#whoops i actually did not mean to post this yet

[skynobi]

lukeleias brainrot below

[vimbry-moved]

long transcript below

JF: you know, I was on- on twitter last night, and uh, you know occasionally when, you know, people leave... posts that are impossible to comprehend, you actually have to seek out, you know, who posted it? and the person who posted it wrote that they were: "shy AF". [audience laughter] and I still don't know what that could possibly mean. [more laughter]

JL: it's "auto-focus". it's a photography term. [laughter]

JF: it's all circling back to (JL: yes, to photography) just what we were talking about a moment ago. so, d- you uh, you just slept today. you slept, you did nothing?

JL: um, you know. I- I lay exhausted, next to my wife, and we- we had one of those conversations where you're just like, "(slurring) yeah, so uh-tha- that was weird. there we were on tour... and we were in... Sa-... Saskaphone, I think it's called?" [laughter]

JF: I, uh, I presented my wife with our very first piece of taxidermy. [laughter and cheers]

JL: yeah, how did- we discussed this earlier in the tour. you were not sure how Robin was gonna go for it?

JF: it's definitely one of those "take it or leave it" things? you know, I mean, taxidermy, come on, people. it's kind of- it's sort of a horrible idea. [laughter]

JL: yes. and yet, how endearing. (JF: yeah) and wonderful.

JF: so, I went to this, uh, antiques (junk) store, and found this very small piece of, uh... I'm not sure what actual animal it's supposed to be. it looks just like a tiger, if a tiger was this big. [laughter] and uh, we have determined that it will, uh- there's a special nook at the top of the stairs in the basement, where it will reside. [audience and JL laughter]

the big problem is that, if you get something like taxidermy, you either, like- you're either gonna lose the friends you have [laughter], or you're gonna have to move on to all new friends, who might... might be a little bit creepier than your current friends. [more laughter]

JL: right. but you could- you could taxidermy your old friends, so you still get to keep them. [loud audience laughter and applause] have all your- everything. keep it all.

JF: ... John, it's that kind of outside thinking that keeps this band fresh! [loud cheers and applause]

JL: think about it. problem solved!

JF: what's a little bit of cannibalism among friends! [laughter]

JL: (laughing) I didn't say- (quietly) I just said- (normal) I just said stuff them.

JF: (laughing) oho, I'd say- I'd say eat them! with a delicious--

JL: -- see, that's where--

JF: -- béarnaise sauce, I would say! [whooping]

JL: that's the basis of our collaboration--

JF: -- I would, I would, I would--

JL: -- I say "taxidermy", you say "eat". (JF: yes) (unintelligible). [laughter]

JF: I would say pair that with a nice white wine from the Loire Valley. [quiet laughter] ... so people, we got 2 sets! [cheering] but only- but only 1 epically long conversation at the beginning of the show. [laughter] so, we're gonna just, uh, you know roll up the uh, taxidermy chat, and say this was another episode of "inappropriate things to say in a public forum" (JL: yes). [cheering]

[elyvorg]

Kieran Part 2: It’s All About YOU

Well, looks like The Indigo Disk didn’t remotely drop the ball – it caught it in incredible style! Pokémon’s best character-writing job yet has been followed up and capped off with, if anything, something even better. Kieran is far and away the most complex and well-written character that mainline Pokémon has ever achieved, and I am here to talk about the second half of why this is, in very great detail. Consider me just, blown away. I have So Many Feelings about this boy.

This is of course a follow-up to my earlier analysis post about Kieran’s character and arc during The Teal Mask, which you can find here. Reading that before this is recommended!

(This will contain a couple of brief references to some post-epilogue lines, so if you haven’t got to that stuff yet and you really care about seeing it completely fresh, you might want to hold off on reading this for now. But there’s no actual spoilers for the epilogue itself in here, because, whoops, I think I’m gonna have to cover all of that in yet another post of its own.)

(Like last time, I will be largely referring to the player character as “you” for convenience, although I may shift into third person occasionally when I’m talking about the vague implications of a personality that they are given, since that’s a little more relevant this time.)

The gaping pit of inferiority

First, though, before getting into The Indigo Disk, I want to re-establish where Kieran’s character ended up at the end of Teal Mask, now that I have a clearer idea of exactly how that relates to where things are headed.

Kieran was always gripped by an aching inferiority complex, one too huge and unbearable for him to ever face directly. Prior to Teal Mask, he’d coped with that by clinging to the figure of the ogre as an ideal of strength. He imagined that maybe one day if he managed to grow strong enough to be just like it, the ogre would acknowledge him and be his friend – and that would finally mean that he mattered and he really was strong after all. He finally wouldn’t have to deal with the crushing pain of his inferiority complex any more.

But then, of course, you swept in with your amazingly perfect protagonist strength, ripping away Kieran’s chance of ever befriending Ogerpon and doing so in the most tragically agonising way possible that only seemed to validate and hammer home to him just how hopelessly weak he really is. Left with nothing but an even bigger gaping pit of inferiority inside him, and no longer able to cling to the idea of Ogerpon as a way for him to one day escape it, the only thing Kieran could do in order to cope was find something else to latch onto: you.

You became a greater ideal of strength to Kieran than even Ogerpon ever was during the events of Teal Mask, so now he’s hung everything on the thought of making himself strong enough to prove he’s just as good as you. If he can become strong enough to beat you, surely that of all things will be enough to prove that he matters and isn’t weak at all. It’s the only thing he can conceive of that might just free him from the grip of his terrifyingly massive inferiority complex, and he’s clinging onto it for dear life, striving for it to the point of obsession.

I saw a lot of people talk in the lead-up to this DLC like it was going to be about Kieran wanting revenge on you, but that’s not remotely it. He isn’t even able to comprehend the idea that anything you did to him could be considered wrong in the first place; that’s just how things were meant to go when you’re strong and he’s weak, right? Even though it was you who took everything away from him and made him feel so crushingly inferior, that pales in his mind next to how incredibly strong you are and how badly he needs to be like that himself. This isn’t even about him getting another shot at winning over Ogerpon, either – as much as you having become her trainer is a huge source of pain and jealousy for him, he seems to have pretty much accepted that there’s no changing that now.

What Kieran actually, consciously wants out of all this is…  well, it’s extremely vague and nebulous, but that’s precisely the point, because there is no rationality involved in any of it. What is he really hoping to gain from it, when (if) he beats you? For you to decide to be his friend after all? For him to instantly become happy and finally feel strong? For him to magically turn into you and have all the good things you have that he envies about you? Obviously none of those things would necessarily happen, but Kieran is not consciously thinking any of this through to its logical endpoint. He’s not actually hoping to get a specific Thing out of beating you – he just desperately, indescribably feels like he needs to beat you, more than anything else in the world.

What Kieran really needs out of this deep down is for you, this person he’s warped himself into idolising as the Strongest Most Perfect Person Ever, to acknowledge him and his strength. It’s just like he wanted Ogerpon to acknowledge him before, shifted onto a new target of idolisation and grown far more desperately obsessive. If you of all people acknowledged him, then just maybe it might actually be true that he really is strong and worth something after all. At its most fundamental level, Kieran has always just deeply needed to gain a sense of self-worth, and yet his self-esteem is so horribly low that he’s basically incapable of doing so on his own without outside validation. But I really don’t think he’s aware on a conscious level that this is what he needs and what he’s striving to get out of all this.

(And of course there’s no way you’d ever acknowledge him and his worth as a person anyway, right? He thought you’d maybe done that when you called him a friend back in Kitakami, but any fleeting hope of gaining self-worth that way evaporated when you went and lied to him, validating his fears that obviously you’d couldn’t possibly have meant it. After all, why would someone as strong as you ever want to be friends with someone weak like him? The only way you’d ever possibly acknowledge his worth is if he conclusively proved that he’s even stronger than you, by defeating you in battle.)

Blueberry Academy

The other thing I want to do before getting into the events of The Indigo Disk itself is to re-evaluate a few assumptions I made about Blueberry Academy in the previous post, now that we’ve actually seen it for ourselves.

I was assuming that a significant part of the reason for Kieran’s inferiority complex was due to him being bullied at Blueberry, but… there’s absolutely zero indication from any of the NPC dialogue that any such thing happened. If the writers wanted this to be a fact that was relevant to Kieran’s character, they absolutely would have put something in. However, in hindsight, I realise that maybe I was primed to assume a bullying problem at Blueberry due to the Team Star storyline, when actually, Kieran being bullied there doesn’t necessarily fit. His issues about being shunned and his paranoia that people are laughing at him behind his back are so ingrained that they have to have originated from quite a while ago in his childhood – and he’s only a first-year at Blueberry.

So, scratch that part of the previous post: Kieran was not bullied at Blueberry Academy, but he was almost certainly bullied earlier on in his childhood, at whatever school(s) he attended beforehand. It wouldn’t necessarily have needed to be a really overt, physical kind of bullying either – that’s the sort of thing that Carmine would certainly have noticed and protected him from. But even something more low-key like being constantly left out of things and looked down on by others would have left a huge psychological mark on him, and would have probably been too subtle for his socially oblivious sister to do much about. (Or, in some ways, she might just have made such things worse by being so fiercely overprotective of him. Most people wouldn’t want to go near the kid with the Scary Big Sister who’ll bite their head off if they so much as look at him wrong.)

Bullying aside, I was looking for any kind of clues at all from the NPCs as to what Kieran was like at Blueberry Academy before his big change… and there’s almost nothing. Plenty of people comment on Kieran now, because everyone knows who he is as the Champion, but nobody shows surprise that it was this timid kid who rose up and beat Drayton. It seems that as far as most of the students are concerned, he just came out of nowhere. But maybe that’s the point; maybe almost nobody ever even noticed him or thought anything of him at all until he grew stronger. By the time he joined Blueberry Academy, Kieran’s default coping mechanism must have been to make himself as small and invisible as possible, so that basically nobody even really thought twice about him.

Only two whole NPCs actually make any kind of reference to what Kieran was like before he became Champion. (Well, other than Carmine, of course, and also discounting Amarys because she’d have only known Kieran through her friendship with his sister.) One of them is Drayton, who’d noticed him as the incredibly shy kid who nonetheless lit up with joy more than anyone else when watching battles. And then there is one random NPC you can find in the Central Plaza who comments on how Kieran has turned into a completely different person. That’s it. Only two people happened to have noticed this timid kid enough to realise he’s the same guy who suddenly became Champion. (And, while they both seem at least a little concerned, neither of them appear to have outright considered Kieran a friend, because of course not. You really were the first friend he’d ever managed to make, until everything went horribly wrong.)

One thing I was expecting to get from the vibe at Blueberry that it absolutely did deliver, mind you, was the culture around battling. There’s all sorts of talk about battling and getting stronger, double battles as standard to make things more strategic, and even the random NPC trainers can actually be kind of challenging. So I was definitely right that this culture must have contributed to Kieran fixating on getting stronger and proving himself to you through gaining more battling strength in particular. One NPC near the entrance also remarks that “you don’t look strong”, as if people here assume battling strength to be correlated with physical appearance, which… yeah, that explains a bit about why Kieran felt he needed to look different alongside becoming stronger in battle, doesn’t it.

Changing himself

Of course, Kieran’s reasons for changing up his appearance go much deeper than just wanting to superficially “look stronger”. In order to achieve the nigh-impossible feat of managing to match you in strength, he felt like he had to become nothing short of a completely different person. He can’t be anything like that timid, weak, pathetic kid from Kitakami who got walked all over, because there’s no way that kid would ever, ever be able to beat you.

Which means that absolutely everything about who he used to be needed to get thrown away. That hairstyle that practically covered his face and let him hide himself behind it? Gone. His country accent and way of talking due to being raised in Kitakami? That always made him feel different and outcast among the students at Blueberry already, but more than that, it’s a distinctive feature of that kid he used to be and cannot be any more, so he had to cast it away and learn to mask it. Even the unambiguously good parts of him – the way he’d always get so excited and passionate over things he finds cool! – they’re a part of his old self, so they had to go, no exceptions. Far be it from him to ever say “wowzers” any more, for more than one reason. His old hairstyle may have been the one that visually resembled a mask, but now he’s putting on much more of a metaphorical mask than he ever was before. (Putting on a mask to become stronger and hide his reasons to be cast out and shunned – a bit like a certain ogre.)

(And since Kieran’s just on the cusp of puberty, I find it fun to imagine that maybe his voice happened to start breaking in the interim between the two DLCs, so that he doesn’t just talk differently and mask his accent, his voice literally sounds different now compared to how it did before.)

Unfortunately for Kieran, no amount of fervently doing everything in his power to change and grow stronger can make his growth spurt come any sooner. It seems it hasn’t happened quite yet, leaving him awkwardly still the smallest person in the room even as he is trying to project an air of being Strong and Tough now. He gets around this as best he can by adopting a mannerism of taking a step back from people, to give him less of an angle to look up at, and tilting his head far enough back that he can kinda sorta still be looking down on them, in a sense. He is so desperate to not feel small any more.

(Fittingly – or ironically, perhaps – you are the one relevant person who is the same height as Kieran and can face him eye-to-eye. That’s bound to be feeding into his complex about you: all the other people he looked up to and saw as stronger than him were older than him and so they had a good reason to be that strong – but you and he are the same age. You should be his equal, and yet you can already do and have all these things that he could only dream of.)

And his timid demeanour isn’t the only thing from before that Kieran cast away – he also got rid of almost his entire team of Pokémon from those battles back in Kitakami. Nearly all of them went the same way as poor Furret and Cramorant before them, because they weren’t strong enough to win him that vital battle that would definitely have decided who got to become Ogerpon’s partner (right?), so there’s no way they’d ever be able to help him beat you now. The only exception to this is Dipplin, perhaps precisely because Kieran knew it was capable of evolving again and so still had more strength it had yet to show him. The rest of his team got completely overhauled, no doubt informed by his fervent studies in battling strategies to let him put together the strongest and most optimal team he could come up with.

I nearly had a whole spiel here about how excruciating it is that his new team has a Politoed, in that he could almost have kept another of his old partners from his Kitakami team if he hadn’t hastily evolved Poliwhirl into the less strategically-optimal evolution as part of his efforts to prove himself to you during Teal Mask. Except, actually, a postgame line implies that Kieran’s Politoed is also a longtime partner of his, along with his Poliwrath, like they’re a pair. So it’s not that he went and caught a “replacement” Poliwag that he was less attached to – apparently he always had two Poliwag friends from the start and just only ever trained up one of them to use against you in Teal Mask. Then, when that one had failed to be good enough for him, it was the other one’s turn to prove how strong it could really be.

As for his other new team members: Porygon-Z and Incineroar are both available in the Terarium, but Grimmsnarl is only available, to Kieran at least, in Kitakami. So that must be another one he’d caught during the school trip, maybe a candidate he’d considered training up back then but never quite had the time to alongside the rest of his team. And then there’s Dragonite, which is an interesting one, because the Dratini line is nowhere in either Kitakami or the Terarium – meaning, Kieran must have gone out of his way to trade for it in order to get one. Perhaps he was really impressed by the strength of Drayton’s Dragonite and wanted one of his own to match that? (but his has a very different build to Drayton’s, so it’s fine, he’s definitely not just copying Drayton in order to win, okay.) I like to think that maybe he got it from Carmine, who’d apparently been visiting loads of other regions with Briar during Kieran’s obsessive training arc and therefore could have been in a position to catch a Dratini.

More importantly than just catching these new Pokémon, though, would have been training them, which Kieran threw himself into so obsessively that it and studying battling strategies now consume every single moment he has, to a concerningly unhealthy degree. He’s cutting back on sleep, barely eating proper meals, because spending any more time than necessary on even things like basic physical needs is not acceptable to him. You are so overwhelmingly, impossibly strong in his mind that, in order to match your strength, Kieran feels like he has to give everything, no matter the cost to himself.

Being Champion

And, well, his fervent desperate self-destructive training did indeed make him strong enough to become Champion of the BB League. It’s only a stepping stone, a means to an end for his ultimate goal of being strong enough to beat you – but it’s something. As Champion, Kieran’s known to everyone in the school, getting awed murmurs wherever he shows up. People respect him now, because he’s proven that he's strong. (The very converse of how everyone ignored and shunned him back when he was weak. That’s how it goes, right?) And on top of that, he’s earned himself a position of authority over everyone in the League Club.

…Frankly, it’s a very stupid rule the club has to make the Champion be automatically in charge of the whole thing, precisely because of situations like this, in which the trainer who happens to be strongest also happens to be someone nobody else wants bossing them around. But thanks to that stupid rule existing, Kieran’s in charge now, and everyone else has to do what he says whether they like it or not, because he’s the strongest of all of them. Way to validate and perpetuate Kieran’s toxic worldview that having strength (battling strength) means you get to call the shots and walk all over anybody who’s weaker than you, and that’s just how things work.

Our first glimpse of how drastically Kieran’s changed, the interaction we see him having with that one poor club member, is bound to be the epitome of how he’s been treating everyone in the club these days. And he is not simply being a dick for the hell of it just because he can now and he’s turned Edgy or whatever – everything about his behaviour here is agonisingly rooted in his own deeply ingrained worldview about strength and weakness.

It's so tragically telling how he phrases his scathing disapproval of the poor guy as, “So that means you’re just OK being this weak forever? That what I’m hearing?” That’s not at all what the guy was saying, but Kieran hears it that way because he can’t help but see his own former, weaker self everywhere he looks. At the end of Teal Mask, he was trapped in that horrible pit of feeling like there was nothing he could do except be this weak forever, unless he devoted himself obsessively to becoming stronger and stronger and stronger with everything he had. Any tiny sign of weakness in anybody else reminds him of that place, reminds him that the only reason he’s not trapped there himself right now is because he’s spending every waking moment trying to claw his way out.

The guy’s reason for not completing Kieran’s training assignment wasn’t even that he didn’t want to do it. He said he’d had hectic stuff going on at home that meant he didn’t have time, which ought to be a perfectly reasonable excuse! But… not to Kieran, it isn’t. Kieran has sacrificed everything to become as strong as he is, even basic physical self-care; he would have chosen training over busy home-life stuff in a heartbeat. Anyone who isn’t willing to do the same, anyone to whom growing stronger isn’t the most important thing in the world – they’re not good enough. They must obviously just want to stay weak forever, like Kieran himself absolutely could not bear to be. So he kicks the poor guy out of the club, thus dooming him, in Kieran’s view, to really being stuck this weak forever with no chance to improve.

It's bound to be just like this for everyone else in the club, too, based on plenty of comments we hear about how Kieran becoming Champion has taken the fun out of everything, and the ridiculously strict rules he’s apparently put in place. He’s projecting his own unhealthily high standards of strength onto everyone else, then shunning them if they don’t manage to live up to that, because that’s just what happens to people who are weak, right? It is agonising to watch Kieran perpetuating the exact same toxicity that he used to always feel like he was on the receiving end of, especially as that isn’t even really why he was ever treated that way.

None of this is the behaviour of someone who is even remotely secure and confident in their strength. Despite being Champion and having the respect of the entire school, Kieran is still constantly terrified that even the slightest thing, even so much as allowing a tiny instance of “weakness” in anyone associated with him, will cause all of the strength he’s worked so hard to build to come crashing down in an instant. (One detail I really love about the scene where he’s telling that one guy off is the way Kieran’s tapping his foot at the beginning. He probably means it as a way to express impatience, but really it comes across as incredibly anxious and insecure. The animators did some excellent stuff with Kieran in this DLC.)

And what’s extra heartbreaking is that Kieran doesn’t need to be doing any of this. He’s the Champion now; he is undeniably strong; he’s able to talk to others; people notice and respect him. He is already in a position to reach out and grasp everything he’s ever wanted: acknowledgement, friendship, fun. He used to love battling – he’s supposed to love battling – so he could be having a great time with all this! If he just dropped this toxic mindset and stopped letting it turn him into a massive jerk, he could make friends with the Elite Four and others in the League Club and not be alone any more!

But he’s not able to see any of that. None of the things he’s already genuinely gained for himself truly feel like they matter, not when they’re all just a means to an end for the one thing that does – proving he can beat you. By desperately hanging his entire self-worth on the idea of becoming strong enough to measure up to you and nobody else, Kieran has blinded himself to the fact that he’s already found a good amount of what he’d always truly wanted in the first place. And it also means that, if he can’t beat you when that day comes, everything he’s done will be for nothing.

Drayton and Carmine

But although nobody is happy with the way things are now (least of all Kieran himself), it seems only a couple of people have been willing to question Kieran’s “authority” enough to try and talk him out of this.

One of them is Drayton, who’s doing this not just out of wanting his club to go back to normal, but also because he’s the almost-only person to have noticed the timid yet battle-loving kid Kieran used to be, and he genuinely wants to help Kieran remember how to have fun like that again. Unfortunately, it seems that any of Drayton’s attempts to tell him this bounced right off Kieran, because fun and excitement were a part of that weak kid he used to be and absolutely cannot be any more.

Plus, with his newfound authority and validation of his toxic worldview, Kieran would easily be able to brush off anything Drayton said to him with the excuse that he doesn’t have to listen to someone who can’t beat him. He actually mentions at one point that Drayton “always loses” to him, implying they’ve battled more than once. Apparently, in an attempt to get Kieran to listen, Drayton actually went and challenged him to a rematch at some point, or maybe even several – a remarkable amount of effort, coming from Drayton – but he still couldn’t win.

(Kieran is bound to be super jealous of the way Drayton appears so effortless in his strength, when Kieran himself had to train and strive so hard to reach this level. But on the flip side, now that Kieran is the stronger one, he can use Drayton’s laziness as another way to paint himself as superior. Obviously the reason Drayton keeps losing to him is because he doesn’t train nearly as hard as Kieran does.)

It also doesn’t help that Drayton’s attitude towards Kieran when he’s not specifically trying to encourage him to have fun again is very sarcastic and condescending, drawing from his deep frustration at Kieran’s attitude. It must be very easy for Kieran to completely overlook the part where Drayton is actually doing this because he cares – he probably feels that Drayton just hates him and wants him gone. (Just like everyone who’d always shun him and treat him like an outcast before, right.)

