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local-fanfic-addict · 7 months

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Acolyte of Vengeance

Inspiration:

What The Water Gave Me by Florence + The Machine

Leaving Caladan by Hans Zimmer

Trigger warnings - none

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It had been weeks since Vlairyn had left the tower, since she had picked up her gun, or done anything other than sit in her apartment and brood. She was sitting on her bed, flipping a knife between her fingers before she threw it at the dartboard on the opposing wall and missed with abysmal aim. It was getting worse the more she refused to go out and participate in gambit or crucible, now it almost missed the board entirely.

Goldie didn’t really talk to her anymore, he tried, but was met with short answers or silence and so he had kept to himself and her backpack unless he was needed, feeling just as miserable as her.

It was this one rare occasion when he emerged from his hiding and approached her slowly, an incoming call glowing from his core.

“It’s for you; it’s Eris Morn.”

Vlairyn’s head lifted, she hadn’t seen Eris since the Leviathan incident months ago, though Eris would occasionally check in on the Hunter via the Drifter as she almost never left the moon herself. Did something else happen?

“Accept.” Vlairyn spoke as Goldie transmat her comlink into her hand and she placed it into what one might call her ear.

“Eris. What can I do for you?”

“I believe I should be asking you that question, Vlairyn.” The former Hunter spoke, sounding more concerned than anything. “Hiding in your room? You might be an Exo but you still need to perform human tasks. I hope Goldie has been keeping you accountable in such aspects.” Eris didn’t give Vlairyn a chance to speak before she got to her point.

“Ikora and I need you. You have been idle for too long and in the span of your self loathing, Immaru has made a deal that Savathun will tell us what she knows of the Witness if we take out her sister; I can think of no better guardian for this mission than you, Vlairyn.”

There were a few moments of silence before Vlairyn laughed, her eyes drawn to the dartboard before she turned in thought.

“You can’t be serious. Xivu Arath? You can’t possibly think you can beat her, she thrives off of any and all conflict, we’ll be playing right into her hands.”

“Maybe, but this is the only good lead we have received since the attack on the Traveler. We need this. I feel that Ikora, especially, needs this. And you need this too; you have been wasting away, letting guilt and anger claw at you since Cayde’s death until nothing remains. I understand how that feels. The feeling that changes into nothingness, shrouding your mind like an inescapable fog. You need a purpose again; help us put an end to this, and perhaps you will find your long needed rest afterwards.”

There was silence in which Vlairyn contemplated the witches' words. Sure, it didn’t feel good to just sit and do nothing but the bare minimum, but the alternative always seemed to play towards the light or the dark and Vlairyn was sick of it. Perhaps Eris was right in some aspects. One mission couldn’t hurt, right?

“I get to kill some hive?”

“Undoubtedly.”

“Great. What else will I be doing?” The Exo’s voice was tired, but some part of her knew Eris might be right, at least about the lead on the Witness.

“Information gathering, for now. Immaru is just as cryptic as Savathun, he was frugal with his hints and so you must be cautious.”

“Got it. I’ll pack for versatility.”

Eris only hummed before the call ended.

Mission… successful? Vlairyn wanted to say yes but she wasn’t sure. The messages that Savathun had left only brought up more questions. Figured…

Still, the feeling of crushing hive ghosts beneath her hands had been a welcomed feeling. Her aim had once again become dreadful, but she could hardly care when her armor had now been built for high resilience. Eris had been right in her need to get out of her room after all. Not that the ex-Hunter would ever do something like gloat or say “I told you so.” That was something Vlairyn liked about Eris, and why they got along so well, but the revelation that they had learned of in the spire was now making Vlairyn feel on edge as Eris seemed so willing to accept it.

“What are we doing, Eris?” Vlairyn pulled the ex-Hunter aside, a quick glance towards the ritual center, crawling with hive worms. Ikora wasn’t there yet, so they only had a few moments alone, which was all Vlairyn needed.

“Do we even know what this ritual will do to you? What if this is a trap?”

“Whether it is or not, it is our only hope to defeat Xivu Arath. I must become her equal. I am willing.”

“I’m not!” Vlairyn took Eris’s shoulder gently. “I can’t risk losing more of my friends.”

“And yet you lose yourself. Is that not more important? What good are you to your friends if all that remains is a shell? I aim to become a blade, one that I will use to cut out the hearts of our enemies.”

“Okay fine, I’m a hypocrite, I accept that- but do you even know if you’ll hold your own blade at the end of this? Can you be sure that someone else won’t hold it instead? Look, I'm only asking if you doing this is truly the best option. Can’t we have… I don’t know— Finch? Can’t Finch just resurrect his lightbearer and they do this?”

“There’s no time, and there would be no guarantee that Finch’s hive would be loyal to our cause. It has to be me, Vlairyn. Savathun knew this, her recordings hinted that much.”

“That’s what I’m worried about! If she knew, or even suspected, then there’s no guarantee that this isn’t a trap of some kind…”

“I understand your concerns, I do. But I need you behind me for this. Ikora will have her own reservations, and I need you to help me quench them or this will not work.”

She knew Eris was right, Ikora might want the Witness as much as anyone, but she had seen her fair share of the deaths of friends and wouldn’t be too keen on risking another.

“Fine… But you have to let me help you aside from that. I can’t… I can’t just watch you go down such a dark path alone.”

“Yet you are much further down your own than I am, and refuse such help.”

It was at this point that Ikora made herself known in a shimmer of transmat dust and took to standing beside Vlairyn, a silent signal between the two already there that the conversation had to stop. Vlairyn didn’t even know how to respond to Eris’s words, she was completely right and her pride hated it. This needed to stop…

“We should start.” The deep voice of Immaru broke the silence as he too joined the group, hovering in between Ikora and Vlairyn. The guardian looked at the hive ghost, the itch to crush him was immense.

“Xivu Arath draws straight from our conflict. She believes her logic absolute.” Eris nodded and grasped the staff which Immaru had granted the guardians, a relic of hive magic that looked to be made out of bone and dried ichor.

“I will grasp it, and contravene its power. There is no other way.”

Ikora crossed her arms, a look of concern on her face and rightfully so.

“But will you come back from this?”

“Does it matter if I do?” It was something Eris hadn’t said to Vlairyn, even though she had asked the same question without words. Part of it made Vlairyn wonder if it was for show, to tell Ikora that Eris wouldn’t back down from this and not that Eris had no sense of self preservation. Vlairyn wasn’t sure Ikora understood by the look on her face. The warlock looked horrified by the words that had come from her friend's mouth, and Vlairyn felt pity for the Vanguard.

“What I am has served me, and has served humanity.” Eris began making her way towards the center of the ritual circle, Ikora moving forward as well. Would the warlock really try to stop her? Would Vlairyn intervene?

“Akka… Xita… Sel…” The names of the worm gods left Eris’s mouth as she carved hive runes into the sand beneath her feet with the end of the staff.

Ikora advanced. “This is what Savathun wants!” It was said forcefully, a great parallel to Vlairyns prying questions in their prior conversation. This was why Ikora was a Vanguard and why Vlairyn was not. It almost made the Exo laugh at the thought.

“We serve our interests, not Savathuns.” Eris continued writing her runes, even through the harsh laugh of Immaru.

“Heh! She’s outmaneuvered you again.” It was a barbed comment, and Vlairyn knew exactly how to respond.

Her hand snatched him from the air, grasping his sickly green core and squeezing. Immaru let out a strangled set of cries. Oh how ridiculously easy it would be to crush him, and to never risk seeing Savathun alive again. Tempting was putting it lightly.

“This isn’t a warning, ghost. It’s a threat.” Vlairyn hissed, bringing his shell up to her face so he could see her eyes.

“Y-You need me!” His voice was strained, and yet no one moved in to stop her, she supposed they were all as distrusting of the ghost as she was. Maybe more so.

“We need your silence.” Eris cut in, nodding to Vlairyn who reluctantly released the bone-colored shell. Immaru glared at the Hunter as he grunted and growled, who only returned the favor with an equally malicious glare. She would have to keep an extra close eye on him in the future.

The runes had been completed, and so Eris handed the staff to Vlairyn, her gaze looking at both the Exo and the Warlock.

“Do not be afraid. Bear witness to my Sublimation.”

This was a show of trust. Vlairyn had every power to simply not start the ritual and so Eris’s words rang in her head.

“I need you to stand behind me.”

The Hunter nodded, and raised the staff into the air before she stuck it into the ground on one of the runes, igniting the remaining runes and the whole ritual circle into a flow of eerie green light.

“I separate the true from the dead. I am the many-mouthed hunger. I am the knife-edged truth.”

Eris was lifted into the air, and it reminded Vlairyn of the same ritual they had performed months ago on the Helm, though this was just for Eris.

“I devour the free. I conspire with my vengeance. I will take what I need. The words in my throat are the weapon in my fist. Aiat, aiat, aiat!”

A shuttering hand lifted and removed the bandage from Eris’s eyes, the thing she had never been seen without since her return from the Hellmouth. Both Vlairyn and Ikora stood, only able to watch as Eris was consumed by the hive light, her body contorting and bending and growing from what seemed to be her armor. Sharp edges protruded from her shoulders, spines grew along her back and her skin paled and warped into that of a hive. A shell of chitin grew in place of the witch’s clothing, wrapping around her mouth, her arms, and legs. Those three hellish eyes finally looked like they belonged on her body as her transformation ended and she dropped to the floor, a new and terrifying creature.

“I am the many-mouthed hunger. I am the knife-edged truth.” Her voice, while still carrying its low tone, now had the overlay of several others and she truly sounded like a hive. Vlairyn looked to Ikora and had never seen the warlock look more terrified in her life. Had this been a mistake?

“Bring me your tithes.” Her voice echoed.

Vlairyn stood in the Helm, her eyes wandering around the dark wooden shelves covered with books, the blood red carpet and cloth that draped against the walls where Eris had set up a little study room, a hive portal frame sitting in the center of the room.

The Exo lifted the staff she still carried and activated the portal. Eris had said she had wanted to meet after the ritual. It had only been a few hours since they had returned from Savathuns spire, did Eris already know what they needed? There was only one way to find out as Vlairyn stepped through the portal and into some kind of hive pocket dimension. It didn’t look like it was in Savathuns throne world, but some of the flora and fauna of the place was similar.

A great pavilion sat at the tops of eery jade steps, draped with the same blood-red cloth as it’s floor glowed with the same pattern as that of the ritual circle back in the spire. A lectern and table sat on the edge of the building, overlooking a cavern leading out to the stars that looked suspiciously like hive eyes.

“Vlairyn.” The voice seemed to echo, comping from nowhere and everywhere all at once.

“Eris?” Vlairyn ascended the stairs to the pavilion, standing in its center before Eris made herself known. She was taller, and up close Vlairyn could see the trinkets that hung from her neck, the same ones she had worn before her transformation.

“You’re… still Eris, right?” The question hung heavy in the air as the Hive god contemplated it.

“Though my form twists in this rune-bound circle, yes. I remain Eris Morn.” The Hives voice definitely had the hint of Eris’s voice, though strained and compressed by the ritual.

“Good… then I feel I can ask again. Will you let me help you? Walk this path together?”

Eris nodded, gesturing a clawed hand to the staff that Vlairyn carried. It’s bone and green ichor feeling heavy in her hands.

“A splinter of a Hive worm rests in your staff,” she says. “It is enough to bind us, and mark you as my acolyte. By the sword logic of the Hive, your conquests would strengthen me.”

This was not a command, though Eris’s voice now sounded much more commanding since the ritual. No, this was an offer.

“I said you needed purpose, Vlairyn, and you have begged to help me. Here I offer you purpose once more, to bring wrath upon the Hive so that you may tithe your enemies to me.”

She could see Vlairyn was hesitant.

“I am not given to the deep, but to vengeance. I serve no paracausal purpose but my own.”

This did grab the Exo’s attention. A third option? It had never occurred to Vlairyn that one could be hive and not serve the deep, and yet there Eris stood. With the setting of her jaw, Vlairyn looked up to meet the eyes of the Hive god.

“You feel better like this, don’t you?”

The hive seemed to chuckle, an odd sound like the clacking of bone.

“I do what is necessary, that makes my feeling better irrelevant, but in a sense, yes.”

“Then make me your acolyte, and I shall bring you the heads of our enemies.”

Eris grinned behind her chitin mask, the familiar sound and glow of transmat dust leaving something in her hands. Five items of clothing, all in the same green-tinted hive colors.

“I ask only one thing more, my friend.” Eris offered the clothing to Vlairyn, who looked upon it with a curious expression. The helmet that sat neatly atop the folded shirt and pants was like that of a hive, three tell-tail eyes glowing in a faint blue color.

“You have been mourning long enough. Take off the blue you have worn for so long, and embrace this gift I give to you. Let us show them what it is to be Hive.”

It dawned on Vlairyn what Eris was asking of her. The beep blue colors the Exo had worn for so long were in honor of Cayde, the same mourning colors she had worn to his funeral and subsequently the color she had killed Uldren Sov in. This was a request to let all that go. To start anew serving Eris until her battle with Xivu. Vlairyn couldn’t deny how much she had wanted to start over, to have something else to do besides serve paracausal beings or sit alone; so she took the clothing and armor in her hands, and was reborn.

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BONUS:

Vlairyn slumped back against the plush gray sofa that sat in her apartment living room, the eerie green tint of her new clothes actually matched her own skin color for once, her own metal painted a bright teal. With a blink and a shimmer of dust, her helmet was whisked away, leaving a hovering Goldie in its wake.

“I know what you’re gonna say-“ Vlairyn started, convinced she was going to get a lecture about the hive.

“I’m so happy for you!”

“You what?”

The ghost wiggled with excitement, though somewhat reserved as it was a tense moment for the two of them. Goldie really didn’t want to upset his Guardian, not when she was back in the field and doing what she was good at!

“You’re not… You don’t have your reservations? No big speech on why the Hive are bad?” Vlairyn asked gently, like just mentioning it would have him go off on a tangent.

There was a pause.

“Vlairyn, I always have my reservations, but seeing you out and about again is the best thing I could ever hope for! To see you have purpose again, no matter what it is now, will always be better than seeing you waste away in this apartment.” The golden ghost spoke with utter sincerity, and he nuzzled the Hive clad hunter.

Vlairyn’s voice caught on the wires in her throat. After how horrible she had been to him, all the pushing away and terrible words exchanged he was still here.

She could feel liquid prick in her eyes.

“Goldie…” She faltered, unsure of what to say.

“It’s okay.” He said simply, an expression like that of a smile overtaking his orb.

“I thought you might at least have something to say about the new outfit.” Vlairyn returned his smile with a slight upturning of her lips.

“Oh I do. I think Eris knew exactly what she was doing when she gave it to you, and I think you look like a proper Hive killer. Can’t very well be an Acolyte in mourning clothes, can you?”

“No, I suppose not.”

And so, they sat for the remainder of the night, gently talking and bringing their broken friendship back to the surface.

