don’t think so? Can you run it please?”

“As you wish.”

You let out a heavy breath as Tomie scanned your biometrics, their data scattering over your vision. It was over in seconds.

“There is not anything I could sense to be the matter,” Tomie said. “Can you describe the symptoms?”

You rocked your head back with a sigh, “overwhelming loneliness and hunger, but not for food. For…anything, I suppose.”

“Hm, I see,” Tomie said, “it appears you are suffering from another depressive episode. Should I call your guru?”

You shook your head as you shut off the water to the shower, “no, just cancel all of my lessons for the day.”

“Are you sure? You canceled them yesterday,” said Tomie as you began to towel dry yourself.

“Just do it, please,” you said gently, wrapping your hair up into the towel.

You stepped over to the cup of real water sitting neatly next to a small dish containing one blue pill. You grimaced as you picked up the pill, examining it once more. Something else key to your daily routine, your medication. You had begun taking it regularly when you first told Saburo how restless you were becoming. Your restlessness manifested mostly in your dreams. These dreams felt so real but it was like you were living in someone else’s body. It scared you, deeply. Once you brought it up to your uncle during one of his rare visits, it was then did you see another type of emotion besides stoicness. He was actually concerned, something that frazzled you even more back then. He quickly referred you to the guru and got you on the most expensive of drugs, and like magic, the dreams went away but not so much the anxiety. With a sigh, you swallowed the lone pill and chased it down with water.

You walked out in your wardrobe picking the same pressed and virgin white loungewear. Once dressed you finally stepped back into your room, collapsing back onto your bed. You let your mind go into autopilot as your hands brushed through your damp locks.

“Would you like your food brought to you, Hina-san?” Tomie said.

You shook your head as you set the towel beside you, “not hungry. I’ll be in my chair.”

You walked out of your room, entering the towering hallway that led to the other connected room and eventually the living parlor (never once used as intended) that led onto the remotely operated elevator. The first servant stood at her post directly beside your door. She bowed deeply, greeting your softly. Her uniform was simple and reminiscent of a traditional style. You bowed your head out of respect.

“Thank you, I’ll be in my den,” you said.

The young woman stood to her height, her expression concerned. You were beginning to get tired of this look.

“Will you not be enjoying your breakfast, Hina-san?” she asked.

You smiled gently, trying to ease the young woman’s worry. You couldn’t blame the difficult job that was handed. Getting to this position was not an easy feat. Saburo was a fickle man who craved nothing but perfection, something that wasn’t lost on the personnel he hired.

“Yumi-san, please don’t worry about it,” you smiled.

Yumi smiled childishly and nodded. You headed down the steps until your reached the below level. You stepped through the automatic clear door into a netrunning den. The walls were lined with countless state of the art servers, the wires stemming like tentacles from them only for them to meet in the center of the room where you chair lie. You sighed, an invisible weight lifting off your shoulders as you stepped deeper into your den. Your hand glided across the white leather of your chair before climbing on. You settled into the leather with a sigh, grabbing the large port that would be your entrance into the net. You move your hair over your shoulder before plugging in, your optics lighting up like a Christmas tree. You relaxed back into the chair, eyes flickering over the data flooding your brain. Perhaps at one time the amount of sheer data held by the entirety of The Net, worldwide, would have been too much to handle -- but you weren’t any normal run of the netrunner. You were the best.

“Ok, see you on the other side, Tomie,” you sighed, eyes falling closed.

“Enjoy your trip, Hina-san.”

Your vision bloomed into pure white, blinding you. For a moment, it felt as if you were falling through cool water, the feeling completely enveloping your being. For a moment, it felt like you would be falling forever before the feeling stopped abruptly. The hum of the net vibrated against you as you finally opened your eyes. Before laid a field of darkness gently illuminated by grids of blue and white light. You looked over your virtual avatar materialized in your space, finding the only difference being your white netrunning jumper. The silence was threatened by the hum of the never ceasing net, which you were well aware was the voices of millions of people scattered across the globe. In the beginning, having access to such a delicate and ruthless place as the net was thrilling. For a while you found pleasure hacking into rival corporations like Millitech or Biotechica, but even this became too easy. Too boring. Not even slithering past the NUSA’s best netrunners brought suspense. It was all too easy.

“Tomie, where are you?” Your voice glitched and echoed in the endless chamber.

In a blink, Tomie’s digital body materializes beside you, her tall frame donning a traditional yukata with her hair tied neatly in a bun.

“I’m here, Hina-san,” she smiles politely.

You smile back at her before waving your hand, selecting a direct strand of the net, its glow illuminating the space around. Your fingers tinkered with, threading through the threads of light and combing out any discrepancies and viruses with ease.

“And how is the Arasaka estate doing today?” Tomie asked, peering over your shoulder.

“Well…” You spread your arms apart, the column of light growing to surround you both comfortably.

Your finger dreamed against your lip as you peered over the collected abstracts that held all secrets and deals of Arasaka. Everything that was Arasaka lied right in front of you, your duty to protect it at all costs.

“Hm, same old things,” you sigh, crossing your arms, “Millitech rearing its head again -- honestly, what could they possibly wish to achieve.”

“Possibly another Corp War for them to benefit from?” Tomie answered.

You sighed, your eyes narrowing in a red speck of flickering light. You curled your fingers toward yourself, the red speck instantly falling in front of your eye.

“How interesting,” you murmur as you inspect the little virus closer.

“What is it?”

“It seems that NetWatch has thrown a little interest toward Arasaka,” your brow furrowed. “It looks like a simple recon virus, I want to believe that they wish to keep Arasaka in check.”

“Hm, how arrogant,” Tomie frowned. “Will we retaliate?”

You took the small speck between your fingers before crushing it between them.

“There’s no use, report this to my uncle’s assistants,” you said with a sigh, restricting the Arasaka database back to a single strand of light. “Tomie, I think I’ll be here for a moment, I’ll call for you later.”

“Yes, but I should inform you about-”

“No appointments or lessons today, remember?” You smile gently urging the AI to simply nod and disappear into the nether.

Once you knew you were alone, you let out a sigh as you looked out into the endless chamber. Your mind settled into your usual routine, preparing to do a thorough sweep of all of Arasaka’s servers and protected data, when you heard something that shouldn’t have been. A voice. Your brow furrowed and you came to stop. Your tuned your ears to listen, only to find the same familiar silence. You shook your head.

“Maybe a rogue AI hiding somewhere, I-”

But there it was again. But this time it wasn’t a whisper, it was a shout. It ripped through cyberspace, shaking you. You gasped as you looked around to see that the space around you rippled and shook from the sound.

“What is this?” You wondered.

Your eyes squinted as you peered into the depths of the Net, hearing the static humming begin to get louder and louder. Scanning the disturbance, you detected the noise was coming from within the Arasaka security servers. Typically such servers were quiet, something that the other netrunners were mainly in charge of since it was typically more local problems that were easily snuffed out. But this was different.

Your eyes narrowed as the endless space began to move past you, speeding through the Net and hurtling toward the noise. The noise became louder and louder the closer you came until finally the shouting and buzzing was deafening. You stopped with a gasp before a glowing red strand that pulsated in rage. It looked almost…alive. That’s not possible, you thought. The noise was almost overwhelming, completely taking over the space around you. Hesitantly you reach out for the strand, flinching at the moment your fingertips brushed against the digital cord, media burst out from it. Your eyes widened in shock as numerous screens appeared around you, the source of the noise becoming clear.

You twirled around, looking at all the screens in bewilderment.

“What’s going on?” You spoke to yourself.

Your gaze stopped on a particular screen. Quickly scanning it, you deciphered it as security footage of an angry mob of people congregating in front of a barricade held up by Arasaka men. The mob had destroyed the front of the building, small fires littered across the crowd.

“Death to Corps!”

“Arasaka is the real terrorists!”

Your heart dropped. They were angry - no, they were vengeful.

“Tomie?” You shouted over the video.

“Yes, Hina-san?”

“Where is this?” You said, your eyes never leaving the screen.

“This is Arasaka Tower, located in Night City of Pacific Coast, North America.”

You swiped away the screen, bringing up another. You listened to their chants, all calling for the end of corporations, but Arasaka specifically.

“Why the anger?” You wondered cluelessly. “I don’t understand, Uncle said that because of our position there, Night City has been able to remain free from the NUSA. So why?”

“There is no use in ever understanding the human condition, especially its relationship with anger and vengeance,” Tomie bodiless voice said.

You shook your head. You couldn’t understand why Tomie was being so cryptic all of sudden. Of course you knew that Arasaka had its enemies, clear by the daily nuisances of the other corps, but you never knew there was this much…hatred. But there was a voice that was the loudest amongst the crowd. Just one. You scanned and searched for who the voice belonged to until you finally found them. Your eyes widened in wonder when you looked over the man. Because that’s all he was, a man. His hair long and shaggy and his eyes obscured by gold rimmed aviators. He wore a bullet proof vest and held a guitar strapped to his back. A guitar?

“Yes, it seems to be of the older variety,” Tomie said.

The man shouted into a megaphone, the crowd echoing his chants. For all extensive purposes, it seemed that this single man had rallied all of these people for this cause. A cause you still were struggling to wrap your head around. You found yourself studying the man closer, partially listening to his hurtful chants. As you watched you couldn’t help but wonder who this man was.

“Tomie-”

A searing white light obliterated everything around you as you were pulled out from the Net. Your bio eyes snapped open in shock, beads of sweat rolling down your brow. As your optics flickered back into frame your den became clear. There was a figure stood over you, blocking out the harsh fluorescent lights. Your chest heaved as the all too familiar voice reminded you just where you were.

“Were you not expecting me, my dear?”

You gulped as you saw your reflection in his glasses.

“Uncle…”

///Memory shard complete…awaiting/transmission…///[ERROR] - MEMORY LOST///

TAG LIST: @moldonfruit @0moonjelly0

(Please let me know if the tags worked, thank u!)

[partyofwords]

Older Sister Yamada ~ *Ichiro Yamada*

Summary: Ever since you've started dating Ichiro, you've taken on the role of older sister of the Yamada Brothers. Each night is crazy, but it's times like this that makes you happy to have that role.

Pairing: Yamada Ichiro X Fem!Reader

Genre: Fluffy Drabble

Word Count: 830

Warning: double entendre, making out, gets steamy towards the end.

Masterlist

Upon entering their apartment, the two younger Yamada brothers were greeted with the smell of food. Jiro could feel his mouth water and Saburo closed his eyes and hummed in delight. It seemed their oldest brother was making dinner already. Which was good, as they were both starving.

“It smells amazing, Nii-chan.” Jiro called out, dropping his backpack off at the door.

Both brothers were surprised to see you peak around the corner with a cheerful smile. “I’m happy to hear it, Jiro. Ichiro stepped out for a minute, but he should be back soon. Dinner’s not ready yet, so the two of you have time to get started on your homework.”

“Ah, what?” Jiro whined, which made Saburo laugh.

“You need all the help you can, so you better get to work.”

“HUH? WHAT’S THAT SUPPOSED TO MEAN?!”

“HEY!” You pointed the spoon you were cooking at them threateningly. “If you two are just going to cause trouble, you can take it outside. I just cleaned this place.”

Both boys dropped their fists and hung their heads. “We’re sorry.”

“Mhmm.” You tsked under your breath before returning to the stove. “Dinner should be ready to go in about twenty minutes. Ichiro should be back around that time, so let’s see how much you can get done in that time. Whoever gets the most work done will get extra dessert.”

That seemed to satisfy them both as they scrambled to get out their homework and get to work. You kept a chuckle to yourself as you continued cooking. It seemed the bargaining strategies you also used with Ichiro seemed to work with his brothers as well. You’d have to save this information for later so you could exploit the hell out of it.

As the twenty minutes passed by, you’d occasionally have to scold the boys for bickering too loudly, but it went pretty smoothly. Dinner smelled divine and you were ready to dish it out when the door to the apartment opened again.

“Ichi-nii! I got all of my homework done faster than Jiro!” Saburo called out to his oldest brother.

“HEY!” Jiro shot back at him. “I got all of my homework done too!”

“Not as fast as me. That means I’ll get more dessert tonight!”

“LIKE HELL!”

“WANNA PUT YOUR MONEY WHERE YOUR MOUTH IS?!”

“GUYS!” Ichiro finally shouted over the two of them before sighing. “I’m proud of you both for getting your work done so quickly. But what do you mean extra dessert tonight?”

Saburo pointed to the kitchen, where you were finishing up dinner. “Y/n said.”

You weren’t really paying attention to the brothers behind you, which is why you jumped when you felt Ichiro hug you from behind, placing his head on your shoulder.

“Smells good, babe.”

“Good, I’m glad. If you want to help me serve it, I’ll give you some extra dessert tonight as well.”