Then there’s Carmine, who’s been incredibly worried about the change in her brother and is bound to have done her fair share of trying to talk him out of this too, evidently also to no effect. It’s certainly easy for Kieran to remain oblivious to the fact that she’s doing this because she cares about him and isn’t just trying to bring him down, since she has, uh, historically not been very good at showing that.

It seems that Kieran has largely been avoiding Carmine since he overhauled everything about himself. No doubt a lot of that is because, what with her being part of the reason for his inferiority complex in the first place, she’s capable of triggering his insecurities more intensely than anybody else can. But maybe it’s also partly because on some level, he’s aware that she’s got a point now with the things she’s trying to say to him, and that makes him feel bad, and have doubts that he can’t afford to be having. Carmine’s certainly right to be concerned that his behaviour now would be driving any friends of his away – although she is almost definitely wildly wrong to be assuming Kieran even had any friends other than you before all of this.

(For that matter, she’s very wrong to assume that you are still his friend right now in a totally normal way; ha ha ha. But then, based on your options of “yes” and “yes” when Drayton asks you if you're Kieran's friend, it seems that you – the player character – are also somehow completely oblivious to the fact that Kieran just maybe might not consider you a friend any more on his end. Which just makes this whole thing even more excruciating.)

The dynamic between the siblings during the one brief time we see them interact here has notably changed, in that Kieran is finally able to stand up for himself more, telling Carmine to shut up when she tells him off. And yet, he doesn’t do so very forcefully, averting his gaze in a way that suggests he just sort of mumbles it. He probably realises she has a point about what she was saying – that he shouldn’t act so condescending towards you. Which on Carmine’s end, she said because she doesn’t want him to drive away the one friend he still (supposedly) has, but that’s not how it’d read on Kieran’s end, because he doesn’t believe you ever were his friend at all. He must have felt like his sister has a point only because he doesn’t have the right to act that way towards you, not when he still hasn’t proven himself to you yet (and maybe never will).

Unexpected reunion

See, there’s a lot of interesting stuff going on under the surface of Kieran’s reaction to suddenly meeting you here. Literally everything he’s been doing this entire time has been for the sole purpose of defeating you when he sees you again. Which means that you showing up and challenging the BB League should be exactly what he wants and has always been waiting for. And yet.

The first notable thing is that he had nothing to do with inviting you here – the person responsible for that was Carmine. She probably figured that you’d be able to help her brother out, so she recommended you to the director when she heard he was looking for an exchange student to invite from Paldea. As Champion of the school, Kieran should also have had enough influence to make such a recommendation – but he didn’t.

Then, when Kieran comes to the cafeteria, he has plenty of condescending things to say to Drayton (about how taking a lunch break is a waste of time, because who needs to bother with basic physical needs like eating when they could be training instead, right). But the moment he sees you, he’s just shocked at you even being here… and then he’s very quiet for the entire rest of the conversation.

Drayton puts things to a vote among the Elites plus Kieran as to whether you should be allowed to join the BB League, and – despite that this should be exactly what he wants – Kieran is the last to vote. He only does so when he’s forced to break the tie.

(Although, it’s revealing in a different way that the Elite Four all ask each other for their opinions first, with none of them naturally thinking to consult Kieran. Despite his newfound strength and authority, he is still socially excluded – but this time he really has nobody but himself to blame.)

Kieran’s wording of how he casts his vote is so very telling. Just: “It doesn’t matter who I’m facing… I don’t lose.” – and he says nothing else before leaving in a huff. He words this in a generalised way, as if this an overarching principle of his that has nothing to do with you in particular, even though it’s always been about you. Because if he let himself think about how you in particular will be his opponent, then suddenly the statement that he doesn’t lose doesn’t feel so certain. But, put on the spot like this, he cannot show any sign that he’s afraid he might lose to you – that would be like giving up and accepting that all the effort he’s put in for all this time has been for nothing. So he has no choice but to let you join.

(Drayton totally knew he would refuse to lose face like this if put on the spot, of course, and that the Elites would vote 2-2 between them and leave Kieran with the deciding vote, which is precisely why he set things up this way. Kieran’s not unaware of this, either.)

There’s a brief interim here as you head to the front desk to officially sign up for the League. This gives Kieran a moment alone to process the fact that, welp, this really is happening, you’re really here, and, isn’t this supposed to be exactly what he always wanted? Hasn’t everything always been so that he can beat you this time? He manages to twist things around in his head, convince himself that yes, this is it, the chance he’s been waiting for, and he will win when it comes down to it, he will, because that’s what it’s all been for.

As such, when he shows up at the front desk to confirm that he’s allowing you to join, Kieran is able to be a lot more direct about you challenging him than he was in his one whole sentence on the topic in the cafeteria. Even then, he makes a comment to Drayton about how he feels like he was manipulated into this… then immediately insists that he’s fine with it because this is what he wanted anyway. If it was truly 100% what he wanted, he wouldn’t have felt manipulated!

To sum all of this up: it is abundantly, delightfully clear beneath the surface that Kieran does not actually feel ready to face you. He would never have felt ready for this, no matter how long he’d spent training and pushing himself, because your impossible unreachable strength and his own inherent worthlessness are both so deeply ingrained in his mind that he is incapable of truly believing he can match you.

But, well, here you are, and now Drayton’s trapped Kieran in this situation where he has no choice but to keep up the mask of strength and confidence he’s been putting on all this time. So he’s got to act like he’s fine with you challenging him, whether he truly feels ready or not.

Your Elite Four challenge

As you work your way through the Elite Four’s ranks to earn the right to challenge him, Kieran is very insistent that you’d better not dare lose to anybody else before facing him, or to have gotten weaker in any way since he last met you.

You might think that Kieran would be glad if you actually did lose to one of the Elite Four and never manage to make it to him, because, hey, that means he’s already stronger than you! He doesn’t even have to worry about whether he can win his battle against you! But… no, that wouldn’t be how it’s supposed to go. The way Kieran’s been building things up in his head the entire time, his whole life is supposed to magically somehow get better when he beats you. He needs to prove himself and his new strength to you, specifically. It wouldn’t mean anything if someone else beat you first, or if you’re somehow not actually still the impossibly strong person he’s idolised and fixated so hard on becoming equal to. That’d just be the most crushing anticlimax for him, in which he never gets to achieve what he’s been striving so hard for, and in which he’d have to somehow come to terms with the fact that… he’s already stronger than you, and yet he still doesn’t feel better or any less agonisingly inferior than he always did? If that happened, he’d be at a complete loss as to any other way to escape how he feels about himself.

But, fortunately for him (for some value of “fortunate”), you of course still are just as strong as you always were. On hearing you assure him of this, and also on seeing it for himself as he watches one of your Elite Four battles, Kieran gives this awful twisted grin that does not even slightly reach his eyes (because he has completely forgotten how to genuinely smile and no doubt hasn’t ever done so this entire time). Yes, he will still get to have his long-anticipated showdown with you, and winning that will still somehow magically definitely fix everything that was ever wrong in his life. Definitely.

There’s also the part where, because you come with such glowing recommendations, you get to skip working your way up the BB League from the very bottom and can start right at challenging the Elite Four. Kieran has to feel all kinds of ways about this – on the one hand, he’d tell himself he’s glad because this means he has less time to wait until the battle that he’s definitely totally ready for, and he knows full well that you wouldn’t need to waste your time on small fry at the bottom. But on the other hand… he had to painstakingly work his way all the way up from zero in order to get where he is, so it sure is something that you’re so special that you just get to skip doing that. (And if you did have to start at the bottom, then it’d give him more time to train himself, just to make absolutely sure that he really is ready to face you…)

When you’ve beaten the final Elite, Kieran shows up again and scoffs that this was kind of slow for you, wasn’t it? I believe this isn’t just posturing and was his genuine reaction – you’re so impossibly perfect in his mind that he can’t even comprehend the idea that you wouldn’t breeze through this effortlessly without a single hitch. But still, at least he can turn the fact that you fell short of his impossible expectations into condescension that helps him feel above you and definitely capable of beating you. (How long did it take him to beat the Elite Four, I wonder? Probably longer than you – but of course he’s not gonna bring that up.)

Drayton, meanwhile, has now picked up on the fact that Kieran isn’t just obsessed with winning like he’d initially thought – he’s obsessed with you. Maybe he’d have approached things a little differently if he’d been aware in the beginning that you were a lot more to Kieran than just an old friend. But, welp, bit too late to back out of what he’s set up now, whoops.

And on Kieran’s end, he hasn’t let go of the feeling of being manipulated into this, and now feels like you and Drayton are plotting against him. This poor kid’s paranoia and tendency to assume people are laughing at him behind his back has still not gone away, even if it’s taken on a slightly different form now. It’s probably a good thing he doesn’t ever learn that Carmine was the one who called you here, or he’d think she was in on this supposed conspiracy too.

(But, hey, while Kieran could never do anything about it before whenever he was ganged up on and shunned by others, at least now he’s finally strong enough to fight back and hold his own, despite being outnumbered, right? Just like the ogre did.)

THE BATTLE

So now, it’s finally time: the battle that Kieran has absolutely everything riding on. Of course I’ve already made it abundantly clear here that every single thing he’s done has been for the sole goal of beating you right here and now – but it says a lot that he spends his pre-battle speech making sure you know this. He probably feels like you’re such an amazing superstar trainer that challenging someone for their Champion title is basically just another Tuesday for you, like this is nothing on your end – but this battle is everything for him, everything that he’s been spending every single moment of every single day building up towards for all this time, and he needs you to acknowledge this.

And as if that wasn’t enough, as the battle opens, Kieran screams into the sky with the sheer uncontainable emotion of how much this means to him. Everything he’s been feeling, bottling up, clinging to for so long is spilling out of him now that he’s finally here in this one pivotal moment he’s always been waiting for.

It comes spilling out in a lot more than just that scream, too; he has so many things to say throughout the battle as it all reaches fever pitch inside him. While some of his in-battle dialogue during his Teal Mask fights had fun hints at his issues in there, this one battle here absolutely takes the cake. This is quite possibly the most dialogue in any battle in any Pokémon game, and all of it has something interesting and nuanced going on that’s rooted in Kieran’s massive issues. I cannot resist taking this opportunity to talk about every single bit of it.

His first line as the battle begins is, “I know I’m making the right choice… You’ll understand that soon enough!”, which seems kind of odd on the surface. What “choice” is he even talking about that he feels the need to justify? Accepting a challenge to his Champion position is just what Champions are meant to do. But that’s not what Kieran’s thinking about here – he’s thinking about all of those times that Drayton and Carmine tried to talk him down from the entire way he was acting and pushing himself too hard. Every time they did, he insisted to himself that no, training this insanely hard is the right choice, he needs to do this, and it’ll all be worth it when he beats you. …Somehow. Definitely. You’ll see, you will, you have to…!

On the very first hit he lands on you – it doesn’t even need to be super-effective, any damaging hit will trigger it – he says, “How do you like that? See how hard I’ve trained? Not like that kid you battled in Kitakami, huh?!” In reality, the hit he lands here isn’t necessarily any bigger than the kinds of hits he dealt to you back in Kitakami – but it feels bigger to Kieran. He’s trained so hard that he feels so much stronger and so different from the kid he was back then, and he needs you to see and acknowledge this too.

Meanwhile, your first super-effective attack you land on him manages to pierce through his mask for a moment and get a “wowzers” out of him. It’s not actually any more impressive than any other super-effective hit he might receive from any other trainer – but because it’s coming from you, it feels so much more incredible, triggering his instinctive irrational idolisation of you just for a moment before he collects himself and puts his mask back up.

Then he insists that he’ll still win anyway, even if “the type matchups work out for you”. Which… isn’t how type matchups in battles work? Sure, you landed one super-effective hit, either because one of your Pokémon happened to have a good matchup, or you just had a good coverage move. That doesn’t mean that all of the type matchups in the battle are inherently in your favour. But Kieran apparently feels like they are – because, when it comes to him versus you, he always feels like everything in the world is on your side and he has to claw and grasp to regain the tiniest bit of ground against his inherent overwhelming disadvantage.

Speaking of everything being on your side, when you land your first critical hit on him (and I say “when” here because this battle is long enough that statistically you’re extremely unlikely not to at some point!), his response is delightful, raging that “even luck’s chosen you over me!” and that it’s “not fair!!!” All of his bitterness and jealousy about Ogerpon choosing you over him is still raw, evidently, so even something like you getting a statistically near-inevitable critical hit feels to him like luck itself taking your side against him, because everything always does. And on some level, he may have realised that you befriending Ogerpon was partly due to the sheer luck of you happening to meet her while he wasn’t around, so of course he’s bitter about luck because of that, too. It’s not fair, how you always get everything, so effortlessly, while he has nothing.

(He doesn’t comment at all if and when he lands a critical hit, because of course not. Confirmation bias is one hell of a drug.)

And of course, you bringing out Ogerpon herself gets an extremely strong reaction from Kieran. “You’ve got some nerve,” he snarls among broken mirthless laughter, to bring her out “NOW of all times?!” This, right here and now, was supposed to be his moment, his time to finally shine and show you how strong he is and take the victory. And yet you’re choosing this moment to parade Ogerpon in front of him, a reminder of the painful losses and inferiority he suffered back in Kitakami that he’s tried so hard to forget and overcome by making himself stronger, just rubbing it in his face that you got to have her because you’re so strong and lucky and perfect.

His expression during this line is one hell of a thing as well: shocked and wide-eyed and practically terrified, in stark contrast to all of his other expressions in this fight. He’s not only reeling from the pain of having his inferiority from back then shoved in his face, but also, he’s always believed that Ogerpon is so incredibly strong. If you’re using her against him in this battle, you and her working together… how is he ever going to be able to defeat that combination of impossible strength…?

(Apparently, Kieran’s trainer AI actually has a modification in this fight that makes him prioritise attacking Ogerpon more than an AI trainer otherwise would, which is delightful, I love that that’s a thing devs programmed in there. Of course he’d desperately want to get Ogerpon off the field as fast as he could before she utterly destroys him.)

As his back’s against the wall and he’s sending out his final Pokémon, Kieran’s still raging, with increasing desperation: “Just go down already! How are you still standing after I’ve thrown everything I have at you?!” This battle is not at all going how he’d insistently imagined it would in his head, in which he’d prove himself and win, not even though he’s giving it absolutely everything he has. (And the thought that you still won’t go down even then is terrifying to him. He really has given everything to this, he couldn’t possibly have done more – and yet, what if that still isn’t enough to beat you? That’d mean it’s just impossible for him, no matter what he does, and he’d have absolutely no idea how to cope with that.)

Just before he Terastallises his Hydrapple, he insists that he “doesn’t need the old me”, that he’s changed – here’s the way he felt he had no choice but to throw away everything about his former weaker self in order to get stronger, even the positive parts. But then he adds, “and I’ll show you I can change again!” He’s not just literally referring to the Terastallisation he’s about to do (although it’s thematically fitting that he brings up this topic as he’s doing this – and his Hydrapple’s Fighting Tera-type is a neat link to him having changed himself into being obsessed with strength) – rather, he’s referring to what he’s convinced himself will happen when (if) he wins this fight. That’ll change everything for him, right? That’ll make everything good, finally; he’s going to change for the better once he wins this, he has to…!

And then… Kieran’s animation while he’s Terastallising is an odd one. He’s remarkably expressionless about it, compared to the intensity of his expressions in the entire rest of the fight. But I think the reason for this must be: most trainers wince with the force of it as they begin charging their Tera Orb – and apparently, Kieran doesn’t want to be seen doing that, because that’d make him seem weak. So he’s trained himself to put on an expressionless mask, not even looking at the orb directly, to avoid that. (And one of the few trainers who doesn’t wince, who’s able to stare directly at the dazzling power coming from their Tera Orb without flinching, holding it up for all to see… it’s you, of course. Kieran almost certainly saw this from you a few times back in Kitakami.)

His last possible line in the fight, as he orders an attack from his Hydrapple, at which point he is guaranteed to have only one or two Pokémon left and be desperately fighting to hold on with his back against the wall, includes him saying, “I’m capable of winning too, you know!” Because that is definitely a very normal thing for a reigning Champion to need to say to their challenger. Even with all the victories he’s had on his way here, Kieran still has to fight to convince himself that he is capable of winning, because being up against you and teetering on the brink of defeat like this just reminds him of all his previous agonising losses at your hands, his inferiority complex rising up to overwhelm him with the feeling that he’ll never be able to be strong or win anything at all.

(And, hey… what if he had actually managed to win? Tragically, the game does not let you see any of his reaction if you do happen to lose to him; it just rewinds time like it never happened. But there’s no way that Kieran beating you here would truly have helped or fixed anything about that massive inferiority complex of his. He’d ride the high for a bit, but then he’d go back to the same condescending façade he’d had before and gradually realise that… he doesn’t actually feel any better about himself beneath it like he was supposed to once this happened. Funnily enough, beating you in a Pokémon battle would not have magically turned him into you.)

Everything falls apart

But, of course, because the game refuses to let you not be the Perfect Protagonist (or, perhaps, because the narrative needs to go this way in order for him to actually get better in the long run), Kieran loses. The last time he lost a pivotal battle against you that he’d told himself everything depended on, back in Kitakami, he crumpled immediately in defeat – but this time, his reaction’s a lot more drawn out. Back then, the conviction that he could never ever beat you was right there at the surface to the point that he was basically expecting to lose despite his determination. But here, he’s spent so long insisting to himself over and over that he will win this time, he will, convincing himself that things just have to go that way… that it takes him a moment to even process the fact that they haven’t. He’s just shocked, lost, dumbfounded, not knowing how to react, because this wasn’t supposed to happen…!

But then the spectators around him mutter and begin to leave, apparently because he lost, because he’s no good after all and so there’s no point staying to watch him, and this seems to be what agonisingly drives home the reality to Kieran. All the respect and esteem he’d managed to grasp for himself – in this one awful moment it feels like all of it is crumbling away before his eyes. All of his effort to get here (so much effort) was worthless, all because he couldn’t beat you. He’s gone right back down to being nothing. I adore the blurry effects in the cutscene as Kieran sways and staggers and collapses, giving a visceral sense that the shock of this is hitting him so deep that it's rendered him physically light-headed and dizzy. Guh, this poor kid.

And then Drayton has to come along and rub it in. Kieran winces in agony as he gets smugly called “ex-Champion” – though he was never doing any of this for the Champion title itself, having it meant something and made him matter, and now that’s gone like it was never there at all. It’s bound to sting especially hard coming from Drayton, whom Kieran believed was plotting with you to take him down, take away everything he had, and now that’s exactly what’s happened, because he wasn’t strong enough to stand up for himself after all.

…The fact that Drayton felt the need to be a smug bitch about this first and foremost does not remotely help Kieran actually listen to and internalise the genuinely good advice Drayton gives just a few moments later. He really was doing this because he cares, and because Kieran ought to go back to having fun with things! But of course Kieran isn’t in any state to listen to that, not after all his paranoia about Drayton manipulating him, and then Drayton rubbing his loss in on top of that; he still has no idea that the guy genuinely wants to help him. (Unfortunately, while Drayton cares about the person Kieran should be, he has been deeply frustrated by the person Kieran is being, and that comes out in sarcasm and smuggery first, hence why this completely bombs.)

So instead of taking on board Drayton’s advice, which he probably wasn’t even listening to, Kieran just starts desperately, incoherently mumbling about how he’ll win next time. It’s the only thing he can cling to – the same thing he always has, to escape the all-consuming, unbearable thought of just being achingly inferior forever and ever with no way out. He still can’t see any other way out that isn’t beating you. (But… how is he ever going to win next time, when he’s already given it absolutely everything he had and still couldn’t manage it…?)

Seeing him being so clearly Not Okay, you approach him and (probably) attempt to say something to him, but it seems like even if you try, you barely get any words out before Kieran just shuts down even more. He reacts with slumping, and with an “Aw, man…” – the same words and body language he’d often have back in Teal Mask whenever something (usually his sister) would push back at him and make him feel small. Now that he can no longer cling to his façade that he totally is stronger than you and just hasn’t proven it yet, he’s reverted right back to the state of mind he was always in back then. And it’s you in particular that triggers his inferiority complex harder than anything else right now, even if you just silently approach him, or say a few words that certainly wouldn’t have been anything cruel.

It's a bit of a shame that the game doesn’t actually let us see what you try to say to him, assuming you do. But it most certainly couldn’t have been anything along the lines of “You put up a really tough fight!”, because that kind of thing – acknowledging Kieran’s strength, even though he lost – is exactly what he’d need to hear right now, and he’s clearly not hearing it. Whatever it was you did say, he probably barely even heard it beneath his crushing sense of inferiority at being near you, and you probably trailed off pretty quickly upon seeing his reaction.

(In fact, it might say a lot that your dialogue options here are so non-specific that they’re literally just “Say something/nothing”. This suggests that the player character has no idea what to say to Kieran at seeing him in this absolute state, and they can only choose to either accept that and remain silent, or to fumble for something to try and say anyway. I believe it’s pretty important to “your” role in Kieran’s arc that the player character is extremely socially awkward and just finds themselves utterly lost as to how to deal with him breaking down like this because of them. Someone with better social intelligence would be able to say the right thing here to help him at least begin to feel better! But that someone is emphatically not you, it seems. This apparent social obliviousness also tracks with the fact that you – the player character – agreed with Carmine’s very short-sighted decision to lie to Kieran back in Kitakami, thus unwittingly setting off this whole domino effect of his issues in the first place.)

Sudden legendary hunt

If Kieran had had longer to process his defeat, maybe he’d have realised that there really is no way he can “win next time” when he already gave it his absolute all this time, and he might have begun to approach the fact that there’s nothing he can do but let things go. However, while he’s still reeling, he almost immediately gets dragged into the meeting with Briar about her expedition to Area Zero.

Kieran looks like he’s barely even listening to the conversation at first, just staring miserably into space in front of him, no doubt stuck endlessly thinking how can I ever be stronger than you when everything I had still wasn’t enough??? But then Briar mentions that they’ll get the opportunity to find a legendary Pokémon on this quest – and whoops, now Kieran’s paying attention. Because here’s the answer to his impossible conundrum of how he can beat you next time.