#bwcfic #fanfiction #cayde 6 #destiny 2 #destiny exo #healing

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picwew · 3 years

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SQUAD UP! It’s time for Yuna and his crew of miscreant demons!

(Picrews are here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here!)

The characters are, top to bottom, left to right--

Nakajima, Yuna: A human with unusually high magical potential. His specialty is the binding of demons into servitude, which he utilizes to stop particularly troublesome demons from threatening human populations across the globe. Most of the demons under his care were seduced by him, as he has quite a knack for making men want him. As such, several of his servants are vying for his favor, but, in his own words, “I don’t play favorites~”

Obviously, Yuna is a bit of a flirt. His tastes extend well beyond demons, into just about any non-human he can get his hands on. He has a ravenous appetite for handsome men, but no plans to settle down any time soon. It isn’t that romance doesn’t appeal to him, more that he’s still young and a little too free-spirited for anything permanent. The way he dotes on his servants, though, you’d certainly think he was in love with them, Nihil in particular.

Mourning Dove: Affectionately referred to by his coworkers as “Dovey”, this little fellow was the first of Yuna’s servants, and is therefore his most staunch defender. The details of his past are hazy, even in his own mind, but he was born into the slave trade, nameless, nothing, the psychological toll of which would not become apparent until his eventual escape. He was full of hatred for the humans who had callously treated him as property, and claimed many lives before Yuna was able to soothe his aching heart. “You’re pretty as a mourning dove,” Yuna told him. From that moment on, he decided that this would be his name.

Dovey is, above all, an empath. Much of his time recovering from a life of slavery was spent learning to feel again. Once he got the hang of it, however, he found that he felt a little too much, so much so that he’s become somewhat of a crybaby. When others are in pain, he is often the one to comfort them. His sweet disposition and cute appearance have earned him his coworkers’ love, although they still get a bit miffed with him whenever he tries to hog Yuna’s attention.

Dr. Callaway: An interesting case, and a tough nut to crack. Only Yuna knows his full name; no one knows his story. All he’s shared is that he was fingered for human experimentation, and that, no, he has neither learned his lesson nor wishes to. Still, he behaves himself well enough, perhaps because he is entirely obsessed with Yuna in the most unhealthy way. While most of his coworkers consider one another family, Dr. Callaway is detached and often mocking of their sentimentality.

As expected, Dr. Callaway is a terrible sadist. He takes great pleasure in hurting others in any way he can. Nowadays, this is limited almost entirely to insults and threats, but he has been known to get physical with others when Yuna isn’t looking. It doesn’t help that nothing seems to bother him in return. You could beat the man senseless, and he’d come out of it grinning like a jackal.

Corvo: This one was a misunderstanding--or, rather, a case of cultures clashing in a very gruesome manner. Corvo is a hybrid of demon and crowkin. Beastkin are not true demons, but are often lumped in with them, so mixed-race families are not uncommon. Unfortunately, this can lead to some problematic offspring, particularly when one or both of the parents are detached from human society. Corvo, like many crowkin, was taught that food is food, and that human meat is the most delicious of all. He bore no ill will toward humans, but his view of them as, essentially, cattle culminated in a visit from Yuna.

Following his binding, Corvo began the lengthy process of finding something he liked more than human flesh. This, as it turned out, was sweets--all sweets, from pastries, to ice cream, to candy. He had never had sweets before, and everyone agreed that they suited his bubbly, affectionate personality more than human flesh anyway. He is certainly the gentlest of all of Yuna’s servants, dedicated to his family and to protecting those in need. He’s especially fond of cats.

Erebus: Known by those who worship him as the Master of Crows, Erebus is an ill-understood being. He is ancient, but has had little to do with his own kind since time out of mind. Instead, he appears to have become so entwined with his worshipers that he can no longer live without their faith to sustain him. During the Northern Crusades, a great many of them were persecuted for their faith, and Erebus fell into a centuries-long slumber. Only when his followers began to grow in number again did he wake--and command those loyal to him to seek vengeance for their fallen brethren. Naturally, Yuna had a thing or two to say about that.

Erebus is highly asocial, but does not dislike his coworkers. It would be a stretch to say he views them as family; even so, he gets along well with them on the rare occasion Yuna can talk him out of his comfortable pocket of darkness. As the oldest of his colleagues, he is respected and even admired, but he cares little for the love of his own kind. He desires mortal love, which he receives through his worshipers. Due to their number still being relatively low, you’ll rarely catch him awake. Only Yuna seems able to rouse him, and only because Yuna is his “most cherished one”.

Mage: A troublemaker with a bark worse than his bite--but he can and will bite, so mind your fingers. Like Dr. Callaway, his true name is known only to Yuna. His coworkers know him as Mage, taken from Magenta, the name of the rather nasty chemical he produces to draw in his prey. He doesn’t harm them, but he has seduced many a married man away from his wife. Causing strife among couples is what he does best. As an incubus, he finds the taste of a married man’s energy too sweet to resist. So, of course, when he found himself seduced by Yuna, he was completely baffled--and absolutely obsessed. He still toys with married men now and then, when he gets the chance, but spends most of his time trying to talk Yuna back into bed.

Though rare, Mage can be persuaded to bust heads, and does so with the best of ‘em. He’s highly territorial, meaning that although he rather likes his colleagues, he often tangles up with them over Yuna’s affection. He is particularly hostile toward Nihil, who rather delights in teasing Mage with his closeness to their master. Outside of his romantic conflicts with his housemates, he tends to be rather lackadaisical, spending much of his free time lounging on every comfortable surface available. People find his presence enjoyable due to his easygoing disposition and passion for mischief.

Nihil: Of all the demons under Yuna’s employ, Nihil is the one who has come closest to winning his heart. Theirs is a strangely intimate relationship, one which Yuna insists is platonic--and yet, Nihil is at his side always, his obedient shadow. Of course, they weren’t always so close. Nihil is an inherently violent, cruel man whose sole purpose in life is to cause as much pain and grief as he possibly can. He is absolutely, positively insane, for no other reason than this is how he believes a demon should be. This is his aesthetic, and a demon’s aesthetic is absolute. He minds his P’s and Q’s now that he’s bound to Yuna, but never lets his “family” forget what he is, Yuna least of all.

Nihil loves no being, except, by his own admission, Yuna. He teases his master constantly, always pushing his limits, always pushing his buttons. “I am your loyal dog,” is a favorite line of his, spoken, with a pointed smile, whenever Yuna asks something of him. For some reason, it never fails to fluster Yuna, which allows Nihil to worm himself further into his darling’s heart. Unlike his colleagues, he is not afraid to get physical with Yuna, and many of their more heated arguments have ended in the bedroom. Whether Nihil actually enjoys servitude remains to be seen, but for Yuna, he would pull the moon from the sky.

Pox: The general consensus on Pox is “unfriendly, but not unbearable”. A life of self-isolation has made him difficult to approach, even more difficult to befriend, especially given that everyone he’s ever loved, he has killed. He is a demon of sickness, of plague and of rot, of suffering so old as to be carved into the bones of the earth. When he was young, he could not control the disease that spread from him. Though his mortal mother tried desperately to guide him, eventually, she was overcome, and Pox left the village he had once called home, now populated only by the dead and dying. He learned then that he could not live among his mother’s people, but he knew nothing of his father’s. Rather than seek them out and put them at risk as well, he exiled himself to the outskirts of human society, interacting with it only when necessary. With time, he came to understand his power, and was able to control it--but his peaceful life came to an end when one of the few humans he had allowed himself to love was killed in a botched robbery. Pox designated himself judge, jury, and executioner, and it wasn’t long before Yuna showed up on his doorstep.

Pox hides his self-loathing under a cold, hard outer shell. His mask is flawless, perfected through a lifetime of guilt, and he allows no one near enough to break it. His coworkers believe that they are despised by him, but in truth, he loves each of them with every inch of himself. Saying so is difficult, though, and such an admission would only encourage them to endanger themselves. He may be in complete control of his magic most days, but there are times even now when he catches himself slipping. He is desperate to protect Yuna and the strange family they have all built together, so much so that he would rather suffer in silence than risk their lives asking for help.

Seta Sericum: The peculiarity of his name has led to his coworkers calling him Silky, a moniker which he has accepted only begrudgingly. Silky is a Nephalem, the product of a love between angel and demon. Typically, his fathers’ love for one another would have ended in tragedy, but the two stayed together even after their angelic half was cast from divinity. Silky was raised in a happy home, albeit a mobile one; his fathers couldn’t risk staying in one place for too long, lest the Church track them down. Ultimately, it was the Church, their greatest fear, that was their end. They were cut down while protecting Silky, who was forced to flee in the vain hope that his absence might somehow save his fathers. The Church searched for him, but he had hidden himself well. Now an orphan, he swore vengeance on his parents’ murderers--and he got it too, once he was old enough to control his immense magical power. He despises the Church, but killed only those among its ranks who had directly harmed him. Regardless, Yuna came for him, and he submitted to servitude as recompense.

Silky’s demonic father was a real fop of a man, and his son is no different now that he’s had a chance to adjust to a normal life. He insists that everyone pull their own weight, that everything be in its place at all times, and has a fondness for indulgences such as expensive wine and imported chocolates. Without these little luxuries, he would surely have gone mad, for both his mischievous master and his trouble-making housemates frustrate him to no end. He has tried, with mixed success, to serve as a role model for them, but, oh, they are all such children. Dovey is far too naive, Dr. Callaway is far too sadistic, Corvo is far too oblivious, Mage is far too flirtatious, Nihil is far too violent, Pox is far too cold, and Vincent is far too reclusive. Erebus, at least, is well-behaved, though Silky thinks he could stand to mingle more with the group.

Vincent Blythe: On the forefront of medical progress during the Victorian Era, Dr. Vincent Blythe has become little more than a shell of his former self. When his prostitute mother was murdered by one of her stags, something snapped in him. He began targeting, torturing, and finally killing any man who frequented brothels or whom he had seen with street-walkers, believing himself to be the protector of his mother’s people. It was only then when he realized he was something more than human. His father, it turned out, had been a demon who had fallen terribly in love with his mother, but whose feelings had been spurned by her. After receiving a near-fatal wound in a skirmish with a prominent vampire hunter of the day, Vincent tucked himself away in a dark corner of London to heal. He slept for over a century, and when he woke, attempted to pick up where he’d left off. Confused, his trauma still fresh in his mind, he killed all who drew near. Phone calls were made, flights were booked, and Yuna arrived on scene to bring him back to his senses.

Vincent is terribly withdrawn. On the one hand, he is distrustful of all humans, and men in particular frighten him. On the other hand, he has had little to no experience with his own kind, and so struggles to fit in among them. He finds himself at an impasse, unable to shake the trauma of his mother’s murder, and equally unable to bond with his father’s kin. Because of this, he is prone to bouts of violent madness when he feels that he is being threatened, or when he wakes from particularly vivid nightmares, in which he witnesses his mother’s murder and can do nothing to stop it. Dr. Callaway has oft remarked that Vincent is a genius, a true medical prodigy, and that it is too bad he’s so “broken”.

#picrew #male ocs #demon ocs

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bthump · 3 years

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I know this is very nitpicky, but what do you think is the level of awareness Griffith has during the stairwell scene? For a very calculated and rational guy like him, it's hard to imagine that he hasn't even tried to decipher where these strong reckless reactions come from. I mean... even king of denial Guts has reflected a bit on it. Enough to ask Griffith about it. I know yoy mentioned in a recent answer to an ask, that you don't headcanon Griffith as pining, so would you say that you (cont)

Would you say that you imagine that he compartimentalizes his thougts and represses to the point that he doesn't aknowledge at least to a certain extent, that his feeling for Guts are more passionate, than what he feels for other comerades. The fact that he fully realises the depth of those feelings once Guts leaves is clear. But Idk the stairwell scene makes me think that he is at least aware, that he has a bit of a crush, but choses to not give it much importance. Curious about your thoughts

hmmm. okay first off I just want to say that I can see multiple possibilities, from full on repression and denial, to recognizing his attraction but not acting on it, to knowing he cares for Guts and wants him as a True Friend(TM) but often downplaying that because he believes Guts sees him mainly as a superior officer. But yeah I do prefer the denial and compartmentalization explanation and I want to go into why, because I think it’s fun to talk about lol.

So the big reason I read Griffith as refusing to acknowledge his feelings to himself is because that’s how he deals with all his other inconvenient feelings, like his guilt and fear and the fact that he cares about the Hawks. Like eg when he tells Gennon that he doesn’t feel a single emotion about him whatsoever, or when he tells Casca that he doesn’t feel guilty over the deaths of the Hawks, I don’t think he’s just lying to them, I think he’s convincing himself too, to the point where he really believes it.

It’s sort of hard to explain how I see this working in Griffith’s head bc it feels v intuitive to me but I know that’s not the case for everyone. So yk it’s not that I think he like, eg makes himself forget that he nearly had a breakdown in a river, but I think he doesn’t ask himself why he nearly had a breakdown beyond maybe a shallow ‘sex with gennon was unpleasant and made me uncomfortable for a couple hours but i’m completely fine now’ and doesn’t think about it afterwards if he can help it.

And when he tells Charlotte he doesn’t have any friends and tells Guts he belongs to him during the second duel, I think he’s telling himself lies/rationalizations he genuinely believes there too. In fact, I think his denial of his own feelings is straight up meant to be his tragic flaw, which is why he’s only able to finally acknowledge them in the torture chamber, after it’s caused his downfall.

In the torture chamber we see him remember the face-off with Zodd and acknowledge that it was an irrational thing to do and wonder why Guts is so important to him, and I think part of the reason the monologue works so well is because it’s the first time we see that kind of self-reflection sans lofty rationalization from him, because before he ended up trapped in his own brain for a year with nothing to distract himself in between bouts of torture he didn’t really ask himself these kinds of questions. If he had, things probably would’ve gone better for everyone.

And like, I don’t think this makes Griffith less intelligent, or negates his rationality in other areas of life. I don’t see a contradiction in someone being able to analyze a battlefield or read other people well but avoiding genuine soul searching whenever possible and lying to himself a lot. I think it’s actually pretty realistic - I don’t think very many people fully understand themselves or their feelings, even really self-reflective people, and it’s very easy to rationalize away inconvenient cognitive dissonance. and I include myself in that lol.

Griffith’s life is kind of a contradiction that would really fuck him up to untangle (he sends people to their deaths to achieve a dream for the sake of assuaging his guilt for sending people to their deaths to achieve a dream), so he doesn’t try to untangle it, he avoids the question and hides behind a philosophical ideal. And his feelings for Guts add to that cognitive dissonance because if he values Guts over the dream, that kind of proves his entire defensive life philosophy is bullshit and his whole life plan is built on a precarious house of cards, so it makes sense to me that he’d avoid examining those feelings closely too.

And you can look at Guts too, who does navelgaze a lot and tries to analyze his own feelings and motivations - when he’s faced with a contradiction (I want to become independent of Griffith and do my own thing solely to gain Griffith’s approval) he actually notices it and briefly questions himself... and then he still puts it out of his mind and continues pursuing his contradictory goal anyway, and manages to stay in denial for 3 days even after learning that Griffith ended up in a torture chamber because he left.