He hummed against your shoulder, understanding your double entendre. “You always know exactly what to say. When the boys are in bed tonight, I’ll take that dessert.”

“Get a room, you two!” Jiro groaned.

You felt Ichiro tense against you and you laughed. “Don’t tell me the great Yamada Ichiro is embarrassed about a little playful teasing!”

“Shut up.”

“Alright, alright. Dinner is getting cold. So let’s eat!” 

Pulling away from Ichiro, you handed a plate to Saburo. Ichiro grabbed Jiro’s plate and the four of you ate together at the small kitchen table. Conversation came easy, as you all talked about your days and the new anime that was coming out in less than a month that all three boys were excited to start watching. Jiro was annoyed to see Saburo get his extra dessert, but you managed to sneak him some more when he flashed some pleading eyes. Ichiro winked at you but kept his mouth shut. 

Anyone outside looking in would think the four of you made a perfect family. And it was nights like this that made you believe the same. It really was the perfect night.

After watching some TV with the boys, Ichiro shooed Jiro and Saburo to bed. Of course they complained, but you simply told them that if they stayed, they’d have to watch you and Ichiro snuggle together. That easily got them off to bed without further delay.

When Ichiro was sure they wouldn’t be coming out anytime soon, he hovered over you. “So, about that extra dessert?”

You rolled your eyes. “You’re insatiable.”

“And you promised.”

“I suppose I did.” You pressed a kiss to his lips. “But I gotta say, tonight was the perfect night.”

He hummed against your lips, holding you close. “You’re right. Days like this, I think you’d be the perfect older sister to Jiro and Saburo.”

You chuckled. “Slow down, Ichi. Put a ring on it first and then we can talk about being the older sister to your brothers.”

“I intend to, someday.” He mumbled.

“I can’t wait for someday.”

[mystic-poison]

✞SELFSHIPTOBER✞

Day 4: Apple Picking

~✞~ ~✞~ ~✞~ ~✞~

Characters: Ichiro, Jiro, Saburo and Poison (me)

Special guest: Rei

Relationship: Adoptive Sons

Warning: Spoilers for Hypmic

~✞~ ~✞~ ~✞~ ~✞~

Fall is Poison's favorite time of the year. The weather gets cooler, but it's not too cold to wear. It was the time for pumpkin spice lattes and apple cider donuts. It was the time for the leaves to turn colors, horror movie marathons, pumpkin patches, apple picking, and, of course, Halloween. The best holiday in Poison's option.

Poison usually goes apple picking every year, and this year, they were glad to share this experience with the Yamada family. Originally, this little trip was just going to be Poison and the Yamada brothers. They were like her sons, and they wanted to do something fun with them on their day off. But plans changed when Rei asked to go as well. This was a rather... shocking ask since Rei never asked to ta along when Poison took the boys somewhere. They asked the brothers if it was okay, and they agreed. After 3 weeks of much thought. They were aware their dad was trying to be better and get back into their lives through Poison. At least until Rei felt comfortable to ask to spend father son time with the brothers on his own. There was clearly some tension between them and they used Poison as a buffer. (Which they didn't mind)

So, one weekend, the Poison took the Yamada family apple picking. They decided to make a whole day out of it. They got coffee and breakfast together in the morning, and by the afternoon, they had made it to the orchard.

"There's trees for miles." Jiro hopped out of the car and stretched his arms.

"It's says the orchard holds 27 different apple speices here. It looks like we camd at the right time. All 27 are in season right now, so we have a huge variety to choose from" Saburo followed behind Jiro out the car.

"All I care about are the sour green apples" Jiro smirked.

"Granny Smiths" Saburo corrected.

"Who?"

"Those green apples are called Granny Smiths."

"Yeah, sour green apples"

"Granny Smith"

"We're saying the same thing"

"No. That's not the name of the apple. It's called Granny Smith. Plus, they're tart. Not sour"

"Nerd"

"Idiot"

Ichiro got out the car as well and put his arm around his brothers shoulders. "Come on guys, stop arguing. This is supposed to be fun. Plus, we don't want to embarrass mom"

"Every time you say that I can feel my knees giving out more and more" Poison closed the car door and frowned, making Ichiro laugh.

Rei sighed, locking the car. He handed Poison their bag. "At least they don't call you old man"

"Come on, old man! The lines are getting long!" Jiro was already walking ahead, clearly excited to start the day.

"See" Rei sighed and put his sunglasses back on.

"You are an old man though" Poison chuckled. "Plus, at least they're not calling you Rei anymore."

Rei knew Poison had a point. For the longest, the boy would call him Rei or Mr. Ayamada. But after Poison came into the picture and Rei started trying to be a good dad again, the boys started calling him Old Man. Rei knew it would be a long time before they start calling him dad again, but just the acknowledgement felt good.

Rei and Poison soon caught up with the brothers. Rei paid for their wrist bands, they were given baskets and they got onto the hay ride to get to the field of apple trees. Jiro was bouncing in his seat. He had never done something like this before and was ready for a good time. His eyes sparkled at the tree that held red, yellow and green apples in them.

"Each orchard is labeled with the name of the apples. And the tractors come every 10 minutes to take you to the next. So which ones do we wanna go to?" Saburo showed the group a map of the orchard. "I want to try the Jonagold ones. These are supposed to be sweet and tart"

"Which ones are good for baking?" Ichiro glanced at the map.

"Jiro wants Granny Smiths, so maybe Suncrisp. These are sweet, tart, and have a floral taste to it. If that's not what you're looking for, they have Myra Fuji apples. They're all right next to each other so we can even walk to each one if we want" Saburo pointed on the map.

Jiro peeked at the map. "It also says the best ones are closer to the top. Looks like we gotta climb on each other's shoulders to get them"

"You are not getting on my shoulders" Saburo rolled his eyes.

"You are such a buzzkill" Jiro groaned. "Big bro, can I climb in your shoulders to get the apples I want?"

Ichiro shrugged but smiled "Yeah sure. But either way we have to stop at the last orchard. Those have Melrose apples. Those are Poison's favorite"

"Awww, you remember my favorite." Poison smiled.

Ichiro smiled. "You said those are the ones you use to make those tarts to madr me for my birthday. Of course I remember"

"I guess I'll make them again."

The tractor soon came to a stop at the Granny Smith orchard. The group got off and went to explore. Jiro was the first to run up to a tree, looking for the perfect apple. Poison followed behind him.

"Do you see one yet?" Jiro asked.

"What does a perfect green apples look like?" Poison asked.

"It has the perfect shade of green, it big and round, it does have any spots on it. Trust me, you'll know it when you see it" Jiro soon gasped, pointing at one of the tree. "There!"

He pointed to a green apple that was front and center of the tree.

"Is that the perfect apple?" Poison asked.

"Yes! And I need it"

Jiro gave Poison his basket before going up to the tree. He tried reach up to get it but failed. He thought for a moment, taking off his hat to try and use it to get the apple down. But he was still short off. Ichiro, Rei, and Saburo was still far back, and he didn't want to wait.

"Do you want me to climb up there and get it for you?" Poison asked.

"Huh? No! You'll get hurt mom" Jiro protest.

Poison rolled their eyes and gave Jiro the baskets. "I'll be fine. Trust me"

Poison rolled up the dress they wore and tied it to the side using a hair tie. They climbed the tree carefully, knowing which branches were safe to put their weight on. They sat down on a branch and pick the apple Jiro wanted.

"Catch!"

Poison dropped the apple, Jiro catching it with his hat before putting it in the basket.

"Yes! Can you get a fee more while you're up there?"

Poison gave him a thumbs up before they started picking more apples and dropping them for Jiro the catch. It was only a matter of time before Rei, Ichiro and Saburo finally caught up with them.

"There you are. You ran so quickly we didn't see what turn you made" Ichiro raised a brow. "You already filled your basket?"

"Yeah! I got the perfect ones too" Jiro answered.

"Where's Poison?" Rei asked.

"Rei! Up here!" Poison called out and waved.

Rei looked up, taking off his sunglasses. He chuckled a bit, a little concerned on how they even got up there.

"Mom! What the hell!? Get down before you get hurt!" Saburo looked up in a small panic.

"I'm fine Saburo. I do this all the time" Poison waved off.

"Get down from there. You'll give the old man a heart attack." Ichiro chuckled.

"Yes, please get down" Rei added.

"Boo! You all are no fun" Jiro groaned.

Poison climb down from the free, fixing the skirt of their dress. Rei sighed in relief, glad they were safe. He sometimes wondered if they were a good influence on the boys, especially Jiro. They feed off each other's stupidity.

Rei watched how Ichiro and Saburo made sure Poison was okay before Jiro dragged them and his brothers away to go to the next orchard. He smiled a bit. Something about their relationship warmed the old man's heart. He could tell the boys really enjoyed having Poison around. The pressure of having to take care of his brothers seemed to be lifted off Ichiro's shoulders. At first, having someone around that was willing offering to take care of him felt unreal to Ichiro. He was use to being the one to take care of himself and his brothers. He was use to being the one his brothers came to for help. But now he had someone to go to if he need help or just hug.

"Old man! Come on!" Ichiro called out.

"I'm coming. I'm coming." Rei fixed his sunglasses before catching up with the others.

The group spent hours running around the orchard, picking apples, and just enjoying each other company. They tried apple cider at one of the pit stops in the middle of the orchard. They raced each other through the corn maze, Saburo and Rei beating the rest quite easily. They walked through the sunflower field, Rei picking one for Poison, and they ended the day off at the fire bit where they ate and made smores together. It was a nice cozy time by the camp fire. Of course some guy brought a guitar, scary stories were being told, and a kid burned their marshmallow to a burnt crisp. So classical camp fire shenanigans

Rei and his sons had stepped away from the campfire to use the bathroom and wash their hands before they headed back home. With the boys gone, this caught the notice of the guy who brought his guitar with him. He saw Poison along and decided to shoot his shot.

And Poison was not interested

"Psst, old man" Ichiro elbowed Rei as he washed his hands. "Look over there"

Rei raised a brow and turned to where Ichiro was pointing. His eyes narrowed seeing the guitar guy failing terribly to flirt with Poison. He could tell Poison was just trying to be nice while showing they weren't interested. But the guy wasn't catching the hints. Or was completely ignoring them.

"The man cannot flirt. He's so bad" Saburo said.

"You call that flirting? I pretty sure Rio can do better than that using roadkill to impress them" Ichiro added.

"I vote go over there and reck his shit" Jiro smirked, cracking his knuckles.

"No, no. I have a better idea." Rei chuckled.

The brothers all raised a brow as they watched Rei take off his fur coat and hand it up on a tree branch. He pick up and basket and filled it with rotten apples. At that point, the brother knew exactly what Rei was planning. Saburo used a branch and Jiro's hat to make a launcher where Ichiro and Jiro placed a rotten apple inside and pulled back.

Rei smirked and took off his sunglasses. "Fire"

Ichiro let go of the branch and the rotten apple was launched right at the guitar guys back. He yelp in a bit of pain as the apple splattered all over the back of his shirt.

"What the hell-"

Another apple was launched, hitting the guy in the back again. The guy turned around with a glare, only to get a rotten apple to the face. Poison covered their mouth to hold in their laugh. The brothers continued to launch rotten apples at the guy at Rei's go. They laughed at the guy as he cried for them to stop, only stopping cause they ran out of apples.

"Wha... who... what the fuck?!" The guy cried.

"That's what you get for flirting with our mom" Saburo walked over to the man, standing over him.

"Flirtings ass!" Jiro added, picking up on last apple the throwing it at him.

"And your guitar playing sucks" Ichiro finished.

"Mom?!" The guy look up at them confused.

"They're taken" Rei walked over to the man and smirked. He looked down at him, looking over how sad and pathetic he looked at the moment. He chuckled before going over to Poison and picking them up, putting them over his shoulder. "This is mine. Catch the hint"

He let out a deep laugh before giving Poison a small smack on the butt. "Oh! Rei!"

"Come on, boys. We're heading home. We still have to make it back in time for our dinner reservations" Rei put his hat on Poison's head before he started walking off.

"Sorry!" Poison waved to the guy as the brothers followed behind, Jiro giving the man the finger. "You guys are so mean."

"We did what we had to do to protect you" Ichiro shrugged.

"He couldn't catch the hint so we helped him" Saburo added.

"His guitar playing really did suck though. It was so worth losing my hat over." Jiro laughed. "It was the old man's idea"

"Rei! You're supposed to be a role model for them!" Poison glared.

"And I did. I thought them what to do when they seen a random man flirt with their mom" Rei smirked.

"We're not even married!"

"He didn't know that"

"Oh my god" Poison sighed but chuckled. They could see how much fun they were having as they launched rotten apples ag the guy. They never seen them not only work together like that, but enjoy it. "Thanks boys. Good job"

"No problem mom" The brothers all smiled.