Make no mistake: this is nothing like Ogerpon was to him. He’d been fixated on her and cared about her ever since he was little for deeply personal reasons based on him relating to her situation and projecting onto her. Her strength was part of it, but it wasn’t that he wanted to obtain that strength by catching her; he just admired her strength and wanted to be like her, and if he could, then maybe one day she’d acknowledge that by being his friend (and therefore also incidentally his Pokémon partner). But Terapagos is nothing to Kieran here other than a source of potential strength for him to acquire for himself by capturing it, a tool that will finally let him beat you.

Nonetheless, because this is another legendary Pokémon, Kieran can’t help but draw the surface comparison to Ogerpon anyway and remember the way she chose you over him. He’s probably already imagining that Terapagos might just do the same thing, because you’re so strong and special while he’s nothing – so he tells himself, fervently, that no, he won’t let that happen again, he won’t let this chance go.

He doesn’t ever say as much, but he’s bound to be already having doubts as to if he really could ever capture such an amazing Pokémon. Legendary Pokémon – or really, any Pokémon in general – are supposed to join trainers once they acknowledge their strength; that’s what battles to weaken and capture a wild Pokémon are all about. How is Kieran ever going to get Terapagos to do that for him when he’s so weak? But even so, even if it seems too good to be true, he has to cling to this possibility. It’s the only chance he has left to still just maybe be able to beat you, to continue running away from that gaping pit of inferiority inside him that he doesn’t know how to face.

(A minor nitpick I have with the game’s writing: it’d have been fun here if things had been subtler and Kieran hadn’t outright said that he wants to catch Terapagos at all. His intent would have been very clear regardless for anyone who could read between the lines – I realised what was up the moment he reacted to hearing about a legendary, because Oh No. But nonetheless, it seems like you the player character and also Carmine are both socially oblivious enough to fail to follow Kieran’s stated intent to catch Terapagos through to its obvious conclusion of “he’s still fixated on beating you”. I guess the two of you just assume, oh, hey, he’s found another legendary Pokémon to get excited about, that’s good, that means he must be getting over Ogerpon, right…? Ha. Ha ha ha. If only.)

Journey through Area Zero

As you make your way into and through the depths of Area Zero, Kieran seems to have largely lost hold of the condescendingly superior façade he’d been putting up all this time (after all, he doesn’t have the right to act that way towards you when he’s still weaker than you). This allows a few little hints of his true self to begin to rise to the surface and shine through again, at least a little bit.

He lets slip a “wowzers” on seeing the sheer alien beauty of the place for the first time, and later at the lab he’s so excited at the technology reminding him of a spy movie that he even forgets to mask his accent for a whole sentence. But both times, he’s quick to catch himself and brush it off and act aloof. That excitableness was part of who he used to be, that kid who was weak, and he's still convinced that he can’t afford to be that person any more. But, hey, getting these little reminders that he actually enjoys being his true self and has missed it, at least certain parts of it, has to help! Plus, Carmine seems happy at these moments of him being the little brother she knows and loves again; they have a bit of regular healthy sibling banter; she notices him being considerate about Briar reading someone’s private diary…

These are all good signs that Kieran’s starting to get back to normal, maybe just a little… but, not completely. The spark still isn’t there in his eyes, even when he’s smiling about the cool spy vibe of the lab. Despite the distractions, he’s largely very intent on just getting to the legendary Pokémon and nothing else. And perhaps most relevant of all, he barely says anything of substance to you, even if you try and talk to him.

He does have a notable reaction near the beginning when you mention that you came here last time with some friends of yours. Kieran had probably never quite considered the idea of you having other friends before – Ogerpon did not exactly prime him to imagine that about his idols, after all – but, now that he’s hearing it… of course you’ve got friends. Why wouldn’t you? You have everything, everything he’s always wanted so badly for himself but could never, ever have.

Then, of course, you’re the one who does all the hard work in the Underdepths to deal with the sparkling Pokémon that are blocking the way forwards. For the first one, Carmine almost asks Kieran to take care of it before changing her mind and asking you, which, ouch, that’s got to have stung. (I don’t think she did that to deliberately be unkind, though; it’s probably that she still feels a little weird and uncomfortable about her brother battling, because of the way he’s been, so she’d rather just watch you battle it instead.)

Because of all this, later on Kieran bitterly comments that he feels like everyone’s relying on you too much. Really, the only reason this is the case is because you just happen to be the one who has the lizardbike buddy that can navigate you to the Pokémon you need to defeat… but then, that in itself is another sign of how special and favoured by legendaries you are, isn’t it.

And actually, you’re not necessarily the only one who can reach the sparkling Pokémon! Kieran has a Dragonite, which must have been what he rode on for the flying Elite Four trial, so, in theory, he could go and deal with those sparkling Pokémon himself. But he doesn’t, because you’re already doing it anyway, and he doesn’t feel worthy of taking the spotlight from you. (Or, he could ask to join you on your lizard buddy as you head over there, but ha, even less chance he’s about to do that.)

One bit of optional dialogue Kieran has during this part is insisting that he could totally make quick work of those sparkling Pokémon if only they weren’t so far away. This is very true… but the fact that he never tries to do so despite actually having the ability to reach them himself tells us that his words are just desperate posturing that he doesn’t truly believe. He can’t even register the part where he genuinely has a really strong team of Pokémon that he worked hard to train, because he did all of that for the sole purpose of beating you, and since he couldn’t manage that, that means that none of it matters and he’s just useless.

Then there’s the moment near the end where Carmine tells Kieran it’s his turn to call out to you to let you know the path opened up, but Kieran miserably assumes you’d prefer to hear it from her instead. (As if who tells you that even makes any difference!) Carmine did this to try and begin bridging the gap between you, and she forces him to do it anyway despite his protest, but then when she asks if he’s got anything more to say to you, he just says no. He still doesn’t feel like he’s worthy of even interacting with you in any way at all, still convinced he must be nothing to you.

There’s a heartbreaking hypocrisy to this, too, since he knows you’re perfectly okay interacting with Carmine, and it’s not like she’s ever been able to beat you in battle either. But… but that’s different, right, because she’s already someone who’s strong and cool and worthy of your friendship. In Kieran’s head, he is the single person in the world who is so automatically, inherently worthless that he needs to prove his strength before he is allowed to Matter to you or to anybody.

Outburst at the crystal

As the group reaches the final chamber, Kieran rushes ahead into it and begins pulling at the crystal the moment he figures it even might be Terapagos, because he is so desperate not to lose this chance to anybody else (meaning you). In his urgency, completely oblivious to how messed-up this sentiment is, he blurts out that this’ll mean he can finally beat you, at which Carmine, who failed to realise this was still the reason he was doing all this until now, tries to call him out on it—

—And Kieran can’t stand that; he can’t let her try and take this away from him too on top of everything else, because this feels like the one remaining chance he’ll ever get to still have something and matter next to you. So in a kneejerk attempt to defend why he needs this, everything comes tumbling out. All of those feelings about how you have everything he’s ever wanted, and he has nothing, how he trained so so hard but even that ended up worthless because he still lost to you in the end, so this is all he has left.

(Well, it’s not quite everything that comes spilling out of Kieran here. He doesn’t say anything about why he feels he needs to beat you, and how that’ll totally magically solve everything for him – because there is no actual logic behind that part. There’s nothing he can say to make that make sense, and on some level he must be aware of that, must know it doesn’t, really. But if he admits that, admits that there really isn’t any way at all to escape from his crushing inferiority, then he’ll have nothing left whatsoever, which he cannot bear.)

Hearing Kieran’s outburst about how worthless he feels, Carmine tries to put in a good word for him about how he’s tried his best too – which is good! That’s exactly the kind of thing he needs to hear; she’s finally getting it! But unfortunately, because she herself is one of Kieran’s sore points, in regards to how you magically went and befriended her, he doesn’t properly register what she’s saying. Hearing her speak at all just triggers that thought and spurs him into venting about that, too.

His hang-ups with you befriending Carmine are interestingly reversed from how they appeared to be in Teal Mask. Back then, he seemed more low-key jealous that she might have been trying to take you, his first ever friend, away from him. But now (now that he’s convinced that you were never really his friend in the first place), it’s all twisted around into yet another sign of how perfect you are, because you managed to win over even someone as prickly and abrasive as his sister so remarkably fast. (Which, of course, has less to do with you than it has to do with the fact that Carmine’s actually a lot softer at heart than Kieran realises.)

He’s also maybe thinking about Drayton here, about the one time Drayton claimed in the cafeteria that you and he were “already tight”. That was a massive exaggeration, but no doubt Kieran filed that away as another person – someone else he finds infuriating and impossible to get along with – that you instantly won over with your magical friendship powers because of course you did. And on top of that, he’s bound to be thinking about his recent realisation that you came to Area Zero last time with your friends, plural, because of course you’d already got a bunch of friends, you’re perfect, you can do anything you want, you can be friends with anyone!

And yet – even as Kieran says this, it is objectively not true. Because you’re not friends with him right now! No amount of your amazing protagonist powers has been able to cut through his pile of issues and properly befriend him, even though you want to, because you are in fact not perfect in the slightest and have no idea what to say to get through to him and help him! But of course Kieran doesn’t realise this contradiction in what he’s saying – he's worthless, so the fact that you’re not friends with him is obviously just because you never wanted to be.

Speaking of you not being perfect, this moment here in which Kieran outright voices his jealousy and sense of inferiority compared to you is bound to be the first moment in which you, the player character, actually begin to realise that this has been his problem this whole time. (And, to be fair to your poor socially-oblivious avatar, it really wasn’t very apparent from their perspective until now! The only time Kieran ever gave any real explicit indication of his issues around you before was in Teal Mask, after the third battle when he lamented that “it’s because I’m weak” – but at the time, the player character wasn’t aware (like we the players were) that he knew they’d lied to him, so they couldn’t have known he was thinking about that. They probably just chalked his reaction down to him taking the lost battle particularly hard. The lie reveal was messy but seemed to work itself out; he was obviously upset when you caught Ogerpon but appeared to accept it well enough in the moment – then all of a sudden he showed up later being really determined to beat you for some reason??? Why.)

Another thing I love about this moment is the animation of Kieran desperately pulling at Terapagos’s crystal, the way he has to pause to catch his breath in between each huge tug, which really gets across that he is giving this every ounce of his strength. And that still isn’t enough, because it never is – he’s always too weak to be able to grasp even one thing for himself, but he is never ever going to stop trying no matter how impossible it seems.

(And I wonder if it’s going through his mind as he does this that surely this wouldn’t be nearly so hard for you. Like this is a sword-in-the-stone kind of thing, in which Terapagos would slide out smoothly like butter for someone who’s truly worthy of it, while a weakling like him is stuck hopelessly yanking on it with everything he has and just making himself look pathetic, because of course he doesn’t deserve this.)

Catching Terapagos

Except it turns out Kieran can manage to pull out the crystal after all, doing so with such force that he accidentally flings it halfway across the cavern to land between you and him. He rushes to pick it up before anyone else can, because this is his and he can’t let anyone take it from him, he can’t—

But then Terapagos wakes up, pops out of the crystal that serves as its shell… and it’s facing you. It doesn’t even see or acknowledge Kieran at all. It looks up at you adorably, like a baby imprinting on the first thing it sees, taking a few steps towards its new friend…?

(this has to be such an aching reminder of the way Ogerpon so quickly came to adore you and didn’t care about him, all compressed into one single agonising moment, ouch)

…This was not Terapagos choosing you over Kieran in any meaningful way. Kieran was behind it, such that it literally couldn’t see him and didn’t even know he existed. All it was doing was latching onto the first person it saw, which was you, because – completely by chance – it happened to wake up facing you and not him. If it’d woken up facing Kieran, it’d have seen and approached him in exactly the same way. Terapagos’s dormant crystal form is symmetrical; Kieran had no way to know which end was the head and which was the tail until it popped out.

This was, almost literally, a fucking coin flip. Only the coin was a magical crystal turtle and the winner was whoever “heads” landed facing towards.

(But then, luck has always chosen you over Kieran, too, hasn’t it?)

And so, seeing this happen to him yet again, seeing his one last chance of maybe finally having something and mattering about to be casually snatched away by you, like always, because the universe always gives you everything he wants… Kieran makes an awful, desperate split-second decision and throws the Master Ball. Because of course he does. It’s not right; it’s not fair on Terapagos – but it is so achingly understandable why Kieran would be driven to do this in this moment. The whole thing was so cruelly, rudely unfortunate. This poor kid just wants so badly to have something, to have anything at all where he’s not immediately overshadowed and upstaged by you.

(Also, shout-outs to the narrative cleverness of quietly establishing that BB Champions get given Master Balls, by the game giving you one when you beat Kieran, such that you think nothing of it at the time but can realise right away in this moment where Kieran got his from.)

Still, it’s notable how quickly Kieran was able to pull out the Master Ball, which suggests he’d had it ready near the top of his bag. It must have crossed his mind on the way here that surely, you’re going to somehow magically sway Terapagos to join you – or that it’ll just shun him, because earning a legendary’s respect involves proving one’s strength, and he’s still so weak – such that he felt he might need a way to guarantee it would become his, no matter what.

But even then, I do want to believe that Kieran wouldn’t necessarily have used the Master Ball if he hadn’t felt like he had no other option, and that he wanted to at least try to get Terapagos to join him willingly, like trainers are supposed to do. If he’d won the turtle-coin flip and it had woken up facing him, maybe he’d have been able to do so! But of course he didn’t get to have that.

(It’s kind of a shame that the characters never discuss the dodginess of catching a Pokémon from behind in a Master Ball, how that gave poor Terapagos no choice in the matter like Pokémon are supposed to have when they join a trainer. But then, pointing out that Master Balls are inherently ethically dubious gets awkward considering that the player can freely use them on anything they like, so the game was probably never going to go there. You are too silent-protagonist and Briar is too irresponsible-adult to comment on it, but maybe Carmine could at least have had a brief line questioning this? But, well, at least she does express apprehension about going in to battle with a legendary Pokémon they know almost nothing about, which is also a very valid concern, considering what ends up happening.)

Trying to beat you with Terapagos

So of course, the very next thing Kieran does is challenge you to battle him with Terapagos, so that he can finally beat you. Only… he doesn’t show anywhere near as much of that furious, fervent determination that he had for the Champion match. All that fire of his got snuffed out the moment he lost back then, and it never really came back. This isn’t the battle he’s been psyching himself up for and dedicating everything towards for months; it’s nothing but a desperate grasp at not falling apart completely. He’s kind of just… going through the motions, trying to beat you simply because it’s what he’s been clinging to all this time, and he still doesn’t know what else to do with himself if not this.

And more than anything, Kieran has to know deep down that he doesn’t truly deserve this, not after the way in which he caught Terapagos. After all, trainers are supposed to earn having strong Pokémon in their team, either by training them up from a low level themselves, or by proving their strength to a high-level Pokémon by weakening and catching it in battle. (This is why high-levelled traded Pokémon will disobey you if you don’t have enough badges – you haven’t given them a reason to respect you!) Catching a legendary from behind with a Master Ball is none of those things. Kieran has to be perfectly aware that he has not earned Terapagos’s strength in any way (just like he knew all along he’d never really be able to).

A very revealing line on this matter is that if you say you’re not ready to battle him yet, Kieran tells you, “You’d better not run away from this”. He never once implied you might run away from the Champion battle – that’d be like admitting you couldn’t win, and you’d never do that. But here, it's different, because Terapagos isn’t his strength, so even if he could beat you with it, it wouldn’t really prove anything about him. You’d be well within your rights to just refuse to indulge Kieran in this at all, and on some level, he knows that.

(…With all that said, Terapagos does obey his commands in the battle anyway. It’s sadly difficult to attribute any definitive emotions to it because it’s pretty unexpressive, but perhaps we can imagine that Terapagos is kind of just lost and confused, going along with the orders of the one who threw its ball because it’s not really sure what’s happening and battling is kind of instinctual for all Pokémon. Maybe it’s even more instinctual for Terapagos, thanks to its ability that automatically shifts it into a battle form when there’s an opponent in front of it. It doesn’t really help matters that you just sent something out to battle it without questioning things, either.)

If you manage to hit Terapagos super-effectively during the battle, Kieran scoffs that “it has a weakness? I thought this was the hidden treasure of Area Zero?!” What do you mean his super-special legendary that would let him finally definitely win this time isn’t invincible, that it’s still functionally just a regular Pokémon and it’s still possible – and not even that hard, really – for you to beat him even now.

And if you land a critical hit, oh boy: “How can you get critical hits, even at a time like this… What are you, the hero of this story?” Kieran is clearly raw with bitterness about the turtle-coin flip, about luck choosing you because you’re just so heroic, even when this was finally supposed to be his moment really seriously for real this time. It’s reminiscent of another time he compared you to a hero when you critted him, in his fourth Teal Mask battle – but back then, he said you were like the hero in “a story”, whereas here, you’re the hero of “this story”. Kieran’s realising on some level that if this were a story, you would be the hero of it, you’d deserve to win, and… wouldn’t he be the villain? Because heroes certainly do not go around throwing Master Balls at legendaries from behind.

(For the record, though? Kieran is not a villain. Stop calling him a villain, people. Not a single thing he does is outright villainous; catching Terapagos in this way is wrong, yes, but it’s an act of desperation for which his entire end goal is literally just to win a dang Pokémon battle against you. He’s barely even that much of an antagonist, if we get into that – this isn’t really a you-versus-him conflict so much as a him-versus-himself conflict that you happen to be inextricably wrapped up in.)

Kieran isn’t even that crushed when he loses this battle, just… lost and confused. He insists that “I thought if I had Terapagos, it would make me stronger,” as if catching it in a Master Ball would change anything about his strength – but really, he has to have known that wouldn’t truly be the case. And when Briar remarks that Terapagos isn’t as strong as it should be, Kieran just miserably assumes, “so it isn’t the hidden treasure?” Like, of course this was too good to be true, of course whatever Pokémon he actually managed to get his hands on was just some dud and not the real deal, because he’s never deserved to have anything worthwhile. His expression’s upset, and pleading, as he says this was meant to let him beat you, still like that’d somehow fix everything, but his desperation’s become something pitiful compared to how furious it was before. He just doesn’t know what else to do, doesn’t know how else to cope with his crushing sense of inferiority if he can’t hold onto this.

Terapagos goes berserk

The only reason Kieran even Terastallises Terapagos is pretty much because Briar tells him to, and he’s at a loss for what else to do. It’s very possible that if an actual responsible adult had been here to talk him down – or, heck, even just let Carmine talk to him, since she was trying to do so again – then he’d have finally been in a state to listen and none of the ensuing disaster would have needed to happen. But Briar’s gotta see her giant sparkle turtle, because it turns out that basically her entire character exists to facilitate Kieran’s character arc having the most dramatic climax possible, and I for one am 1000% okay with that.

Kieran looks apprehensive and afraid even as he’s just beginning to Terastallise it (no emotionless mask to cover the wince this time), perhaps because he can feel that the power from his Tera Orb is way more than it usually is and isn’t sure this is a good idea. But what else can he do? He has nothing else left – so he throws the orb anyway.

Again, Terapagos is frustratingly unexpressive, such that it’s difficult to get a sense of whether it attacking Kieran once it Terastallises is an instinctive, unconscious defence mechanism, or something more deliberate. But it’s certainly more fun to imagine it’s deliberate – that this is Terapagos lashing out from anger and fear now that it’s been given a terrifying amount of power it can’t fully handle and begins to realise, wait, no, it didn’t want this. That makes this problem distinctly more Kieran’s fault, which is a good thing for his arc. (If Terapagos’s rampage wasn’t based in its emotions in any way, then this kind of wouldn’t be Kieran’s fault at all, not really! It was significantly more on Briar that he Terastallised it, after all. Kieran’s real mistake was catching it without its consent – so it’s more narratively satisfying for this to be, in part, him facing the consequences for that.)

Either way, the important part is that Kieran is bound to feel like this is Terapagos lashing out at him because he shouldn’t have caught it. He always knew deep down that that was wrong, and now here’s the proof, because of course a strong and special legendary like that would never truly acknowledge him. And now it’s so mad at him for trying to act otherwise that it tries to kill him. (This poor kid is already clearly very sensitive to rejection in general, but, ouch, that has to have been like a stab in the gut.) This is all his fault for daring to think he deserved to have any kind of strength at all.

But then you save his life, by sending out your lizardbike friend to shield him! Which on the one hand just makes you even more of a perfect hero – but this time, your heroism is a good thing for Kieran. And, more than that… you wanted to save him. You saw him as someone worth protecting? You, actually, care about him??? (Kieran has been convinced that he’s nothing to you pretty much ever since you lied to him back in Teal Mask, but, oh, hey, maybe not…?)

Not that he has much time to process that in the heat of the moment; he’s too busy freaking out over everything such that Carmine has to be the one to tell him he should recall Terapagos. Maybe on some level he just feels like Terapagos would never listen to him if he tried, because it literally just attempted to kill him – and indeed, it fights back and breaks the Master Ball rather than go back to being his Pokémon (there’s another painful sting of rejection). Of course Kieran should never have caught it or called himself its trainer. He reflexively asks “why?” it wouldn’t come back, but he knows why. It’s because he’s worthless and deserves nothing, and he should never have tried to pretend otherwise.

Facing the gaping pit

At the start of the final battle, Kieran’s just frozen in terror at what he’s accidentally unleashed, not to mention the recent shock of nearly being killed and the knowledge that this is all his fault. (Even though, it isn’t all his fault! Briar deserves at least half the blame for this! But that doesn’t remotely occur to Kieran in the moment, because he is intrinsically the most worthless person ever, so of course all the blame should be on him.) But after a little while, the immediate terror fades, and Kieran’s left with nothing but the overwhelming feeling that he’s useless, that he can’t help anyone. It’s that vast aching pit of inferiority that’s always been there inside him, finally right at the surface.

There’s nothing he can do to run away from it any more. Ogerpon didn’t want him and chose you instead. All of his efforts to make himself stronger meant nothing in the end because he still lost to you. He never should have tried to catch Terapagos, because it never wanted him either and all he’s done is put himself and everyone else in danger. There’s just no way out.