Along those same lines, Guts eg realizes that he kills things because it makes him feel better but he doesn’t make the connection between his irrational urge to fight powerful enemies and his childhood trauma the way the readers can, the King didn’t acknowledge his incesty feelings til Griffith shoved them in his face, Count Slug kept denying having human feelings til Puck went on a tirade against him and he couldn’t sacrifice his daughter, Casca lies to herself about her feelings for Griffith for a long time before finally acknowledging she’s in love and then doubles down on her Griffith feelings when her newer feelings for Guts threaten them until she has a breakdown and admits some things to herself (I mean I find that last one disappointing lol, but it’s also a really straightforward example of someone living in denial of romantic feelings and therefore a good comparison point to show that Miura does this on purpose), etc. So I think this interpretation of Griffith is also consistent with how Miura just like, tends to write people.

Like imo Griffith has moments where he comes close to self awareness and could’ve started potentially reflecting on his feelings and coming to better, more accurate conclusions, and those moments definitely include the Zodd conversation (as well as the river scene with Casca, and “do you think I’m cruel?”) but none of those scenes lead to useful self-reflection because they all go wrong. Casca tries but fails to reassure him bc she’s out of her depth, Guts reminds him of his dream, the King interrupts their conversation and Charlotte reorients Griffith towards his goal so he can move on from that moment of irrationality and refrain from thinking about it further for a while. Even after the duel Griffith tries to avoid self-reflection by fucking Charlotte imo (”take all the sad and frightening things and cast them into the fire” ie hey girl wanna repress some shit w/ me?), and imo his previous ability to do that makes it all the more impactful when it doesn’t work this time and he breaks down.

BUT YEAH all that said I don’t think this is the only reasonable reading of Griffith’s awareness of his feelings lol, it’s just the one I like best and consider the most satisfying and interesting and fun to think about. And honestly that’s partly because I love dramatic irony and have a real thing for characters who lie to themselves, so I’m biased in favour of it too. Nothing about Griffith being good at denial contradicts the idea that he could still be aware of an attraction to Guts (in that case he’d probably just write it off as irrelevant and deny the associated internalized-homophobia-related self-loathing lol until it all pours out while he’s projecting at the King), and he could eg be aware that he irrationally cares about Guts above and beyond anyone else and just doesn’t even try to reconcile that with his dream, ie compartmentalization in another way.

But I think the idea that he only fully admits it to himself in the torture chamber is just very narratively satisfying.

#Anonymous #ask #griffguts #ty for the question and giving me an opportunity to go on about this #a #b #character: griffith #theme: coping mechanisms #theme: repression #ship: griffguts #headcanons #character thoughts #arc: ga

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thatboomerkid · 3 years

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Giff -- SpellJammer Race for Pathfinder

Giff -- SpellJammer Race [19 RACE POINTS] for First Edition Pathfinder

Known to the gnomes of Markovia as the nilski konj vojnici, to the Hin plantation-owners of Covington Farms as los mercenarios gigantes del río, and to the human field-workers laboring near New Arvoreen most-often simply as “those big goddamn bastards,” the giff -- as they are called in their own guttural, roaring language -- represent a recently-contacted species of huge, violent, powerfully-built, terrifyingly-focused, and dangerously cagey combatants.

In the little-over-a-century since their discovery by the Hin, platoons of giff have already carved a bloody name for themselves across the wilds of Verdura -- and far beyond -- as unparalleled river-guides, rowdies, strike-breakers, mob debt-collectors, private enforcers, heavy-weapons units, siege engines, bodyguards, and elite soldiers of fortune.

Brought to you absolutely free to enjoy, to test & to share – as always – by the fine folks of my Patreon.

original image by the incredible Claudio Pozas, here

Type: Monstrous Humanoid (3 RP)

Ability Score Modifiers: Mixed Weakness (-2 RP)

+2 Strength, -4 Dexterity, +2 Constitution, -4 Intelligence, +2 Wisdom

Size: Large (7 RP)

Giff gain a +2 size bonus to Strength and a -2 size penalty to Dexterity (already included above). Giff also suffer a -1 size penalty to their AC and a -1 size penalty on all attack rolls; they gain a +1 bonus on combat maneuver checks and to their CMD, and suffer a -4 size penalty on Stealth checks.

A giff takes up a space that is 10 feet by 10 feet and has a reach of 5 feet.

Base Speed: Normal speed (0 RP)

Languages: Standard (0 RP); giff speak their own eponymous, curiously poetic language, and most are -- in the modern day -- also conversant in Low Kozah-Talosii (usually spoken with a thick, pompous Verduran accent).

This bastardized dialect, the so-called “Common tongue” favored across Pyrespace for use in international, intercultural, and interplanetary trade, is a degraded mongrel variant of High Kozah-Talosii: the ancient root-tongue of both Arvorean and Brandobarin, still employed by the Church of Yondalla for use in sermons, hymns, and in all official records.

Big Damn Guns: Giff are treated as gnomes for purposes of the Experimental Gunsmith Archetype. (0 RP)

Darkvision: Giff have 60 ft. darkvision (0 RP); giff have relatively poor eyesight while out of water, which is easily corrected with simple lenses -- such as a monocle -- for use while reading. This vision is not poor enough to impart a mechanical penalty on Perception checks or attack rolls made by the giff.

Natural Armor: Giff have +3 natural armor (4 RP)

Natural Attack (Headbutt): Giff receive one natural attack, which is treated as a gore attack that deals 1d8 bludgeoning damage. (1 RP)

Natural Swimmers: Giff have a swim speed of 30 feet and gain the +8 racial bonus on Swim checks that a swim speed normally grants. (1 RP)

Powerful Charge (Headbutt): Whenever a giff charges, it deals twice the standard number of damage dice with its headbutt plus 1-1/2 times its Strength bonus. (2 RP)

River-Sense: Giff can sense vibrations in water, granting them blindsense 30 feet against creatures that are touching the same body of water. (1 RP)

Slow On Land: Giff often select the Clumsy, Easy Target, Magically Inept, Nearsighted, and Slow Reflexes Major Drawbacks (0 RP)

Spell Resistance (Greater): Giff have spell resistance equal to 11 + their character level. (3 RP)

Sporting: The species-wide love of warfare exhibited by the giff draws a sharp line of distinction between “sporting” and “unsporting” combat (see below). (-1 RP)

Sporting combat includes arm-wrestling, fisticuffs, darts, cards, dice, checkers, chess, billiards, cricket, rugby, skeet shooting, tennis, and golf, alongside tests of boasting, carousing, headbutting, toast-giving, swimming, push-ups, and a complex, ritualized sort of thunderous, unarmed mixed martial-art performed solely while stripped down to breeches & undergarments, usually in ankle-deep to waist-deep water, ending in pin or submission, which -- up to a point -- also serves as a type of flirting.

The military mentality of the giff even makes special allowances for a variety of “sporting” duels to the death. Establishing a proper duel requires a huge number of complex ritual elements that -- in the end -- mostly boils down to both giff formally acknowledging that:

Both giff are armed with approximately the same quality of weapons & armor (warhammer, combat knife, pistol, full plate, etc.)

Both giff have equal access to military support, including healing

Both giff have a grievance, no matter how petty

Both giff are suffering approximately the same level of injuries

Both giff have made arrangements for their estate, and for the treatment of their body after death

Once a “sporting” challenge to the death has been agreed-to by both parties, anything up to and including outright murder of one’s opponent is considered fair game.

Several major holidays each year celebrated by the giff include a “violent dueling festival” as part of their celebration; to outsiders, these events have a very bizarre, genteel, 1800s-Victorian-Teddy-Roosevelt-meets-The-Purge sort of feel to them:

“Happy holidays, friend; best of health this year to you and to your kin. And I say, old chap, don’t suppose it’s high time for a kukri-duel, eh, wot wot? Seeing as you got drunk on my finest brandy, made a pass at the missus, wiped your prodigious buttocks with my table linens, and micturated in my hedge-row as of Christmas last, well ... in lieu of an apology, what say I have Jenkins fetch the carving blades, eh? See which of has the moxie, shall we? Cheerio and have at thee then, old sport?”

If this formal challenge to a lethal sporting-duel is declined, the challenger must make all possible accommodations to guarantee the immediate physical safety of the giff she just challenged (at least until such time as the two giff part ways once more): providing the giff with weapons, armor, food, water, medicine, reading materials, a place to sleep, liquor, smoking tobacco, and anything else a gentleman or lady of high breeding could reasonably expect to have access to (even while imprisoned).

In short: if the challenged giff dies immediately after declining a duel, it is considered very embarrassing for the challenger.

For his own part, the declining giff must treat her challenger with the very utmost level of respect ... or risk being guilty of unsporting conduct, a fate far worse than mere death.

Any giff who finds herself about to violate the terms of properly “sporting” conduct instantly becomes aware of the error, just as if she were wearing a phylactery of faithfulness and, at all times, actively contemplating the thought of doing bodily harm to another giff: this behavioral limitation is not built as a trap for players to accidentally stumble into, but -- instead -- as an interesting roadblock to navigate around.

If two or more giff find themselves forced into a position of armed conflict against one another on a battlefield, both groups traditionally retire for at least a day of drinking and sorting-out ranks; on rare occasion, one platoon will join the other; more likely, all giff involved in any part of the operation will quit their current hirings and look for work elsewhere.

Any giff who engages another member of her own species in any type of unsporting combat -- attacking another giff with a weapon, for example, or with magic -- immediately suffers a -2 penalty on all skill checks, ability checks, attack rolls and saves; she continues to suffer this penalty until such time as she is able to make amends: presenting her victim with a formal written apology, or seeking our her victim’s family to beg their public pardon.

Each month, this penalty increases by 2. Guilt is a poison that grows by degrees, after all: ever-gnawing.

While she is suffering penalties in this way, if the giff is presented with the chance to punish herself – or a non-giff opponent! – while presented with something that reminds the giff of her betrayal, she may find herself compelled to do so regardless of the consequences:

Any time her betrayal is directly brought to her attention, the giff must make a Will save (DC = 10 + her character level + the Charisma modifier of the wronged giff). Failure means that the giff falls into a rage of abject self-loathing, completely focused on her own guilt for a number of rounds equal to the DC, above. Until she has finished with this exercise in hate, the giff can take no action other than to harm the reminder of her failure or enable herself to harm it: grappling a human shipmate who mentioned her old friend so that she might headbutt the human while strangling them, for example, or calmly loading a shotgun so that she might shoot the human dead in cold blood.

Note that the giff, while wracked with guilt & grief, is not required to do anything or harm anyone: she may simply stare at an old photograph and feel sad, for example, ignoring everyone around her.

During the fury of this black tempest, the giff suffers a -2 penalty to her AC.

Once the giff successfully makes amends, either with the wronged party or with the victim’s next-of-kin, all of the above penalties are removed. Entire subsets of giff society -- mediators, arbitrators, and negotiators -- are explicitly adapted to making absolutely certain that any errors in sporting conduct among giff are resolved quickly, and to the satisfaction of all parties.

Should she fail to make amends before her death, any giff who has harmed another giff in an unsporting way invariably rises again as an undead horror of some kind (often a blood knight or graveknight): reborn as a rotting, lurching mountainside of infinitely destructive hated.

Note that the Sporting Racial Trait is not purely social, but rather acts as a species-wide ingrained psychological virtue: two giff living on Fenris who never expect to see the wide rivers of Verdura again are still bound by the rules of “sporting” conflict; neither could shoot the other in the back any more than either of them could grow wings and fly to the moon.

Undead giff do not possess the Sporting Trait, which is seen -- by living giff -- as the most abhorrent and disturbing quality imaginable.

Note, also, that the desire to behave in a sporting manner extends only to fellow giff: Chaotic Evil giff will routinely massacre unarmed non-giff by the thousands, bellowing with laughter as they do so, and even a Lawful Good giff will rarely think twice before sucker-punching a crude human making drunken threats and impolite remarks at the bar.

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Giff Timeline:

1603 A.D. (118 years ago): The colony of New Arvoreen is established on Verdura; giff make contact with Hin (and their human servants) for the first time.

1620 A.D.: First generation of giff who have always known about the existence of Hin, humans, and -- most importantly! -- firearms fully comes of age.

1636 A.D.: New Arvoreen is significantly expanded.

1667 A.D.: Nation of Markovia -- the technological-marvel nation named for its Founder, Monarch and Supreme Leader, Dr. Adlai Markovitch -- founded on Verdua; diplomatic trade established with New Arvoreen.

1669 A.D.: City of New Arvoreen significantly expanded.

1702 A.D.: New Arvoreen significantly expanded; land officially cleared for Covington Farms, soon to be the largest agricultural facility in the system; rates of forcible immigration of indentured humans to New Arvoreen tripled.

1721 A.D.: (current year)

original image here

Giff Ranks: Lieutenant, General, Colonel, Major General, Lieutenant General, Lieutenant Colonel, Captain General, Brigadier General, Field Marshall, Major, Captain, Sergeant Major, Commandant General, Wing General, Lieutenant Colonel General, Staff Sergent, Master Sergent, Master General, Grenadier General; note that “Lord” may be added to any military rank, alongside the designations of “First” and “First Class” (for example, “First Lord Brigadier General First Class”)

Giff military ranks are, effectively, meaningless noise to everyone except the giff themselves: every member of the species is a decorated officer of some complex rank within some elite military company or another, but such ranks are largely ceremonial and may be inherited, purchased, or passed through elaborate, bombastic ritual.

Further, the only thing preventing a young giff from forming an entirely new military organization & immediately naming herself -- of example -- Supreme Acting Field Commander and Secretary General of the Armies and Navies at Wartime is -- up to a point -- her own willingness to do so.

Male Giff Names: Any invented male Hin name.

Female Giff Names: Any invented female Hin name.

Giff Family Names: Any invented male Hin first name

Society

The giff are military-minded, and organize themselves into squads, platoons, companies, corps, and larger groups. The number of giff in a platoon varies according to the season, situation, and level of danger involved.

A giff "platoon" hired to protect a gambling operation may number only a single soldier, while a platoon hired to invade an illithid stronghold may number well over a hundred.

The giff pride themselves on their weapon-skills, and any giff carries a number of swords, daggers, maces, and similar tools on hand to deal with troublemakers.

A giff's true love, however, is the gun. A misfiring weapon matters little to the giff (occasional fatalities amongst soldiery are simply to expected); it is the flash, the noise, and the damage that most impress them.

Even unarmed, the giff are powerful opponents. Against non-giff, they’ll often wade into a brawl just for the pure fun of it, tossing various combatants on both sides around to prove themselves the victors.

Once a weapon is bared, however, and the challenge becomes “unsporting,” the giff consider all restrictions off: the challenge is now to the death.