"Where's my thank you? It was my idea, after all" Rei smirked.

"You'll get your thank you later" Poison answered.

"Oh? Does this thank you invole lip to lip contact"

"Maybe"

Rei smirked again, giving Poison another smack on the butt, making them laugh. "Good, good"

"Gross" Saburo rolled his eyes.

"Okay, put mom down. People are staring" Ichiro said.

"No. Mine" Rei laughed before running off.

"Rei! Be careful!" Poison yelled.

"Get back here, old man!" Jiro ran after him.

"Wait for me!" Saburo followed.

Ichiro smiled and laughed, running after them all well.

~✞~ ~✞~ ~✞~ ~✞~

Selfshiptober promotes creator

Day 4 is done. I wanted to do something different this time. I wanted to write about Rei, but also write about the brothers and how they're my adoptive sons. I always had a headacannon that at some point, Rei tries to get back into his sons lives and be a good dad. So I wanted to play into my headcannon more. So, hopefully, you all likes this

- Poison ✞

[littleeyesofpallas]

Hello! I come from your 2019 post (that I found on a Google search while doing some research) where you "disect" bleach character's names. I also want to create a very meaningful name for my oc, but I have no clue on the language. Do you have any advice on how I could go about this? Google is no help ):

(Im so sorry i started up a draft for this what feels like forever ago and it never quite took solid form and just sat in limbo for a while. Anyway I have a samurai TTRPG campaign I'm trying to piece together and came back to the subject, so it seemed like a good time to try and finish this... )

Oh boy, so I don't really know if i'll actually be much help with this, as I'm not a native speaker so I don't have the ear for Japanese that lets me just intuit when things feel "off" or "unnatural", but I can sort of walk you through some common tropes:

One approach is to take a core word/kanji and work the name out of them, fiddling with suffixes or pronunciations until you get something that "sounds like a name." Given that a lot of anime characters don't actually have "real" names this gives you a lot of wiggle room, but also there are definitely some sensibilities that --again I'm not personally a good enough judge of-- that make certain non-names sound more or less passable than others. This can be a tricky thing to play with, but there are a few shortcuts that might help.

Several suffixes are extremely common in Japanese naming conventions and most of them are gendered. A handful of super common ones are things like....

-ko[子]: "child" but typically denotes a girl's name

-me[女]: "woman/female"

-mi[美]: "beauty/beautiful"

-ne[音] "sound" but implicitly a pleasant one, like a chime or a musical note

-ka[香]: "scent/smell" but again implicitly a pleasant one like flowers, perfumes, or incense

etc...

...for girls. Or for boys, things like...

-rou[郎]: "son"

-tarou[太郎]: "big/thick/fat son" (implying he's health/plump/robust, not obese)

-suke[佑]: "help(er)/assist(ant)" but more colloquially just denotes one who facilitates the appended thing.

-suke[助] actually a homonym/synonym for the above.

-maru[丸] lit. meaning "circle" or "whole/full/complete" (kind of functions as just "...one" in the English sense? Like the meaning "One who is XYZ" might comparably be rendered XYZmaru.)

-emon[衛門]: "defense gate" but it has a distinctly old-fashioned sound to it, and kind of evokes samurai or yakuza depending on the era.

Attached to these are a few other sort of commonalities. Ichiro[一郎], Jiro[二郎], Saburo[三郎], Shiro[四郎], Goro[五郎], etc... are common boys names that are just a # and "son" indicating order of birth...

[edit]: okay no I super underestimated how stupid long this post was gonna look in Tumblr format... Cutting here for length, more under the cut

...the -suke:"assistant" suffix is often appended to aspirational traits or values, sort of like how English Puritans had a habit of naming kids English words like, Charity, Temperance, Faith, Credence, Prudence, etc... albeit without the background radiation of the cultural baggage of the Puritans.

But these suffixes are also often used to make unique fantasy names that are pretty distinctly not real names historically. In Shaman King, the ghost of a samurai named Amidamaru[阿弥陀丸] is just the suffix -maru[丸] slapped onto Amida[阿弥陀], the Japanese name for Amitabha[अमिताभ] the Buddha. This is absolutely not a name any real person has, but in the context of the manga you wouldn't expect to question it, although it sounds a tad silly. -maru specifically is also a common name-ifying suffix for nonhuman names, things like naval ships and swords often get names that are distinctly not human passing, but still very overtly "namey" names.

Incidentally it should be kept in mind that depending on the sort of characters and settings you're dealing with there are certain restrictions that you might want to consider. For example, the real world Japanese Ministry of Justice has maintained a list of Jinmeiyo kanji[人名用漢字] since the 1950s which dictate which kanji are permissible in the legal documenting of a person's name. For the most part this is to prevent weird or stupid rude or inauspicious names; you cannot for example name a newborn something with the kanji for death[死] or shit[糞]. But plenty of anime characters absolutely do not abide by this.

Otherwise there are some common conventions you can turn to with anime in particular, as again there is a certain affordance for nonsense.

Names with obvious color associations are super common, often by proxy of Super Sentai as a franchise and derived tropes. This can apply to either given names or surnames, and often are worked in as puns rather than kanji specific readings.

aka[赤] red

ao[青] blue

ki[黄] yellow

ha/hakku/shiro[白] white

kuro[黒] black/dark

kin/kane[金] gold

gin/shirogane[銀] silver

momo[桃] pink, but literally "peach" as momoiro[桃色]: pink color(ed)" is literally "peach colored"

which brings me to another point: Japanese names refer very heavily to plants and flowers specifically. Most common flowering plants, be they cultivated for lumber, decorative flowers, or food have some notable presence in Japanese naming conventions and can be pretty readily turned to. These tend to be predominantly girl's names either alone or as a root, but not exclusively,

sakura[桜] cherry

tsubaki[椿] camellia

azami[薊] thistle

ayame[菖蒲] iris

sumire[菫] violet

kiku[菊] chrysanthemum

etc... (although not all of these can function as names on their own without some appended suffix/prefix) But also a wide wide array of other regionally specific and seemingly more obtuse plant names pop up all the time. Also, while flowering/fruit bearing plants are very commonly evoked for their beauty as girls' names, there is also hanakotoba[花言葉] the japanese flower language, which can be a quick reference for what features might be evoked by specific flowers more generally, and for both boys and girls.

Oh and a few more general terms also show up in a lot of names, ha/ba/wa[葉]:"leaf" in names like futaba[双葉]: "Twin leaf"; [梢]: "Treetop/tip(of a branch)" [枝]: "Branch", [幹]:"(tree)trunk," etc... Not all plants as names or nonspecific plant related terms are as flashy or romantic as you might expect.

Animals are also a popular motif, but I won't get into those because that's just an endless list of like every animal... You can probably think of some really obvious ones just off the top of your head though.

Typically they stick to very general types or families of animal and of course those most obviously native to Japan, or else those with names borrowed from Chinese, both for the real and the mythic. In fantasy settings these may be evoked directly, but more realistic settings may opt to reference more menacing or otherwise less dignified animals(vermin especially) only through puns/homophones.

Domesticated animals or those with virtuous/valorous associations would be easier to accept at a glance, real or not, while those with overt negative characterizations might be a little campy. (I actually totally forgot but Hiruma[蛭魔] in Eyeshield doesn't actually "evoke" the word for leech phonetically, it just straight up IS the kanji for leech in his name. [蛭]:"Leech" + [魔]:"Demon/EvilSpirit" in fact. Like, for every test he ever took all middle/high school he just signed "LeechDemon" at the top. Neither of those are legally approved jinmeiyo kanji in the real world of course.)

Also worth noting as an extra layer in all these considerations, is that most common Japanese names will probably average 2 or 3 characters, maybe 4. A handful of names are single kanji and as you'd expect are thus very straight forward in their meaning. 5 or more kanji to a name certainly aren't impossible but they can be unusual, and I feel like they tend to appear as older, outdated, and samurai-esque names, if not just weird or ostentatiously silly.

(for example, in Bleach, Marechiyo's whole family shares the root Mare[希] and as each family member is introduced the names kind of escalate in silliness, until we get the younger son, Marejirousaburou[希次郎三郎] which even comically uses the -rou[郎]:"son" bit twice. His name literally reads as "Rare NextSon Third Son." It sounds very stupid and kind of pegs him as a spoiled rich kid. I guess in a way we sort of have a similar cliche in English about rich kids from stuffy old money having multiple middle names and "Jr." or some roman numeral tacked on.)

Rather famously there is just a random living businessman in Japanese whose given name is Taroukizaemonnoshoutokinori[太郎喜左衛門将時能] which might more readably be broken down as Tarou-kizaemon-no-shoutokinori. Written this way you might notice that basically each individual section could itself be a name by itself.

There is also supposedly some record of a meiji era citizen registered under the name Egawafujifumishigozaemon’nosuketarō[江川富士一二三四五左衛門助太郎], Egawa-fuji-i-fu-mi-shi-go-zaemon-no-suke-tarou. You may note that thoes are like 3 separate nameifying suffixes just slapped onto the end there(-zaemon, -suke, and -tarou) and the middle bit is just "1,2,3,4,5." So as I said the tendency for super long names is a distinctly silly tone.

Once again there is a distinctive kind of aesthetic or familiarity to long names that someone who knows better than me can definitely just kind of tell when a long assemblage of kanji and syllables just does not sound like a name. No advice for how to sus this out yourself, it's kind of just a matter of prolonged exposure.

On the flip side of things, it's entirely possible to write names with no kanji at all. For example, despite the very obvious evocation of cherryblossoms in Sakura's name in Naruto, her name is just written SA-KU-RA[サクラ]. If you just like the way an existing name sounds and don't want to risk implying other meanings that picking a random existing kanji writing might, you can in fact just opt out of it. It'll still carry some connotations but it at least won't look like you were trying to hone in on one reading in particular.

In some cases I also think it's just a common practice for media aimed at elementary school kids, as it foregoes excluding anyone on the basis of their reading level, where as you're less likely to see this kind of thing in manga aimed at, say, young adults.

So after hacking our way through all that... the other approach is to take a real existing Japanese name's phonetics, and find kanji that can serve as a homonym to the more conventional root in the name.

So, for example, the name Tanjirou is a real name, but it's written any of a few ways, including [丹士郎]: "Rust-Colored Samurai Son," [丹次郎]: "Rust-Colored Next Son," and [丹治郎]: "Rust-colored Peace(&order) Son," but in Demon Slayer the protagonist's name is Tanjirou[炭治郎]: "Charcoal Peace(&order) Son" alluding to his family's job as charcoal artisans and his affinity for the fire and sun elements by swapping in an unusual character with the same pronunciation. (the "peace and order" part probably referring to like a governor being a peace keeper which makes it a partial synonym with "samurai" as a part of the ruling class)

Does that all make sense? I can't tell how easy to follow any of this is for someone without a kind of cursory familiarity with this stuff...

And then surnames... I don't want to get into this oneb bcause it's just too damn big. but they do tend to follow some pretty familiar conventions used in the west. Locational surnames are common, denoting landmarks:

yama[山]: Mountain

kawa/-gawa[川]: River

mori[森]: forest

tani[谷]: valley

ta/-da[田]: field

mura[村]: village

etc... Some also reference manmade landmarks like towers, temples, bridges, wells, marketplaces, etc... Or even more general elements like "stone" or "tree" without pointing to an actual singular and specific object in the landscape. These kinds of root words can then be modified by adjectives like colors, size/dimension, cardinal directions, (one of)twins, and very often eachother. (i.e. Yamada[山田], Yamamura[山村] Kawamura[川村], Yamagawa[山川], Tamura[田村], Kawada[川田], etc...) I don't really know how to cleanly or neatly break these kinds of things down into easily referenced categories... It's just kind of a broad range of things that can be applied, and that's just in regards to real names, the realm of fantasy settings, even mundane ones, opens things up substantially.

But unlike a lot of western languages, there aren't actually a whole lot of occupational surnames. i.e. things like Smith, Baker, Carpenter, Mason, Miller, etc...

(and... uh... I'm not getting into kira kira names... that's a whole other can of worms and a very modern/recent issue, and I dunno that I know enough to really comment on it meaningfully. you can google it though and you'll find stuff even in english discussing it in some detail.)

Oh and of course the last "method" is just that some creators will just straight up lift their character names from other characters entirely. Like, in Naruto Jiraiya, Tsunade, and Orochimaru are all just the names of the characters in the 19th century folktale Katakiuchi Kidan Jiraiya Monogatari[報仇奇談自来也説話]. Like the names don't have any directly evoked meaning based on how they're written, they're just direct reference to the themes and motifs of preexisting characters. Same way Sasuke's name is just lifted from Sarutobi Sasuke[猿飛佐助], popular turn of the century fictional ninja hero.