Which means that, for the first time ever, Kieran has no choice but to finally, actually face up to and confront his terrifyingly huge inferiority complex, and begin to fight against it in a genuinely healthy way.

Maybe he wouldn’t have even tried at all if it hadn’t been for the fact that he needed to help with this battle! Shout-outs to the narrative for creating a situation in which Kieran has to help after Carmine’s one remaining Pokémon goes down, because he might otherwise never have done so.

(I love that one of the things the battle camera can do while you’re idling here is cut to Kieran and linger a moment with him, with the look of either frozen terror or miserable inferiority on his face. Even though he’s technically just a background character right now for the mechanical purposes of the battle, this moment is about him, and the devs knew it.)

And of course it takes Kieran a really long time, most of the battle, to actually find the courage to fight back! His inferiority complex is so massive, so all-encompassing, the root cause of all of the desperate, self-destructive, obsessive things he’s done to try and escape it, that of course it’s so, so terrifyingly difficult for him to actually face up to it and find the strength to try and believe that… maybe it’s just wrong.

Crucially, the single thing that does the most to trigger Kieran’s shift into courage is you – you, calling out to him, asking for his help. Hearing that you actually value his strength and need his help is exactly the kind of acknowledgement that Kieran has always desperately craved from you all along. It’s just what he needs to help him believe that, just maybe, he might actually be kinda strong and worth something after all.

But even then! Even with that, his inferiority complex does not magically vanish, because of course it doesn’t work that way! All your words do is give Kieran the courage to fight it, by holding onto the fact that you believe in him and he’s not alone. His animations here are so good; there’s tears in his eyes even as he manages to snap himself into determination, because he is still so scared and just finally being really, really brave about it!

One really lovely subtlety is that the highlight in his eyes, that little visual detail that makes a character really look alive, which was completely not there in Kieran for the entirety of Indigo Disk up until now, finally comes back in the exact moment when he finds the courage to fight. And it's neat how the game manages to re-use the same screaming animation Kieran had for the beginning of the Champion fight, with the only minor differences being the tears and that highlight in his eyes, but in this new context it communicates an entirely different kind of emotion. It’s like he’s fervently psyching himself up into believing that he is capable of doing this.

And hey, Kieran’s contribution to the battle really is pretty helpful! It’s a genuinely tough fight to the point that, no matter your level, there’s a good chance you were struggling on your own for a while, so you’re probably glad he’s here to help even just in a mechanical sense. His Hydrapple’s Supersweet Syrup ability can be useful to you as well as him, and then if it goes down, he switches to Dragonite and – because of the evasiveness drop – begins spamming near-accurate Thunders on a Terapagos who is Water-type for this final phase. Look at him go! (And another thing Hydrapple can do to support you is use Dragon Cheer, which delights me, because it’s Kieran deciding that actually he’s okay with you getting all the critical hits after all. Aww.)

Once Terapagos is defeated, if you try to not catch it, Kieran will tell you that you need to do it, that “it has to be you, not me!” It’s so lovely that there’s not a hint of bitterness to him here as he says this, just perfectly comfortably accepting it, because he never really wanted Terapagos anyway and he knows it’ll be happier with you, and that’s all that matters. Even if you don’t get that line, his encouragement of you as you go for a Pokéball is more than enough to communicate the fact that he’s okay with you doing this. And Kieran’s smiling again, cheering you on with that same animation of his from back in Teal Mask when he was super excited to watch you battle his sister! This is the excitable, battle-loving kid he always was and finally is once more! His smile is even more adorable now without his hair obscuring half of it, too.

Letting it go

In the end, Kieran’s finally able to let things go thanks to multiple factors brought about by what happened in Area Zero. There’s the part where he spent the adventure being just a little bit closer to his normal self, letting him realise that he misses being like that and that maybe there was nothing inherently bad or weak about those parts of him at all. There’s the way that Terapagos going berserk served as a very stark representation of how his obsession with strength only ends up hurting himself and everyone around him, which must have helped him see that his behaviour leading up to this was doing the same kind of thing and he can’t go back to that.

And, perhaps most importantly, you acknowledged his strength by calling out for him to help you against Terapagos, which is what Kieran really needed the most all along. By joining you in the battle, he’s finally begun to face his inferiority complex, to shoot down the conviction in his mind that he’s useless and weak and can’t do anything, and prove to himself that he’s capable of confronting scary things after all, even including his own mistakes.

I do have another small writing nitpick about his dialogue in the post-battle scene, in that I don’t quite agree with his progression from “I just don’t have it in me to be like you” straight to “finally I can let it go”. Kieran was always aware of the former, deep down, but knowing that never did anything but make him latch desperately onto trying to prove that wrong no matter how impossible it felt. Meanwhile, the latter implies that he’s always consciously wanted to let it go and just somehow couldn’t despite that, which isn’t quite it either.

Instead, I think it’d work if he first went from how he can’t ever be like you into “I guess I have to just let it go”, and then from there into “Yeah… finally I can let it go”. Feeling like he simply has no choice but to let go at first, and only from there would he reflect and realise that actually, he can now, and maybe a part of him had always kind of wanted to after all.

Delightfully, as Kieran begrudgingly accepts that he can’t ever be like you, you finally get a dialogue option that lets you tell him that he’s strong and cool and worth something as he is!!! It seems like it really did take you hearing his inferiority complex directly from him in order for you to realise that this was something he needed to hear. He reflexively tries to downplay your compliment, like he didn’t really do anything impressive at all just now, because he still instinctively feels that way about himself – again, his inferiority complex has not just magically vanished, because it doesn’t work like that! – but hearing otherwise from you of all people has to be an immense help for him in fighting against it.

And it’s this that sets Kieran off crying, from that overwhelmingly positive emotion that you think he’s really cool, aww. This seems to break something of an emotional dam for him, letting him just have a good long cry about all of it, which, yes, he has so many emotions he’s needed to let out for so long now and it is good and healthy that he’s finally able to do so! (I wish this part was better animated, alas – but believe me, I am imagining him having such a big long cathartic cry even if the game isn’t managing to adequately show it.)

Then there’s the final scene! It’s so brave of Kieran to have resolved to apologise and make amends for everything he did wrong. That is scary as hell and comes with a huge risk of massive painful criticism and rejection, but he’s doing it anyway because he wants to do the right thing. He is such a good kid at heart despite his massive issues having driven him into several big mistakes.

Now that Kieran’s returned to something resembling his old self, his anxious body language from before is back – he’s barely making eye contact with you as he speaks, his head low, instinctively trying to hide his face behind the one bit of hair he still has hanging down. But nonetheless, you can tell that he’s making an effort to fight that and push himself to be just a little bit more assertive than he was able to be before all this. As he asks if you two can be friends again, he’s grimacing, already braced for rejection, hesitating then blurting out all of it in one big go before he changes his mind – there’s still a very significant part of him convinced that you’d just never want that and he doesn’t even have the right to ask. But at least he’s now able to realise that said part is probably wrong and find the courage to ask anyway! Because he wants this, and he deserves to at least try and grasp good things for himself!

And of course you still want to be his friend, because you basically always were anyway from your perspective, and Kieran is so adorably happy to have this second chance, and I am so delighted that the two of you are able to be friends again like you always should have been all along, aaaa. I could not be more proud of my boy.

(Well, I could go into a lot more detail about just how proud of and happy I am for Kieran thanks to all of his scenes in the epilogue and postgame. But that’s enough of its own separate Thing that it ought to get its own post! So hold on for that; I’m not quite done having So Many Feelings about this boy just yet. Aaand here it is!)

[evispunk]

cardigan - jj maybank

summary: JJ’s feud with the reader builds to it’s breaking point, causing her to push JJ off of the HMS Pogue. Little does she know, JJ all but hates her.

warnings: bad writing, unedited work, slapping, pushing, arguing, cringe.

wc: 1,852

a/n: this is my first one-shot. like, ever… i’m so nervous to post this. ps in the middle of writing this i ate an artichoke

kie: are u on ur way yet??? john b is threatening to leave the dock in 30 seconds

you: he is such a drama queen i’ll be there in like 2 minutes swear

kie: kk hurry

With little to no more haste than you were walking with before Kiara’s text, you continued on your path to the dock behind the Château. There waiting for you was none other than your favorite people – not including JJ – on the HMS Pogue. John B whooped as you stepped into the boat and set your bag down. Taking a beer from the cooler and cracking it open, you watch as the boat departs from the dock.

“Can’t believe we waited that long for you of all people to come.” JJ scoffed, looking towards the front of the boat while you sat across from him.

“‘That long’? You hardly waited an extra five minutes for me and that was only because I had to fix the mess your ass left behind in my room. Thanks for breaking my vase, dickhead.” you retorted, sick of the attitude he had given you since you started hanging out with the Pogues. JJ had only known you for a little over three months, but he decided his hate for you on night one. You rolled your eyes as he ignored you, yanking his muscle tee off of his fit frame and throwing it on the floor. 

You hated to admit it amidst your loathing of the blond boy, but he wasn’t unattractive. He certainly grabbed the attention of many girls – Kook, Touron, and Pogue. His abs and salty blond hair made it a little harder for you to hate him, but not enough for you to tolerate his bad manners and rude remarks.

“Hey, Pope.” you called out to the teenage boy next to JJ.  “Are you all ready for your scholarship interview? Congrats, by the way.”

“Thanks, but I’m not even close to being prepared. It’s still a few weeks away, but I could use some more time to mull it over. My, like, whole entire life kind of depends on it.” he answered, clearly stressed about the entire situation. You knew how big of a deal this was to him, even if you yourself didn’t care about school much.

“Hey, don’t sweat it. I know you’ll do great, you still got time.” you smiled at him, and he returned it sincerely. Out of the corner of your eye, you see JJ mock you from across the boat. “What? What did I do to upset you this time, King Maybank?”

“Do you actually just flirt with everything that walks? I mean, are you really that desperate? Hey, if you are, you could’ve just asked. No shame in-”

“Watch your fucking mouth, blondie. Before I teach you how.” you snarled, and he jokingly threw his hands up in defense with a knowing smile.

“JJ, cut it out.” John B added from the wheel, looking at him with the face of a friend that is trying not to upset him, but really means what he’s saying. You could only hope that he got the hint.

“Just saying, a girl who’s getting it doesn’t act like such a priss.” JJ smirked, knowing he was beginning to get underneath your skin. It wasn’t solely the things he was saying, but also that you had no idea why he was saying them. You had given him no reason to hate you, whatsoever. “You should really smile more, then maybe-” he began, but the moment you heard the words coming out of his mouth, only one thing came to mind that seemed like the right thing to do. You slapped him. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

“Hey!” Kiara jumped in, but you had already pounced on him and began hitting at him wherever you could. Unfortunately, you weren’t stronger than a built sixteen-year-old, and he easily blocked all of your attempts. You could hear the voices of the rest of the Pogues and their attempts to calm you down so you two would stop fighting, but you had taken too much of his bullshit to stop trying now.

“I told you to watch your fucking mouth!” you huffed out between attempted hits, and he grunted in return.

“I would watch my mouth if you would stop being such a fucking bitch!” JJ argued back, and finally, you were pulled off of him while he was hoisted to the ground by Pope.

“Chill the fuck out!” John B ordered from behind you, still holding your arms back to make sure you wouldn’t literally jump at the chance to try to maul the blond boy again. “Truce? Just for today?”

JJ turned his head and spit out into the ocean, looking back with a nod.

“Yeah, truce.” he said, voice low and eyes trained to the ground. His face betrayed him – anyone with a pair of working eyes could see just how angry and irritated he was. John B called out your name, awaiting your answer.

“Fine. Just for today.” you reluctantly agreed, feeling JB’s grip on you loosen, and seeing Pope do the same.

“Shake on it.” he said, backing away from JJ. He extended his hand out to you, and you slowly raised your hand to meet his. However, in that split second, you thought of a much better way to get him back. Taking a few quick steps forward, you placed both of your hands on his bare chest and used all of your leftover strength to push him off of the boat. Pope’s eyes met yours as you let out a deep, proud breath. “I could be mad at you, but honestly, he deserved that.”

JJ’s head emerged from the ocean, and he spit out the salt water that had made it into his unsuspecting mouth. 

“What the fuck happened to the truce?” he yelled, wiping his hair back and treading the water.

Later that night at the Château after everyone showered off and calmed down, you and JJ had actually been getting along. Well, not what anyone else would call getting along, but you weren’t fighting or blatantly throwing insults at each other, so it was a win for the Pogues. Kiara passed the blunt to you, and you took a puff, letting the weed make it’s way into your body. You really needed this after today.

You couldn’t help but let your eyes linger on JJ for longer than they should’ve been. He was wearing his worn out blue shirt – the one with a few tiny holes and a pocket on his chest – and cargo shorts. His once wet hair was now dry and fluffy, and he was smiling in his conversation with John B and Pope.

“I don’t think he really hates you,” Kiara said quietly into your ear, leaning in so only you could hear her. The boys were distracted talking, so chances they would notice were low anyway.

“W- what?’ you stuttered with a cough as you blew out smoke, having been caught gawking at your sworn enemy.

“Don’t worry, nobody else saw you drooling over him.” she said with a knowing smile, taking the blunt from your hand. “But I don’t think he actually hates you. I think it’s something else.”

“Why do you say that?”

“I see the way he looks at you when you’re not looking. That’s not hate.” she explained. And maybe it was the marijuana in your bloodstream, or the fact that you hoped a little too much than you should’ve for her to be right, but you believed her. What you were going to do with this information, you didn’t know yet. But just looking at him with something other than hate for once was enough right now.

A few hours later, the Château was dark, and the living room was empty, save for you and JJ. John B was sleeping in his room with Pope, and Kiara had slyly taken the remaining bedroom and told JJ that no boys were allowed. Meaning that you and JJ had to share the couch.

“I’ll just sleep on the floor.” you said, quietly. He scoffed in return, and you grabbed a pillow and laid down on the floor. There was only one blanket, so you left it on the couch for JJ. You didn’t want to give him yet another reason to be an asshole to you.

“You don’t want the blanket?” he asked, no lingering tone of resentment in his voice. Just simple, genuine curiosity.

“Oh, no. You can have it, it’s fine. It’s pretty hot out anyways.” you replied, and he nodded, albeit a little confused. Sure, it was hot outside. But there were fans inside. Laying down on the cold hardwood, you held back a shiver, and tried your best to drift off to sleep as JJ shifted on the couch.

After what felt like a few hours, you had been in and out of sleep, shivering and teeth chattering on the floor. Right about now, you were regretting being so nice to the blond-haired boy as you were only in a tank top and linen pajama pants – so you were actively freezing your tits off.

“Okay, seriously, just get over here. Your teeth are chattering so loud that it’s keeping me awake.”

“Oh, I’m oka-” he cut you off, sternly saying your name and opening up the blanket in welcome. “Well, if you insist.” you said, scrambling to get up from the cold floor as fast as possible and scooting in next to JJ. Immediately, his body heat warmed you up, and you could feel your shivering begin to stop.

“Holy shit, you’re freezing. Why didn’t you say anything?” he whispered, wrapping the blanket over you and resting his arm on your waist.

“I didn’t want to make you to be mad at me.”

“Mad? That you’re getting hypothermia?” he said and you laughed, scotting back into him for more warmth. His arm slowly traveled around you even more, waiting for you to stop him, but you never did. “I could never be mad at you.” he whispered a few minutes later, albeit thinking you were asleep at the way your breathing had become a steady pattern, and you weren’t stiff from the cold anymore. His lips softly met the top of your head, and you felt your heart skip a beat.

“Thank you.” you said, barely loud enough to count as actual speech. You could feel his heart skip a beat from behind you too, and it was relieving to know he heard you. Would you say anything about this in the morning? Knowing yourself, no, you wouldn’t. But, for at least the next little while, it was enough to know he didn’t actually loathe you, and you could continue to look at that boy with something other than hate in your heart.

[drenched-in-sunlight]

Hi there! I wanted to say your art is absolutely incredible and always brings me back to Elden Ring when I forget just how amazing the game is. I live for your depictions of Marika.🥹

I was partly just curious after you posted the recent family tree, is there a reaspn Ranni and Radahn don't make as much of an appearance in your drawings? What is your thoughts on their questline/storyline in general?

Thanks for all the cool art, you're getting better with every piece!!

tbh... i think draw Ranni a lot, she's literally the cover of my first fromsoft fanbook 🥲🥲

though most of my art of her is from 2 years ago, i wouldn't say i don't draw her often at all 😭 i've drawn Radahn 4-5 times too. i understand because i draw too much, it's easy to have an impression that i draw some specific characters less, but compared to, say, the Omen Twins or Rykard or Melina (who i keep meaning to draw but haven't got around to do so yet), Radahn and Ranni are two Carian characters i draw the most of that side of the family (well, Rellana is looking to dethrone them soon but you get what i mean aksfkjdfkj)

Radahn dudebro fans keep pointing fingers saying i hate him but i actually like him. as a guyfailure that is so obsessed with these symbols of a Lord in his father and Godfrey, yet failed to live up to any of them (*stare at that scene of Morgott whooping his ass*). his involvement in the DLC is an interesting spin on things to me, and make a lot of sense in the grand scheme of things (when i saw that we found like... 11 Miquella's Lily in places most personal to Radahn like Carian Manor and Sellia. hoo boy).

lately, i lowkey think Radagon specifically picked him for Miquella and encouraged his obsession with being a Lord. to me at least Radagon is really bitter that Godfrey is the First Lord and not him (her actual other's half! sentenced to live away from her while another man got to be her first in everything! the injustice!), so him not only discrediting Godfrey's descendants (whole thing with Hunters of TWLiD) but also preparing a whole new pair of Lord and God that should have been how he and Marika could have been from the start sounds like the kind of overcompensation he'd be doing (look honey that could be us but you tripping).

so in a way i do feel for Radahan and Miquella falling victims to Radagon's list of issues (though it's only one reason in many other reasons for them to turn out that way ofc. Radagon merely nudges the pieces into certain direction, they go barreling head first down on their own). and i actually like that i could come up with all that thanks to the DLC. imo it actually adds a lot more to Radahn and Miquella's character (depends on how you view the story though whoops).

you can say i like him (and Miq) the way one likes AC6 Iguazu... or Genichiro. the kind of hater characters that are doomed to fail from the start, but they are stubborn and will run head first into the wall again and again. and it's fun to put them in a jar and shake them.

Ranni... after the DLC my feeling for her is a bit more complicated. before i get why she did all those things and i like her story enough, but after the DLC as you see i come to really like Godwyn and links him closely to Marika. so now it's kinda awkward for me to insert Ranni in all the scenarios im drawing lately?

it's not that i stop liking her, it's simply that the scenario doesn't line up for me to add her in that's all. and it goes to other characters i haven't drawn tbh. not because i don't like them, i simply don't have anything in my brain about them to draw out. i don't think there's any characters in Elden Ring i hate tbh (yes i do like even the Hornsents. i find the stories in the scorpion stew and dried flower talisman really somber and give them a lot of humanity too, fucked up rituals aside).

and thank you for your kind words! my editor has been on my ass for a whole year about my art and it does help me improve a lot, im glad to know it shows in the quality of my fanarts as well!

[stargazing15]

Now that we meet again

Bradley Bradshaw x you

Summary: For five summers you were Bradley’s summer love (aka each others first love), until he joined the Navy. What would happen when you two stumble unto each other at the Hard Deck 15 years later?

Warning: no use of y/n, mention of alcohol consumption, teasing, smut, oral (f receiving), p in v, protected sex, adult banter. Minors DNI 18+

A/N: saw this post from @roostersforevergirl and got the idea. This is long, whoops, I am not sorry at all

Enjoy! ❤️

You had to blink twice, after your initial thoughts got confirmed by hearing the name.

“Bradshaw, you gonna take the shot or what?” Bradley had noticed you too and started to make his way over, after shoving the pool cue in the blond haired man’s hands.

“It is really you. Wow, long has it been? You look good, no, you look fucking great Bubbles.”

“About 15 years I guess. B, you aged well too. Where did that cute babyface go?” The hug was more than welcome. “God I missed you.” As you were about to tickle him, you weren’t feeling the soft belly under your fingers that you were used to feel, but rock hard yummy abs.

“Liking what you feel?” Oh Jesus that smirk combined with those puppy eyes, he still knew how to get to you. Definitely no alcohol tonight as you wanted to make sure to remember every single second clearly.

“Hell yeah, the scruff too. These muscles and the fact you didn't coming back during the next summers, does that mean you did it?” 

“Yup, Lieutenant Bradshaw at your service.” He said after taking a sip of his beer, of course letting a droplet beer escape and drip down his lip, to his chin, down his neck, okay, you were a goner already.

“Hmm, you know I like men in a uniform, care to introduce me to those hunks over there? Seems my colleagues already ditched me.” He smirked at your first remark.

“One sec Bubbles, just so I know I wouldn’t cross a line. Since I don’t see a ring, any boyfriend I need to watch out for?” He actually was right to ask that as you were about to flirt shamelessly with each other for the rest of the evening.

“Nope, still waiting for you B,” you teased. “And on your side? So my eyes wouldn’t get scratched out.”

“Same, I was searching for you. Let me introduce to that bunch of idiots I call friends.”

“Bradshaw, since you brought the lovely lady over, apology accepted. Hangman is the name, but you can call me Jake.” The blonde one winked.

“Hangman, stuck in kindergarten?” He had never expected that answer from you while displaying your cutest face.

“Callsign darling. Please don’t tell me you’re his sister or something?”

“Ew no.”

“Bagman shut it.” Bradley introduced you to the group and vice versa.

“B, you have a callsign too?” Everyone told you theirs, but Bradley stayed awfully quiet next to you.

“He hasn’t told you yet? It’s one close to his father’s, to honor him and he's always the first one up, Rooster.” You choked on the water you were trying to drink. They all knew now with certainty, that was not the complete story behind his callsign.

“You’ve got to be shitting me B.”

“Darlin, you know the real story?” The blonde one asked you. You looked with a little mischievous smile at Bradley. Trying to warn you, Bradley signalled you with his eyes.

“Oh come on B, don’t give me that look, don’t they deserve to know?”