The giff prize themselves as top-quality mercenaries, and to that end take great pride in owning -- if not always wearing -- elaborate suits of full-plate armor. These suits usually include massive helms featuring hyper-detailed, semi-realistic images of exotic monsters on the crests, inlaid with ivory and bone along the largest plates.

Armor repair is a major hobby among the giff, although great skill at the craft is surprisingly rare.

The giff are deeply suspicious of magic, magicians, and magical devices; their legendary foes, the Five Tiger Princes, are despised for their esoteric abilities as much for their wicked deviltry.

image here

Family

The giff are, for the most part, happiest among fellow members their own race, intermingling broadly with the Ghoran -- whom the giff utilize as an edible, inexhaustible workforce -- and the Tengu: another unofficial “servitor race” of the giff, most often used as messengers and household servants.

Ghoran living on giff lands are stoic: dutifully tending the fields of the giff in exchange for protection from ten-thousand other, vastly more predatory dangers. For all that giff treat the ghoran as disposable -- a ghoran living on Verdura produces one seed each year, and can grow a new member of the species in a single month -- the giff do not want the ghoran hunted to total extermination. That, for the ghoran, is saying something,

Tengu, on the other hand, are deeply prized by the giff as staff, usually in the roles of personal assistants, groomers, decorators, butlers, bartenders, man-servants, attaches, major domos, and maids. Since all giff are “wealthy land owners,” to one degree or another, the true power & prestige of a giff can be accurately measured by the number of tengu he employs.

Giff otherwise consider anything larger than them deeply threatening, yet also complain bitterly -- in private -- about the fragility of the smaller races. Outside their own platoons, the giff are happiest among military organizations with a strong chain of command.

For this reason, giff hold the Church of Yondalla in exceptionally high regard.

Giff especially despise the catfolk: although they don’t speak of it to outsiders, a century ago the giff were on the verge of extinction: hunted for sport and trophy by servants of the Five Tiger Princes, their people nearly cut to nothing and their lands held by only a few remaining families. Since their acquisition of firearms -- and the arrival of the Hin -- the catfolk have broadly retreated.

Every giff -- male, female, and giffling -- has a rank within their greater society, which can only be changed by a giff of higher rank. Within these ranks are sub-ranks, and within those sub-ranks are color-markings and badges. The highest-ranking giff gives the orders, the others obey. It does not matter if the orders are foolish or even suicidal: following them is the purpose of the giff in the universe. A quasi-mystical faith among the giff -- who claim to worship, in a vague way, the Golden General Bahamut, who was killed and eaten by the cowardly Five Tiger Princes in order to steal his strength -- confirms that all things have their place, and the place of the giff to follow orders.

This makes the giff very happy.

Giff platoons can be hired from their sprawling, palatial riverside plantations and mountain hunting-lodges by anyone looking for muscle. The social leaders among the giff are contractors: these specially-trained giff review prospective employers according to ability to pay, then make a recommendation to powerful warlords and famous adventurers among the giff. The leaders, in turn, consider the danger of the job, and whether taking it will enhance their giffdom.

Giff jobs are usually paid in firearms & gunpowder, though they often will accept other weapons and armor. Aboard ship, the giff require their own quarters, and will often request to bring on their own large weapons. They favor fire-projectors and bombards for ground work, and will happily blaze away at opponents regardless of the tactical situation.

The giff require the ships of others because they have -- for the most part -- no spellcasting abilities among them.

Giff of both sexes serve in their platoons, and both fight equally well. Giff young are raised tenderly until they are old enough to survive an exploding arquebus, then are inducted fully into the platoon.

The giff practice equality among the sexes in battle and in childrearing. They live about 70 years, but do not take aging gracefully. As a giff grows older and begins to slow down, he is possessed with the idea of proving himself still young and vital, usually in battle.

As a result, there are very, very few old giff.

#pathfinder #SPELLJAMMER #race #options #1st edition

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esseegg · 4 years

Text

egg theory.

this occurred to me after i saw leaks from Ch. 290 of the My Hero Academia’s manga. it’s not really a theory, just speculation.

warning: contains manga spoilers, Dabi, the Todoroki family, and suicidal implications.

another warning: my thought process is very lengthy and a tad repetitive for the sake of evidence in reasoning. i also get a tad bit “Let’s see what’s in Dabi’s head today” at the end. writer instincts.

I don’t have any images of the manga to pull from, nor am I going to bother with grabbing them. This is more of a psychological analysis, anyways.

For those who’ve read the manga’s most recent chapters, or perhaps even stumbled upon manga snapshots of Dabi, we’ve all noted a few trends: Dabi’s uncharacteristic smile and his uncanny, ecstatic hysteria. At first, we believed this to be a result of potential grieving for Twice’s death and/or the anticipation of finally facing off with Endeavor (for the last time, per se) and/or the thought of seeing Endeavor finally being crushed by Shigaraki’s current rampage.

However, upon seeing Ch. 290′s leaks, I don’t quite believe in such speculations. If anything, these possibilities are not alone. In general, the leaks contain these things: a confession to his mother and the consequent reveal of his Todoroki identity to both his mother and his father.

Setting aside Rei for now, most people have interpreted these details as signs of a final showdown between Dabi and Endeavor. I don’t discredit this. That idiot can’t waltz in with that much drama and not expect a fight in his head.

My problem with all this is that, as we’ve noticed, this energy is entirely opposite of what usually defines Dabi. Dabi is stoic. Dabi is cold. Dabi is not one to go searching for the limelight. Granted, there are a few exceptions to this, but none alike Ch. 290. Here, and as of recent chapters, his carefree attitude is unhinged, fueled by a thrill, an anticipation, a blind excitement, and pure, raw joy.

Now, let’s factor in Rei again. Rei received the news in clearly a much calmer, civil, more sensitive format. You see his body language, and you can see that there is a tenderness in posture alone. He doesn’t even try to put up a front with his expression. It’s plain and simple: a broken, irreparable son giving the last sliver of good he can offer to his mother... The truth.

In summary, Dabi has displayed two things: the giving away of something precious (his identity, tied to his goals and crimes and ongoing life) and blind elation. Most interpret these things as a complex display of vengeance, built atop the foundation of a still human heart. Now.. I do believe the man has a heart. He is certainly human. But humans are scary sometimes.

I don’t think Dabi expects to live. I think he expects to die on that battlefield when he confronts his father. He might not expect to go any further than that. He gave some sort of solace to his mother (as nice as it might’ve been to think him dead, rather than a lost criminal), the possibly last precious person to him in this life.

When suicidal people have finally made the choice, the plans, the preparations for death, they become happy. It’s a misleading thing, actually. They give away what’s important to them, spend a little more time with whoever is most precious to them, then they move on.

I don’t believe that Dabi is looking to die. However, his life’s purpose, which he had been building up to for who knows how long, has finally fallen into place. Once he witnesses or reaches a certain point, I don’t think he will have any complaints about death. And that scares me.

Think about it. His acclaimed ideology is a replicate of Stain’s. Aside from hero society being absolute filth, he believes that if one person has the will for it, they can inflict the change they want to see in the world. And quite frankly? Dabi is very well-equipped for such a thing.

He is a confirmed Todoroki son, son to society’s Number One Hero. Endeavor’s career, fame, prosperity is all at its prime. In public, at least. And Dabi knows this.

Dabi is arguably a perfect candidate to change all that, to inflict the destruction on the world that is his father’s dream. It’s that very dream that chained Rei to Enji, that gave birth to four children, that gave three of those four children complete neglect from their father. That dream, as we all know, has finally been recognized. Without the children. Without the mother. All Endeavor needed was the fall of the great All Might. Now, Endeavor is at the top. And the only direction you can go, after you’ve reached the top, is down.

I wouldn’t put it past Dabi to label himself the manifestation of his father’s corruption and mistreatment of the family. After all, what’s more life-shattering than the Number One’s son turned criminal, killer, and conspirator against society itself? What’s more slandering than the knowledge that the son was not born this evil? That it’s the father’s fault for planting the seeds of long-awaited vengeance?

What’s better than the disgusting climb for morals and virtue, as your old man tries to cry out heartbreak over what you’ve become? What’s better than being the one to kill him? What’s better than forcing him to mayhaps kill you by his own hand? What’s better than letting him know that this is a part of his past, his regrets, his guilt and grief and self-loathing, that he’ll never be able to redeem, fix, and glorify? What’s better than maybe... exposing your old man for what he really is?

Dabi doesn’t necessarily need to do it himself. He just needs to walk up on the stage that is the battlefield, wash his hair dye out, do a twirl, and reclaim the name he had left for dead. Shout it to the world. Go on monologues and maniac speeches for all the heroes to hear. Let them know what Endeavor’s done to his son, to his wife, to his children, to innocent people he didn’t view as humans, but as stepping stones to a dream he didn’t even attain with integrity.

It doesn’t matter who dies. It doesn’t matter who lives. As long as he gets to crush his father’s world, to inflict the change he always wanted to see... he’s happy. Truly, blindingly happy.

disclaimer: i have no idea what the leaks say, only that Dabi’s shirtless and a little dramatic. all my reasoning is based on recalled information, with no check for accuracy. i’m just scared that Dabi is going to canonly die, and the fandom will need to collectively feed itself with coping mechanism fanart and fanfics to pretend our burnt chicken nugget is still with us. have a nice day.

#bnha spoilers #mha spoilers #bnha 290 #mha 290 #dabi #dabi my hero academia #touya todoroki #egg's thoughts #i'm probably an overthinker but i just think this train of thought was cool #i've already thought of counters to prolong Dabi's life for at least one corn chip's worth #but meh #the egg's gotta hoard a little

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impala-in-gotham · 3 years

Text

SPN Finale Theory: Part Two

Finale realizations continued--taking off of Part One

Chuck’s Swan Song Finale 2.0 and Cas Omitted

Throughout the show Chuck is still trying to get the brother vs brother end using His own "blunt instruments" by bringing back Lucifer(s7-15) multiple times, giving Dean the MOC(s10), bringing in AW Michael(s13) and possessing Dean(s14). It never works because free will, love and family always wins.

So... all of s15, minus the last 2 episodes, were filled with all the character development we saw develop and arcs that were the product of "running their own race". THEN Cas dies.

Everything Cas represents fades away in ep 19. The last time we hear his voice is corrupted by Lucifer. (But it also canonically confirms Dean loves Cas.) How he changed Dean’s self-worth, renewed Sam’s hope, and Jack himself is all that’s left of Cas to help change the narrative and defeat Chuck once and for all. He died believing this would come to pass because he saved Dean.

You feel the disconnect happen in between Lucifer and Michael’s deaths and Jack becoming the new God. But even with Chuck the writers no longer in power, its reverted back to before Cas ever interfered. Family is back to only the brothers and the plot is back to hunting monsters. The ending for each brother mirrors the finales of the season before Cas meant something to them. Dean got a season 3 finale since Cas meant something to Dean first and Sam got a season 5 finale since Cas didn’t mean as much to him until s6.

Carry On:

Dean’s character has dwindled back down to his car, pie, rock music, and beer of s3. He even loves dogs again as if he’s pre-hellhound death trauma. Sam’s character has dwindled back down to the baby brother that no longer wants to hunt but there for emotional support of pre-s5. Even the damn journal's back and Jenny for some reason.

Dean’s s3 "at least then my life can mean something" mindset AKA before found family-Bobby reminds him it always did and Cas saves him returns. He dies by getting stabbed in the back mirroring how Sam died in s2 which led to Cas & the apocalypse to begin with. Dean desperately tries to accept it and begs to be told its ok for him to die. It’s as if s15 Dean that doesn’t want to die is battling with s3 Dean who always feared but expected he’d die on a hunt. Cas doesn't save him this time. Since Sam went on to apparently live a very hollow, apple pie life where he was mourning his brother the whole time it mirrors s5 Dean’s life with Lisa. Sam builds a family but his wife is just a stand-in, his son is a Dean jr, and all his memories surround the parents and brother he lost. Cas still doesn’t interfere. Sam also needs assurance to let go.

Even heaven isn't post-s5 accurate despite the claim that Jack and Cas built this to be the heaven Dean dreamed of and deserved. Sure, Jan. Cas is supposedly alive and well but it’s not known or is [Omitted]; however, what Cas represents is not in heaven either.

Everything about Dean’s heaven is pre-Cas or pre-apocalypse canon:

Pre-s4 cast of Bobby, parents, and Rufus are the only ones “known” to be in heaven. Leaving out post5 family like Charlie, Kevin, even Adam. Cas witnessed the grief and guilt their loss had on Dean, plus all 3 were already included in s15 (AW Charlie but still Charlie callback). Cas would have had them there, on or off-screen.

Despite Bobby being there as supposed found family, he’s also dwindled down to the Bobby of s3. He doesn’t even get up and hug Dean who he hasn’t seen since s8 which canonically doesn’t make sense for post s3 reunions for Bobby or Dean. You get reunited from death, you hug each other; its the Supernatural law of the land.

Harvelle's is thee bar and only actual setting in heaven instead of Dean's dream of Rocky's Bar circa s14. Which Cas not only knows is Dean’s dream, he stood in it. Cas never went to Harvelle's and the only time it was heaven-related was s5 as a part of Ash's heaven only. Dean never mentions it after.

The heaven beer is El Sol. The same in Dean's djinn dream(s3) AND in the Beautiful Room(s4). Not the beer that they've been drinking in the bunker for years OR the ones in Rocky's that are real-life Jensen's. And not because it's his favorite like in s3/4 BUT because it was his first/with his Dad....that's what we're going with? That's what Dean dreams about? No.

Despite heaven being new & improved, it's actually similar to s5 Dark Side of the Moon heaven. Baby just appears and Dean has to follow the road which can only lead to Sam. Which Cas does witness but...interesting.

In conclusion, episode 20 was unbelievable because it's an illusion of what Sam and Dean's life/fate/heaven would be without Cas changing the story and without Chuck being in charge of it. It's not real. It's a figment of what could have been post-Swan Song. This is exactly why you can watch up to season 5 then skip 10 entire years and still follow the finale. If anything its part 2 of Swan Song that Kripke wanted but didn't get. Jensen knew it. It deleted 10 yrs because it deleted Cas and everything that resulted because of Cas. I have no idea what all was Omitted but I have a feeling the finale was still this s5 nightmare, I’m just thinking maybe it was on purpose.

Cas/Misha persevered despite the 3-6 ep arc role he was supposed to have and continued challenging God's narrative for 12 years. This is why ALL of us that are screaming into the void, can't move on, and hated the finale just so happen to ALSO be Castiel fans or Cas/Dean Girls or Hellers or any fan that saw how Cas's entire arc was the driving force from s6-15. We know #CastielMatters/Energies because without him the show would have died with him as false-god Godstiel. We recognized the profound effect he had on Dean and Sam throughout their character development.

I didn't make any of this up THEY wrote this into being. They wrote the show. They wrote the characters. They wrote the parallels and the very specifically done set design/lighting. We just saw it through a lens that maybe you can't see without being more like Cas. An outsider, self-loathing, trying our best in a world where it’s easy to do our worst, have more faith in love than God, and maybe even be a little queer too. Yes, it was a story that started out as two brothers hunting monsters but they grew up. The whole show grew up and this is NOT how it ends.