I'll be honest, I'm not a fan of this one. It tends to feel flimsy and shitty. The only exception being those characters that are actual in-world evocations of historical characters/figures, like Ishikawa Goemon XIII, in Lupin III, just straight up being a descendent of the legendary Ishikawa Goemon. Although in Eyeshield 21 Takekura Gen has a cool one where the name Takekura[武蔵] is written the same as Musashi[武蔵], and so he's given it as a nickname and given a reputation and motif evoking the samurai Miyamoto Musashi.

Anyway that was a lot of blustering about just to get to the point now where I can say: This all is extremely incomplete/unexhaustive, and of questionable real practical use to anyone as a guide to actually making up new names for a sort of anime/manga type setting. This really turned out to be less of a guide and more like a laundry list of just loosely adjoined/adjacent observations: Less a guide to bowling and more just a pair of bumpers to put in the gutters to help guide otherwise still utterly untrained attempts at success. It's as much as I can really muster in this regard.

[pinkyjulien]

Okay now I'm gonna jump on the bandwagon of the prev ask about Valentin's and Mitch's first meeting 👀 how does his story continue with Takemura (if at all?) Does he track Valentin down, and how, or is what follows immediately after being saved and stable again also diverging from canon? (I just love the image of Goro showing up all dusty and exasperated at the nomad's camp like "There you are!! Fucking finally!" XD)

AAAAAHHH FHF Eating you UwU

They DO meet up properly eventually! 👀 (more old screenshots being used to illustrate here hfhf)

After getting his bullet extracted, Val stayed a couple of days at camp; he couldnt really do much in his state, plus the caldos wouldnt just simply let him go like that

Mitch and Scorp were keepin an eye on him, they were responsible of him after all; if Val turned out to be a danger to the clan, they would've finished the job, succeeding where Dex failed

Val eventually woke up, and he was asked a couple of basic, straight forward question by Mitch; his name, where he's from, and what happened. Val didnt lie, but he also didnt mention the whole -arasaka- thing. He might be a gonk, but he's not dumb; saying that his failed gig was an heist on Arasaka, when every radios and tv stations been blasting about Saburo's death for the path days wouldnt be a smart move fhksjgj

It was all over the news- and Dex probably left Night City too (< at that time he wasnt aware Takemura killed him yet. Dex took Goro to the dump, only to find it completly empty. He got popped before he could swear he left him here hfjd)

Infos and Rumors goes around extremely fast in NC, especially between fixers, so Dexter departure/disappearance and Saburos death wasnt a coincidence at all; so was Jackie's and Valentin's potential death. (Jackie being confirmed dead cause he sent his body to his fam, but people had no idea where Val was)

He had to get back to NC, to Viktor, Misty- his friends, the only people he had left over there

That night at camp, Valentin experienced the Johnny Night TM; of course, he freaked out, screaming and talking "to himself" - Ripper wasnt far, knew the screams where coming from the nursery and quickly gave injected him some tranquilizer

In the morning, not sure whatever happened was a dream or not, he asked Mitch and Scorp (not friends yet, but the only guys he knew around) if someone could drive him back to NC- Dakota was still around and since she had to go back to her Garage soon, he could tag along and she'd get one of her guy to drive him to Vik's

During the drive, he explained to Dakota what happened, from the heist, the relic, Jackie- ans the weird dreams he's been getting (she's like a mother figure to him, a trusted friend)

She didnt liked any of that and pressed him to get checked properly asap, hoping this might be a virus that can get easily wiped out

Once at Vik, everyone was happy and relieved to see him alive "and well", but it quickly changed when Viktor took a closer look, obviously

He also mentioned that a guy, kinda sus looking, came in looking for him the day before. Said he could help him if he ever show up. (Takemura is a resourceful guy, I'm pretty sure he could pin down V's main ripperdoc to ask questions- and Viktor, knowing that Jackie did die, would trust Takemura's story and information since it correlate with what Vik knows)

So they make contact and eventually meet up at Tom's Diner like the canon timeline 👁👄👁

Despite all the years its still a ROUGH MAP AND TIMELINE FHJSJF that I really need to properly put down 💀💀 BUT YEAH FHDJ

Thank you friendo for the ask!! 🤗🧡🧡

[elvenbeard]

trembling hands!!

Trembling Hands

(this was from the micro story prompts, but I'd been aching to write this scene for a while, and this was the perfect prompt for it. thank you for enabling me XD)

Something hadn’t been sitting quite right with Kerry all night. He was on the sofa, absentmindedly strumming his guitar. It had been a while since he’d felt as good about doing just that to wind down after a long day, but today it just wasn’t cutting it for some reason. The nagging thoughts that kept him awake were louder.

V had said everything was fine… he’d sounded weird at first, yes, but he had a lot on his plate at the moment. No surprise he was a little out of it. Also, why would he lie? Just to not worry him? No one else had ever felt the necessity to try to protect Kerry’s feelings like this.

But then again… V was different. Different from most people Kerry had ever dealt with. Surely, he would have said something, anything… After all, he’d promised to call if something new came up with Arasaka, good or bad.

 It struck Kerry like lightning. Yeah, that’s what this had been about. And whatever it was, it had been so bad, he hadn’t been able to spit it out…

Kerry cursed and put his guitar down, simultaneously pulling up V’s number on his holo. As it was still ringing, he got up from the sofa and began pacing through his empty villa that felt particularly quiet tonight without V here.

“This is V,” the voicemail answered, and Kerry’s heart sank, “Leave your contact info, I’ll get back to you asap.”

“V, can you please call me back like, right now? I’m kinda worried,” Kerry replied as he absentmindedly walked upstairs, still no particular goal in mind apart from moving around. He hung up and looked out of the windows facing east. The very first thing that caught his eye in the night sky was a heavy AV just leaving the Arasaka’s estate up the hill. Kerry wasn’t sure if it had brought or picked someone up, but as such this kind of movement wasn’t that much out of the usual. Ever since old Saburo had kicked the bucket, their little hideout here had been as busy as never before. People, vehicles, AVs coming and going all day round. But still, in this moment, it increased Kerry’s uneasiness. He quickly turned around and dashed to the opposite side of the upper living room, keeping an eye on the sky for the AV. But it was nowhere to be seen. Maybe he’d missed it, or it had taken a different route than he’d expected it to. His eyes wandered along Night City’s skyline to Downtown, where the rooftop of Arasaka Tower was only just visible. He stared at it intensely for a good couple of minutes, thoughts racing. But the sky over the city center was not any busier than every other night. Maybe… everything was fine. He was probably panicking for no reason, starting to see things…

“Argh, fuck it,” he hissed and decided to call V again, but again he only reached the voicemail. There were a million reasons why he didn’t pick up. Maybe he was busy with an impromptu late-night gig, maybe he was in the middle of an important conversation… Hell, maybe he was sitting on the shitter with food poisoning. He’d call him back any moment for sure, they’d have a good laugh about Kerry’s paranoia, and Kerry could finally catch some Z’s.

It was after midnight already. Minutes passed, but V’s call didn’t come. Kerry scolded himself for not realizing sooner that something had been off, for not being more insistent, asking him to swing by later…

He stared out of the window again, to the tower, a little while longer. 50 years ago, he’d known what Johnny had been up to – no details, obviously, they barely talked at that time without it derailing into a shouting match. But he’d known him long and well enough to make a good guess where he was headed with Rogue when they left, with the big farewell gesture and speech and everything. Johnny hadn’t expected to come back, and Kerry hadn’t run after him because he’d known it wouldn’t have made any difference. He’d been more than ten years late trying to prevent Johnny from doing something stupid… part of him had always regretted not trying harder, punching some sense into him. But he’d also regretted not going after him, stopping him from throwing his life away for something he couldn’t change.

V's situation was different though, completely… Sure, he didn’t have warm feelings for Arasaka either, but he didn’t have a personal vendetta to complete. And yet, with Johnny in his head, who knew what ideas he’d given him about solving the Relic-problem, especially if they’d received bad news from Hanako…

Kerry was like frozen in place, in fear even of what might have happened without him knowing. He couldn’t do this again... He’d lost Johnny before, and he had accepted that he’d have to lose him once more if it meant keeping V. But the thought of potentially losing them both, and again not daring to at least try to do anything about it…

He unglued himself from the window, ran down the stairs and out the backdoor. Everything was a blur until his Rayfield emerged from the tunnel leading up to the highest portion of North Oak. The winding road took him to the entrance of the Arasaka estate. He slowed down, pulled over, and tried to analyze what he was seeing, but honestly… all was normal. No private army, no unusual number of vehicles or people or anything really… In fact, the estate seemed very, almost too empty. Kerry shivered. Had someone given them a reason to fuck off in a hush-hush operation, maybe? He could only guess though, and since he had no intentions of ringing their doorbell to ask, he stepped back on the gas and took off.

Grasping the steering wheel with all his might to stop his hands from shaking he left behind Japantown’s rainbow of lights and entered the sleek wide boulevard that led to the heart of the city. The perpetually circling holographic koi fish of Corpo Plaza were visible from afar already, but Kerry kept looking up to Arasaka Tower in search of… what? He wasn’t sure. All the way there he expected the whole damn thing to go up in flames.

So late at night, Corpo Plaza shouldn’t have been particularly busy. As he got closer though, Kerry finally got the confirmation he’d been looking for that something was not right. The turning lane that would have brought him to the tower’s main entrance was blocked off by a large NCPD truck, orange flashing lights burning in Kerry’s strained eyes.

“Keep going!” a cop ordered over loudspeakers, and Kerry sped up only just enough to not raise eyebrows, catching a brief glimpse of the tower’s entrance as he switched back onto the main lane. A minotaur mech or two were guarding the area, as well as some people, cops maybe… or Arasaka soldiers? Kerry floored it, zooming through the underpass below the plaza and switched to the left lane. At the first chance he made a U-turn and suddenly found himself surrounded, not by police cars, but mobile units of all the big news stations headed to Arasaka HQ like the vultures they were. The roundabout below was beginning to fill with medias, police cars trying and failing to maintain order, and then just some curious bystanders all trying to get a glimpse at whatever was going on.

“Fuck, V, what have you done,” Kerry hissed, only just squeezing his car that was way too big for maneuvers like this past the traffic jam. He was convinced this had to do with V and Johnny. It just had to.

He had no clue what he was supposed to do now, but he knew he had to get away from this crowd as a start. About a half circle around the roundabout later he passed under the bridge connecting the central pedestrian area to Arasaka Tower. He managed another brief glimpse at the mechs posted there. He’d feared to spot Adam Smasher among them, but thankfully he was nowhere to be seen.

There was a portion of the roundabout that was still relatively free of cars and people. Kerry pulled over, then attempted to call V again. Nothing, no response, only the voicemail after 20 seconds or so. He slammed his hands on the steering wheel.

“Fuck!”

Then he turned to look out the window. He realized they’d been here, almost in this exact spot, not too long ago. It wasn’t really a decent parking spot, but there was a half-hidden stairwell leading upwards to the shops and walkways. Kerry had asked V about his favorite places in Night City, and he’d dragged him here of all places. Parked his bike and led him up to the center of the plaza, where stressed-out corpos mingled with wide-eyed tourists usually.

“Whenever everything got too much,” V had said, speaking of his time working for ‘Saka, “I clocked out for thirty minutes, came down here, and did a round or two along the walkways to wind down. Dunno, there’s something calming about watching the fish float by.”

Kerry had joked that for someone who wasn’t “really that into meditation” V subconsciously did a lot of things to cope with stress that could absolutely be classified as such. His chest hurt thinking back to that day and their conversation, standing against the rail side by side in the midday sun, surrounded by the massive skyscrapers. Talking about the past and a possible future together.

“Everything’s gonna be okay, one way or another,” V had said, “At least that’s what I have to keep telling myself, or I’ll go nuts.”

“Everything’s gonna be okay…” Kerry repeated to himself before he got out of his car, pulled up his hood, and jogged up the stairs. Medias and onlookers had replaced the corpos and tourists, were pushing towards a barrier erected by the NCPD. TV drones were zooming around and promptly shot down by cops and security. Kerry realized the mechs he’d seen in front of the entrance were not Arasaka, but Militech branded… Was this some kind of weird coup again, nothing to do with V after all?

Once more, Kerry was lost. What the hell was he even doing here… He was half tempted to go back to his car because… whatever was going on was way beyond his capabilities. He overheard some of the medias’ questions screamed at the police spokesperson trying to keep everyone at a distance. Something of a shooting, a terrorist attack, and Kerry’s heart sank, memories he thought he’d long repressed welling up of the news reports from that night 50 years ago. At least no mentions of a nuclear bomb. Yet.