“Bubbles, pretty please?” And like that puppy eyes appeared again, but you were enjoying this way too much knowing his mind and dick were about take a little trip down memory lane.

“Wait, you’re THE Bubbles?” Natasha, the only girl in the group you learned, asked you/ screamed for the whole group. “Tell me ALL the juice. But you can start with his callsign.”

“I’m gonna get a drink before I die from embarrassment.” Bradley excused himself from the group. Just to stand at the bar a couple of feet further, still able to hear everything.

“Okay, one evening, we had a couple of drinks, he was telling me about his father’s job and about callsigns. I knew about his desire to become an aviator. So we were trying to find one fitting for him. And Bradley with his big dick energy, do I need to tell more?”

“Oh my god, you two fucked?” Mickey as you remembered right, shouted.

“Bubbles, it was your favourite hobby during the summers as I remember right?” If he wasn’t shameless anymore, you were definitely not going to hold back anymore.

“Oh B, you know I love your massive dick.” The group was in awe on your reaction.

“S-so, how did you get your nickname, Bubbles?” The most innocent one of the group asked you, trying to chance the subject. He did not know, you were about to corrupt him further.

“Lost a bet and got Bubbles tatted on my butt, I always liked her.” You immediately noticed Jake eying your butt, as if he could see through your jeans. “Wanna see cowboy?”

“Hell yeah darlin.”

“Oh hell no, over my dead dick, uh body.” Bradley took a sip of his glass from embarrassment. You went closer to Bradley and stood in front of him, blocking the view from the others.

“Don’t tell me you already jerked off in the bathroom?” You whispered in Bradley’s ear while slowly letting your fingers trace down from his abs to your favourite merchandise in his pants and of course giving it a soft squeeze, making Bradley grunt.

“Well, your fault for looking this good.” After your little stunt he placed one leg between yours, letting his thigh touch with your clothed core, making you wanted to grind on him already. The moment your pelvis shifted a little to feel some friction, he removed his leg and joined Bob and Micky on the other side of the pool table, leaving you behind already hot and bothered. "Dickhead." You growled

“So, tell me more about younger Bradley, sorry, but we are in desperate need of blackmail material.” You were joined by Natasha and Rueben, after Bradley ditched you.

“Ooooh, I still have pictures on my phone, I think they’re somewhere in my cloud. One sec.” You kept your pictures together always close, let’s be honest, because he was and still is the love of your life. Only for five summers you got to call him yours.

Your face lit up the moment you found the pictures you were looking for. “Here, this was I think 16 years ago. And here, this one, from our last summer. This babyface is the same Bradley as the one standing over there.”

“I never imagined him being a little, chubby? But good chubby. You know he talked about you when we were deployed? When we are deployed, we all get sappy.”

“He was the cutest, too sad we lived so far away from each other during the rest of the year back then. What did he say about me?”

“It was always, back then Bubbles this and Bubbles that. And I don’t know if I should say this, but he referred to you as the one who got away. You were not just his first love, also the love of his life.”

“Nat is right. He was never able to keep a girlfriend, there was clearly always someone else on his mind.”

“Guys, I just met you and you two seriously trying to make me cry?”

***

“Rooster, man, you two are too obvious.” Mickey patted on his back.

“She’s ... really hot, I knoooow.” Bradley slurred.

“How many did you have already? You’re drunk and dumb. You two are so in love with each other. You realize that right?”

“Yeah.” He sighed.

“Come on, Rooster, this was your chance, why did you fuck it up by getting drunk?” Bob tried to make him aware of his mistake. Bob signalled you to come over with a sad expression.

“I’m so sorry your reunion night has to end like this, but he’s too drunk to keep him here, it’s been years since he’s been this drunk. I'm so sorry he's like that."

“You don’t have to apologize for his actions Bob, you are too kind. Can you help me with his address, I’ll drive his car, I came by cab.”

“I don’t think that’s possible, no one else but him can drive his Bronco.”

“He still has that thing? Don’t worry, I’ve driven it before. Ain’t that right B? I helped a bit with fixing it back in the days.”

“What? My Bronco gets to touch you first, I’m mad at her.” Bradley drunkenly grumbled.

“Jesus B, shut up before you’re about to embarrass yourself further.”

“Can you handle him on your own darlin?”Jake asked, coming out of nowhere.

“Not my first ride with drunken Bradley. It was nice meeting you all. Probably till a next time!”

After they helped you with loading Bradley in his Bronco and typing in the address, you were finally alone with him. Alone, with drunk Bradley, or so you thought.

“This was not how I imagined our reunion would end B.” You mumbled quietly. Not wanting a quiet ride, you put on one of cassettes you found on the dashboard. “Still the same music? Not much has changed apart from your appearance B.” Bradley hummed in response.

“Almost there, just don’t get sick and puke in your own car.”

“Never.” He sat up, stretched himself and suddenly did not look and sounded drunk at all.

“What the fucking hell! Dipshit, we left your friends because of you, they were all so nice.” You smacked the back of his head, making Bradley hiss in return.

“Eyes on the road Bubbles.”

“But what the fuck B, why this stunt? What were you drinking all night? You’re an idiot!” You were done raging by now.

“Feeling better?” You nodded as you parked his Bronco. “Penny, the nice bartender, she’s a good friend of us, she asked about you. And then noticed that you were having a nice time with the group. I might have said something about how always took care of me when I had a little too much to drink and she might have helped me with giving me apple juice.”

“Oh my god, you want me all for yourself. You didn't hear this but I love selfish Bradley. Come on, lead the way.”

Bradley’s house was unexpectedly … cute and cosy. “B, I love this place.” Oh god, he sneaked up behind you, just like the old days. His scent has changed, this was better, more manly, even more intoxicating than it ever was. His hands now on you waist, re-exploring the form of your body, his lips already planting kisses on your neck. The outline of his hardened dick already noticeable on your back. 

Bradley hurriedly turned you around and pressed your back against the wall, taking your face in his big hands. His nose was touching yours as he was staring in your eyes.

“I missed you so much.” Before you got the chance to say anything back, his lips were on yours, his tongue immediately demanding entrance. Your arms sneaked around his head, occasionally gripping on his locks. You both got flashback to those hot summer nights, making out in one of your bedrooms. Those memories and your bodies being pressed together made you moan, loud.

Bradley heard you and let go of the kiss, only to start attacking your jaw and neck with needy, wet kisses while hurriedly trying to discard your blouse, but he was stuck somewhere. You placed your small hands on his big ones to make him stop destroying your clothes.

“B, stop, take a breath.” He looked so lost at your words, eyes still blown with lust. He was doubting himself on the inside. Was he wrong to think you wanted this too? You two were flirting non stop with each other the whole evening. And when he kissed you, you definitely kissed back, he was sure you were enjoying it a lot.

You placed your finger on his lips and let your other hand that was still on top of his, slide in his hand. Slowly you guided him to his sofa while walking backwards, not breaking eye contact. Once Bradley was seated, your finger let go of his lips. “You really look cute confused B.”

“But I am Bubbles, I thought that you l-”

“Stop thinking and start feeling.” You seated yourself on his lap facing him and placed his hand on your heart and so did you with your hand on his heart. “Let’s do this again.” This kiss was not hurried, it was slow and tender. You and Bradley had kissed a lot in the past, and was passionate many times, but never like this. Every kiss, every touch, every time you and Bradley fucked were burned in your memory. Your heart had never be able to let go of him and tonight you were going to let him know. When you broke off the kiss to catch your breath, you noticed how wet you got from just kissing him. Yes, you wanted him to take you here and now, but you had waited so many years for this, so this moment had to be the most memorable one.

“But I don’t want you to leave after tonight Bubbles, I’ve been so dumb for not coming back or searching harder for you after not coming back-“

“You really only think with that big dick of yours? Have you not listened tonight?” Bradley shot you the same confused look as earlier, but with a slight smirk at the mention of his dick. “I” kiss “was” kiss “at” kiss “the” kiss “bar” kiss “with” kiss “colleagues” kiss, you tried to deepen the kiss, but Bradley backed his head and kept looking at you confused.

“Colleagues? Work?” You hoped those words would start to make sense.

“I really am not getting it Bubbles.”

“Jesus B, you are stationed here right?”

“Yes, permanently.”

“I work in the city. I live here too B, since 10 months and I am staying here, permanenly.”

“Oh”

“I’m not going anywhere B.”

“Never going to let go of you again.” He lifted you up with him and walked with you clinging onto him to his bedroom. “You are not allowed to leave this house for the next two days.”

“Uh, underwear?”

“If I remember right, you look good in mine, but I doubt you will wear anything during those two days. Because we,” he threw you on his bed, “are going to make up for all the time we lost.”

Bradley still being the big tease he is, slowly got out of his shirt and tossed it somewhere on the ground. Your mouth fell open at the sight in front of you, you had already felt it, but seeing him being this ripped, looking at you with his sinful eyes and sweet jesus that massive stick visible in his jeans, you were officially done for any other man.

Bradley crawled on top of you, opening your blouse button by button and kissing the newly exposed skin before opening the next button. When the last one was opened you helped him get rid of your blouse. Next he opened the button and zipper of your pants, letting it slowly lower on your legs. “Have you got any idea how beautiful you are? You’re so fucking perfect.”

Bradley returned to pepper kisses all over your body while his hands roamed over the rest of your body. He made this moment feel so intimate and perfect. When he was satisfied with his kisses on you, he turned his attention to your boobs, letting his fingers trace over the lace covering them. “As much as I like it, I think I might like more what’s underneath it, can I?”

“Please B, your lips feel so good on me.” He didn’t need to be told twice to remove your bra and toss on the other side of the room. He started to kiss each boob first before turning his attention to your nipples. He skilfully took one bud in his mouth and let his tongue make love to it, the sensation going straight to your already dripping core. He had only just begun and you were already a moaning mess under him.

Bradley sat up after taking care of your other nipple too, admiring your needy look under him. You never used to like this quiet moments, but with Bradley, he made you feel like a goddess.

After contemplating for a minute what to do first, Bradley decided something was missing on you and he went back to kissing your neck and collarbone again. His kisses weren’t going to give him the result he wanted so he started sucking your skin in between kisses right under your collarbone to leave a mark he will be able to admire the rest of the weekend.

“B, please … something.” you moaned under his touch and kisses.

“Enlighten me Bubbles.”

“Your mouth, on me, lower, ooh.” He yanked your panties off, your sweet moans were now making it impossible for him to keep up the slower pace he was trying to maintain.

“Fuck you’re so wet for me babe. So, so perfect, all for me.” He settled himself comfortably between your thighs, letting his hot breath ghost over your wetness. After a needy whine escaped over your lips, he stopped admiring you and kitten licked your slit first and your clit a couple of times. He let his tongue explore what you liked and found a good rhythm softly circling your clit, making the heat inside your body rise more and more, getting you closer to your pending orgasm. Deciding not to let wait any longer for your high, Bradley gently inserted two fingers in your needy core. He moaned when your walls already started to clench around his fingers. You were so lost in the trance Bradley had put you in, that you couldn’t hold anything back anymore. You started to buck your hips a little to make his fingers hit the spot that made you see stars immediately. The little movement of your hips added more pressure from Bradley’s tongue on your clit, what made you scream out his name. As soon as he increased the speed of his fingers in combination with the circling motion of his tongue on your clit, you felt the heat building up in your belly reach its high and the muscles in your butt and abdomen tense. And then, it all exploded, your insides squeezed the hell out of Bradley’s fingers, a firework went off in your belly and your mind was on the fluffiest cloud possible.

Bradley pricked your wonderful bubble open by starting to kiss the Bubbles tattoo on your butt. "Missed you beautiful girl. Only you." Good thing his obnoxious smirk betrayed his intentions.

“You dick.”

“Hear that buddy, she loves you.” He said to his proudly erected dick.

You put up your biggest eyes and a pouty face "You want me to lick your lollipop B?" You licked your lips in the process.

"Oh yes please."

Your expression changed to an apologetic one "Too bad I'm not in the mood for a lollipop, I think you only look good between my thighs." You took his dick in your hands and teased him by pumping in an extreme slow motion. He threw his head back when he felt your hands on him and groaning at your slow speed. "You only get to enjoy when you're inside me" you winked, "punishment for not searching for me harder."

"Fuck Bubbles, come here." He closed the gap between you with a sloppy kiss. His hands back on your boobs as soon as you laid on your back. Maybe your heads hitting each other for a second when you landed on the bed. You couldn't hold back a little laugh as Bradley was still clumsy when he wanted to hurry something.

"Remember we have time B, no hurry or one of us might get injured." You joked with a little mischievous smile. "But I've got to admit can't wait to have you inside me."

"Fuck Bubbles. Got mouthy over the years. I like that." He moaned in between kisses. He started to lower his kisses to your neck, to your boobs and eventually to your stomach while gripping your thighs with his wonderful hand throughout his kissing-spree.

"God, B. The scruff feels wonderful, thought the Navy wouldn't allow that." It did tickle your stomach lightly.

"Unfortunately not, thought to try it on my time off. Will keep my stache. That will never disappear. Do you want me to grab a-" He said while signalling to his top drawer of his night stand.

"Maybe, yeah, I think I'm clean, I always have been careful, but I don't want to risk, you know for the Navy. Sorry for being a little party pooper. Going to make an appointment first thing in the morning." During your sudden rambling Bradley had already taken a condom and torn the package open with his teeth. He rolled it over his very erected dick and started to position himself in front of your entrance, until he noticed you suddenly changing attitude.

"Don't go all shy on me now Bubbles."

"It's not that, might sound weird, but I just got this nostalgic feeling. I wanted to cherish it for a moment."

"Good, but we're going to make it better." He positioned himself in front of your entrance and slowly pushed his cock inside you.

"F-fuck B, so big, easy p-please." You panted, trying to adjust to his size, a small tear appeared on the brim of the eyes.

"Had any decent dick after me?" He started to play with your boobs again to make the adjustment somewhat easier.

"Fuck no, your lovestick is the best." One thing your learned during the years you and Bradley fucked: praise his big dick, the more you fuel his ego, the lovelier it gets for you.

Your remark unleashed his ego and he accidentally bucked his hips, making you moan loud in the process. "Shit sorry Bubbles."

"Keep going, fuck it feels so wonderful. Oh." You didn't mean to, but the sounds escaping your mouth sounded like a needy little bitch. That was the effect Bradley had on you, make you loose complete control.

Bradley started to thrust, deep and slow thrusts. Only grunts and moans were escaping your mouths, even Bradley managed to keep his dirty mouth shut. All because you were both enjoying this way too much. For the first time in your history with Bradley, he was making love to you. If he had done it like this the last time 15 years ago, he would have probably snuck you into his bag when joining the Navy.

His thrusts were still slow and deep, but he managed to go a little harder the second he managed to hit your spot. You were getting close again, very close. You moaning his name over and over again as you were meeting his thrusts while bucking your hips slightly.

"Close too Bubbles, fuck, you're so, ah, so good. Let go." And you did exactly as he asked, he sped up lightly and made your orgasm hit you like a truck. Just like that, your body fell limp due to to intense contraction of all of your muscles. It felt weird this intense, yet so wonderful. Seconds after you Bradley came too, screaming your name, not Bubbles. Hearing your name roll over his lips like that, damn. You were still in a haze from your own orgasm, but hearing was as icing on the cake. Life was perfect now.

Two minutes had passed and you were both still laying knocked fucked out on the bed, your hands had found each other and intertwined. "Wow, I always thought they exaggerated in movies after the mind blowing sex that we never get to see. But now I understand. I'll be right back." Bradley took the condom he had removed after collapsing on the bed and came back a bit later with a warm washcloth to take care of you.

"Thanks B, I don't think I am able to walk for a bit." You smiled shyly.

"That good huh?" He joined you again on the bed, giving you your panties and one of his his large shirts after getting in his boxers. He kissed you softly before laying down in front of you, so you could stare at another.

"Hmm, let me think, did I have better? Oh maybe that one ... nah, oh bit a couple years ago, he was good .. but nah. Oooh fifteen years ago, that guy was something. Oh wait. Just kidding B, you have always been the best for me and this was the best yet. No one has made me cum with his dick only."

"I love you." Bradley blurted out, he was shocked at his own words. He was planning on telling them, just not yet. He wanted to bring up some good memories first, talk a bit, cuddle, spoil you, maybe make you confess first. But the words were out before he knew it.

You moved closer to Bradley and laid one hand on his cheek while planting your lips on his. "I love you too B, always have."

A little tear appeared in his the corner of his eyes. "B, are you crying? Is something wrong?"

He quickly wiped away the tear and smiled. "Fuck no, everything is alright, even more than alright. Hearing those words, I can get used to hearing them .

"Bradley, I love you too. I love you. I love you. I love you." And you ended your mantra with a peck on his lips.

"Hmm, in for a treat sweetheart? Spoiling me like that." Bradley already disappeared under the sheets, holding your hips down, ready to go down on you again. This was going to be the most memorable weekend of your life and finally the start of Bradley and you.

Taglist: @mrsjaderogers @mavrellover91 @cycbaby @bradleybeachbabe @iamdannyday @rhirhikingston @luckyladycreator2 @xoxabs88xox @mak-32

Tagform

Let me know what you think!

[azucar-skull]

How Many Sorrys Does It Take To Fix This?

(written for @tmnt-write-fight for @dorky-pals)

Fandom: Rise Of The TMNT (post movie)

Prompt: I don’t know how to apologize., any turtle angst

Word Count: 963

Posted on AO3 too!

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

Leo was never one to say sorry. In most cases, his pride had always been first and foremost priority in any argument or fight.

Yet there he was, his neck clutched around Raph’s kraang arm. Lowering his hands to his side.

“If this is it, I want you to know I finally understand… A-and I’m sorry…”

And now…here he is, hours after saving the world and getting his ass whooped by the Kraang. Sitting at the dinner table with Raph on the other end. And…eugh boy…did Raph want to have a talk with him.

There’s a lot of awkward silence for a long moment, only the ticking of the kitchen clock making any sound. Leo would do anything to get out of this.

“So…how’s your eye?”, Leo draws out.

“It’s healing.”, Raph nods. His eye is still covered in gauze and there’s high debate about how it’ll affect his sight.

Leo nods slowly. “...Cool.”

More silence. More awkwardness. Leo drums his digits against the table.

“Soooo-”

“I’m sorry.”, Raph speaks up.

Leo blinks. Twice. Processing what Raph just said. “...What?”

Raph takes a heavy sigh. “I don’t know how to put this. I don’t know where to even begin with this so I might as well just come out and say it.” His eyes meet Leo’s. “I’m sorry.”

Leo pauses for a moment, brows furrowing as the gears are turning very slowly in his head. Did I get a concussion back in the prison dimension or something?? And the way Raph isn’t speaking in the third person let’s Leo know he’s been super serious.

“What could you possibly be sorry for?”, Leo asks, more confused.

“I don’t know! Beatin’ you up? Tryin’ to actively kill you?”, Raph throws his hands out more agitated. “I mean, c’mon, Leo!”

“But that wasn’t you.”, Leo argues. “You were under Kraang’s control. The last thing I remember you doing was…” Leo glances down at the table, clasping his hands together. “Was you saving me when I went to get the key. If anything I should be sorry. You had to use your escape pod on me when I abandoned mine. I should’ve listened to you.”

“No. No.”, Raph argues back. “You were just doin’ what Casey Jr asked you to do and warned us ‘bout the Kraang. I’m the one who should be sorry, I couldn’t protect you-”

“You wouldn't have had to protect me if I actually listened to you when you said “I got it”. I was so focused on being cocky and trying not to bruise my pride that I messed up the entire mission and caused the apocalypse-”

“That shouldn’t be on you! That should’ve never been on you, Leo, ever! It was my fault, okay? I should’ve taught ya to be a better leader instead of arguin’ with you over a pizza stack competition-”

“But that was on me! I made Donnie and Mikey ditch out on training to do some stupid activity because I didn’t want to listen to you, I was being petty-”

“Ya weren’t listenin’ because I didn’t help you prepare enough. We got into another fight and you took it upon yourself to help cheer up our brothers-”

“Our brothers who should’ve never been involved in the first place. But they had to because I was too stubborn to let you knock me down a peg and get me to listen-”

“But I shouldn’t have fought with you! I let my anger take over and couldn’t control myself. I should’ve never had use my strength against you or any of our brothers-”

“ENOUGH!”

Leo’s anger spills over in a shout. The bickering stops. Raph stares wide eyed at Leo, noticing how he’s leaning over the table with clenched fists. The slider sighs and flops back in his chair.

“Just…enough.”, Leo laments. “I’m tired of fighting with you, Raph.”

Raph's expression softens, recognizing that tired look in his little brother’s eyes.

“You want to keep coming at me? Go ahead. I’m done fighting you.”

“I don’t want to fight anymore.”

Raph sits back in his chair, unclenching his fists. He heaves a heavy sigh, shutting his eyes to hold back tears of the memory.

Leo’s brows upturn more, frowning sympathetically.

“Can we just admit we’re both in the wrong here?”, the slider asks the snapper. “I’m sorry for not listening and you’re sorry for pushing me so hard or not pushing me enough or however to get me to listen.”

Raph sighs. “I don’t want to fight you anymore either, Leo. I just… I just care ‘bout you so much. It would kill me to see ya get hurt.” His eyes scan his brother up and down at all his bandaged wounds, scars, and cracks on his shell. “But I guess it didn’ even matter.”

“It doesn’t. Our injuries are the result of both our failures.”, Leo nods. “But we fail together.”

Raph can’t help but smile at that. “We fail together.”

Raph gets up, walking across the table to Leo’s side. He holds out a hand with a sad but warm smile on his face.

“Brothers?”

Leo’s eyes widen for a moment before smiling back, standing up and taking Raph’s hand. He nods. “Brothers.”

Raph chuckles as he pulls Leo in for a hug, rubbing his knuckles against his brother’s head which gets a laugh out of him. But Leo’s laugh is cut short when Raph hugs him just a bit too tightly.

“Ow! Raph, Raph, be careful. My shell!”, Leo winces.

Raph immediately pulls back from the hug. “Omigosh I’m so sorry!”