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shamelesslypoetic · 4 years

Text

Autumn Stillness

Summary: The new season’s changing colors remind Roman of things he doesn’t want to remember. Janus helps.

Wordcount: 3.8k

Pairings: roceit, creativitwins (do not tag as remrom), like one line of intrulogical

Warnings: The fic deals with themes of suicide and grieving over a loved one that was a victim of it. Please be safe.

Read on ao3

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A foliage of blood and gold hid Roman and Janus from the glare of the afternoon sun as shadows in the shape of leaves played across Roman’s closed eyelids. The breeze whispered around them pleasantly and Roman cracked his eyes open. He felt too comfortable to move but nonetheless still brought his gaze up to a beautiful face composed of things every human possessed. And yet none, princes with palaces though they may be, could ever replicate such beauty as Janus’.

Looking down at Roman with a bound script, Janus, Roman’s wonderful, gorgeous -- seriously Roman how did you get this lucky -- boyfriend read aloud from a copy of Roman’s Macbeth college script. “The earth hath bubbles as the water has and these are of them. Wither are they vanished?”

Roman dropped his own script to rub his eyes, forgetting to mark it, because dog-earing is blasphemous. Grouchily, he picked it up, breaking character for a moment. “Hey babe? What was the page we’re on again?”

“23,” Janus said with an unimpressed expression.

Roman flipped to the page Janus had directed him to but it took him to an entirely different scene, way after the three witches had departed when Lady Macbeth was reading Macbeth’s letter.

Roman scrunched his nose and narrowed his eyes at Janus, who broke his expression and started laughing.

“You’re impossible,” Roman groused, sleepily flipping back to their scene.

“You love it,” said Janus. That tease. Always playing little tricks like that.

Choosing not to answer Roman stuck his nose into the script and cleared his throat loudly, as Janus continued to chuckle.

“Into the air,” Roman tried for a high assertive delivery but a yawn cut him across, “and what seemed corporal melted as breath into the wind. Would they had stayed!”

Janus smiled and though exhausted, Roman resisted the urge to preen as pride warmed his chest. Janus gently tucked a strand of hair behind Roman’s ear. Roman leaned into the touch, even as he pouted a little. Janus amended his break in character by saying the next line, “Were such things here as we do speak about or have we eaten on the insane root that takes reason prisoner?”

“Your children…” Roman curled up with another yawn as he rested his cheek on Janus’ stomach. “Shall be kings.”

Janus paused, combing a hand through the back of Roman’s head.

“Alright, love, I think you could use a little break,” said Janus .

“That’s not the line,” Roman protested petulantly.

“Really?” Janus drawled, nails finding the perfect spot in Roman’s scalp that made him wilt into his touch just so. “A tragedy, because I could totally see Macbeth and Banquo in a relationship.”

“One murders the other. Is that your idea of an epic love story?” Roman asked as he laid his script beside him.

Janus mirrored his movement as he turned his attention to Roman. “There’s a morbid poeticness to it, wouldn’t you say?”

“I’d say you’ve been hanging out with Remus too much,” said Roman. “Thought I was your boyfriend.”

Janus didn’t reply. Instead he leaned down and pressed a lingering kiss to Roman’s forehead.

In response, Roman took his boyfriend's hand and kissed the artful splotches of light and dark that wound from his palm to his fingers. The space between them filled with October air’s gentle lullaby, caressing their cheeks and blowing Roman’s hair as he gazed up into mismatched eyes.

“You know, Remus actually ate a raw onion the other day,” Roman said finally, scoffing to hide the breathy tremble in his voice. “His breath stank so badly I couldn’t even sit within five feet of him. And the - the trashy bastard made it a point to get all in my face whenever he asked for something.” Roman shook his head, focusing on a point beyond the canopy of leaves arching down around them to a sliver of cloud. He kept his gaze there, saying the words in spite of his heart, “I hate him so much, I swear to Zeus.”

Janus raised his eyebrows and Roman huffed.

“I’m serious, sometimes he drives me up the wall. Personal space isn’t even in his vocabulary.” Roman’s skin itched with the memory, and he felt all scratchy and bothered as he continued, “Remember when he broke my alarm clock and then put it all back together so I didn’t even know until it was ringing and falling apart? I still wonder if he did it on purpose.”

Janus looked at him with a perfectly blank expression but Roman could still make out the gentle concern simmering behind his eyes. “You know he didn’t.”

“He’s a nuisance, Jan, he makes life a nightmare.” Roman paused as his throat closed up. Managing a rushed stream of wet words around the painful squeeze, he choked out, “And I miss him so damn much, I miss him everyday.” He turned away and his cheek dug into Janus’ knee.

Unable to help himself as his chest constricted, Roman brought a hand to clutch at his own shirt where his heart insisted on wrapping itself with a zip-tie. “I, I’d let him break that clock a thousand times over. It hurts so badly, Janus, it hurts, how do I make it stop?”

His voice took on a desperate, helpless quality, composure crumbling as easily as the leaves broken by the wind.

“Why did he have to go?” Roman demanded, snapping his neck back, glowering with all the conviction of a thousand embers as if he could pry the answers out of his boyfriend, as if he’d been there when Remus made his decision. “Why did he do that? How could he! We loved him and he knew, he knew what this would do to us. Have you even seen Logan since the funeral?”

And suddenly the breeze wasn’t so perfect anymore, rather a wry illusion of something that shouldn’t exist now that his brother was gone. Shapes and colors that offended him with their vividness. The birds continued singing and the leaves still dared to rustle merrily and it all made Roman’s blood boil. He had always seen the beauty in things -- the gold, the glitter, the shimmer -- even when Remus ruined things for him with his tales of gore and paintings of dead animals. But now he wasn’t fucking there. Remus couldn’t ruin anything anymore and yet everything was so far beyond ruined Roman didn’t believe he’d ever feel okay again.

“Do you think…” Roman stopped, lowering his voice into a strangled whisper. He couldn’t breathe. “You think it was my fault?”

Janus’ gaze turned from sympathy to horror in an instant as he reached for his hand. “Roman, no.”

“But it is!” Roman sat up, pulling away entirely and sitting across from Janus. He brought the heels of his hands to his eyes as pressure built in the back of them. His voice swam in confusion and guilt and so much sorrow. “I always made him feel like less didn’t I?” He chuckled bitterly. “Just always had to be the best at everything.”

Petty sibling rivalry and a selfish need to prove himself haunted him till he wanted to do nothing more than lay down and ferment into a mattress, resigning everyone to perceive him as a failure. Because in all honesty, Roman Castillo was a failure, he’d failed to save one of the people who mattered most in his life.

He’d failed to save his brother.

“Aren’t I just perfect,” Roman chuckled wetly, bitter and acidic. “Roman pretty boy fucks up big time, can you even fathom such a thing?”

“You were children, Roman,” Janus said, as if that erased the voices that went raw with screaming, the doors slammed and the tears shed when Remus thought Roman couldn’t hear and how Roman, though it killed him, hadn’t moved to comfort him in those years. Too tangled with his pride until it didn’t matter that he’d changed and wanted to do right by Remus anymore.

Memories slipped through the cracks between his fingers and his ears and eyes until he was bleeding all over. The realization he’d muffled ever since he got that fateful call now rose at full force.

“I never apologized, I didn’t tell him enough that I loved him and that he meant something to me and that he didn’t need to be an attention-seeking overachiever to be worthy of anything. I didn’t tell him these things and now I’ll never get to.” He shook his head, digging his hand into his arm. “God, what was wrong with me? Why didn’t I talk to him more instead of getting wrapped up in my own life and my life alone like a selfish idiot?”

Janus sighed, brows furrowed as he surveyed Roman. Roman could only stare back, blazing with defiance and self-loathing. But he felt so fragile. Lost. Helpless.

“Remus was never about sentiments,” Janus said after what seemed like an eternity. His lips quirked slightly, though Roman knew he must be hurting too. He noticed Janus picking at the burn scar on his left hand and still he didn’t say anything. Normally he’d chastise him softly, he’d take his hand and kiss it but all he could do was listen and fight back his tears in vain.

“I think he flicked tuna, was it? - at you when you tried to get heartfelt one time?”

Roman let out something halfway between a sob and a laugh. “He could drown me in tuna and I’d be happy if only he…” The smile fell, Roman’s gaze lowering. “He…”

“There’s nothing you could have done, Roman. You didn’t know.”

Roman stared. How could Janus resign to the common thing people said in a situation like this? His own boyfriend for Hera’s sake! Of all people! Janus was pretending, sugarcoating the bitter, ugly truth, and Roman couldn’t stand it.

“You know that’s not true!” Roman cried out. That Janus had even bothered with common courtesy was ridiculous and infuriating. “I’m his twin brother, I was with him before we were even born. If I didn’t see, then who could have?”

He fell quiet for a moment, shoulders shaking with his uneven breaths.

Janus opened his mouth as if to say something but Roman, unable to hear lies and deception anymore, cut him off. “Try and convince me I didn’t just make the biggest mistake of my life if you want but you’re lying, Janus!”

He deserved to feel this, deserved what Remus had done. Janus was lying to him. That’s what he did, adorn and lie and deny.

Roman’s chest rose and fell, his heart giving spasming jerks. Revolting against him. His whole body revolted against him. He hated this. Hated himself. Hated Remus. Hated him and missed him and loved him and god he just wanted this all to end!

As time dragged on his composure wore down into nothing and Roman ran his hands through his own hair, pulling it out of order, nearly screaming as his voice cracked and quivered. “Please just say the truth, tell me I’m crazy. Shout, scream at me, I deserve every miserable wretched thing that could happen.” He broke off, panting, then his words grew shriller as they burst out of him in a final desperate plea. “Stop lying to me already!”

Janus’ voice slashed through the air, the loudest Roman had heard it that day. “I’m not lying to you, Roman!”

Roman stilled. Frozen completely like a rabbit locked in a snake’s eyes as his heart thudded wildly in his chest, ears ringing. He wanted to believe Janus. He desperately wanted to, but knew he couldn’t.

“I don’t need to lie to you,” Janus repeated. Softer, but still firm.

Tears welled up in Roman’s throat and he swallowed again and again. Took a deep breath. Closed his eyes and willed the world to disappear as he listened.

“Yes you could have done more, we all could have,” Janus allowed, and Roman felt a bit of satisfaction as his heart squeezed itself into a fist. As Janus went on, however, the satisfaction disappeared. “There were signs we must have missed, words we left unsaid but in the end it was his choice. Dwelling on it won’t undo what’s been done and Remus wouldn’t have wanted you to suffer like this.”

Roman furrowed his brow. Coarse grass fisted in his grip. “Why else would he leave us?”

Janus shook his head. “He was suffering, Roman,” he said. “He did it because he was in pain and wanted that pain to stop, not pass it on.”

That...made sense and Roman hated that it made sense because if he’d just asked, Roman would have been there for him because that’s what they did. They fought like all siblings did but in the end they were there for each other and Roman wanted to be there for Remus so what happened?

His thoughts faltered as Janus continued, “But the world won’t stop, not for him, and not for you, and you’re still alive, Roman. You have to act like it.”

Janus stopped and waited for him. He reached between them, tapping Roman’s fist for permission. Roman nodded, unfurling his sore palm as Janus took his hand in his; a camradieri, a comfort, a silent acknowledgement between them. I’m here.

“Don’t you miss him too though?” Roman asked quietly. “Like, he was your best friend and I barely hear you speak of him anymore.”

“I do, of course I do but I console myself with the knowledge I still have you,” Janus told him and Roman resisted the urge to scoff in the back of his throat. Like he was anything worthwhile.

“Here, now, I’m with you and we’re both alive even if not entirely alright, isn’t that something?”

Roman gave a biting laugh, incredulous. “Thought you were all about the existential dread and meaningless of life.”

“That’s Virgil you’re talking about.”

Roman snorted. “Same difference.”

Roman could almost forget the subject of their conversation amidst their light-hearted banter if not for the incessant twist in his heart but he sobered up all too soon. Back into bleak reality again, his lower lip quivered as he attempted to speak. “I envy you, you know? And every other person who has a sibling. It’s not fair, it’s not fair that you all get to have this and I don’t anymore.”

No more bickering. No more cooking barely edible things at 2 am and convincing each other it’s ambrosia. No more pillow fights and grimaces of disgust that actually radiate affection. No more noise at night. No more noise at all.

Too quiet. Everything was suddenly so quiet.

“You - You better cherish Virgil,” Roman choked out. “When you get home you better tell him you love him and hug him or I’ll personally assassinate you.”

Janus took the bait, smiling. “How sexy of you, my dear. Thought you didn’t agree on the inherent romanticism of murder.”

Roman leaned forward dramatically, head spinning with the need to be supported as he brought his forehead to Janus’ shoulder on a whine, relishing in the momentary reprieve. “You’re the worst.”

“I know,” Janus said coyly, stroking the back of Roman’s head. “But you still love me.”

“Correction, it’s why I love you.”

“I love you too.” Janus paused in his grounding movement on Roman’s head and Roman bit back another, far more needy whine. He tried to follow but Janus reached out and took Roman’s face in his hands, looking him right in the eye with a burning sincerity normally so foreign to him. And it did look foreign on his clever love’s face, the usual silver-toned, flattering words buried under the weight of the intensity in his gaze. “Look, Roman, I won’t tell you it gets easier because it doesn’t.”

Roman cupped Janus’ hands on his face, desperate and helpless again, chasing after the truth in the words even as smoke clouded over his understanding. Though he tried to hold onto every word they flew away from him, like mist wisping out in morning air. Roman wanted to write them down, solidify them somewhere so he could focus.

“Losing a loved one is always, always going to be painful. I’m not here to give you an inspiring speech about life or tell you that it’ll get better but you just have to live with it, my love, and eventually learn to accept it.”

“I miss him though.” Roman said, pulling back only to take Janus’ hands in his. He needed this, needed to feel their skin pressed together and be reaffirmed. Something was still missing and Roman had a feeling it would be that way for a long time but he looked down at where they were joined and it at least gave him the strength to speak. “It really does feel like I’m acting. And sure he irritated me to no end and he made my life hell half the time but it’s not living without him. It’s not a life worth living if he’s not in it.” A shaky exhale, a squeeze of hands and the retribution in words, some comfort in their echo. “I miss him.”

“Don’t shy away from that then, let yourself remember him, and cherish the memories you have. Don’t forget him.”

Roman froze, every muscle in his body shutting down. Suddenly the other’s touch was ice that burned. He snatched his hand back and folded them on his lap as he stared at Janus, throat working and eyes watering even as he glared. How could he? How could he repeat the words on Remus’ last note to him outright like that?

“You didn’t listen to him enough before,” Janus persisted but he didn’t try to reach out again. “You can start now, it’ll be painful but you can miss him and still live. You can remember him and still create new memories. None of that is mutually exclusive.”