As long as the reporters were occupied with harassing the police still, and vice versa, Kerry decided to get some distance between them and himself. He pulled up V’s number once more, knowing deep down it was in vain. He wouldn’t pick up. For a second Kerry wondered if he was even still alive, and his stomach turned at the mental image of V lying somewhere in that tower in a puddle of his own blood, staining the polished marble floors.

Kerry paused and closed his eyes for a moment, hoped it would stop his head, or better even the whole world from spinning. The last weeks had been absolutely insane. Johnny back from the dead, somewhat, this kid stumbling into his life more on accident than with purpose, but at just the right moment to prevent Kerry from making his worst decision so far. The way they’d connected almost instantly, the way V just got him without Kerry having to say much or anything at all sometimes… How V had reminded him of all the beauty in the world that made life worth living, that Kerry was not done just yet, that it was never too late to start over, no matter how hopeless everything seemed... Someone like that wouldn’t just throw his life away like this, would he? V wouldn’t just leave him behind without a word, right?

Kerry opened his eyes again, V’s holocall profile still on his display. He slowly started walking, away from the noise of the crowd, drawn towards the walkway, to the warm, happy memory of the conversation they’d had up there. With Arasaka Tower looming in his back, he called V, one more time. It rang and rang, the noise droning louder and louder in his head with every step he took towards the center of the plaza… Kerry stopped dead in his tracks and listened, because he could have sworn... But then the voicemail answered, and he cursed, hung up, and immediately called back. The holo was ringing, yes, but he could hear V’s phone ringing, the actual ringtone… Or had he finally lost it now? He looked around, trying to locate where the ringing came from, turning down the volume of the holo to better hear his actual surroundings. He didn’t dare to call out for him, the medias and police weren’t that far away, and he preferred to not have their attention right now. He jogged up the walkway to his left a bit, but the ringing got quieter again.

He spun back around, and then his heart stopped. A little bit ahead, he’d just passed it, was some sort of modern sculpture, a bunch of black and white cubes stacked on top of each other. The other day they’d seen some people hanging out on them for their lunch break, tourists sitting down taking selfies. And now, only just, Kerry could see a shock of blond and purple hair poking out from behind it. He raced back down, skidded across the artificial lawn covering the area around it, and stumbled behind the sculpture. It was him, it was V… but a sledgehammer to the chest wouldn’t have taken away Kerry’s breath more effectively than the sight of the state he was in. He sat on the ground, slumped back against the cubes, hands in his lap… and his goddamn phone in his hand still. Had he been trying to call help and then passed out? Then Kerry noticed all the dark stains on his clothes, in general V was utterly drenched for some reason. There was so much blood, it couldn’t have been just his… or was it? He was awfully pale, beaten up, covered in scratches and bruises. Before Kerry really knew or realized it, he was down on his knees in front of V. With trembling hands he reached out to cup his face as gently as he managed, almost didn’t dare to touch him, and flinched at how cold he was. Overcome by dread he managed not to scream only just, only when a hint of V’s breath grazed his hand. It was weak and shallow, but he was breathing. He was alive.

“V?” Kerry croaked, almost not recognizing his own voice. He softly stroked V’s cheeks, his hair, let a hand trail down his neck to briefly check his pulse, and he was surprised for a moment at how strong it was. It made him hopeful that he wasn’t in the middle of bleeding out at least.

“V, please, wake up!”

He still didn’t dare to try and shake him, scared he’d hurt him even more. Some of the scratches in his face looked like he been dragged across concrete, his bottom lip was split but not really bleeding anymore. Kerry looked him up and down intensely, for wounds or anything that would explain his state and the amount of blood on his clothes, but he was too all over the place, heart racing, vision blurry with tears to really achieve anything at all or find a semblance of closure. He looked back up at V’s face and gasped when he saw V had opened his eyes, just barely. He was looking at him with a slight frown, almost as if in disbelief.

“V!” Kerry’s hands immediately went back to his face, lifting his head slightly to better meet his gaze, to let him know he was safe.

“V, we need to get you away from here. Can you walk? Are you hurt, can I… can I do anything?” he almost tripped over his own tongue, thoughts faster than his mouth managed.

V’s eyes went wider, just slightly, as if he’d only just realized he was really here speaking to him.

“It’s gonna be okay, I’m here, and I’m not goin’ anywhere,” Kerry whispered, pressing his forehead against V’s.

A hoarse noise escaped V’s mouth, not quite a groan, more a weak laugh. Kerry moved back a little again, and his heart broke at seeing V’s eyes closed, face distorted in pain and tears starting to stream down his cheeks. V, who’d always been so collected, logical, who had such a pretty, dorky laugh… he was utterly devastated.

“Kerry… He’s gone,” V said, voice so raw and so full of pain it hurt Kerry just as much, “And it was all for nothing…”

He started full on sobbing, his entire body shaking unconsolably. Kerry needed a moment to stomach what V had said, so many new questions on his mind now… At a loss for words, he put his arms around him tight, held him close for as long as he’d need him to. They cowered like that for a long time, in the shadow of Arasaka Tower, but engulfed by the red and blue light of the two holographic fishes continuing their eternal dance above them as if their world hadn’t just changed forever once more tonight.

(thanks for reading, hope you liked this! I have yet to play the "Don't Fear the Reaper" ending myself, but this is what I'd picture to happen immediately afterwards)

[discotenny]

IDEK WHERE THE IMAGES R FROM IM SEEING EVERYWHERE BUT CANT FIND VIDEO BUT HEY LOOK DID U SEE THIS (from someone random blog post bc idek where to find the original)

https://www.tumblr.com/lochness-art/733533305005293568/no-one-asked-but-here-r-my-opinions-on-the-new

NEW SPRITFESSS TIME SKIP REAL TIME SMIP REALFL

NEW SPRITES NEW SPRITES AWAHHWAHFHEAJIORERER

I posted my thoughts on the outfits when that big compilation image came out but now that we have visible LEGS for the all the charas now I feel obligated to update my thoughts fdsafadsfs. Put under a cut cause I have a feeling its gonna be long fdsfdsafs

Original thought post

Original post listed in the ask

ALSo, the images are from the new hypmic flava trailer posted on their yt channel here :3

Ichiro: We saw him in full before, but I just want to reiterate how they intentionally got rid of all the connections Ichi had to the bros within his clothing. From Jiro's blue on his sleeves, the zip up shirt they all shared, and having the iconic BB lettering not there anymore- it seems like they're trying to distance Ichi's character from being so bro centric. Maybe to show growth how he's going to be more independent? It's a bit odd because being dependent isn't Ichi's flaw, that's Jiro and Saburo's... Maybe it's to show how THEYRE distancing from HIM 🤔

Jiro: This hair change is such a W for Jiro fans!! It was unclear if he actually changed it in art prior but this is a W SUCH A W!!! I miss the white stripes on his shoulders for contrast reasons but he looks just like a more mature version of his old design. It looks like he's wearing the checkered shirt instead of wrapping it around his waist which is cuter and makes much more sense fdsafdsfds.

Saburo: He looks all grown up LOL The time skip is only supposed to be a few months from what I recall, so at most he's now 15 but imo I think they're keeping them to og ages tbh. The mustard is such a good look for him! The more pastel yellow and school uniform esc coat of his old design did a lot to keep him looking / feeling young so this new design feels like he's growing up to be more comfortable to be who he is ;_;

Samatoki: He looks just as hot and he's somehow showing even MORE skin despite having a jacket lmao. Those popping buttons I see you Toki fdsafdsaf. Again he looks less like a gangster / yakuza but I wonder if they're trying to lean into that look. He pretty. Real pretty...

Jyuto: Thoughts have pretty much stayed the same, it reads like an Extra Wardrobe outfit rather than something he'd wear on the daily. In the new arc did he stop wearing his uniform since the government shut down? Did he just say fuck the dress code? I do like the outfit, it makes him look a lil more sleazy LOL

Rio: Rio looks good he looks good!! I don't have much thoughts on him since I never really do but I still find it hilarious he has the same pants as his old outfit.

Ramuda: He looks excellent as always but I do agree with the original poster that I miss his blue :C I think the yellow makes him look really young and it kinda doesn't jive with me ??? I love the hat though he looks very very cute. Ramuda also has the best shoes in the cast and I appreciate they didn't change it.

Gentaro: Gentaro is so funny I think they legitimately just made his back cape longer?? He also got rid of the high collar undershirt, which probably symbolizes that he's hiding less of himself to his friends. I love Gen but I need to see him not in motion to see how well this outfit fits him. ATM I think the longer cape messes up his silhouette by making him seem like a rectangle.

Dice: I miss the trench coat!! I miss the trench coat!!! I don't care if it would be smelly I miss the trench coat !!! I think getting rid of the black parts on his collar and outside his sleeves kind of make him look too... normal??? Like idk, where's the spice!! Give him fingerless gloves or sm shit he needs SOMETHING to make him look less like just a guy :C He's cute but I think his old fit is >>>

Jakurai: He looks SOOOOO GOOOD. We've seen this in full before but he looks CUUUTEEE. Like I'm no Jakurai stan but hooo boy that coat does smthn to me. He looks looser, like he's gonna have some fun, maybe go to the mall or smthn he looks good !!!!! Anons brought up Jakurai removing his doctor coat as a symbolism for his savior complex going away and I think it's really cool !!! One of the best new fits imo.

Hifumi: I like his og outfit much better I'm sorry 😭😭😭 I think with Materno's main color being light grey, Jakurai being in white, Doppo being a light grey now, Hifu being that off white just makes him blend together with the other members. Maybe it's the fact that he's set against a white background but he just gets lost among the other two. Having the darker colors concentrated around his head / upper body helps though.

Doppo: I love him my baby I love him I lve nye my baby my vobeoteoy frmajwfmweoijfghuefuwafjewanjmisafkowafewoawfeaiow. I say from my last post: "He’s getting loose he’s getting silly he’s CRAZY DOPPO IN THE HOUSE !!!"

Sasara: I like the outfit on it's own but I kind of... hate how it's matching with Rosho. SasaRo enjoyers rejoice but I don't like how it doesn't allow Sasara (and Rosho in turn) be his own character. It was mainly an issue I had with Rosho but this new fit puts in on Sasara too, that it kind of forces you to look at him in the lense of his relationship with Rosho rather than who he is as a chara on it's own. Also they made him less colorful :CC The bowtie is super cute though I like it.

Rosho: Rosho does look cute but again I wish it wasn't so obviously a callback to his relationship with Sasara!! I do like the hair, it's very cute fdsafdsa. He looks a lot more comfortable and a lot more confident but I'm unsure if its due to character development or just for cool points. Rosho looks like he smells good

Rei: He's too grey 💀 TOO GREY !!! I think getting rid of the hat and glasses was such a downgrade it does not look very good. It's a lot of my issues with Hifu's outfit without actually having a good clothing design to make up for it. I think it's nice how it could possibly be a call back to Kazuma Kiryu but that doesn't really make up for it :/

Kuko: I was wrong his hair did not get shorter 💀💀💀 But he is INCREDIBLE !! IT'S VERY GOOD!!! I have nothing to complain / nitpick about I think it's very good. (one nitpick I guess FDSAFDS. His bright hair now seems a bit out of place against the darkness of his clothing. Maybe making the purple accent stripes blue or red would have made it better? Unsure though.

Jyushi: He looks very good but I wish they gave him more interesting pants they're very underwhelming compared to his incredible top!! Like imagine sm crazy shit like lace racing stripes, some peekaboo patterns in triangles at the bottom of his flares, it would be very cute !!!

Hitoya: Very cute, very good, a stark improvement from his original look I have nothing else to say fdskafdasfdsa. Again, a 35 year old baby.

I think for some of the characters the outfits really really really really work (Doppo, Hitoya, Jakurai) but for a lot of them I think their original looks were much more iconic and much more fitting to themselves (Dice, Sasara, Rei). I hope we still get content put out with their original outfits because I'd legitimately be sad to never see Dice in his trench coat again :C

[birdmitosis]

Thoughts chewing at my brain about a Keroro AU where it’s like an alignment swap only instead it’s a Frog Swap, meaning the humans are Keronians now and the Keronians are humans. Maybe college students but maybe late high school I guess?

The Platoon:

Kamomo Gunsou / Sergeant Kamomo comes from a high-ranking military family and she’s the one in charge of her platoon! Like Momoka, she still has the split personalities; her energy bursts from her hands rather than her mouth or eyes and she can use it as an aura in a physical fight. She’s still a tadpole but not-so-secretly hopes that won’t be true for long.

Nasusu Gouchou / Corporal Nasusu is the weapons specialist and she’s good at basically all kinds of athletics and combat, as well as being Fuyuyu’s big sister of course. She’s a lot like Natsumi in most ways, except stick her in an unhealthy military society and hand her guns.