“No, no you’re good. I should be sorry, I wasn’t being careful-”

“No, I’m sorry because-”

“Oh my GOOOOOOD we’re never gonna stop saying sorry to each other, are we?”

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

I have that one Justion Bieber song stuck in my head now

[tiddygame]

hello im sorry i wrote more for @myriadblvck ’s streamer au ghoap

I time travelled and around 4,000 words magically appeared in a document titled: "you didn't juju on the fucking beat soap" I think I was possessed by something. anyways here’s that:

tw: is it a panic attack? is it just typical ghost angst? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ just be careful it's mostly fluffy (ghost is mean to himself cause he almost kissed soap on the forehead)

also i just realized after i wrote this whole thing, this is based on my general knowledge of dog tags… as an american. writing about the british military. so if you know your shit about the british military, uhh sorry in advance. my bad. from a very brief search i think a lot of it’s the same or at least same enough but this might hurt for people that know a thing or two. whoops!

fun fact: did you know for a brief stint (iirc, >40 years from around 1960s to 2010ish) the american military was printing soldiers’ ss numbers on their tags? yeah can’t imagine why they switched back to serial numbers.

Ghost had been pacing outside of his office for three minutes before he actually entered. When he did, he didn’t say a word. Just sat down in one of the chairs, fidgeting. It wasn't that uncommon of an occurrence, he was normally either gathering his thoughts before talking to Price about something more personal or hiding from what/whoever he didn't feel like dealing with.

When it came to mission debriefs, he was clear and concise. However, personal matters were a different story, and based on the way he anxiously opened and closed his hand, he'd guess this was a personal matter.

Price didn’t ask. He knew that whatever it was Simon needed to say would come out eventually. For now, he continued filling out paperwork and trying to figure out what it was that had Ghost so worked up.

Honestly, there wasn't much guesswork involved. Chances were, it was probably yet another leave request. He knew from Gaz (who was such an awful gossip he sometimes wondered how the man made it through interrogation training) that Simon had been visiting some social media person he had taken a liking to.

(Look, yes, Price knew about Twitch and live streaming and everything. He’s not actually that old. However, as long as he kept up the front of the old man who complained about the keyboard on his phone being too small, he didn’t have to deal with social media. Sure, it caused all of them to joke that he was geriatric and on his last legs, but he was able to convince Roach that he doesn’t know what TikTok is, meaning he wasn’t in charge of reviewing all the bullshit he and Gaz posted. A fair trade if you ask him.)

He also knew that Gaz was convinced the two were in love to the point that he and Roach had a bet going to see when they would get together. Price thought it was rather stupid, but he had to admire their ability to keep it under wraps; if the lieutenant found out they’d been placing monetary bets on his love life, he had a feeling he would need to find replacements for the 141.

Regardless, Price hoped that one day Simon would tell him about the friend but, until then, he was happy to fill out any paperwork that would get the poor man off base. God knows that idiot needs a vacation.

Simon was bouncing his leg, messing with his fingers, and staring off into space.

Three of his nervous habits at once? He must be even more worked up about this than Price thought. But, he was a patient man. It was about seven minutes of companionable silence before Simon spoke.

“I need replacement dog tags. I seem to have lost mine.”

Price looked up. He could see the chain around his neck and the outline of them still under his shirt.

"You do?" Price shuffled his documents around, eventually finding a blank piece of paper he could write on.

"Yes sir."

“And do you know what happened to them?”

“I believe they were knocked off during the fight from the last mission. I didn’t notice until later that night when we were back at base.”

Price paused and looked up from where he had been writing.

The last mission had been an odd one. Ghost normally stuck further away, their eagle-eyed lieutenant typically stayed at long to mid-range, watching for hostiles and making sure whoever else was in the field wouldn’t get caught off guard by someone they hadn’t seen.

During the last mission, he decided to engage at close range, a far cry from his usual approach of sniping hostiles from the shadows.

At one point, their lieutenant had been tackled and almost strangled. The fight had pretty much ended, his attacker was the only one left there. Ghost, being The Ghost, dispatched him with ease, but it stuck out to Price. Ghost may prefer to stay further back, but that didn’t mean that his hand-to-hand combat skills were lacking by any means.

He remembered thinking at the time that it was a clumsy mistake, that Ghost would have had to be intentionally trying to fuck up to get knocked down. He assumed the man had just been caught off guard, but he knew that theory wouldn’t hold up to any scrutiny. Ghost isn’t one to get caught off guard.

What was stranger yet still was Ghost specifically pointing it out in his mission report, calling even more attention to it.

Price set his pen down and leaned back in his chair.

“You planned this?”

“I plead the fifth,” said the British man.

Price just continued to stare, curious to see if this was actually going where he thought it was going.

“Is this off the record?” Simon eventually asked.

“Of course,” almost everything the 141 did was of dubious legality. Not reporting a conversation about possible wasted assets was far from the worst thing that had been swept under the rug.

“Then yes.”

“Why?”

Simon didn’t answer. Price waited, giving the man time to gather his thoughts, but based on the way his mouth opened and closed before he slumped in his chair, it seemed he didn’t know what to say at all.

Price had an inkling he might know what this was about.

“You know, Gaz likes to keep me informed,” Ghost looked up at him, somewhat panicked yet resigned, like he already knew what Price was going to say.

“He tells me you have a certain someone you’ve been visiting?”

“Yes.”

“Is this person a friend or…?” Ghost once again paused, calculating the potential consequences of his available responses.

He didn’t answer.

“Hmm,” Price paused, wondering how far to push before he continued, “You want to give this person your old dog tags?”

“Yes.”

Of course he would pre-plan “losing” his dog tags. Price mentally chuckled, leave it to Simon to be such a sap that he wanted to give someone his dog tags yet still make sure to follow protocol so he never actually risked going without them.

He had to hand it to him, it wasn’t a bad plan.

Price had a smile now, knowing his grumpy hard-ass lieutenant had a sweetheart he wanted to be sappy with.

“Romantic or platonic?” Price tried again.

“… I don’t know,” he’d never seen Simon look quite so… forlorn.

Hmm… That would explain his hesitancy.

He was pushing how much Simon was willing to divulge.

“And does this person know the significance of you giving them your dog tags?”

Well, curiosity killed the cat…

“No, they don’t.”

…But satisfaction brought it back. How interesting, the plot thickens.

“Do you plan on telling them?”

There was a long pause, after which it dawned on Price, “You want to give them your dog tags because they don’t know.”

It wasn’t a question, he already knew. Simon somehow slumped further, attempting to hide his face as if he weren’t wearing a balaclava.

His grumpy hard-ass lieutenant. Absolutely smitten with someone yet too shy to say anything, deciding on a quiet confession, one they likely wouldn’t pick up on.

Price chuckled, jotting down the necessary information he would need when he got his hands on the right paperwork, polishing up some of the details of Ghost’s story to make it more believable, before reading off what he had written to Ghost to make sure he got everything right. Ghost nodded once, and that was that.

“Replacement tags will probably be here in two to three weeks.”

“I would like to request leave for two to three weeks from now.”

Price handed him the form, having already grabbed it. He noticed how the man seemed to calm at just the thought of getting to visit his mystery person.

Oh, he thought to himself.

I am definitely joining Roach and Gaz’s bet.

<><><><>

They were lying on the daybed in his streaming room, or, well…

No, that’s not quite right.

Simon was lying on the daybed.

Johnny was lying on top of Simon.

His computer was still softly playing quiet (non-DMCA) music from where his stream had just ended. Instead of turning it off, he had decided to unplug his headset and leave it on, the music just loud enough to be heard.

Simon was sleepily scrolling through his phone, trying to pretend like he hadn’t almost dropped several times while dozing off, desperately trying to stay awake. Johnny had watched his struggle and decided to lay down right on top of Simon, not even trying to pretend like he was trying to fit on the remaining space on the daybed. Why would he when Simon was right there?

It was meant to be a joke, having thrown himself on top of him to annoy the man into sleeping on an actual bed (he claimed he wasn’t tired but the comically loose grip on his phone and the waking world said otherwise.) However, unfortunately for said sleepy man, Simon was very, very comfortable.

His head was resting on Simon’s chest, arms under his back like he actually was just a pillow, one hand reaching higher to feel where Simon’s hair had begun to grow out slightly.

I wonder if he would let me help him cut it…

Simon had said he was like a clingy cat, his free hand running through his hair in the same manner one would pet a cat to prove his point. The joke's on him though, he likes it.

Simon had tried to stop but Johnny didn’t let him, threatening to tickle him if he did.

(“I’m not ticklish, I just don’t want you throwing a tantrum.”

“Yeah, sure. Whatever you say,” he was definitely ticklish, and one of these days he was going to prove it.)

At some point, Simon had given up on keeping a grip on his phone, letting it drop to the side. They would probably have to go digging through the cushions to get it out of whatever crevice it had fallen to. As of right now, the idea of ever leaving his spot was comical at best.

The sun had begun to set, orange and pink tinted light filtering through the sheer curtains, making everything look more like a dream. Or maybe it was just the proximity to the man below him that was making him feel so serene.

Johnny took a second to inhale and exhale slowly, appreciating the moment. He hoped that this memory, this beautiful tranquility with Simon, would be something he cherished for a long time to come.

He knew that they had things to do. Soon, Simon would be catching a flight at some ungodly hour, headed back to save the world yet again. But for now, he was happy to nap away in their own little bubble. He never was a religious man but here in the arms of Simon Riley, he was tempted to think heaven was real, and that it was right in front of him.

“I almost forgot,” Simon mumbled, not sounding any more awake than he looked, reaching up for the collar of his shirt. Thankfully, the hand that was running his hair remained. He didn’t like proving the cocky bastard right, but he probably would have thrown a tantrum had he tried to remove it.

“They had some fuck up along the line or something and accidentally printed me an extra set of dog tags. I was just gonna toss ‘em but thought you might want—”

Johnny was now wide awake, sitting up and yanking the chain out of his hands.

“Don’t you fucking dare throw them away, of course I want them!” Simon’s face reddened, a frequent treat for Johnny now that he had gotten more comfortable going without the mask. Simon might have been good at keeping a poker face, but without his mask, he was a blushing mess.

He wondered if the blush was from his obvious jubilation at the gift or if it was because he was now straddling the man. Such pesky details, however, (even ones that would keep future Johnny awake at night) were far less important than examining the necklace in his hands.

It was obvious this was the older set, the metal worn and dented in some spots though the writing was still clearly visible.

“Calm down, I’m not going to take it from you,” the gruff tone was severely undermined by the aforementioned blush. It was hard to sound tough while half asleep on a daybed and being used as another man’s pillow.

Johnny stared at them for a little bit longer, feeling every dent and wondering the story behind how they got there, before putting them on.

He smiled at the man under him, “How do I look?”

He was going to joke, asking if he looked like a rough and tough soldier ready for war, but something in Simon’s eyes made him stop short.

He was looking with… with… Reverence was far too intense of a word for the softness of the moment but it was the only word that came to mind.

Simon reached up with his hand, grabbing the tags, his knuckles grazing his chest.

Well, that’s just fucking unfair.

Simon was supposed to be the blushy one. Not him, goddammit!

Though, he thinks when they make eye contact, they end up tied for who is blushing the most. They stare for a while, maybe it should have felt awkward but it was too adoring for either to feel any form of uncomfortability.

Neither moved.

It was Johnny that broke first, smiling at him, yet again tracing all of the scars he could see. It was his new favorite hobby, especially when Simon would blush making the scars on his face all the more visible.

He took one more second to sleepily appreciate the man before him, then went back to using him as a pillow. His hands went back to where they were before, one under Simon’s back and one playing with his hair. His head, however, did not fall back to his chest, instead resting in the crook of his neck and shoulder.

Simon’s hand returned to running through his hair, his other now coming up to rest on his back, rubbing up and down a few times before the sleepiness from earlier fully returned with his hand stopping somewhere around the small of his back.

Johnny leaned up slightly and gave a chaste kiss to the part of his neck that he could reach, then settled back to where he was. The hand in his hair paused.

“Thank you, Simon.”

A second of delay, and then the hand continued.

“You’re welcome, Johnny.”

Simon shuffled slightly, getting comfy before—

A kiss, on his forehead.

He couldn’t stop the blush and smile if he wanted to. He snuggled closer before drifting off to sleep.

When he woke, he was in his bed, practically tucked in. His window had been opened slightly, blackout curtains that had been drawn closed now swaying slightly with the breeze. When he focused, he realized he could smell petrichor and hear heavy rainfall outside with the occasional grumble of thunder.

There was a note on his nightstand. As he expected, it was Simon’s handwriting, apologizing for not waking him up before he left. It said that he had made breakfast for him (pancakes, with enough for when his sister would inevitably try to steal them), that he made sure to lock the front door, and left the window cracked.

He giggled sleepily at the last line. Regardless of the context, it always made Simon anxious to have the curtains open, much less to leave a window open. But, he also must've known how much Johnny loved the rain and set his worries aside, just this once, so he could wake up to the rain.

He set the note down and flopped back onto his pillows, his hand felt something cold and he remembered.

The dog tags.

John MacTavish is no stranger to crushes and heartbreaks.

He's had high school sweethearts, been in and out of love, he knows his way around the world of dating. Which is why he most certainly does not squeal and kick his legs while holding the tags like some kid with their first crush.

He did it like a grown man, thank you very much.

He grabbed his phone and sent Simon the worst pun he could think of; it was tradition at this point to send him some god-awful joke before his flight.

Simon has probably already forgotten about the whole exchange. He probably woke up and assumed he threw them away when he noticed he wasn't wearing them. It was probably stupid, an insignificant gesture with no meaning. But to Johnny, it felt like everything.

He sighed dreamily at the ceiling and felt the cool metal once more. Thunder roared outside. He thought about how he had felt in the man's arms. Thought about how much he wanted that again.

God.

His phone dinged and he immediately reached over to grab it.

I'm fucked, aren't I?

<><><><>

Elsewhere, Ghost was in an airport terminal, having far too much time to think.

Over the weekend, it was almost impressive how many times Ghost had talked himself into and back out of giving Soap his dog tags. He really hoped he hadn't made a mistake.

Simon felt the spot that Johnny had kissed and wondered if he remembered it. Wondered if he had meant it.

Simon thought about how Johnny had looked cradled in his arms when he carried him to his room, the way he had reached out for him when he laid him in bed. The way he had grabbed his wrist and clung to it, grumbling when Simon tried to pull it back.

If asked, he'd say that he had woken up late and that's why he was so far behind schedule. He'd keep the part where he sat there, kneeled in front of Johnny's bed, waiting for him to fall back into a deep enough sleep to pull his arm away all to himself. After all, it would have been rude to wake him up, no?

He had made sure to plug up his phone and, upon seeing the forecasted weather, hesitated before opening the window. It was only barely cracked, just enough for the sounds of the outside world to shamble in, but not so wide as to worry about water damage. He stared at it, convincing himself not to worry and that Johnny would like waking up to the fresh air.

He turned back to make sure the man was still asleep, still comfy, but stopped for a moment. He approached the bed and hesitated before running his fingers through his stupid haircut, almost wishing the man would grab his arm and give him an excuse to stay.

He didn't. Simon did, however, lean in to give him one last kiss on the forehead as some stupidly sappy goodbye, before his brain turned back on and he ripped himself away.

What the fuck is wrong with you? What? He grabs your arm in your sleep so you feel entitled to be able to kiss him?

Simon backed away, staring at the hand that had just been in his hair. He felt dirty.

For fuck’s sake, relax. It's not that big of a deal, you did it earlier; the man fell asleep in your arms, a forehead kiss isn't too much of a stretch.

He went to the kitchen and scrubbed his hands for a while, only stopping when he thought about how much water he was wasting. He still felt dirty.

Not a stretch? You don't get to decide that. How would you feel if someone tried to kiss you while you were unconscious? If they said that they felt they should be allowed to do so because you fell asleep?

He had started making pancakes. Something quick, easy, and reheatable for when Soap woke up. Like making him breakfast would make up for trying to kiss him in his sleep.

Why can't you just be normal?

Eventually, and after a run-in with Soap’s hell-spawn of a twin, he had to leave. The time on his phone showed that he should probably already be halfway to the airport by now but he has always been a selfish man.

He had snagged some paper and left Soap a quick note, hoping the apology would make him feel better about worse sins than not waking him up. It didn't.

He stared at the man for a second, admiring him, before he reminded himself that he was a fucking creep and left.

The storm left the flight delayed by 1.5 hours. Ghost had sat waiting, wireless headphones on and connected, but not playing anything. He had far too much time to think.

Simon thought about how Johnny had looked, his dog tags around his neck, silhouetted by the fading light, the sun behind his head as if even the stars knew they could never compare to him.

He stood and started pacing. Amongst the screaming children, feuding families, and people who think they're entitled to listen to their music without headphones, one middle-aged man having an existential crisis didn't stick out.

He thought about how he had never understood weighted blankets so well until Johnny had thrown himself on top of him. It should've hurt. He should've been annoyed. Instead, Simon selfishly hoped he would never get up.

It took him a while to put his finger on what he had been feeling exactly. Finally, he realized.

There, in that moment, he had never been so happy to be alive. It was a startling emotion to discern amongst the swath of negativity he normally felt. It startled him so much, he had snapped out of his reverie and stopped short in his pacing. When he checked the time, he saw he had one missed text from Johnny.

Soap (art streamer): i was trying to think of an airplane joke but none of them landed

Simon chuckled and sat down; he almost forgot about their dumb little tradition.

Ghost: Disliked.

Soap (art streamer): everyone is so mean 2 me 💔

Ghost: It is not my fault your pun was so Boeing.

Soap (art streamer): well i thought i could wing it

Ghost: Did you look up what giving do-

Ghost: About the tags, you

Ghost: I think you make me want to live

Ghost sighed and fell back further into his seat, coming to a conclusion that his subconscious had long ago discovered.

I'm in love, aren't I?

Soap (art streamer): speechless huh? finally, the Wright reaction to my comedic genius

Ghost: Absolutely awful, Mactavish.

Soap (art streamer): :D

Took you long enough, dumbass.

<><><><>

Soap’s twin spent a good bit of time staring at her brother's new accessory.

“Is something wrong?” he challenged, hoping she wasn't in a bothersome mood.

She failed miserably at hiding her shit-eating grin but didn't care.

“Nope!” she replied.

She had run into Ghost early that morning before he left.

"Detergent."

She was pretty sure he never even learned her name, just jumped straight into calling her detergent.

"Ghoul," she greeted, glaring at the man.

Being required by law to not trust him, she checked on her brother as he was still gathering his things and noticed the necklace.

“You gave him your dog tags,” she accused, like she was framing him for murder.

“Yes, I did,” he replied casually, as per usual robbing her of the fight she so desperately wanted to pick.

“Did you tell him what it means?”

“...What does it mean?”

Damn, he was good. If she wasn't convinced that he was the devil incarnate, she might have fallen for his feigned ignorance.

“100 bucks and you buy my silence.”

“I don't know what you mean.”

“200 then.”

“It doesn't even mean anything.”

“Hmm. Well, I suppose you might be right… JOHN!” their neighbors were probably going to complain.

“What the fuck are you doing?” ooh he was getting panicked now.

“If it doesn't matter then you won't mind me telling him to look it up,” she started walking to his room, “JOHNSON!”

“Fucking Christ, woman! Just— Fucking— Here.”

He pulled out his wallet and started counting bills. Damn, that was easier than she thought.

“What did you say? 100?”

“Nope! That was before inflation. Now it’s 300.”

“What the hell is wrong with you? You said 200!”

“So you admit you tried to scam me?”

“Just take the 100 and g-”

She didn't even get to yell, he reached for more before she could finish taking a deep breath in.

“Just shut the fuck up! Here! Three fucking hundred!”

She was tempted to raise her price further, but she was no gambler, she was a strategist. She knew a defeated man when she saw one. If she played this right, she could extort money out of him for a long time to come.

Something, something, vampires not fully killing their victims and all that.

She took the money, counted it, and then held out her hand to shake.

“It was a pleasure doing business with you, Mr. Wraith!”

He didn't shake her hand.

“Christ, both of you are awful.”

He packed his stuff and left, broke, broken, and defeated.

She ate as many pancakes as she could, rich and victorious.

She thought about how much power, how much blackmail she had in this moment.

“I’m fantastic actually,” she walked to her room.

I am going to be so fucking rich by the time they get their shit together.

[fours-writings]

cw a little suggestive. maybe

but i had to. explain this idea for a moment.

so everyone’s scared of moon. it’s common sense in the plex bc bro he is scary and evil looking. a little gremlin that would pounce on you without hesitation.

now. everyone is scared of him. and that is because he will attack you. he is fully capable of murder, being security for a reason. he is all bite and no bark. silent but murderous yk

but what if. everyone’s scared of him. but only because he’s scary.

they avoid him at all costs because they think he’s this super strong bastard that will eat them.

however, because of this, no one know he is not actually strong at all.

yes sun and moon look after children and they’re big massive hunks of metal. but what if the lankiness is true lankiness.

sun is able to pick up kids bc, well, they’re kids. lightweight. weak. moon has never actually had to attack an intruder bc they always run at the mere sight of him, and the glamrocks usually take care of any truly dangerous intruders before he even gets to them bc the glamrocks are usually the targets in the first place (want some high tech parts? let’s go attack the big animatronics with teeth and claws like total idiots!!)

now. if you couldn’t tell by now, i just love to hc moon with a thing for being absolutely manhandled. get pinned evil clown man.

now imagine just. human night guard y/n. is scared of him. obviously.

but then they make friends with sun, so of course they should make friends with moon, right? sun even convinces moon to take it easy on the human bc “they’re not like the others” (moon calls total bull on that but begrudgingly tries to tolerate them)

sun’s super touchy. attention starved and stuff. he hugs you a lot, and he’s strong enough to pick you up.

then. you find out he’s also light enough for you to pick him up. (or maybe you’re just strong enough. buff y/n time)

of course, you realize this means you can also do the same with moon.

and yet, it takes you a long time to build up the courage to even attempt anything of the sorts bc. yk. claws.

by that time you get a little closer. totally on friend grounds. they definitely aren’t blatantly pining for you. (at least, moon isn’t.)

one day, you end up getting super excited for whatever reason while with moon (you get some good news like a game coming out finally or a big creator liked one of your posts. maybe moon admits he’s your friend. whatever)

you instinctively pull him into a bear hug, and before he can protest you’re picking him right up off the floor and spinning him around in your excitement.

it takes you a moment to realize you did this, and you immediately drop him again, apologizing profusely, while he just. stands there. it’s like he’s completely blue screened.

then you hear his fans turn on.

whoops. you usually only heard that when you starting randomly praising sun. (bc he deserves it. bestest boy)

“Um… wanna pretend this never happened?”