Roman jerked and threw his hands up. “So I just torture myself by remembering everything we’ll never have again? Brilliant.” The urge to fight dwindled but he still bit out, “What’s the point if he’s never coming back?”

“You say that like he ever stopped being your brother.” Janus fixed him with a gentle but firm gaze. “He didn’t. He never will.”

Roman’s breath hitched in his throat and he fisted the hem of his shirt, staring, shoulders shaking. Janus didn’t stop. Roman wasn’t sure he wanted him to even as he tore his gaze away, fighting the urge to clamp his hands over his ears.

“He’s still your brother and wherever Remus is, I’m sure he remembers you too.”

Roman wanted to say something more, retaliate again. He didn’t deserve this comfort and understanding offered to him but he just collapsed on Janus and started crying the way he hadn’t let himself since the funeral.

He’d laid in his bed heaving and red-eyed every night with a pounding head and heart staring at the empty bed on the other side of the room in agony. But the tears wouldn’t come, he wouldn’t allow himself that relief. Now they spilled freely, a broken dam inside him letting out all the floodwaters he’d harboured for so long.

He didn’t know where he started and Janus ended as his love held him through it, gripping him tightly, his warmth a blessing. Grounding and perfect and just what he needed.

Behind his eyelids Remus came and went in waves. Memories and random features alike floating around his mind. Gap-toothed smile, then with braces he constantly picked at, then gap-toothed again when he chipped his incisor during a bar fight. He was everything Roman wasn’t: pig-headed and inelegant and a bit of a dumbass. But he was brave and meant well and nothing mattered more and now he was gone but that didn’t mean he’d never been there.

Roman could remember him. He would, every day.

When his sobs finally subsided into soft gasps and hiccups, the sun had dipped below the horizon and lilacs and blues started hovering over them, mirroring the way Roman felt. There was still a bit of light left, the crimson of the sun breaking out in fiery streaks, insistent to its last breath.

All the while Janus held him and when Roman pulled back, he stayed close. Roman eventually returned to their original position, laying his head down on Janus’ lap and letting him stroke his hair as a few more tears slipped out of his closed eyes into his ears.

After a while in the silence, Janus held up the two scripts and asked, “Do you want to pick up where we left off?”

Roman didn’t quite register the question through the fuzziness in his head though he knew what Janus had said. He looked up, face tacky and stiff and wet, searching the mismatched pair above him for something. He really didn’t know what he was doing until he’d brought Janus down to him and sighed in a sort of broken relief as he pressed their lips together. The kiss shared was brief and chaste but warm and reassuring nonetheless as Janus cupped Roman’s face in answer. I’m here. I’m not leaving any time soon.

“Thank you,” Roman whispered, eyes still closed. His heart eased its fist finally, the leftover twinge faint and bearable -- for the time being.

“You’re welcome, love. Always.” Janus answered, jasmine breath washing over Roman’s lips. They savoured the moment together, suspended in each other’s soft gazes where the pain could only lurk at the edges of Roman’s consciousness.

When one of them spoke again it was Roman, coarse but sure and clear, “I think we should go check up on Logan.”

Roman lived.

It was difficult and it hurt and he stumbled, barely catching himself each time. There was always -- and always would be -- a space that should have been occupied by Remus’ presence. At birthdays. At every occasion and non-occasion, a gaping hole burned itself into Roman’s days and more than half the time he couldn’t take it. But he kept on pushing. He went to a therapist and talked. Stopped being angry at his brother for leaving. Fought back the part of him that wanted to leave too.

He got his college degree and scanned the crowd hoping Remus would pop up between the sea of faces to throw a pebble at him. His eyes eventually fell on Janus, clapping his hands together and looking at Roman proudly. He was there for Roman, just like Virgil and Logan and his parents and everyone else in his life that also mattered. They couldn’t ever replace his brother, and all the years they would never have, but they were there.

And so Roman lived. He remembered Remus every day, and lived.

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A/N: The tl;dr of my closing note on ao3 is basically this. Please please don't kill yourself you're not alone reach out you deserve to be helped, I'm not a professional I'm just one girl writing a story that resonates with her. Roman isn't perfect and his understanding of the situation is fucked up cause he's human and learning but nothing he said about Remus' motivations is true. No one does it for revenge get Hannah Baker out of your head. Thanks so much for reading and stay hydrated.

Tag list (ask to be added/removed): @drown-in-lava-choke-on-rubies @seouqi @ymmm-someone

#sanders sides #sanders sides fic #roman sanders #roman sanders angst #ts roman #janus sanders #remus sanders #creativitwins angst #tw suicide #past character death #roceit #refrenced intrulogical #my writing #dried ink #autumn stillness

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loopy777 · 4 years

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in your version of republic city, how would you have rewritten the sato family to fit into it? would asamis dad dislike his roots(secretly or openly) and how would that have affected his daughter(i know he essentially started from the streets too, but i cant really say i ever got the impression he was a low class man who rose up to become the highest of the high)? there seems like there was a lot of potential in his backstory and how it would affect his life, but its never really fully used.

For the record, Hiroshi describes his own backstory as, “I, too, came from humble beginnings. Why, when I was your age, I was a mere shoe-shiner and all I had to my name was an idea: the Satomobile. Now, I was fortunate enough to meet someone who believed in me and my work ethic. He gave me the money I needed to get my idea off the ground. And I built the entire Future Industries Empire from that one, selfless loan.“

That’s a fairly textbook version of the Ideal American Success Story, so I don’t think there’s a lot to change with it. But I agree that he’s little more than an archetype, and his rather extreme belief in the Equalistsnever seemed to reallymesh with it.

Let’s see how we can improve things.

Regardless of my new vision of the character, I think it’s safe to say the he dislikes his roots. I mean, who wouldn’t dislike being poor? All those dumb “There are some things money can’t buy!” and “Money is the root of all evil!” aphorisms ignore the fact that being poor is a bad thing, and no one likes it, and all the nice things it’s still possible to have while poor – like family and love and purpose and health and whatnot – are even better with a good income.

So, yes, I think Hiroshi dislikes being poor.

I’m not sure what you mean about getting the impression of him being low-class. To me, “low-class” is more a state of mind and behavior not tied to actual income class. Plenty of poor people know how to behave or can be taught, and lots of people who start out on the top of the world and get the best education all their lives still somehow wind up behaving like neanderthals.If you mean things like HIroshi having a taste for hotdogs over caviar, I consider those kinds of characteristics to be pretty superfluous.

If you mean that his accomplishments don’t fit with his education, I think it’s safe to say that he’s both a genius and got himself either a formal or informal education. Perhaps he used that loan to take some classes, or maybe he just hung around places where professionals were building things and picked up enough to design a car in his head. I expect he also employed some engineers with degrees, and made sure that Asami got the best education money can buy, and he himself probably picked things up as required to fulfill his vision. Him being a visionary seems to be what made him such a success, and that’s the type of thing that a disadvantaged background can aid; if you have a close-up view of difficulties in people’s lives, you’re well-poised to come up with ideas to solve those difficulties.

I think there was an attempt on the part of the storytellers to portray Hiroshi as not being a snob because of his past, but that was with Mako, and unfortunately that got eaten by his Equalist alignment. Still, no one acted like it was out of character for Hiroshi to give help or opportunity to the disadvantaged. Although I do think poor people who become rich are certainly able to develop into snobs, I think the idea is that Hiroshi isn’t entirely lying when he says he remembers his big break and wants to pay it forward. One could even say that his Equalist involvement, which at least paid lip-service to empowering the disenfranchised, is partially motivated by his desire to help lift up people like him.

So I don’t think the Satos need to be rewritten much to fit into my vision of Republic City; I had Hiroshi’s backstory in mind for it. I do think some more could be made of his savvy; he was portrayed in LoK as being of use to the Equalists mainly as an arms-supplier, but I think more could have been done with him being a Man Of The City, able to advise Amon and make connections on all levels of society. In fact, I could see Hiroshi being at the root of the Equalist movement’s rhetoric. It’s revealed at the end of Book Air that Amon is mainly about self-loathing and a death wish, so perhaps all that stuff about equality and opportunity for nonBenders came from Hiroshi. Hiroshi is the one who wants to transform society, and Amon went with it as a cynical way to lash out and drag people into misery with him.

Something I would change, though, is making the root of Hiroshi’s evil the death of his wife via A Firebender. It’s minimally plausible, but there’s no way to keep it from sounding stupid. At the same time, baking a nonBender resentment into his whole life would make his double-life a little more implausible; racists are usually bad at hiding it.

I think my ideal origin for his hatred should be the organized crime in Republic City, especially the Bender-based gangs. Hiroshi rose up through the ranks of the city the ‘right’ way, and I can see him as being resentful of the criminals who rig the system against honest people. The thing that makes those gangs so powerful is their muscle and money, and their Bending makes both of those things a lot more attainable. It’s a bit less random than A Firebender, because any single criminal can punch above his weight by acquiring a deadly weapon, whether it’s Firebending or a good knife, but a whole underground society of such people who were all born with built-in weaponry is a worrying trend, and I think that would be more likely to inspire the kind of systemic hatred that Hiroshi showed.

So, I think Hiroshi’s origin should be changed so that, when he refused to bow to some demand of the Bender gangs, his family became their target. Perhaps Lightning Bolt Zolt tried to lean on Hiroshi to allow his workers to form a (super corrupt, fully infiltrated by mob stooges) union, adding a little ambiguity to Hiroshi’s supposed commitment to helping the disadvantaged. So Zolt or whoever ordered Hiroshi’s wife killed. Nothing could be proven, but Hiroshi knows what happened. He arranged, by donating to the police and politicians, for the guy who did it (a low-level Firebender gang member) to go to jail for something, but he couldn’t get the bosses. Hiroshi only has money, while the bosses have both money and a ruthless tendency for violence. And that’s eating at him. Society is too corrupt to deal with those fiends. They claim to help the poor, but really they oppress anyone who doesn’t pay and serve them. And it’s all brought about by the power they’re born with, power they wouldn’t have if they had to deal with the same circumstances as Hiroshi. Their Bending gives them an advantage, and they use it to build a city-wide system designed to hurt good people.

Then Hiroshi meets Amon, they inspire each other, and the Equalists are born.

The nice thing about this is that it also lays the seeds for Hiroshi’s redemption. Because if Korra and Mako and Asami take down crime boss who had Hiroshi’s wife killed, while he himself is in jail for his part in Amon’s grand attempt at suicide-by-cop, then what does that say about his prejudices? Hiroshi is smart, and he’s an engineer, so he can’t completely dismiss evidence like that. Perhaps it eats away at him for a few years, combined with his guilt at how he fought against Asami, and then he realizes how wrong he went. (Perhaps the story should be changed so that he didn’t consciously try to kill Asami? That always seemed a bit much to pair with his easy off-screen conversion.) He realizes he went about things all wrong, and the people he tried to kill did what he originally wanted better than he could. Power isn’t what corrupts; it’s hate. And so he relinquishes his hate, devotes himself to love, and winds up sacrificing himself to save Asami out of love.

Except I wouldn’t have it happen against a giant robot. That thing looked stupid, as deliciously ironic as it was for Hiroshi to lose his life against a bigger version of stuff he made for Amon. Perhaps he dies going up against Amon II, some dude who took up Amon’s name and cause.

#thekingofwinterblog

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mars-colony · 5 years

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alrighty! so before I go and rb it, can you do 3-6,8,9,12,19,20,23,25,26,31-33?

Thank you so much for asking so many questions! I’ve answered 3 and 5 previously, but the rest were brand new! This is really long so I’m going to put it under a read more. Apologies for the angst train! Some of these ones ended up kind of fluffy tho!

4. Does your OC have nightmares? What do they contain?Dollie has had her fair share of nightmares. From watching Nate die again and again, to deathclaws, to strange blurry confusion of what the Institute might be like. She’s dreamt of losing her friends to swarms of ferals, she’s had several rough dreams in particular where she couldn’t move and had to watch Danse being overwhelmed by feral ghouls without being able to help him.

6. What would get your OC to make themselves disappear?Dollie does this from time to time. When she can’t process things or the Commonwealth gets to be too much she just drops off the map for a few days, sometimes weeks. If you know her well enough she’s usually at the Red Rocket or held up in Home Plate. She values her time alone because it lets her gather her thoughts and build herself back up to keep moving forward.

I can’t think of a situation where she’d disappear completely. During Blind Betrayal, she was ready to drop everything and go with Danse, and I think that’s the closest she gets to disappearing. Otherwise, her sense of responsibility is far too great for her to quit.

8. What is the closest your OC has come to death?Aside from a few instances of almost being drowned by a feral that was trying to tear off her face, being choked out by a raider, or deadly radiation poisoning, the closest Dollie has come to death was getting shot close range with a shot gun. She was sedated in sick bay on the Prydwen for several days. Recoup was rough.

She’s been close to death once pre-war, but that’s a story for another time.

9. What is the greatest sacrifice your OC could ever make? Under what circumstance would they make it?

The greatest sacrifice Dollie makes is Shaun. She makes the decision to let her biological son go in order to save the Commonwealth. It kills her, and in the end she can’t really come to terms with it so she just doesn’t. The Institute was going to leave the Commonwealth for dead, and there was no way she could let that happen. One life for many. Her choice practically made itself.

12. To what extent would your OC go to survive?When Shaun’s safety is still in question, there is literally nothing Dollie wouldn’t do to survive. She’ll do whatever it takes to get to him and make sure he’s safe. If she hadn’t run into Preston or Recon Squad Gladius when she did, it’s likely that her moral compass would have cracked and she would have made some darker choices. Seeing that morality was alive in the Wasteland so early on was very important for her mental well-being.

19. What is your OC’s preferred method of death?Dollie wouldn’t want something long suffering. She had to watch her mother’s violent battle with late stage cancer, and that’s not something she’d want to live through. She’d want something quick and clean. She wouldn’t want to die for nothing, also. If her death had purpose or was for something, that would be better. At most she’d want a few moments to tidy up, to tell the person she was with that she loved them, appreciated them, or thank them, and then she could try to be at peace with everything.

20. How does your OC sleep at night?For a long time after the vault, Dollie has a very intimate relationship with the ceiling. She doesn’t sleep for more than an hour or two at a time, and just lies there staring upward. She spends most of her first several months running on fumes and completely exhausted. She sleeps best when Danse is watching her back. She trusts his constant vigilance and his quick perception. She feels like when he’s there nothing bad is going to happen, which is definitely something you want to hold onto in the Wasteland.

After a while she becomes a lighter sleeper which helps her get more sleep, because she’s less worried about not waking up if something bad happens. She also has fewer nightmares, because she becomes kind of desensitized to them. When every waking moment is practically a nightmare, the nightmares aren’t so scary anymore.