Fuyuyu Nitouhei / Private Second Class Fuyuyu is the newest member of the platoon, and Nasusu is both worried about him but can also vouch for him. Nervous but tries to be more serious so he doesn’t let anyone down, but like Fuyuki, he really still loves Weird Unexplained Shit and is also excited about meeting an alien... on the planet they’re invading. Since he’s not really a fighter or the tech guy, he actually has more of a role of tactician and (unofficially, later) diplomat. He’s also still a tadpole.

Yukiki Heichou / Lance Corporal Yukiki is the former assassin, because all assassins and former assassins who aren’t like Captain rank are Lance Corporals I guess. Like Koyuki, she’s bright, enthusiastic, and curious; like Dororo, she’ll get taken in by the ninja village and take to it like a duck to water, but she’ll really badly want to share it with the rest of her platoon friends.

Tsumimi Souchou / Sergeant Major Tsumimi doesn’t have the bad attitude of another Sergeant Major we could name but he’s super laid back and no one knows what to do with him so he gets assigned under Kamomo despite outranking her. Like Saburo, he’s too smart for his own good and takes everything in stride, even getting excited about shit he shouldn’t be... and is kind of a mischievous guy with a slight jerkish streak! Their tech guy, natch.

The other Keronians:

Akiki Chui, either a current or former First Lieutenant, and Nasusu and Fuyuyu’s mother. Might fill Garuru’s role? Or might just visit sometimes if retired!

Haruru Juni, a current or former Warrent Officer, and Nasusu and Fuyuyu’s father. Might still be current and that’s why he’s off on some assignment?

Kinana, the family’s retired grandmother (Akiki’s mother)!

Baii Taisa / Colonel Baii, Kamomo’s father.

Okaka Chuusa / Lieutenant Colonel Okaka, Kamomo’s mother.

Palulu, that family’s butler.

Mukuku Heichou / Lance Corporal Mukuku, Yukiki’s old friend and fellow assassin and basically a big sister figure to her. Was honestly relieved when Yukiki surpassed her.

The other aliens:

Angol Asami. Takes Amano Moa’s appearance to make people lower their guard. Like Mois, she came to destroy Earth, but she winds up friends with the Platoon and Moa instead.

Alisa and Nebula are just always Alisa and Nebula. Nothin changin there.

The humans (these are all working names...):

Hinata Keiro, like Keroro, is a bit too lackadaisical and unconcerned. He’s either in high school and supposed to be studying for college entrance exams, or he’s a ronin who really needs to be trying hard again next year. He loves the internet and TV and, of course, Gunpla! And he gets some ridiculous ideas that he somehow manages to drag his friends into, even though Tangirou and Dororo, having known him since elementary school, should really know better. Usually called Keiro or Keiro-kun.

Takeda Tangirou is a more laid-back Giroro, at least by a bit. He wasn’t military and has never touched a gun, which is much better for him tbh. He’s great at sports and is a long-time member of Judo Club. Again, either still in high school, or in his case going to the local university; if the former, he hopes to get into the same school his older brother Garouichi. Might be roommates with Keiro? Usually called Giro or Giro-kun.

Azumaya Dororo, formerly named Reishi, is a childhood friend of Keiro and Giro, though years spent in a nearby ninja village distanced them somewhat after elementary school; his mother sent him to stay with family there in hopes that the forest and the training would help his poor health, and it did, enough that he took on a name for the forest rather than his old one. Like in canon, he’s calm and adores nature, and is still a bit traumatized from being Keiro’s childhood friend, but still loves his friends fiercely. Usually called Dororo now, but sometimes called Doro-kun; formerly called Reishi or Rei-kun.

Nishizawa Tamaki is like Tamama but without the energy beam attacks; he does still have the split personalities, and is a shockingly good fighter when in his violent side comes out. Loves sweets and kinda loves Keiro’s chaotic plans, too. Even if the others are all college-aged, he’s probably still a senior in high school; if they’re high-school aged he might be just entering high school or still in his final year of middle school. Has a huge crush on Keiro the moment he meets him. Usually called Tama or Tama-chan.

Tsukishima Kuruo is Kururu as a human, which as we’ve already established, means he’s a lazy hacker weirdgirl (goes by Kurumi online). Spends most of his time in his room, which he makes shit in but also spends a lot of time online and also playing video games in. Loves curry, naturally. Bleaches his hair but then does fucking nothing else with it. Has decided if he’s going to get dragged into Keiro’s ridiculousness he’s gonna make it even more ridiculous as often as possible, partly because he’s kind of desperately bored. Has had no friends until recently. Usually called Kuru or Kuru-kun; Tsumimi starts calling him Kuru-chan early on. It’s just a wave thing.

Amano Moa is basically Mois but a normal human; she’s a complete sweetheart and not at all a ditz the way some people might assume at first, very bright and competent. A shockingly naturally skilled fighter when it comes down to it, too.

Takeda Garouichi is Giro’s older brother and just an all-around cool and impressive guy. Usually called Garou or Garou-san.

Kano Rumiko is, like Pururu, a childhood friend of Keiro, Giro, and Dororo! She’s also either a nursing student now or wants to go into nursing. Usually called Rumiko-chan, but her childhood friends call her Ru-chan.

Goto Taru is a year younger than Tamaki, whom he calls Tama-senpai. Like Taruru, he’s also a little weirdo.

Shinoda Kotoro is either a bright but egotistical high school student or he’s like, twelve. No in-between. Like Tororo, he can be a bit of a brat and get carried away, and cries somewhat easily. Usually called Toro-kun.

Hayashi Zorusuke is a much less single-mindedly vengeful Zoruru and I don’t know what else to do with this guy. Has prosthetics but I’m not sure why yet. Usually called Zoru or Zoru-san or sometimes Zoru-kun.

The pronouns I used for all of the above are their canon ones, but let’s be real, if I were writing this for real I’d be transing a lot of genders. Yukiki at least would be she/they and Dororo would be she/her and Doro-chan (the name change was totally part of a trans thing on top of everything else), Garou might be they/them, Zoru might also, Keiro would probably use all kinda pronouns. Tsumimi and Kuru can go on a gender journey over the course of the story, that could be fun.

[gcldfanged]

Jae laughs, a quick bark of genuine amusement.

"And here I'd thought being tailored for a bespoke suit and having a four-figure paycheck had made you forget about where you came from," he sighs, pushing onto his splayed knees to take a standing position again.

Reno was a creature of impulse. Whenever the mood struck, it really didn’t matter who was there tagging along for the ride. Much like a raggedy alley cat wandering the streets it thought it owned, his moods could shift from playful to aloof at the drop of a hat.

Jae normally liked cats. Had Reno come along his way in another lifetime, he probably would have beat the crap out of him with a broom.

"You know, this makes me all nostalgic. See, back when Wall Market was run by a much better man rather than an oversized perverted toddler- Well... I actually don't know how much about where you were at the time, but things were pretty good. Saburo wasn’t actually head for all that long and even though everyone you'd ask would've sworn up and down that he’s the man, they didn’t always think that. He won that seat by the skin of his teeth and nearly died doing it. So he becomes head, but there’s still people who aren’t too keen on it — especially since he’s got notions that some people figured were a bit old-fashioned."

Yoon crooks an arm and splays his fingers against the decorative facing of a cup noodle vending machine, tilting his head and looking off into some far-away distance back when shit made sense in the city of sin.

"Aside from the guys that backed Saburo, the two main guys that were in play were Leesang, the second-hand of the guy Saburo won over, and Choi, one of the old guard. Leesang and his group figured they could still hold on to some of what they had before and Choi’s bunch of oldies were the sort that weren’t too keen on any new, young guys coming into power what with them always wanting to change things. Didn’t matter who you were, if you weren’t them, you were just doing it wrong. That didn’t keep them from constantly picking one side or another just to muck with things, though."

The annoyance in his voice is obvious when it came to mentioning Choi and his men, all wrinkled and shriveled up has-beens with faces like a chicken's asshole.

"Now, I didn’t like Leesang because he was the one guy that wasn’t holding to the old ways. Didn’t like the way Saburo wanted to go back with us swearing the old oaths and being bros and shit. And though he was sticking with it publicly, the only brothers he was gonna benefit were the ones who were best at kissing his ass. Choi’s group was even worse. They were just of buncha oldies that were so strung up on spite, they couldn’t do everyone a favor and just die. They liked getting their jollies by making everyone else land in shit."

He glances up at Reno from beneath dark lashes, eyelids falling to half mast with the same lazy intensity a tiger's might before it decides stuffing you in it's jaws might be fun.

"I know for a fact that your never ran with Wall Market's own personal octogenarian club, but man does your general attitude remind me of them. Kinda like you just look down your nose on anyone who's not a part of your special little retiree mah-jong circle."

Reno washed his hands of the evidence. A ghastly mess of mashed banana and peanut butter was scraped and thoroughly soaped up thrice before both the smell and sticky sensation was rid of beneath his finger nails. Why he was the only one that had to clean up, Reno had no idea. Maybe Rude didn't want to get leather gloves dirty with food when soiling them with blood was a better alternative, or perhaps he still did not understand the joys of pulling pranks on fellow ShinRa employees.

Someone was going to get their ass wet with unpleasantness, and Reno's only regret was he would not be around in person to witness his prank come to fruition. He washed up, took a leak, washed again, and then stepped out of the men's bathroom with a fresh tune moving past his pursed lips. Two plain faced office workers steered clear, and Reno traveled down the flight of stairs to the next level where rows of ShinRa friendly vending machines lied in humming wait. ID badge was flashed in front of the sensor to one of the machines, and it was not long before the hall was filled with the smell of hot coffee.

Gemstone eyes were focused on the odd serenity of the foam cup being filled with ebony fluid when motion flashed in his peripheral. The machine flashed a pixelated thank you. It went ignored in favoured of watching. . whatever the hell Jae was doing. While Reno felt no animosity towards him, the sudden and sick urge to toss the coffee in his face presented. Fortunately, the malicious thought was ignored. A snort formed like broiling water, and he turned his attention away, briefly, in order to pick up the warm cup of coffee.

(  ❛  Coming into work drunk, or do you really want some of this? ❜  )

Reno pressed his side against the brightly lit machine, brought the rim of the cup to his lips, and blew air to scatter the mesmerizing stream of steam.

(  ❛  You look like a cosmo-rat. ❜  )

jae slavic squats in front of reno, taunting him. @gcldfanged         (   is this a love confession, jae ?  )

[mystic-poison]

i love seeing hypmic selfshippers!! please tell me more about your hypmic f/os 🤲🤲

Hello!

I'm so glad you like seeing my selfships! Hypmic lives in my head rent free and it was about time I started talking about them. I was deadass scared about posting them too

I will definitely be posting more about my hypmic selfships because of selfshiptober, but I can definitely give a little crash course on how I meet some them

And I definitely would love to hear about yours and any others' hypmic selfships. I love talking about this stuff ♡

Warning! Spoilers for Hypmic at the end

- Poison ✞

~✞~ ~✞~ ~✞~ ~✞~

Rei, Sasara and Rosho and I are a poly ship. I meet them after my job hosted Dotsuitare Hompo's rap battle event. I was a fan of their music so I worked that event, hopefully trying to get a autograph. I was able to sneak in and see some of their show. At the end of the event, all the staff and employees took a group photo with them and the event was over. I really wanted to say hi but I was shy so it was actually a co-worker who dragged me over to them and say hi. Of course the guys were really nice. I got my autograph and I even gave them little chibi stickers that I made. They thought the stickers where cute, even posting about them on their social media (ran my Sasara). It was a random commentor who told them who I was and tagged my social media page where they saw all the art that I did for them. And in just my luck, they were looking for a new artist for their merch team. So after getting in contact with me, and many, many meetings, I became part of their merch team, using a penname no one would ever find out its me.

Jyuto and I have a long distance relationship and meet through Rio. Rio and I were pen pales and he would show Jyuto and Samatoki the letters we wrote to each other and all the doodles I sent him. One day I decided to fly out to see Rio and meet him in person. While staying there for a week or two, Rio introduced me to Jyuto and Samatoki at one of their rap battle events. During my stay, I spent some time talking to Jyuto and getting him and Samatoki out of eating Rio's roadkill food. We would get coffee together, I would show him my art and doodles, and Rio was 100% okay with this. (As if he was trying to set us up to begin with). We got a closer than expected, traded info and started talking more when I went back home.