“Mhm.”

you start picking him up and carrying him around more often after that. every time it sounds like he’s about two seconds away from combusting. but he never tells you to stop, and whenever you ask if he’s okay with you doing it it’s always a resounding “yes im fine” so you don’t stop.

just.

unknowingly weak moon <3 He thinks he’s strong. he’s not.

[lirabuswavi]

Hi Lira! Good to see you here. Do you have any Ozpin Lives Au headcanons? And do you have any Oscar&Ozpin vol.4 headcanons?

Hey! I was pretty excited to see you on here too, if the spam liking your posts wasn't any indication, lol. And oh boy do I have a lot to say, I'm just gonna put it under the cut.

Okay. So. For Ozpin Lives AUs. There's so many ways to go about it. I'm a fan of Ozpin Lives but with Consequences of the Soul kind, because how else are you supposed to tie in our favourite farm boy? Whether this is some kind of half baked merge, or a kind of platonic soulmates, or just a Connection, Ozpin deserves a chance to actually parent the kid the universe randomly assigned to him.

I imagine he'd be very tactile, hands on shoulders, hair ruffles, holding hands, helping Oscar learn to fight, the whole nine yards.

And I imagine Oscar would, at some point, start to reciprocate. Initiating hugs, poking Ozpin, gently kicking Ozpin when Oscar thinks he's being stupid (Oscar should get to kick Ozpin in the shin at least once, he deserves it).

What's the point in being shy about physical contact when their very souls are intertwined?

Now in Haven, I feel like Qrow would be baffled by the presence of Oscar but more releived and focused on the fact that Ozpin's alive. Oscar has an easier time making friends with RNJR when he doesn't have their dead Headmaster in his head and constantly hovering over his shoulders. Though, I do think in contrast, Yang will be more aggressive with Ozpin since he's physically there and doesn't have Oscar as a kind of buffer between them.

In the Haven fight, Oscar would still be the one to fight Lionheart, because Ozpin will be very occupied with Hazel trying to beat his head in. I think there could be a sweet moment in there where Oscar covers for Ozpin there. Ozpin protests that this is his fight, but Oscar replies that they're supposed to be a team aren't they? And that means no one has to face anything alone! Hazel, of course, would get even more pissed off at what he sees as another child trying to fight Ozpin's battles so the moment is quickly broken up.

Now, when it comes to Jinn... it's hard to say. RWBYQ will definitely know that Ozpin's hiding things from them, but how would they get the Lamp's password without Oscar giving it to them? And without Oscar in Ozpin's head and vice versa, how would they even get there? I don't think it makes sense for them to get the Lamp's password, though I definitely think they'll be frosty with Ozpin because they know he's hiding things from them, they just can't tell how much.

Now the Apathy, however... oh boy. With all of Ozpin's repressed trauma I expect he'd be taken the fuck out. Could probably fit in a reveal in there, with the Apathy impacting Ozpin's ability to see the point of hiding his secrets since Salem's unkillable anyways, and they never did technically get a divorce and killing your spouse is frowned on though that hasn't stopped her yet and wow he's so useless at protecting people, all of his children have died, he's so sorry to Oscar for bringing him into this, he's just getting another one of his kids killed-.

Yeah. I. I really don't think Ozpin and the Apathy would get along.

(I know you asked for Ozpin Lives AU headcanons but you're getting an entire AU, whoops.)

Jaune definitely punches Ozpin in the face in Argus. No argument there. I do feel like Oscar would still go off on his own to go shopping and also have some time alone to reflect. What does he really want out of this? He's just another one of Ozpin's kids, how much does he really matter? He's not a Huntsman either, he's the youngest of everyone, just a kid, is he a burden? In the end, I feel like Oscar would come to the conclusion that he's not stuck here, but he wants to be here. He wants to do more, he wants to help, he wants to fight. It might have felt like he was just getting dragged along from his Aunt's farm but now... Now it's his choice. And he chooses to fight. He chooses to save lives. He chooses to stay. He chooses Ozpin.

Ozpin, meanwhile, is freaking the fuck out over where his kid went. Everyone's kind of shocked to see how much their perpetually in control Headmaster is panicking, meanwhile Ozpin's in the corner catastrophizing because oh no, what if he's been kidnapped what if he tried to go home but then got kidnapped what if there was a Grimm attack what if he's dead-.

Yeah. Panicking. Ozpin hugs the life out of Oscar when they see each other again (codependency says what) and doesn't even bother trying to play it off. Cue heartfelt speech of how though he may seem implaceable, he deeply cares for people. He cares for his friends, his students, his kids. He thought the best way to keep people safe, keep his friends safe, was to seem invincible, and the only way to do that was to keep everyone at arms length. But looking at everyone, they find strength in their closeness, and not letting people know how much they mean to him seems to only have been hurting them in the long run. Cue promises to do his best and to try to trust other people more. Oscar's still grounded for the heart attack he gave Ozpin (hey!).

The Cordovan issue is not automatically fixed. Ozpin lost his scroll and by extension his ID when Beacon fell. Cordovan thinks there's no way this burn scarred ragamuffin is the former Headmaster of Beacon Academy, fraud is a crime you know! They still steal an airship. Oscar gets to commit a felony. As a treat.

Now Atlas is... hmm, a toss up based on how you characterize Ironwood. I believe he has the potential to make the right decisions, to be a good person, but he also very much obviously has the capacity to make terrible decisions and be a bastard. Would having Ozpin there fix that? Fuck if I know! Still won't stop Salem from showing up.

Now, for funsies, I think Ozpin should be the one getting kidnapped by the Hound. Let him be a Damsel in Distress, it'll be fun. Oscar should get to go rescue his father figure, it'll be enriching. Bonding time in the evil whale!

That's as far as I've got for Ozpin Lives AU (headcanons, I wrote so much, this was just supposed to be headcanons, ahhh-). Now for Oscar and Ozpin volume 4 headcanons!

In the show Oscar seems to spend most of the time ignoring Ozpin where he can, so it'd be up to Ozpin to fill the silence. I think Ozpin tells stories about people he once knew, about heroes. Teams at Beacon when he was a Headmaster, teams when he was a student, the people that were the basis for fairytales and ones that have been forgotten to time.

Oscar ignores the fact that he can picture the faces of every single person his hallucination talks about. Though the stories are nice.

But less nice stories would be the nightmares. Oscar definitely has nightmares of Beacon's Fall, Ozpin's death, past deaths as well. He has hardly gotten a single good night's rest since Ozpin showed up in his head.

I think more than just breathing exercises and talking Oscar through his panic, I think it'd be cool if Ozpin taught Oscar how Huntsmen check themselves for wounds. Adrenaline can numb pain, and Aura could be actively healing the wounds too, but that doesn't mean they aren't there. It's both educational and grounding, allowing Oscar to root himself in his body and not in the body of the person who he just remembered (lived) dying.

Ozpin tries to hide it but he feels very guilty for these nightmares. He knows they come from him.

Immediately after these nightmares is the most Oscar's willing to engage with Ozpin at the beginning, before Oscar accepts that this is happening, that it's real.

As you can see I have a lot of thoughts about this. Thank you for the ask! ✨️❤️🧡💛💚💙💜✨️

[cuephrase]

from the questionnaire:

are there any results that really surprised you or that you didn't expect?

oooooh good question!! for me personally, no, not really? at least nothing that automatically comes to mind, so yk, don't quote me on that if i share data later and say "this surprised me/i didn't expect this!!" lmao

ummmm, hmmm. well actually okay, so i did expect Tim to be the Most Disliked Robin, but not by such a margin, if that makes sense? more like, logically one of them was going to be the most disliked even if only like 10 people disliked a Robin and my bet was that Tim would have the most votes, by process of elimination/other hypotheses. i wasn't upset by the results, if you've seen the post you know i was incredibly entertained.

there were definitely some results that were a relief? like they aligned with my personal predictions, but it was still really nice to see them.

oh, something that did surprise me was the amount of commentary i got on batcest!! there is zero discussion of shipping in the questionnaire, which is mainly why i wasn't expecting so much commentary, and there's not really a whole lot of ship discussion apart from batcest stuff that i remember- i did think i might get a couple mentions of it but i got a lot more than a couple lmao.

in favor of and against, to be clear, and to be even clearer to anyone reading- this is not an invitation to share your thoughts about batcest with me, i truly do not care. not to be rude, either, like i don't care if you love it or hate it, i just have zero interest in discussing it since a) my blog is mostly gen and b) i don't see any benefits in engaging in discourse about batcest 🫶

on the individual response level, there were some things that surprised me in isolation, but made perfect sense in the context of the responder's answers, like for instance one person said they didn't see Dick as brothers with any of the boy Robins except for Damian, because "he doesn’t really interact with a lot of the other robins in canon", that being said, the only eras they said they read were pre-crisis and rebirth. makes a lot more sense in that context. like i was thrown for a loop, but then i saw the full picture and i was like, "oh. okay."

let this be your daily reminder that the statement "i read comics" means basically nothing lmao. and i don't mean that as a dig at that responder, not at all, just that if you're someone who reads comics you cannot assume that someone else also reading comics means that you guys will be on the same wavelength. not because canon is nebulous and unknowable imo, but just because there's a lot of it!!

also!! a decent amount of people said i was brave?? that freaked me out a little, because i hadn't really...i didn't think i was stepping into shit, okay? in hindsight, i realize that that was naive of me, but idk. i wasn't thinking about the results in that way, and i also really didn't think i was going to get much interaction either- i was floored by the engagement the questionnaire got. but yeah, idk, i was just genuinely curious to see if my theory had any weight, i wasn't thinking about the broader implications of what the data might reveal. whoops.

and here's what surprised my wonderful data-crunchers:

@chinajousama: Hmm, I think one thing that did surprise me was how little the types of Robin media actually impacted the results [of the Most Disliked Robin]. Aside from that pocket of Jason hate from the post-Crisis fans, everyone was remarkably consistent. Also, it wasn't really a surprise, but it was extremely funny to see how big the gap between tim and literally anyone else was, dislike wise.

(we got an ask about if the media/eras consumed impacted which Robins were disliked, so that math has been done, but i haven't shared the results yet, sorry!!)

@tevyaa: Lots! Off the top of my head: - I was sure that the clear winner of the most disliked Robin poll would be Damian. He's the only one I've ever really seen hate for - probably because I entered fandom through Tim-centric whump fic 😂. I was shocked that it's actually Tim who the fandom is most annoyed with. - I was surprised how much of the fandom does actually read comics! I would have guesstimated that the comics/non-comics fans were something like 50/50, and was shocked to find out that only 15% of fandom doesn't read comics (and only about 4% doesn't interact with canon at all, including comics/ games/ animation)

(dw, we haven't released any data apart from the MDR yet, but you'll be able to see the breakdown of comics read/canon interaction eventually!!)

ty for the ask, anon!! i hope you enjoyed the answer!!

[fangirlwriting-stories]

Brighter Days Ahead

Summary: No One Knows AU Part 30, Everyone looks to what's coming next. (Final Part!)

Author's Note: Hey, thanks so much for reading my accidental stumbling into the Danny Phantom fandom!  I hope you enjoyed it, I know I sure did!  It was originally just going to be a one shot based on a fic that really inspired me, and then it kind of evolved into something else, and then I just had a thought one day like “hey I wonder if Vlad can get Sam and Tucker to hunt Danny as Phantom while knowing it’s him.  That would be a really fucked up thing for him to try to do.  I wonder if I can make it work.”  And it turns out I could!

Also, something else I learned while I was writing this story is that… I need more of it?  Like this did not nearly satisfy the itch I didn’t even know I had.  So, if you liked this “Vlad takes advantage of a no one knows au situation” story, you’ve got more coming your way!  It’ll be a little different from this one, and I can’t promise when it’ll be posted, but I’m having a lot of fun planning and writing the first parts of it, and I'm going to post what I've written whether I actually end up finishing it or not (it is a monster of an idea).  Either way, I hope you enjoyed this story, and thanks so much for reading!

...

Danny sucks the ectopus into the Fenton thermos and lets out a little whoop, spinning to face Valerie.

“Ha!  That’s six for me!”

“Oh please, I helped you with that one, it’s a half point for each of us,” Valerie says.

“No, it’s in my thermos, that means it’s mine,” Danny says, shaking his thermos back and forth.  “Those are the rules.”

“Oh are they?  So if I do this,” Valerie says, and before Danny can react, she flies forward and kicks the thermos from Danny’s hand, catching it easily.  “Does that mean it’s mine?”

“Hey!”

“Hey, lovebirds, six o’clock!” Jazz’s voice comes over their earpieces, and both of them spin around to find another ectopus coming towards them.

Valerie tosses Danny his thermos back, and raises her gun, firing it and knocking the ghost back a couple feet to give Danny time to fire up the thermos and suck it inside.

“Ha!” he says again, spinning back to Valerie.  “And that makes seven!”

“Wha— I did all the work that time!”

“I am gonna have to give that one to her, Danny,” Jazz says, and Danny glares down at where she’s standing on the ground below them.

“Traitor!” he calls.

“In all honesty, I think there’s just one left,” Jazz says, looking down at the list she’s been keeping.  “Mom and Dad’s containment unit had 24 ghosts in it, and your thermos has six of them and Valerie’s has five.”

“Uh, that only makes twelve,” Valerie says.

“Oh yes, sorry, I have eleven of them in here,” Jazz says, gesturing to her own thermos without looking up.  “Maybe if you spent less time flirting and more time chasing ghosts, we’d have all of them by now.”

“Oh no way you have eleven ghosts in there,” Danny says, crossing his arms.

Jazz gives him a look and holds up her list, which has all ghosts accounted for except for the snake ghost, difficult to find because it’s the size of an actual snake.

“See now that’s not even fair,” Valerie says.

“Honestly, you can’t just get in the way of our competition like that,” Danny says.

“Sorry, I can’t hear you over the fact of my definite win,” Jazz says, shooting them a smug smile.  “I’m gonna take these guys home, have fun competing for second place.”

And with that, she turns and drives off on her scooter, and Danny sticks his tongue out after her.

“You want to just get this last one together?” Valerie says.

“If we can even find the thing,” Danny says.  “But sure.”

They both turn and start a route towards the places they haven’t checked yet, scanning the ground and sky as they go.  Unfortunately, snake or not, it’s still a ghost, and it can still fly.

After a bit of time and no snake appearing, though, Danny turns to face Valerie.

“Hey,” he says, “I’ve been wanting to ask you something.”

Valerie turns to face him.  “Yeah?”

Danny can’t read her face under the mask, which he’s pretty sure he’s not going to enjoy during this conversation.

He takes a deep breath and presses forward anyway.

“So, Sam and Tucker and I are having a movie night this Saturday,” he says.  “Sam rented this supervillain crossover movie we were looking forward to but never got to see.”

“Okay?” Valerie says, confusion evident in her voice.

“Would you want to come?” Danny asks.

“Uh,” Valerie says, instantly sounding uncomfortable.  “I don’t know.  I mean, I don’t know if I’ll have all the necessary context.”

“Valerie,” Danny says.  “I really think you guys should talk.”

Valerie sighs and pulls her hood off, turning to face him.  Her face shows more uncertainty than discomfort, like he thought.  “We probably should,” she admits.  “I just… don’t know how to start.  And they kind of remind me of… things I don’t like to think about.  But…”

She trails off, but she doesn’t seem like she’s done, so Danny doesn’t say anything while she thinks.

“But we do have too much in common to just never talk,” Valerie says finally.  She looks over at him, and Danny’s glad that he doesn’t see a ton of guilt in her face, like he did after he first told her everything.

“Does it have to be before Saturday?” Valerie asks, turning to face him.

“No, not if you don’t want it to,” Danny says.  “I can do the movie night thing with just them.  I just don’t want to keep my girlfriend and my best friends separate forever unless I have to.”

“I don’t think you’ll have to,” Valerie says.

Danny smiles a little at her, and Valerie smiles back.

“Okay.  I’ll at least try and talk to them before Saturday,” Valerie says.  “And I’ll let you know how it goes.”

“Thanks Val,” Danny says.  “Oh, and by the way?”

“Yeah?”

Danny points his thermos at the snake ghost that appeared in the corner of his eye a second ago and fires it up, sucking the ghost inside.

“Second place!” he calls, grinning back at Valerie.

“Wha— hey!  You cheated, asshole!”

Danny gives his best imitation of an evil cackle and starts flying back towards his house, with Valerie following quickly behind on her board.

…

Valerie, once she considers the idea enough, doesn’t want to wait too long to talk to Sam and Tucker.  For one thing, she wants answers herself.  She’s also pretty sure she can use Saturday as something to kick her butt into gear.  If she has a deadline she has to give, it’s a good way to force herself to find them and talk to them.  Besides, her space thing only applies to Danny.  She doesn’t owe anything to other people who have hurt him.

So, she settles on Thursday afternoon, as a way to have a little bit of time before Saturday, and finds Sam and Tucker in the cafeteria at lunchtime, which is where Danny said they’d probably be.  She’ll miss her normal lunch time in the library with Danny and Jazz, but she really does need to talk to Tucker and Sam.

So Valerie finds Sam and Tucker sitting at the table, both looking a little bit too casual and like they’re having an okay time.  So she walks right up and sits down next to Sam, startling them both into looking at her.

“Danny invited me to your Saturday movie night thing,” she says.

Tucker blinks at her.  “Oh,” he says.  “Okay.  Do you guys have room for one more?”  He angles the last question at Sam, who nods.

“We can get some extra popcorn too, if you want it,” she says to Valerie.

“Sure,” Valerie says.  “But that’s actually not why I’m here.”

“I figured,” Tucker says.  “Are we talking, then?”

“We have to do it sooner or later,” Valerie says.  “I know a classroom that’s always empty at this time.”

So they relocate to the classroom Valerie used to have lunch with Danny in.  Valerie leans back against a desk, and Tucker does the same to the one across from her.  Sam sits on top of one and starts fidgeting with a wrist ray she’s wearing, that looks ghost-weapon in nature.

Valerie was worried that once she got here she wouldn’t know where to start, but the first thing that comes to mind doesn’t take much effort to come up with.

“So I hear Vlad screwed you over too,” she says.

Tucker smiles a little bit.  “Yeah,” he says.  “I guess that’s one way to put it.”

Valerie looks at him for a little longer, then looks over at Sam too, who hasn’t looked up at her yet.  She gives them both a couple seconds to say something else, and then decides she needs too many answers to wait longer.

“Did he send you guys the suits anonymously too?” she asks.

Tucker shakes his head.  “No,” he says, rubbing the back of his neck.  “He, uh, pretended to save us from the vampire ghost that was also him, and then pinned the blame on Danny, and said Danny was trying to kill us.  And then said he’d teach us how to hunt him first.”

Valerie thinks about that for a second, then nods.  “Yeah, that sounds like something he’d do,” she says.  “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry you got tangled up in everything.”

“I’m sorry we didn’t tell you who we were or what we thought was going on,” Tucker says.

“No,” Valerie says instantly.  “No, I’m glad you didn’t.  I… I would have believed you.  In the beginning.”

“Not at the end though,” Sam says, finally looking up at her.  “Not by the time I tried to tell you.”

Valerie doesn’t say anything, because she honestly doesn’t know.  She figured after the fact that that’s probably what Sam was trying to tell her when she asked to talk, but she doesn’t know how she would have reacted then.  Yeah, she was starting to question things, but she didn’t have the full realization of how much she had to learn until she heard the truth from Danny himself.  She doesn’t know what she would have thought if she heard it from Sam and Tucker first.  She doesn’t really want to think about it.

So instead, after a second, she says instead, “You know, you’re not completely at fault.  Even if you are at fault for a lot of it.”

Sam looks down at the desk again like she doesn’t believe her, so Valerie continues.

“Seriously.  Some of it is on the asshole who knew he could manipulate you and so decided to do that.”

Tucker nods slightly like he knows, but Sam still doesn’t look back up.

“You’re not the only one who did stuff you regret, you know,” Valerie says quietly, leaning back against the desk behind her.  “I hurt Danny a lot too.”

“You haven’t known him since you were 8,” Sam snaps suddenly.  “It’s different.”

“Yeah,” Valerie agrees.  “It is.  I’m just saying.  If you ever want to talk.  We don’t have to do this waiting game every time.  You know you’re not totally alone in this, right?”

“I know,” Tucker says.  He looks over at Sam, and after a long, long pause, Sam nods shortly.

“Good,” Valerie says.  “I’ll see you on Saturday, then.”

“See you,” Sam mutters, and Tucker gives her a small smile.  Valerie gives him a nod and smile back and heads out, giving the two of them some space they look like they need.

She still isn’t positive how she feels about them, but they have exactly the stuff in common that she thought they’d have in common, and it might help all of them just to have people around they can vent about Vlad to.  That might be worth it all on its own.  Either way, she’s willing to stick around to find out.  And trying to just have fun at this movie thing Saturday doesn’t sound like the worst place to start.

…

“Thanks for the ride, Jazz,” Danny says as she pulls to a stop in front of Sam’s house.

“No problem,” Jazz says.  “It’s on my way.  Plus Mom and Dad would get suspicious if you said you weren’t going to need a ride.”

“On your way where?” Valerie asks from the backseat.  “I didn’t realize you were going somewhere too.”

“She’s got a ghost psychology club meeting tonight,” Danny says, glancing back.  “It’s getting pretty popular.  I think she’s getting a big head.”

“Oh please,” Jazz says, shoving him towards the door.  “Not like mine could get bigger than yours.  Go hang out with those friends of yours who’ve tried to kill you.”