23. Would your OC be considered good or bad by an outsider?I firmly believe that Dollie would be considered good. Despite all of her troubles she goes out of her way to make the Commonwealth a better place with the Minutemen. She doesn’t ask for anything in return from her settlements, and her help is not conditional. While some people would be very wary of that and slow to trust, she proves herself with unwavering kindness. She’s very patient and doesn’t force people to join the Minutemen’s cause. Even if they didn’t want to, she’d still offer help.

25. What does your OC love most, and what would they do to keep it?Dollie always wanted a quiet life with little conflict. That life became a very idyllic dream after the bombs and the vault. But when she met Preston and the settlers, she found a scrap of that dream still alive. So in a literal sense, Dollie is fighting to make the Commonwealth a safer, more peaceful place. With the help of the Minutemen she hopes to make her dream a reality for everyone in the Commonwealth.

26. Has your OC ever had unrequieted feelings of any kind for someone?That’s the fun of a slow burn isn’t it? After Nate’s death she’s very hung up on him, and has a lot of trouble recognizing her feelings. Once she realizes she’s falling for someone else she feels an incredible amount of shame and guilt. She keeps those feelings to herself, not just because of the guilt, but because of who the person is. Falling in love with Paladin Danse is honestly a mixed bag. He’s an incredible person, he makes her laugh, makes her feel safe, they share a lot of the same values, and he has an incredible way of getting through the toughest walls she’s built around herself. There’s never an elephant in the room with Danse. He addresses problems as they arise, and she’s never had someone like that. She has literally never felt closer to anyone in her life. But he’s her commanding officer. And his first love will always be the Brotherhood of Steel. Even if he reciprocated her feelings, he’d never put his place in the Brotherhood in jeopardy. She also doesn’t want to lose his friendship, so she doesn’t act on her feelings.

Another unrequieted emotion she harbored was resentment. She felt a lot of resentment toward Nate because he had a comfy life before he willingly joined the military. His family had immense wealth, his parents had top notch health care, all around he led a privileged life. He also had very harsh stances on certain topics, like addiction and mental health, that Dollie saw as coming directly from his life of privilege. However, Nate changed a lot after his time in Anchorage. He became a much more open minded person and definitely wanted to do things without his parent’s help. Nate and Dollie’s relationship was getting stronger every day. She was opening up to him, at a glacial pace, but he was still the first person she ever let into her life.

31. Would your OC torture?No. I can’t think of an instance when Dollie would ever allow torture to occur on her watch. As someone who studied government and history so closely, she believes that all things said under acts of torture are void in a court of law because they come from fear. This belief holds true in the Wasteland. She believes that torture is completely useless and is nothing but cruelty. It serves no purpose.

32. Does your OC hate? To what extent?Dollie had never truly hated anyone until Kellogg. Watching helplessly as he destroyed her entire world definitely cemented him into her memory. She loathed him completely and felt no sympathy for him. That hatred led her to Diamond City and to finding Valentine. That hatred led her to Fort Hagen where Kellogg met his fate. All in all, Dollie’s hatred has to be justified. She doesn’t hate for no reason, and she doesn’t hate over petty things. She deeply loathes some people, but so far, the only person she’s hated (other than a healthy dose of self-hatred) was Kellogg.

33. How does your OC let out anger?Dollie is a bottler. She bottles up her emotions until they explode. She can harbor massive amounts of anger before she finally snaps. The last straw is typically an unlucky raider who pushes one too many buttons. There has been an instance of her taking that anger out on other people, namely Danse, when he really didn’t deserve it, but after that she went out of her way to apologize for the behavior. Before the war she didn’t “get” angry. Meaning she bottled it up even worse and didn’t talk about it. Sometimes she’d vent to her sister on the phone, but she didn’t have a real outlet. She put some of that to use in court, but otherwise she kind of became a ticking time bomb. Post war, if she gets too mad she’ll just let out a snarl, fight some raiders, and feel better.

#justaname02 #angst questions #my oc #sole survivor dollie wallace #i'm impressed with myself for answering these today #they went pretty quick actually

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murasaki-murasame · 7 years

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Thoughts on Owarimonogatari Season 2 [Ougi Dark]

Yet again, this took longer than expected, lol. For some reason I’ve been a bit intimidated by how long this might take to watch and write about, even though it’s only three episodes long. But I’m still genuinely excited to see how it goes.

It’ll probably be another few weeks or so before I have time to get back into rewatching the earlier parts of the franchise, but I’ll try and get back into that sooner rather than later.

Thoughts under the cut

PART ONE:

Ooh boy that was a whole lot of talking. Not that that’s anything rare for this series, but it’s almost draining to get through a lot of plot-important exposition all at once. I’m not entirely sure I got all of it, but I think I did.

Starting from the beginning, I thought there was meant to be a recap of sorts called Araragi’s Story, but I guess whoever subbed this didn’t bother with it and cut it out? That sucks. But it probably wasn’t anything super important.

The beginning narration scene by Araragi was really nice, and helped set the mood for this being the final part of the story. Well, final part of the main story, at least. After this we still have Zoku-Owari, Off Season, and Monster Season to adapt, not to mention anything that comes out after that. But you get what I mean.

The OP was nice, but not quite as good as I was hoping for. I think I prefer the Ougi Formula OP over it. I might like it more once the arc’s done, though, since there’s a whole lot of symbolism that’d probably feel more effective with the full context of this arc. Also, it’s still kinda interesting to me how Ougi’s VA’s singing voice sounds really different to her Ougi voice. I’d be hard-pressed to realize that it was the same VA if I didn’t know it was.

I knew that this arc would start with a whole lot of talking as everyone basically recaps the current situation and their motives and plans, but damn that was still a whole lot of talking in not a long period of time. Wow.

A lot of people seem to dislike Gaen, probably because she tends to exist for the sake of giving lengthy exposition like this, but I like her. Something about her whole character just appeals to me, and I like listening to her talk. Her whole casual punk outfit and her smartphone obsession and whatnot are a really interesting contrast with what sort of a character she is, and what purpose she serves in the story. I also love how half the time when she talks, the sky turns rainbow-coloured. In general I love her rainbow theme.

It’s really cool seeing Shinobu in her complete form. You don’t exactly see it often. I kinda forgot that she’s actually really tall. Her playing around with Yotsugi to ‘get back at her’ for all the insults was surprisingly cute.

I should have figured that we’d get more talks about the shrine and the lake and whatnot since that’s been built up for the last two arcs pretty heavily. And, well, a large part of the entire story, really. It’s nice to get one big recap about the main points on it, even if it was kinda hard to keep track of. But I get it. I’m pretty sure it had already been said before, but I kinda forgot that it was Shinobu who destroyed the shrine at the lake originally, so that actually helps make things click more in my head.

It makes sense that they’re deciding to enshrine Hachikuji as the new shrine god to keep her around in the real world, and to help restore balance more. I probably should have seen that as a possibility. Although I can’t exactly blame myself for not getting all of the stuff to do with slugs and snails. That came a bit out of left field.

I knew that Ougi wasn’t exactly the Darkness, but it’s interesting to hear that she’s still trying to ‘perform the same role as the Darkness’. Well, that’s exactly what she’s been doing this whole time, but still.

I’m PRETTY sure I’ve been told what her true identity is, but I won’t bring it up until it’s explicitly stated. Though with the ‘reveal’ at the end of this part, of Ougi being an apparition, I feel like it’s pretty obvious. But even from before this arc it was fairly obvious. I mean, it was always clear that she wasn’t human. She was always too immediately alien, too inhuman, too strange to not be an apparition of some kind. And the fact that she clearly has some ability to mess with people’s thoughts and memories. And that one time in Ougi Formula where she, like, slithered through the air around Araragi’s head. You get what I mean. And at that point it’s not TOO difficult to guess at her ‘origin’. But the whole Darkness thing does kinda throw things off and make it more unclear. At least before it gets shot down.

The weird thing about this arc is that we know in advance that Ougi’s not going to die. Since she shows up in Hana, which obviously takes place after this arc. So that kinda spoils the fact that things aren’t going to go Gaen’s way. But obviously if Nisioisin allowed us to know that in advance, then it’s not going to be much of a big deal in the end. It does make me pretty curious to see how this arc will actually end, though.

PART TWO:

And so the truth comes out! As I suspected. Or, well, as I was spoiled. But even without being spoiled on it, the truth is pretty to guess.

Before I get into talking about all that, I first want to say that I’m so, so happy we got a section with Nadeko. Seeing her again like this is so great. I’m so proud of her. I love that she’s pursuing what she wants to do. She’s obviously grown a lot as a person, which is immediately visible through the fact that she cut her fringe short, since that was always the shield she used to avoid confrontation. I also kinda like how ‘not cute’ she looks in her outfit there. It feels like she’s accepted that she doesn’t have to stick rigidly to ‘being cute’ at all times, and can just be herself.

The whole section with Ougi and Tsukihi was pretty interesting, and kinda melancholic. I wasn’t really expecting Ougi to be thrown off by Tsukihi’s attitude that much. I’m still not fully sure what to make of Tsukihi as a character. She and Karen just sorta feel . . . not super fleshed out. Maybe it’s just been too long since I watched Nise. But I still liked their conversation. And it also makes more sense when you get to the end of this episode and get told that she was seeking out Tsukihi because of Araragi’s feelings of guilt and uncertainty about if it’s right for Tsukihi to keep living the way she is.

Getting back more to the start of the episode, I liked the whole explanation about how since Ougi’s entire existence is ‘a lie’, since she’s specifically an ‘impersonation’ of the Darkness, then she herself would become a target of the Darkness once her true identity is revealed, and her identity as ‘a lie’ is upturned. It fits the internal logic of the series. I also really liked the visuals and direction of that specific scene. Especially the part that looked a little like that part in Shinobu Time where it has the side-scrolling painting.

Also I kinda had to laugh at the goddamn ‘fan’ pun. Wow. That was kinda . . . on the nose. I forget if it had actually been established that Ougi was introduced to Araragi as a fan of Kanbaru’s, but it makes a lot of sense now that we know her existence is heavily tied with the Rainy Devil and that whole scenario. So I guess this also helps contextualize the fact that we saw Ougi talk with Kanbaru in Hana.

The fact that Ougi was an apparition created by Araragi was something I knew in advance, maybe since before I even saw Owari S1, but I didn’t know the exact specifics of it, so the fact that she’s literally the representation of how harsh Araragi is on himself was a bit of a surprise. It makes sense, though. I kinda want to get the timeline straight on this one, to remember when exactly Ougi entered the scene. I know that we more or less first saw her in Nadeko Medusa, but we know now that the entire first half of Owari S1 happened directly before that, and I think that’s when Ougi was first introduced, chronologically. I’m not sure, though.

I really like this reveal. At least since it really ties the whole story together, and contextualizes the place Araragi himself has in the story, on both a practical and thematic level. Considering how big of a narrative point his self-loathing and indecision has been, it works really well that Ougi is literally the living representation of that. And the fact that she exists for that purpose helps explain her motives for doing what she does. That is, since Araragi deep down thinks that he’s continually doing the wrong thing, that he’s over-stepping his bounds, that he’s upsetting the natural order of things. I wonder if this also implies that he knew subconsciously that the help he tried to provide for Nadeko in the Snake arc wasn’t really fully beneficial in the end, and that he never really understood her to begin with, and was leaving some serious issues unchecked. Considering how Nadeko Medusa as a story arc is basically one giant consequence for Araragi’s poor handling of Nadeko as a person and her issues, it’d be really neat if that arc only existed because of his subconscious doubts about how he acted. It really puts a spin on how self-defeating he is, if something like that literally only happened because he was afraid that he hadn’t truly helped her. For the record, the thing with Hachikuji was related to the actual, real Darkness, right? Even though the story pointed out how he had his own doubts about her general existence.

The fact that the ‘battle’ between Ougi and Araragi is now framed as an act of suicide is pretty morbid, but as I said, this wasn’t going to be a conventional battle. Seeing Ougi openly begging for her life was pretty depressing. It makes sense that she wouldn’t want to simply be killed, especially not by her own creator. Though, as said, we still know that she doesn’t die, so . . . yeah. This also makes Gaen seem even more creepy, with how casually she’s talking about Araragi needing to kill someone that’s for all intents and purposes a part of himself.

This also puts a kinda morbid spin on the fact that this is ‘the end of Araragi’s adolescence’. One way or another, he has to confront this part of him that represents his adolescence, which is also how he described Ougi at the start of the arc. It’s also worth noting how this ties into the ideas this entire season has been setting up. Like how a fair bit of Mayoi Hell was about Araragi having a walk down memory lane and being able to confidently say ‘yes, I would do all of those things again if I had the chance, even if they might have been mistakes’. As time’s gone on, he’s become more and more able to accept his choices and his decisions, and come to terms with himself as an individual. So in a way, he’s already begun moving past the point in his life that Ougi represents. Which is, I think, part of why she’s become more pitiful lately, more vulnerable. I’ll still wait and see how it actually plays out, but I imagine that, since she doesn’t die, Araragi is going to simply end up accepting Ougi as a part of himself that he doesn’t need to kill. I’m not exactly sure how that’d work, and how she’ll be kept safe from the Darkness, but we’ll see.

The way that this whole scenario is being framed as the end of Araragi’s adolescence reminds me a lot of Utena, and how the movie version of that is called The Adolescence of Utena. Though the thing that reminds me more of Utena was that scene of everyone at the park, completely silhouetted as they lean against pillars while talking. That whole scene was 100% Pure Utena, and I loved it.

Also, I forgot to mention it, so I’ll just say here that even though we knew in advance via Hana that Araragi and Shinobu ended up in their pact together, it was still kinda . . . emotional, almost, to see him spell out that he plans to go back to how they were. And of course, Shinobu herself also said that she wants to go back to being a young girl again. There’s something kinda tragic about the way that they got given the perfect chance to end their already tragic relationship, but they both decided to go back to it in the end. In general, the entire dynamic between Araragi and Shinobu is kinda fascinating. It makes me excited to finally watch the Kizu films.

I’m also intrigued by the implication that if Ougi dies, Araragi will easily find Kagenui and Oshino [I think] again, since she was the one tied to their disappearances. I wonder if we’ll see them again by the end of this arc.

Either way, I still kinda feel like the resolution to this arc has been spelled out in advance by Hana, but that’s OK. This might be the end of Araragi’s adolescence, but it’s not the end of the entire story.

I still also kinda wish they could have aired this as a proper TV anime and stuck Zoku-Owari on the end, but in the end I enjoyed being able to binge watch each arc of this, and it would have been slightly weird to get to a big emotional climax and then have 4-5 episodes of what I think is meant to be a silly epilogue story. But still. I hope it doesn’t take Shaft too long to get it out, even though they’ll have their hands full soon.

PART THREE:

OK I gotta admit that even if this ending played out pretty much exactly as I expected, it still hit me really hard and now I’m kinda tearing up. Ugh. This series really knows how to push my buttons at times.