Ichiro, Jiro, and Saburo are my adoptive sons. After I started during Rei, I, of course, meet the boys as well. He was trying to be a better dad after much, much thought about it. At first we had kept it a secret that we were dating to the boys but Saburo is way to smart to fall for something like that. So Rei and I came clean and told them everything. Ichiro had a lot of mixed feeling about it, Saburo was shock Rei even was able to date again, and Jiro hopped on broad with the idea from the start, accepting me into the family already. Jiro and I became close (us sharing a singular brain cell). It took a while for Ichiro and Saburo to get use to me being around and trusting me. But slowly they grew to like me. Ichiro and I talk about anime and manga, Saburo is always teaching about coding and new software to use for art, and Jiro and I are always running around playing sports (despite me not being very athletic at all). Rei seems to enjoy seeing us hangout, even finding it funny when the boys call me mom

[baka-bakeneko]

The Things I Do for You - Takemura x Fem!V Reader

cw: car sex (perhaps exhibitionist) , love bites, hinted dominant Takemura, hinted sub V

word count: 2,880

synopsis: V follows Takemura's order, falls for Takemura harder. Their plans begin well thought before things go awry, leading them tired hurt and parting ways. (Major spoilers for mission Search and Destroy)

a/n: definitely a sequel to the first Takemura fic here. I love this man so much, I've died so many times for him already.

Your head pounded, Johnny's personal alarm clock panging against your temple. Your arm stretched out, half-expecting Takemura's sturdy chest under your palm but was met with still-warm yet empty sheets.

You groaned, avoiding the sunlight as you ducked your face into your pillow. Not a good sign.

Even worse now was Johnny perched in the corner, crooning about what you put him through. "I know I said go for it, but having to share that experience of fucking a corpo lapdog…" He cringed, faking a disgusted shiver down his body.

"Shut up," you growled from the stuffy confines of the pillow. You waved your hand out, hoping to disperse Johnny like a fine mist or nicotine smoke.

"And just when you gave it up, look at him. Nowhere to be found," Johnny shifted, glitched at the foot of your bed to the edge. "Done played yourself, V."

You turned your body away from him, facing the wall now as you pried your eyes open. The panging subsided with a steely slate of blue, wracking your eye sockets to garble before they stabilized.

"Fuck," you whispered, holding the heel of your palm to your temple.

Your phone buzzed from the opposite side of your bed; you rolled back around to get it then sat up, next to Johnny now lighting an imaginary smoke.

'V,

I must apologize for my abrupt departure. I wished to have stayed longer, but I have much else to do in order for our plan to come to fruition.

I hope to see you again soon. '

You read Goro's text message, formal and poignant as always. However, this one felt out of his own character, apologizing for going out to do his own personal task.

Your fingers hovered over the keyboard, thinking of a response, when you received a second text message, one linked with a photo.

Raising your brows, you opened the attachment to see Goro, holding his phone low under his chin as he took a selfie.

'I do wish I were there with you this morning.'

You bit back a girlish smile, one that made a lone butterfly emerge from its stomach cocoon and tickle your insides. Johnny, ever the sitting spider in your mind, squashed the feeling in an instant.

"Corpo lapdog, running back to his task."

You folded your hand to your face, rubbing at your forehead to ignore Silverhand's comment. In response, you ran your hand up through your hair then snapped a selfie, sending it back to Goro.

You purposefully stretched your neck to the side in a fake yawn, reminding the man about the dot map of love bites he left on your skin.

'Better have a way to make up for this.'

-

Turns out that Goro did not have a way to make up for his abandoning you or his marking of your neck. Apparently they were just part of the trade when it came to a "relationship" with Takemura.

In exchange for mind-blowing sex and longing stares in public, you would receive a repeated morning feeling of abandonment, close to what you felt when your nomad clan turned their back on you, and stage three hickeys that look like if a tentacle tried to strangle you. Deal?

Of course you took it for what it was worth. There was still no downside to it. You weren't a morning person, Goro was. You weren't a necklace person, Goro begged to differ.

Truly small potatoes in the grander scheme of things. Even now, as you sat across from him in the diner, poking at the breakfast platter you ordered, there was no downside.

"So, about Arasaka…"

Okay, one downside.

"I believe I have come up with a plan. We must talk to Hanako-sama."

"Saburo's daughter? Why?" You asked, poking at an over-easy egg. You'd ordered over-hard, but poking at the raw white, your mind flashed to filth.

You turned your gaze back to Takemura.

"She will be the voice of reason on the inside. If anyone could take down Yorinobu, it's her."

You blinked once, stifling a yawn under your shirt. "I thought that she was back in Japan."

Takemura shifted in his seat, acknowledging your comment with a single nod. "Yes, but she has returned for the dashi parade."

You were listening, you were, but the more you stared at Takemura's steely eyes, his stern jaw along with his perpetual resting accusatory glare, you were tested beyond relief.

"He could bore paint off a wall," Johnny but in on your left.

You shook your head, it wasn't that. Your mind was transfixed to do whatever this man wanted if it meant that he'd remain flustered when looking at your lips.

You prodded your tongue between them, wetting them before reaching for your coffee. "You point me in the right direction and I'm there, Goro."

He nodded curtly. "We will have to talk to Oda, Hanako-sama's bodyguard. My long term friend."

"Okay," You agreed. "Is he a reasonable guy?"

Takemura offered a dry scoff in response. "Not at all, but he is our first option. I need you to remain calm."

You took a long draw of your coffee before repeating yourself. "I'm there."

Takemura finished his meal with a low grimace at the quality. You tried your best to stomach through your breakfast but gave up when the waitress approached with the bill.

You paid for your meals then followed Takemura outside. Following him through the alleyway on the way to your car, Goro stopped on the opposite side of a dumpster.

He tugged you aside, pressed you up against the wall while you tried to ignore the stale pungency of urine.

"Goro," you tried, being greeted with his nose brushing closely against yours.

Takemura's hands drifted down your forearms to your waist, closing whatever small distance between you two. "I am not one to express my feelings, V."

Your chin twitched in acknowledgement. "I know."

"But they are hard to ignore around you," he whispered against your lips.

Your eyes drifted from Goro's lips to his eyes, your hands grabbing at his elbows. "I know."

He said nothing else, leaning in to peck your lips. You tasted the lingering black coffee on his breath, knowing that it mixed well with your oversugared coffee.

Takemura was stiff before you, propping you up against the wall. The jagged brick wall poked at the small of your back, arching yourself into him.

His large arms circled around your waist, practically begging you to wrap your legs around him. However, you refrained and reluctantly pulled away to catch your breath.

"What is it?" He asked lowly, his voice a considerate gravel.

"Let's go to the car," you panted into his mouth.

-

You barely made it up the road before you pulled over to tackle Takemura in the backseat. Now that the option to do anything else or fuck Goro was there, you were going to choose the latter if given a minute.

You climbed into the backseat after Goro, sitting in his lap and immediately going to undress him. If he could keep the trenchcoat on, it'd be a plus, but you wanted to caress as much of his bare skin as possible.

"We don't have time for this, V," he groaned into your neck as his hands squeezed at your thighs.

"Then we'll make time," you offered, easily undoing his belt with no experience with it before.

Goro restrained his hands at the small of your back, slipping them along the curve of your ass while his strained gaze was trained on you. He caught your mouth with his, kissing you fully before slipping his tongue in and exploring your mouth.

While you tried to carefully undress the man before you, Goro wasted no time gripping tightly at the belt loops on the back of your pants before ripping them open as if cracking an egg.

You whined into his mouth, you were already struggling to find nice clothes as it was and now that was another pair of pants in the trash. The thought was quickly subsided with his calloused, tender fingers slipping underside of your ass and timidly petting at your pussy.

"Goro," you breathed into his mouth, your hands instantly cradling his jaw.

He said nothing, the corner of his mouth twitching in a ways of a smile. Takemura angled your hips directly over his, his cock now free and standing at attention.

Carefully, he sank you down on him causing you to throw your head back with a moan filling the cabin. Goro buried his face in your cleavage, tearing your top down with his teeth to find your nipple.

You held him closer, running your hands up the back of his head and through his messy bunned hair.

"V," he breathed against your chest, only holding you on him.

The two of you stilled, revealing in the feeling of each other while connected at the hips.

-

Oda's eventual meeting was a bust. Which wasn't surprising when you had to stand on the opposite side of the car, wearing a pair of mox shorts you found in your trunk.

Attempting to be intimidating while using the car as a well-placed censor was not something you planned on ever doing again.

It was less about you, though. Takemura was deflated after meeting his friend. But not to the point of wanting comfort. No, Takemura wanted to prove his friend wrong now at whatever costs.

And just like he was a corpo lapdog, you were practically his ready for your next task by his words.

"When he says 'sit', you say 'on what?'," Johnny quipped as he perched on the metal ledge overlooking the pier. "When Goro says 'come', you…"

"I get it," you cut him off, giving him another dismissive wave.

"But do you, V? You're playing into his hand, and for all we know he might serve you up to Arasaka on a silver platter."

You sneered at that. "He already gave us his word. He's on our side, Johnny."

"He's on your side, he's not fucking me," Johnny snapped back.

"See you say that," you started, leaning against your car, "but you're right in here. You feel those same synapses firing when he hits it good."

Johnny groaned, turning around on the metal fence. "Ugh, don't remind me."

You turned around to Goro, folding your arms over the top of your car. "What now?"

"We will regroup later. I must come up with a plan to talk to Hanako-sama," he metered, crossing his arms before his chest.

"Do you want me to drop you off somewhere?"

He pressed his lips in a straight line, looking from you to your car and back again. "I will find a ride back. Thank you, V."

And just like that, dismissed.

"Okay. I'll see you later, Goro."

-

This was not a part of the plan. When you said you'd help with anything, you were at Takemura's side, that did not include taking down three snipers, scaling a rickety building, fighting fucking Oda, then sparing him and watching Goro kidnap fucking Hanako.

But what was the saying? The things you do for love…

This wasn't what you signed up for, but what did you expect? A man with nothing to lose along with a mercenary with also nothing to lose was quite a pair of reckless beings.

But goddammit you were in the shit of it now. You were going to meet Goro and Hanako at the abandoned apartment building in Westbrook.

"Good job, V," Johnny chided, following you down the sidewalk as you jogged up to the entrance. "And I thought I knew how to pick 'em."

You wanted to bite back some venom, maybe something scarring about Rogue or even Alt, but for once Johnny was right. You did know how to pick them.

You took the steps two at a time, reaching the third floor and knocking four times. You were not expecting Goro to open the door and pull you inside, pull you…into a hug?

Was he functioning alright? Maybe the excitement was making him act off, he'd never put his arms around you like this. But that's what lovers did, didn't they? They cherished an alive presence.

You curled your arms around him in response, curling up his shoulder blades as you buried your face in his metallic neck.

"Thank goodness you made it out safe," he said lowly, not allowing much room for a response as he pulled back and kissed you fully on the lips.

"You too," you offered when he pulled away. But then your fist was pounding on his chest in frustration. "That was not part of the plan!"

"I had to act quickly." He shrugged away from your light taps on his body. "Hanako-sama was going to activate her tracker."

You raised your fist to start pounding at him harder, so angry and relieved that he made it out but he caught your wrist in his hand and brought it to his cheek. "I know I have worried you, and I apologize."

A beat passed between you two; you stared into his opulent eyes, feeling their softened stare melt away all your worry in an instant. He was warm, nuzzling his cheek into your fist until you unfurled and cradled his jaw.

Goro kissed at the meat of your wrist, his own silent apology again. You hid a swoon with an overt blink of your eyes, avoiding his gaze to look through the plastic curtain.

"I offered her tea," he continued, back on his standard bodyguard bullshit. "She politely declined."

"You kidnap her, take out her bodyguard and you thought tea would solve it?" You griped, though you wanted to laugh. Ill-timing on your end.

The man single-handedly led you as a one-woman assassin but politely offered tea to his superior as a makeup. 'I'm sorry for my girlfriend, she is well aware of her strength and I asked her to help me in this endeavor, would you prefer chamomile or earl grey?'

Were you even his girlfriend? His paramour? A lover of sorts? You took a deep breath and let the thought go, even though Johnny wouldn't.

"Is now really the time to be thinking of relationship statuses? You've got Arasaka goons sniffing up your alley!" Johnny said, leaning against the far wall of the dingy apartment.

You walked through the plastic curtain and took a seat before Hanako; Goro took to standing behind her, explaining who you were.

"I have no reason to lie," you said. "I'm dying and I saw your brother murder your father."

When you said your peace, your eyes flashed over to Goro, noticing his body stiffen at the words. That's right, you were still dying from Johnny disease. So far, no cure.

How could you forget that? Like Johnny was just a vulgar Jiminy Cricket that steered you down a path of full anarchy? Where would that leave Goro once you were gone?

And he'd only seen you cough up blood once. Did he know how far gone you were?

"I do not know what to say..." Hanako began, her frigid demeanor not warming an inch to your confession.