“You said you’d stop calling them that,” Danny says, but he opens the side door and climbs out, Valerie doing the same a second later.

“I’ll be back to get you in a couple hours,” Jazz says.

“Thanks,” Danny calls, and he gives her a wave as he shuts the door.  Jazz waves back as she drives away.

“Okay so basically,” Valerie continues as they walk towards the front door.  “These are three supervillains who are fighting each other?”

“Yep,” Danny says.  He’s been filling her in on the context behind what they’re watching since Valerie told him she was definitely going to come.  He doesn’t know as much as Sam definitely does, but he knows enough so Valerie won’t be totally lost.

“It’s probably just going to be a lot of cheesy action scenes,” he says.  “You won’t strictly need the context to enjoy it.  Oh, and uh, one last thing entirely unrelated to movies?”

“Yeah?”

“Sam’s parents won’t like you, don’t even try.  It’s not you, they don’t like anyone.”

Valerie raises her eyebrows, but just says, “Noted.”

With that, Danny knocks on the door.  Thankfully, it’s not a either of the Manson parents, but Sam that pulls the door open.

“Hey,” she says, with a smile that looks mostly genuine (and a little scared, but they both decided not to acknowledge that part).

“You guys are late,” Sam says with a smile.  She’s clearly aiming for a casual joke, so Danny decides to help her out.

“I blame Jazz, she drives slow,” he says, smiling back as he walks inside.  He waits to make sure Valerie makes it in before reaching out and pulling the door shut after them.

“Smart, blaming it on the person who isn’t here and can’t defend themselves,” Valerie says.

“That’s just how I roll,” Danny says, grinning at her.  He turns back to Sam a second later.  “Do you need any more help with the popcorn?”

Sam shakes her head.  “It’s done.  Just gotta carry it downstairs.”

“We’ll help you out,” Danny says, including Valerie by virtue of her not knowing where Sam’s basement is.  So instead, they all walk towards Sam’s kitchen, where, surprisingly, there’s no sign of her parents, just four tubs of popcorn on the stove.

Sam seems to see Danny’s question in his face, because she says, “They’re taking Grandma out to eat.  It’s just us.”

“They’re giving you the house to yourself?” Danny asks in bafflement.

Sam shrugs.  “I think they’re trying to go a little easier on me,” she says.

“I didn’t realize they’d go that easy on you,” Danny says.

“Does this mean I don’t get to meet the parents who hate everyone?” Valerie asks, picking up one of the tubs of popcorn.

Sam smirks a little at her.  “Sorry,” she says.  “You don’t get two more people to hate you tonight.”

Valerie shakes her head in disappointment.  “Damn.”

“Come on,” Sam says, picking up two of the popcorn tubs and letting Danny grab the last one.  “Tucker’s waiting downstairs.”

Tucker is finishing setting up Sam’s massive sound system when they get down there, and he brightens when he glances over and sees them holding popcorn.

“Okay Sam your turn,” he says, walking over and taking one of the popcorn tubs right out of her hands.

Sam gives him a deadpan look, but lets him go sit on the couch, taking up half the space, and goes to finish setting up the movie.

Danny sets one of the tubs of popcorn down on the other end of the couch, then turns to Sam.

“Hey, which one’s yours?” he calls.

“Tucker’s got it,” Sam says, without looking away from the screen.

Tucker, who’s about to shove popcorn in his mouth, immediately drops it with a noise of disgust, and Sam and Danny both laugh.

“You could have warned me!” Tucker exclaims, setting the popcorn down on the ground.

“Sam uses vegan butter,” Danny explains to Valerie.

“It doesn’t taste different in the slightest,” Sam says, finishing with the TV and walking back to the couch.  She sets the non-vegan tub down and picks up her own, then glances at Tucker.  “Move your feet.”

Tucker does, and then Sam plops down next to him and puts her feet in his lap.

Valerie settles down at the other end of the couch, and Danny picks up his popcorn and sits in the spot next to her, resulting in Valerie immediately sliding up to his side and leaning her head on his shoulder.  Danny wraps an arm around her shoulders and leans into her too.

“Alright,” Sam says.  She turns the TV on, where the movie is already set up.  “Who’s ready for this?” she raises an eyebrow at Tucker.  “You’re not gonna run out of the room like a chicken, right?”

Tucker gives her a look, but then shrugs.  “I’ve seen scarier things.”

“That’s an opinion,” Sam says, hitting “play” on the movie.

“Oh, that’s right, you weren’t there when I found Vlad’s poems about Mrs Fenton.”

“Wait, really?” Valerie asks, wrinkling her nose.

“Ugh, yeah I believe it,” Danny says.  “He’s always been really creepy about her.”

“Yeah, I spared all of you,” Tucker says.  “You owe me.”

“I’ll owe you more if you’re quiet and let the movie play,” Sam says.

Tucker sticks his tongue out, but turns to watch the movie.  Danny smiles fondly at them for a moment and then casts an equally fond glance over at Valerie.

Valerie sees him looking and faces him.  “What?” she whispers curiously.

“Nothing,” Danny whispers back, leaning further into her side and looking towards the movie.  Valerie does the same a second later.

And though it’s not long before she turns to him and starts asking about the context of what’s happening, Danny doesn’t mind too much, because he’s not paying much attention to the movie before that either.

Instead, he’s deciding that even if things are far from normal yet, he likes the way they’re heading.  And if telling people he’s Phantom keeps working out like this at the end of whatever else comes his way, he’ll probably be alright after all.

[rainofthetwilight]

hey hi hello hihi, welcome back to another post of me ranting abt sora <3333

(be aware...this got longer than I expected, also there's s2 spoilers)

smth I really wanna talk about is how much more cheerful sora seems in s2. she's more playful, and much more happier, more sillier, and it just means so much to me???

in s1, she was more resigned, more hopeless, she was still a bit playful but it wasn't like now. her time in imperium never left her mind, it basically haunted her and she hated it. she still wasn't able to be herself, it was already hard enough anyway

she was already alone before she made those photacs, and when she finally thought she got attention and more love, she got her dreams crushed. she saw the truth, she saw how horrible the situation actually is, and her idol wasn't who she thought she is. and before she knew it, instead of her parents standing with her, with no thought they immediately disowned her. everyone did, they all shut her out and gave her the cold soldier. she was lonelier than ever before. she was basically trapped in her home, and like she said, it was a prison. and for goodness sake, she was only like what, 10? she was a child younger than someone would expect. she had no one to help but herself, and the way she immedialetly left imperium with absolutely no hesitation just hurts dude.....

the only one who managed to shine some life into her was arin, he was basically a saviour to her. she knew him from the very start, and their friendship was almost unbreakable. but despite meeting arin, her past never left her. she was still frustrated and sad, she just couldn't move on so easily, and she didn't understand how arin still had so much hope in him

but then, she stood up to her parents, finally shouting to them who she really was, what her name always was. screaming her name did not only confront them to what her name really is, but the meaning of it had layers. sora means orphan, so her shouting it, she's basically saying she doesn't have parents. they were not her parents, never were. they were dead to her. and so, she finally let go of the thought that they could ever be redeemed, because there was no hope in them, yet she had hope in herself to finally let go. just like how she saw arin having hope that his parents will come back, she had hope that it was finally time to move on. only then did she understand his hope.

and she also got to expose beatrix's lies, showing the people beatrix's lies, despite them having disowning her once. she did not want another person to exprerience what she had, and to put an end to it for someone who was already experiencing it. after beatrix was defeated, after imperium was freed, she still felt that guilt and frustration, but with the help of her new family, she soon became prouder and stronger.

and now, in s2, she's so happy. she moved on, she's finally focusing on her new life and letting go of the other. she's just so cheerful and silly and animated, and just being herself. when she speaks, there's no guilt anymore, no sadness, no frustration, no hopelessness, no defeat, she moved on and is being treated so well by her new family. she's happy. the past still clings onto her from time to time, but when it does, it's much easier to actually handle than when the memories of that time were still fresh. and I think that's so goddamn beautiful

anyway I uh...maybe analysed a bit too much abt a silly lego character, whoops sorry guys 👍

save me dragons rising........save me sora ninjago......she's so me bro I literally can't, I love her so much 😭

[mysteriouslybluepirate]

OFMD S2 EP 4-5: Izzy Hands (from a S1 Izzy fan)

I'll admit. I teared up at the Izzy shit in ep 1-3. Not a full-blown cry. But close. I was stressed, and tired, and hurt more than anything. I only cried in my car driving home. It hit, but it was more prolonged.

Do you know what got me crying? Izzy opened that letter, revealing 'For The New Unicorn'. He looks up and smiles. I went from 0-100 dry eyes to crying in seconds. I had to rewatch it because HELL.

The entire episode, hell, debatably from (S1ep4) we see Izzy go through it. Socially isolated and losing his identity. Leading up to S2ep4. Drunk and sad and heartbroken. He tries his best to stay afloat without a lifejacket as his self crumbles around him. He doesn't care anymore. He thinks his life is over. He lashes out because there's no one there to help him.

BUT THEN THE LEG. He cried and I cried during both scenes.

BECAUSE HE IS CARED ABOUT AND HE CAN HEAL!

GOD, and the way that leads into EPISODE 5. Izzy slicked his hair back and regaining some of his own personal identity. Izzy genuinely bantering with Stede, and gently helping him to be a better Captain. The way he desperately asks Stede if Ed said anything else nice about him? Showing that. Yeah, he's not all the way there yet, but he's working on it. The training scene where Izzy just looks on in fascinated horror at Stede's skills? THE LITTE OKAY HANDSIGNAL AT THE END WHEN STEDE USED HIS GRUFF VOICE? He smiles, and jokes, and TRIES. Izzy is pissed, obviously, but he's getting there.

He is kind and caring, all WHILE STILL BEING A PRICK? Him being a total nerd during the curse monologue? Izzy mutters 'rude' and pointedly crosses his legs as Stede ruins the vibe. I laughed harder at Izzy sitting at that desk than I did at most of the jokes in the show. THAT'S MY FUCKING BASTARD!! I'm so happy I saw a character and have been rewarded by showing, yes. He is kind, and trying, but he needs to learn to let himself become new.

I fucking love him. I can tell from the teaser that Izzy is just going to grow closer with the crew (and with himself) and I can't wait. (Even if it means his imminent capture, whoops).

I do think they'll do something with Izzy/Lucius, at least a single happy (Izzy no longer holding himself back from wanting) consensual kiss or genuine discussion about life(post-wedding) to show their growth as characters because I had to pause with the cig and shark interaction. Jesus Christ. I didn't really ship it before, but they are so snarky and it's great.

I'm a bit sad as Izzy's current arc likely means he might not get the big 'fuck you' moment of anger to Ed that Lucius got. Mainly because Con would make me cry, but If Izzy is genuinely just shoving this shit down, ignoring the years that Ed ignored his existence, then...idk.

They purposefully gave Izzy and Ed no scenes and thank god we get a TINY break. Because Ed will try to patch things up, and I don't think it works like that with Izzy. He needs proof that Ed is trying. Add to that Ed ACTUALLY saying sorry to him, and not expecting Izzy to immediately accept it(my theory as to why Lucius pointed it out: Ed will ACTUALLY say sorry to Izzy and mean it. This will heal something for Izzy, and hell). I can't wait for Ed to come back and see him. See him for who he is, a silly prick who is loyal to a fault, who is loved.

This is likely the happiest two episodes we'll get, and fuck, I loved them both SO MUCH. After a rewatch I'll write about the crew. Ed/Stede is actually working for me as we watch them both learn, and Fuck, Lucius/Pete...my darlings.

NOW FOR THE TEASER:

THE IDEA OF SEEING CON IN DRAG AGAIN MAKES ME SO HAPPY! Especially what it means for Izzy. Izzy lets his hair down and has fun with Wee John as he explores what actually makes him happy. Hell, him opening up to being a bit of a masochist as a joke while tied up is...actually my favorite thing (while obvious, given his propensity to put Ed before him in all matters, Izzy casually mentioning 'I like to be roughed a bit up' in front of the crew is the type of openness about himself that I crave). Izzy "cocksuckers" Hands letting himself joke about SEX-GAY SEX(probably)- Kill me now.

(To clarify: I don't think he or Ed ever got off to the abuse, hell, we see Ed flinch away when Anne/Mary do it. That's not the face of someone who knows what that's like as the Sadist).

I just love the way Izzy has so obviously relaxed into a person that he'd never let exist. Hell. I hope Izzy gets to rub this happier version of himself RIGHT in Edward's sad face. I need a 'he was never like this with me' moment of Ed watching Izzy SMILE to parallel Izzy's jealousy in S1.

Con obviously loves this character, you can see it in the performance. He fills the role perfectly, from his ups to his downs. Con smiles and hell, that's not Con, that's Izzy fucking Hands. Striding along proudly pretending his world isn't changing, because it is, and he is healing and I LOVE IT.

I am so proud of our growing Izzy loving community. For some, we've been through a lot of shit. Probably in life, and hell, maybe even in this fandom. Even if you haven't been harassed, you loved Izzy, you saw yourself in him, and I hope you felt the show giving us a big fucking hug.

We grow, we recover, and hell. We get a happy fucking ending (with a few yet-to-be-seen bumps in the road).

[enchxanting]

our love is god [ethan landry] pt. 2

read part 1 here || all parts

pairing: ethan landry x fem!reader

warnings: light angst, mention of drugs/alcohol

a/n: hey, thanks for all the love on the last part! i promise I'm not churning these out like crazy lol, i wrote the first chapter way before posting it here. not a lot of ethan in this one because we have to flesh out the lore, but i make up for it with some tara/sam angst! yippee!

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

“I can’t believe it. I actually can’t believe it.” Chad’s eyes are wide with amazement. “Y/N, at a loss for words? Because of a guy?”

“Dude, I’m telling you, it happened!” Tara said.

I was beginning to get tired of this back and forth. 

Friday nights were usually fun, the whole gang gathered in Tara’s room, getting ready for the night’s festivities (in this case, a house party at the Woodsboro Community College), but today, my friends seemed more interested in rehashing today’s lunchtime events.

“Do you know what his name was?” Anika asks.

“Oh god, please don’t egg them on,” I groan. “No, I didn’t catch it.”

“Hey, he didn’t throw it, either,” Tara teases. “He was probably just as nervous. The dude could barely even make eye contact with her.”

Chad sits up on Tara’s bed. “What did you say he looked like?”

“Uh, tall, really tall. Curly brown hair? He was new, I’d never seen him before. And neither had Tara, so don’t chalk it up to my being a newcomer.”

“Wait. Oh my god.” Mindy suddenly chimes in. “I know who he is. His name is Ethan Landry, he’s in my American History.”

I can’t lie; I’m excited by this. “Really? Why haven’t we seen him before?”

“Because he just moved here.” She grins. “Hey, I thought you’d given up on high school boys, anyway.”

I tinge pink. “Never say never, I guess?”

Chad and Tara whoop. Anika rolls her eyes at them. “Do you think he’ll be there tonight?”

I scoff. “I doubt it. We already have to lie about being college students to get in, anyway.”

Tara’s eyes glimmer. “Hey, you never know. That means you have to get extra dressed up for tonight, just in case he’s there.”

I am not prepared for one of Tara’s evil-genius machinations, especially not a makeover. But I entertain the fantasy for a second too long, and she takes my silence as agreement. 

That’s how I find myself in one of Tara’s old dresses, a strappy black thing that hangs too low on my chest for my liking. After fighting over it for a long while, she eventually agrees to add a long-sleeved top underneath, if only to stop my whining.

Yet even though my getting-ready process was the most involved, I’m still the first one downstairs, which is typical. I’m debating whether or not to run for the hills and go home when Sam comes through the front door.

“Oh, hey, Y/N. Is Tara upstairs?” She sets down a few bags of groceries and turns to lock the four deadbolts freshly nailed to the door. 

“Hey, Sam. Yeah, she is. I think everyone will be down soon.”

There’s an uncomfortable energy between us. Sam has never liked me much. Not because of my character or anything, as Tara has reassured me, but she’s overly wary of outsiders ever since last year’s attack. I try not to blame her, but I can’t help but feel a little hurt when she keeps her distance, giving me a once-over instead of asking about my day.

The tension is broken when I hear the rest of the gang come down the stairs. Sam smiles when she sees Tara, but it fades when she notices that we’re all dressed up. “Hey, Tar, where are you guys going tonight?”

Tara shifts her weight from foot to foot. “My friend at Woodsboro Community College offered us an in, so… we’re taking advantage of our youth?”

Sam’s face darkens. “No. No way, Tar. You remember the last time someone had a party around here? We nearly died.”

“Jesus Christ, Sam,” Tara groans. “You were out of my life for five years now you can’t let me be alone for five minutes..”

I look at Chad, uncomfortable. He slightly shakes his head at me– better not to interfere.. Still, I feel like I have to say something. “Hey, Tara, maybe she’s right, we could just–”

Tara whips around to glare at me. “You’ve got to be kidding, Y/N. Butt the fuck out.” Her words sting, but I step back and sit on the couch.

“I’m not interested in living in the fucking past, Sam,” she continues. “I’m not gonna let what happened to me for three days define me for the rest of my life.”

Sam is quiet. I expect her to snap, to yell at all of us, but she just stares at Tara for a few seconds.

Finally, she picks up her bag again. “Alright. Fine. Go to the party, bring your taser, or not, I don’t care. I won’t be here when you get back.”

Tara’s eyes widen. “Wait, Sam. Wait. I’m sorry, I–”

“No, it’s really fine.” She glances around the room, where the rest of us are trying to blend into the shadows. “I hope you guys have fun. If some psycho killer tries to get you, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

With that, she marches upstairs, and I hear her bedroom door slam and lock. 

No one knows what to say. Tara turns her back, and I see her wiping away angry tears. Without looking at us, she opens the front door. “Okay! Who’s ready?”

“Tara, are you sure that’s a good idea?” Anika says. “We can stay back if you want, I mean–”

“Nope! What I want is to get so shit-faced I don’t remember this conversation. Let’s go.”

My stomach still feels hollow, but I silently follow Tara out of the door. Anika and Mindy follow close behind. 

Chad takes a second before making up his mind. He grabs his keys. “Yeah, okay. Let’s go, then.”

[inbarfink]

Okay, so that previous post was a bit of a goof but also… kinda not?

I mean, I already did a silly rambly post trying to figure out my thoughts about an Ineffable Husbands Petrigrof AU. And specifically about the idea of how an Aziraphale-as-Simon-as-Ice-King would even work and what he would be obsessed with. By that I mean that books seems like the obvious choice but also that might be too well-suited for Aziraphale? You know, when the whole point of the Magic Crown’s curse is that it made Simon into a totally different person. Like, it’s not like Ice King liked collecting ancient artifacts… or books for that matter. Simon loves books too!

And it’s really just recently that it hit me that I was looking at it from the totally wrong angle! Like, Simon was not just generally inclined towards princesses from the get-go - he became obsessed with princesses and romance because he was missing Betty! That’s like a whole Big Obvious Point in ‘Holly Jolly Secrets’!

So what I need to think about isn’t just the Magic Crown exaggerating and twisting Aziraphale’s general personality and behavior - it’s the Magic Crown exaggerating and twisting Aziraphale’s behaviors and emotions when he feels like he lost Crowley forever. The question here is ‘how would Aziraphale cope with losing Crowley’ and then twisting and exaggerating it until Aziraphale feels like a wholly different person.

(or, well, nearly so. I mean, like I said the chasm of difference between Simon Petrikov and Ice King are a very important thematic point I would like to preserve but also… given as this IS an AU, I would also like every variation of Aziraphale to read as Recognizably Azirapahle on some level. So that means the difference between ‘Ezra Fell’ and ‘Snow Angel’ might not be as extreme as the original Simon and IK but… it should still be a Difference!)

So… well… this might be yet another case where Good Omens S3 would end up being very instructive to an Adventure Time AU. Like, how would Aziraphale act if he thought that he lost Crowley forever? Well, just Wait and See in S3! Buuut… S3 is still a long way away (and also the circumstances between the Ineffable Divorce and what happened with Simon and Betty are very different so whatever happens in S3 might not be a perfect match), so let’s see what I can think up right now…

Does Snow Angel just kidnap random people to try and make them his drinking buddies or take them out to dinner? Does he try to go after, like, ‘bad boys’? Maybe he tries to make Evil folks good with the power of his ‘love’? You know, that’s not what the Aziraphale/Crowley dynamic actually is but it is the misconception Aziraphale seems to have about it sometimes - so it can play into the whole ‘whoops turns out my view of our relationship was totally biased and wrong!’ thing Simon goes through in ‘Fionna and Cake!

Or maybe instead of kidnapping people… Snow Angel is infamous in Ooo for putting himself in perilous situations and looking for some romantic rescue that never quite comes? 

Or maybe Aziraphale’s longing for Crowley makes him fall even more into his hedonistic streak. You know, Crowley loves to tempt him, enjoying Earthly Indulgences together is their most common pastime… If Aziraphale was trying to chase the Feeling that Crowley Made Him Feel while the Magic Crown was also eating away at his sanity and his actual memories of Crowley… maybe the thing he ends up chasing in a futile attempt to fill the hole Crowley has made in his life is just more and more mindless hedonism? (And you can actually bring the Book Hoarding idea back into it, it’s just that Snow Angel would be hoarding a lot more than just books)

Or maybe Aziraphale would go in the total opposite direction, maybe he’ll cope by totally turning his back on Crowley and his questions and their mutual love of life and instead start embracing Heaven-like ideas of coldness and discipline and an incredibly black-and-white, self-righteous and self-centered view of the world? On the one hand it feels very thematically appropriate for the Magic Crown’s effect on Aziraphale to be counterpart to Heaven Propaganda…. But on the other hand, I feel like it kinda leads Snow Angel into being a more Serious type of villain than an Ice King Counterpart should be?

I still need to think which of these options I like best, but I feel like I’m finally going at the right direction for this AU! Right now I am leaning mostly to the hedonism focus, especially as it seems like a good way to balance out the whole thing where Ezra Fell and Snow Angel can have seemingly totally different personalities but also on some level are both recognizably a version of Aziraphale Goodomens?