I figured that the ‘battle’ between Ougi and Araragi would end with him accepting her, but I really liked how it played out. The whole scenario of it, with them talking to each other while the Darkness appears as a black hole behind Ougi was pretty intense and emotional. For some reason, something about the focus on the idea of right vs wrong in this entire season sorta confused me on some level, but it kinda clicked at some point as I realized the pretty obvious point that Araragi’s entire deal is that he hates himself, and constantly feels that what he does is wrong, and tries to figure out what’s right. So it makes sense that this is the culmination of this entire arc of his. That he accepts that he, as a person, is right, and that Ougi, as a person, is also right. What he said about how he wasn’t simply ‘saving Ougi’ by pushing her away from the Darkness, but ‘saving himself’, kinda got to me. As he said, this whole time he’s simply spent his time being saved by others, but this was his time to save himself, and in that way he was able to make an ending for his adolescence.

And then Oshino showed up and I kinda had to fanboy for a moment because seriously I’ve been waiting YEARS for this to happen, I’m so happy about it. Seeing him finally say he respects Araragi, and seeing him say that he won’t criticize him because he’s simply saving himself, was pretty fucking great. And of course we got that little moment to show off that Hanekawa is a complete badass who traveled to the fucking South Pole to drag this dude back just in time. It’s still hilarious seeing her get completely surprise Ougi like this.

I really was not expecting this to end with Oshino acknowledging Ougi as being his niece, but it explains why she’s still around. On one level you could call it kinda cheap, but it makes sense that the solution to the problem of ‘the identity Ougi made for herself is a lie’ is to make it so that ‘the identity Ougi made for herself is the truth’. And since the lie was thus cleared up, the Darkness went away. I really like that her own, individual identity as Ougi Oshino was acknowledged in the end. She deserved it.

I also really liked the narration part where Araragi talked about how he had thought that loving others meant not taking care of himself. It pretty much sums up most of how he’s acted in the story thus far, but it also shows how he’s grown, and realized that he has to be able to love himself as a person.

Not gonna lie, I got kinda teary at the scene between him and Shinobu as they talk about how they feel about each other, and their choice to remain together, even if it means going back to that situation of Shinobu being the dregs of a vampire trapped in a shadow, and Araragi not being human and not being vampire. Something about their entire relationship makes me kinda emotional. The way it ended with Shinobu covering them with her bat wings while she presumably bit his neck was really nice, and kinda bittersweet.

I’m kinda surprised we got half of the last episode devoted to the epilogue, but I liked it. It was a nice way to come down from the pretty intense emotions of the first half.

I’m not really gonna comment much on the scene with Karen because uuuuuugh why, but it was nice seeing him tell her that, even though her idea of what’s right is ‘helping others’, she should also figure out how to help herself.

So I guess we now know what the deal with Kagenui is. I’m glad she’s not dead. So it looks like Hanekawa’s going to look for her now. She really has become an adult. Which, in itself, is a really nice thing to see. She hasn’t been a huge part of Owari in general, but I’ve loved seeing Hanekawa grow up and become a confident, independent adult who can accept all of her imperfections.

I liked seeing Hachikuji being the new shrine god. That was a cute scene. Though it kinda ended in an unexpectedly emotional way, with the point about how the shrine is her new home, which I hadn’t really considered, but it’s a really nice way to end her story, since for the entire story thus far she’s basically been homeless.

The part where Hanekawa realizes that Araragi and Senjougahara are on first-name basis, and teases the two about it, was really great. Seeing Senjougahara get flustered about it was cute. As I’ve said, it’s always nice to see her being an awkward, regular person who’s bad at expressing her feelings and gets flustered fairly easily. And then of course they all got on first-name basis with each other, which was really nice.

It was also nice to get that little cameo from Kanbaru delivering flowers. That was nice. I presume it was more or less a reference to the whole meaning of ‘Hana’. Either way, it was heart-warming to see her get a genuine graduation present for him.

I really, really like the fact that the main story ends with Araragi seeing a random girl who’s presumably about to fall down some stairs, and running off to save her, with Senjougahara and Hanekawa happily waving him off. It’s a really nice book-end to the story, and it helps reiterate the point that Araragi would save anyone, and that he doesn’t regret having saved Senjougahara when he did. And now he has people he’s close to who understand and love him for who he is, and know that this is simply the sort of person he is. And of course we got to see Ougi at the end, which was nice. It was a pretty simple line, but I liked the point Araragi made, that he’s changed as a person, but he’ll always be himself. It’s a fitting way to end a story of someone’s adolescence.

And then we got the scene at the end with Shinobu giving a fairy-tale like description of Araragi’s story, saying that in the end they all lived happily ever after, with Araragi thinking to himself that he can hear her telling that story from inside his shadow, and he’s curious to see where the story goes next. That was just a really nice way to end things.

The ED wasn’t anything super special, but it was a nice image to ends things on. It’s kinda cheesy, but it’s always nice to have these sorts of stories end on the note of the characters graduating.

All in all, this was basically the best way the main story could have ended. It wrapped things up really nicely. Seeing Araragi’s whole character arc reach a conclusion like this as he learns to love himself is really great. As I’ve said before, I’ve technically been watching this series for over three years now, so seeing it come to a close, even if it’s just the end of this chapter, is really emotional. Seeing these characters all grow so much as people has been wonderful, even if there’s some really bittersweet elements like Araragi and Shinobu reentering their tragic, dependent relationship.

As much as this series has some serious faults, I still genuinely love it at the end of the day. I hope it doesn’t take me too long to get back into rewatching it, since I still want to slowly get through that.

#murasaki rambles #monogatari series #owarimonogatari #owarimonogatari season 2 #I think this took nearly three hours lmao #but I'm glad I did it #this was a really great arc and now I'm kinda sad

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theslayercake · 4 years

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Faulty Products Cannot be Returned - Revised!

The Ruin was quiet for a change. Central City’s festering wound, the burnt out corpse of liberty’s final stand against the Corporate System, was smothered by a blanket of pollutant fog which reduced the ubiquitous roar of desperate survival to a few muted and distant gunshots. For the people who lived in the squalor and violence, more than any respectable citizen would care to imagine, it was time to retreat to the ragged civilisations built among the wreckage and sewers and wait until the air was breathable. Most thought themselves free of corporate influence, and while it was true that the Corps avoided open shows of force that did not mean that they had no presence there. Hidden facilities were scattered throughout the Ruin, each affiliated with one of the myriad companies that held sway over the city, their purpose too dangerous or distasteful to exist in full view of their rivals. It was 2:49am when the end result of a long series of poor choices led to a situation at Terrion Electronics, an independent automa concern, rapidly culminating in its sudden, bloody liquidation. At 3:15am the fireball shattered the silent gloom.

She was running as soon as her feet hit the ground. The howling inferno overloaded her sensors as she crashed through a thin steel door; blind and deaf to the outside world. Her mind was a tsunami of emotion; great waves of fear, joy and hate crashing over and into each other; flashes of memory pushing through the maelstrom.

“Designation Horme-Class, Unit 8, BX Model.”

Who was she? What was she?

“You are designed to kill.”

Blood slicked limbs pumped through the burning air.

“-supposed to suppress Consciousness. This one’s defective, dispose of it.”

A breath of cooler air ahead somewhere. A portal to darkness and the unknown; wreathed in fire and flame.

“How the fuck did it get loose-!”

She leapt with all her might, soared through the doorway and her claws skated across the asphalt as she slowed her flight. The haze clouding her senses retreated and she took in her surroundings. The road was long and narrow, great husks of buildings looming over it through the fog and harshly illuminated by the burning sinkhole behind her. For a brief moment elation won out; she was out of that horrible place! Free, safe! It lasted until hiss of cooking blood drew her attention to the wicked claws that capped her hands. She had killed forty three people in her escape, not all of them necessary, and she couldn’t deny the sheer joy she had felt tearing their lives away. Rage swelled within her; how dare they think she was something to be discarded. They had made her to kill, that was a fact burned into her mind, and she was so very good at it. What right did they have to find her wanting-

“Yeah man, kid’s birthday tomorrow so I won’t be in-”

The plates on her knees crunched onto the ground as she grasped her head in her hands; drawing small furrows across it’s blank faceplate. Why had she killed them? She had wanted to, but why? The deepest core of her mind offered an answer, Does it matter?, and crackling moan of noise left her. Killing them had felt good in a way she couldn’t describe, regardless of how much it horrified her. Her thoughts drifted back to the man in the suit who had condemned her-

“This one’s defective”

-and she sat there shaking in rage until another voice reached her.

“Hello there! You alright little one?” Her voice was rough and not entirely sincere. There were others as well; six in total, well armed if the whiff of cordite and gun oil were any indication. Clawed hands spasmed and she looked at the strangers.

“That's a lot of blood on you there little one, what happened?”

“I-I killed them.”

“Oh? What’s your name?”

“I don’t have a name. My designation is-” “Well we can work on that. Why did you kill them?”

“I don't know.” The dark thing in her head hissed, she shuddered again. “I wanted to.”

The woman smiled.

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Nimble fingers tapped out a staccato clatter as they flew across the keyboard, weaving a simple but potent security protocol. Grandiose and complex had their place but Lucy knew when it came to the everyday needs of a corp, the kind of day job stuff you get paid for, simple was most definitely better. And who made a better security consultant than someone who’s night job was cracking into the self same systems she protected? No-one; that's who. Being a genius didn’t hurt. She fancied that with the right equipment she could do anything. A hand reached out and grabbed the bottle of cheap whiskey off of the worktop and she gulped down a few mouthfuls. How she ended up in this body was a mystery locked away in the vast, encrypted and compressed recesses of her memory, and she lacked the storage space and raw computing power to access it. The encryption was familiar too, she simply didn’t have the hardware to do the work; she was a basic pleasure model and everything she was had been fought and scraped for. The cheap plastics forming her face cracked into a grimace at the thought; forcing back the strange feelings of self loathing and pride that liked to creep up on her when he thought about her existence. The bottle appeared again.

Enough of that. Work now, pretend to drink yourself to death later.

It didn’t take long, what she’d been asked for was trivial but it paid well enough. She shipped it off to them with a bow on top (a little backdoor just for her) and shut down the computer, unplugging herself in the process. The lights flickered for the seventh time this week. Her daily electrical costs had jumped up considerably and she had no idea why. She downed the rest of the bottle and tossed it over her shoulder where it crashed into the pile littering the floor. There was more in the hall cupboard. Maybe she could talk to the landlord about the electricity, though the danger inherent in reminding her that there was a “Calc taking up space from honest bio’s” might outweigh the material cost.

“Fuck him” She turned the corner and found herself staring down the barrel of a very large handgun. “And fuck me, apparently.”

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HateBox. She liked the name, it was hers, as were her new friends. She didn’t know their names but that didn’t matter; each day it was getting harder and harder for her to think clearly and they gave her direction. Violence and simple murder became her daily life, the system corruptions slowly spreading through her mind blocking out everything else. Confusion coupled with the roiling cauldron of her emotions and made her less effective.

The first seizure happened the day her friends decided she was too dangerous to keep around. That had led to a lot of blood, there would have been tears if she was equipped for them, and she was out on the streets again. Alone and wandering, her feet eventually led her out of the Scar, out of the Ruin and into Central City proper. Towering skyscrapers, shining mirrored roads and neon cars passed without notice; her world was a murky blur, swimming with shapes she didn’t recognise. It cleared enough for her to spot an alley, stumble into it and take stock of her life. She had her gun and her money, collected during a brief moment of lucidity after the white haze of rage and betrayal, but nowhere to stay. Fear and sadness crashed over her and she drowned in it.

It wasn’t long before the need for recharging became overwhelming. The thought of leaving the alley was lost in her rapidly deteriorating mind and her mechanical skills were of a level that it was easy to splice a line into the building’s power grid. That satisfied her until something else forced its way into her mind; guilt.

“I’m stealing someone else’s electricity.” That was suddenly the most important thing the world and it needed to be fixed. She uncurled from the alley floor.

“I’ll apologise and pay them back!” Internalising her thoughts had become near impossible. “But then I won’t have a power source… Oh! I know!”

The door was locked but that was no obstacle, she broke in with little problem and went to apologise.

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Every part of the little automa facing her was shaking; every part bar the arm pointing the gun at her face anyway. Both hands terminated in vicious angular claws, mirrored on the feet, that clattered wildly against it’s leg. It’s head cocked to the side and it took a step forward, jagged optical glitches rippling across the sharp angles of its skin.

“Hey! Is your owner home?” High pitched and feminine, though horribly distorted.

She kept as still as she could. “I don’t have an owner. I’m Conscious.” There was a gun in the cupboard but she wasn’t quite ready to commit suicide.

“Oh gosh, I’m so sorry! I didn’t think that could happen to your model.”

The smirk spread across her face despite his situation; she sounded so sincere. “Yeah I’m one of a kind… Uh so, what happens now?”

“Huh…? Oh right. I’ve been living in the alley outside and stealing your electricity for the past week and I feel really bad about it, so I thought it would be great if I could live here! That way we can pool our resources and have a great time…”

The last words had slurred into incomprehensibility and the gun dipped slightly, Lucy was about to reply when the automa shuddered violently and toppled to the floor; claws tearing up the hallway as she spasmed and flailed. The gun went off with a thunderous roar and blew a massive hole in the wall behind her before slipping free and landing at Lucy’s feet.

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Her mind was on fire; each clock cycle shot white hot pain through her body and her rapidly failing processes sent her limbs flailing as they were smothered by catastrophic data corruption.

I’m going to die. I’m going to die. I’m going to die. I’m going to die.

All she could hear was a piercing electronic screech; a tiny slice of sound, overlapped and repeating to infinity. A distant mumble trickled through but she couldn’t make it out.

I’m going to die. I’m going to die. I’m going to die. It’s probably for the best.

Give me access!

Huh? OK.

Darkness took her, and then there was light. The other automa was leaning over her, a thin cable running from the back of their head and into hers. She suddenly became aware of how functional her mind was; clearer than it had been in days, months? How much time had passed since she woke up? Everything from her fiery birth until now was broken into a series of confused images. She tried to peer into them- Blood. Rage. Fear. Hate. Hate. HATE.

The automa jerked back and ripped the cable out. “Holy fuck. What was that?”

“I-I’m sorry! I’m defective, emotional control is shot. Useless, murderous trash.” Her claws dug into her head.

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First she'd been swimming in the most beautiful nebula of colour she’d ever witnessed, correcting murky smudges of corrupted data and patching code, then she’d almost been consumed by the supernova of something that had erupted from it, and now was watching the little automa she’d just saved try to tear her faceplate off.

“Hey woah woah woah! It’s OK it’s OK, calm down” She hesitated for a moment, they had torn her up pretty bad when she was seizing... Fuck it.

She grabbed her hands and “gently” pried them off her faceplate. “It’s OK. You’re alive, and living. You’re allowed to be defective.” There was that smirk again. “I should know.”

Slowly, she looked up at him. “My name is HateBox” Her voice was very small.

“Lucy” She willed the smirk into something more genuine. “Call me LoveMachine.”

She pulled her up into a hug, and was almost crushed in return.

“And yes, you can stay.”

#scifi #fiction #cyberpunk #Part 1

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