Typical. You were a very acquired taste, moreso now that Johnny was co-piloting.

Before you could say anything else, the ceiling blew open with explosives. You were thrown from your chair and to the floor as Arasaka goons pounded the floor, brandishing guns and retrieving Hanako.

Your head was on full tilt, looking around for Takemura while everything spun. A gun was pointed in your face and you tried to push it away but the floor gave a warning rumble before you fell two floors down, buried alive in the rubble.

When you finally woke seconds later, Johnny was yelling at you to get up and get out. You were slow to start, pulling yourself to your feet in the dark room before stopping in the doorway.

"Keep your head low and eyes three-sixty, we gotta go, V." Johnny urged, stepping in the way of a quick exit.

You leaned against the doorway, catching your breath while you thought of leaving. "Not without him."

And you went on a rampage to retrieve your grimacing Japanese man.

-

Outside of the building, he helped you to your feet and tried to hold onto you though your head was going full tilt. Going against Johnny like that, fighting so hard…

You spat out a few drops of blood into your hand, trying to hide it though Goro saw it anyway.

He leaned in and kissed your lips, pulling away with his tinged with a dull crimson. "We must part ways for now, V."

Goro held onto your elbows, looking deep into your eyes. "I will contact you when it's safe."

"Okay," you said groggily, dead tired almost.

Takemura leaned in and kissed your forehead, gentle and memorable. You felt his breath waft through your hair, lingering as long as he could without you two being unsafe.

"I love you," he whispered, nuzzling his nose against your hairline. "Be safe."

Your eyes threatened with tears, an absolute first since Jackie. You sniffled tightly and brought up your resolve to steel.

"I-I will," you said. "I love you too."

----------------------------------------------------------

(unsure if i'll be making a third chapter. the thirst is immeasurable, but I also enjoy my sleep)

[thenihilistofthevoid]

"Might as well relieve you of your ignorance... Your grandfather was either an orphan or caused trouble back home as a kid. Until the doctors picked him up, that's when it went wrong for him. You're a second generation immigrant, he came from Germany as a survivor after the war. There's an organisation that keeps records of them." Saburo stated, the sound of running water from his bathroom. "No hosepipe attachments, so you can't shove it down my throat like you did Ruby." So it would take time to fill, the water pressure was atrocious.

"What do you mean, Germany?" Either Matthew was confused or interested. "Your surname's German, Schmidt. You're in your late 30s, so your grandfather would be mid 1930's. He was taken to the Institute for Developmental Psychology as a child, although it was less about psychology or anything remotely scientific and more of a euthanasia factory, an extension of the experiments they ran at the concentration camps. Starvation, sleep deprivation, altitude experiments... Drowning and reviving them again. They keep the records in a castle, not exactly advertised. The national psyche isn't quite ready to reconcile that they tortured their own children. And the Nazis were unfortunately very fastidious about keeping the records, as if trying to prove some experimental validity to their inhuman torture outside of Hitler's Aryan Master Race theory. He probably spent most of the war in that Institute, until Nazi Germany collapsed and he emigrates to America as a farmer. You went to live with him after your parents died in the crash." Saburo explained.

"He made me strong." The other man sniffed. "He repeated those experiments on you, the abused becomes the abuser. Probably in the bath or a water silo. If I went back there, I'd probably find records he kept. And it solves another case my friend is on, the prostitute murders. You drown a psychologist, then you kill a prostitute... Both left-handed." The psychologist grunts as he's punched.

"What do you know of it?!" Matthew shouted. "It's what those poor girls found out, they discovered your dirty little secret. Are my words getting to you, Matthew? This wasn't the plan. You were supposed to tie me up and drown me, not beat me with the stock of your shotgun."

Falls The Shadow

(A starter for @fordfrontalnews)

It had been a difficult few weeks. Saburo had been at another psychology conference, not because he liked such things but because one of his college friends was presenting. He had to support her, and now she was dead. Not just dead, she was murdered in a bizzare and brutal manner, and Ruby was the first. His colleagues were being picked off, found drowned.

His phone buzzed in his pocket, Ford. Probably about the latest murder. Dr. Rifah Chowdri, found hogtied in her own kitchen with the hose from her sink forced down her throat. He knew a bit about her, but they worked in separate fields. Answering, he stopped when the cocking of a shotgun was heard.

"You can leave the light out, Doctor Kusanagi. We can do this in the dark." The voice said, a man's voice. Relatively young. He muted the phone call before Ford could speak, he might be his only chance at survival. "You were at the conference. I saw you, the waiter I bumped into." Saburo responded, realisation coming to his voice, that crack it made when things fell into place.

"Sit down and put your hands behind your back." The order was gruff. "There's no point threatening me with that gun. You don't want to shoot me, you want to drown me. I know why. No matter how fastidious you were, you left clues." Saburo's response was calm.

[hypmicdaydreams]

you’re down sick w/ buster bros

-pairings: ichiro yamada x gn!reader, jiro yamada x gn!reader, saburo yamada x gn!reader

-genre: fluff

-overall word count: 1.65k

-a/n: i came down with the flu and have been utterly sick the past few days 😷 i wrote this amidst all my delirium and pain with my fav boys lol, and you can def tell that i was ranting a bit lmao. word count ended up uneven between the three of them buttt hope you guys don’t mind 😓 anywayy hope you guys enjoy, and remember to stay safe, esp during cold and flu season 💕

ichiro (432 words)

“here, take this.”

“but ichiro-”

your boyfriend shoves a spoonful of disgusting medicine down your throat the moment you open your mouth and give him the chance. it tastes like shit, despite the overwhelming artificial strawberry (cherry? whatever it was red) flavor. it was so bitter, so gross. it should’ve at least been bubblegum.

and it’s the third or fourth spoonful you’ve taken that day, and also the third or fourth time you were close to gagging. ‘it’ll be good for you’ ichiro yearns, with a cute smile and gentle pat on the head. but he’s not the one who’s sick and definitely not the one who has to deal with shit-tasting medicine.

ah fuck, you really miss not being sick.

“that wasn’t bad now,” ichiro chuckles when you give him a disgruntled look and cute pout. he’s enjoying himself a little, perhaps, happy to nurse you back to health. he’s done this many times; ichiro is practically a pro by now, a licensed nurse or whatever. he definitely carries himself as so, with the demands and spoon feeding you medicine, like a child. but he’s a cute nurse, at the very least. or you think so, looking from your lashes as he takes your temperature with his hand. his smile is cute, after all, when he finds you to be just fine.

“how’s your throat by the way?” you can’t speak that loud, as much as you try, because you’re in pain and your throat is irritating the everliving fuck out of you. you just want to rest it but also take all the disgusting cough drops in the world to numb the sensation.

he laughs again at your defeated look, having succumbed to this no good, rotten flu. but at least you feel the tiniest bit better when he rubs his thumb across your hand, the comfort and warmth putting you at ease. “i’ll go prepare some soup for you, alright?” you nod, content as can be (while sick that is) as he ruffles your hair. you were somewhat sick of soup, but ichiro had told you that the sensei told him fluids were the best, and it definitely did soothe your throat (and burn your tongue but that was neither here nor there), so you had no room to complain really.

“alright babe. you’ll get better in no time.” your boyfriend/nurse is so cute, you think, happy to know that you had such a loving guy to look over you. a bit of luck in these trying times, you contentedly sigh.

but you’d still rather not be sick.

jiro (611 words)

“trust me babe. i do this all the time and i get better right away!!”

you had no energy to argue with jiro, nor the capacity to given your strained throat. how pitiful a state you were in, throat sore and sinuses inflamed (or so it felt). but the last thing you needed was some bullshit homeopathic medicine that your boyfriend had just made up on that very spot, if only to give you a slimmer of false hope.

“you said that the last three times jiro,” you groan out quietly, and all three hadn’t worked, not one bit. you were sick and tired of taking different medications, of which neither you nor jiro knew what the fuck they even did. and honestly, you were a tiny bit worried that the concoctions within you would somehow kill you on the spot. they had allergies, headaches, or sinuses on the label and jiro just gave you them, whether they’re intended to be mixed or abused or not. bless his dumb little soul.

“but this time for sure.” yeah sure, whatever; you roll your eyes, and jiro sighs, running a hand through his hair. “listen babe, listen! when i have the flu like you, i always take this and it works like a charm!!”

he puts out some weird juice, the likes of which you haven’t seen much before. well, not entirely true; you did see jiro take it once a while back when he himself was sick, except that he gagged and threw up his entire guts after, which wasn’t entirely helpful nor comforting i presume. “this got rid of my flu in like a half hour or so!”

doubt. or maybe his immune system is just that strong. he was an athlete, right? maybe you should’ve practiced soccer with jiro much more, now that you think back on it.

but you can’t say no to him, not when he gives you that pleasing look that makes him look like a cute (yet troublesome) puppy. he just wants to take care of you, to be that strong boyfriend you can rely on. it’s cute, you have to admit, even as strangely excited as he was to take care of you when you texted him that you were down with the bothersome flu. he had shown up at your door in five minutes flat (despite living ten minutes away what the fuck-) with a whole bunch of medicines and shit.

but you’re just glad you have a caretaker i guess, aside from your mom. you have to let your boyfriend have this, to let him know that he’s doing a good job (as terrible of a job as it probably was, but he was good in morale and kisses, sick and delirious kisses). so you take the drink, cursing your heart for doing a flip when he gives you that puppy beam.

and it tastes like shit. complete and utter garbage, so bitter and disgusting.

“ack, fuck! jiro what-!”

“just drink it,” he shoves the drink towards you, as awful tasting as it is, and you take another awful sip. gosh how you just want to gag. “yeah yeah, it tastes like shit, but it works! i promise!”

and as much as you love your boyfriend, jiro is also such a big fat liar, or so you feel that way at the moment, glaring at him. you just feel and look worse afterwards.

“um, on second thought,” he rubs the nape of his neck, too embarrassed to look you in the eye. “i’ll just make ichi-nii’s special soup for your throat.”

yeah, that sounded much better. ah well, at least he was cute.

saburo (606 words)

“saburoo, this tastes gross.”

your boyfriend just seems to roll his eyes at your whining and complaining, perhaps finding your strained voice and quiet groans a bit amusing. you want to slap him for that — you’re the one going through hell and back after all, not that he’d understand — but you can’t; he’s the one nursing you back to health, despite his complaints. and you’re definitely not going to let go of your own personal nurse, especially when it’s your boyfriend.

you have the urge to gag up the bitter medicine he just shoved in your mouth, even more so when you swallow it out of force. ugh why did it taste like that?! it was (supposedly) supposed to help with your cough and congestion, but all the medicines and pills you took and that was simply untrue.

you were uncurable, much to your dismay and pain.

“you need to take it,” saburo scolds, emphasizing the ‘need’ as if you were a child not understanding. “why did you even go to school today if you felt so bad?”

“my mom forced me too.” well, it’s more like she forced you to take some disgusting medicine, the worst you’ve ever tasted, and then sent you off to school when you didn’t seem to have a fever. there was no way you were missing a day of school, not on her watch. just wear a mask and take some cough drops or whatever, she advised, handing you a bunch of gross honey-lemon ones (they weren’t even your favorite! the absolute worst of the bunch) then throwing you out.

at least saburo could tell that you looked of death. and bless his soul for forcing you to leave early, dragging you to the office despite your protests as you were too tired to fight back, especially against his monolith.

“can i get headache medicinee,” you whine in your raspy voice, again. ibuprofen was your savior, especially against your pounding headache and eyeache. it didn’t help that whenever your nose wasn’t congested, your sinuses were on fire as well.

“no.” you pout at his firm stance. it was the fourth time you’ve asked, and fourth time he’s said no. how cruel..did he like seeing you in pain? “you just took one a few hours ago,” he sighs, not even immune to your puppy eyes.

and he had a point, as much as you didn’t care. sure you’d probably be actively destroying your liver and body by taking so many — and i really mean so many — concoctions, but at the moment, you’d take that chance. you just wanna feel better man.

well, it’s cute how worried saburo was for your health i suppose, even as he insisted that it’s because he knows you can’t take care of yourself whatsoever. and we can’t have you dying on him, can we? as i said, it’s cute that he cares.

“can i at least get soup?” you give him the puppy eyes again. at least soup made you feel a bit better, especially good at soothing your throat for a few.

and he obviously can’t say no to that request, as much as he seems to reluctantly agree.

“alright,” saburo sighs, “but don’t take anymore medicine when i’m gone.” typical saburo, doesn’t trust you not to destroy yourself.

but you don’t entirely mind right now, at least. you know your boyfriend well, and you know he’s going to make your favorite soup, “accidentally” of course.

sigh, saburo simply being there sure did make you feel a tiny bit better. you relished in his affection, and perhaps you should appear sick more often (not).