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zecretsanta · 1 year

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Fic: Shrapnel

[AO3 Link]

To: @dcomexperiment

From: @lightphieric

Happy holidays from one Eric appreciator to another! The prompt was Eric going through horror and angst, and what could be more horrifying for him than dealing with his own guilt in the aftermath of that infamous grenade launcher ending?

Some content warnings because this is rather dark: Canon-typical violence, death, and gore, mental breakdowns, vomiting, references to past child abuse, and implied sex.

—

Eric dropped the grenade launcher as Mira pulled him out of the way, and with it, he let go of the power and confidence it made him feel. That was a high he would never achieve again. Cowering behind the staircase, he plummeted back down to small and powerless. The explosion left his hands buzzing with numbness; his ears whined and his vision was hazy. None of that seemed to fade as the dust settled.

“Now announcing the current casualties.” The mysterious voice warbled distantly. “C-Team: Carlos, Junpei. Q-Team: Q. D-Team: Diana, Sigma, Phi. These six are now deceased. As a result, six X-Passes will now be revealed: Fight, Jump, Bro, Red, Milk, Blue.”

Eric stood on unsteady legs. He felt weightless and too heavy all at once. Behind him, Mira pushed herself up. He was afraid to look at her, terrified to see her furious expression. Meanwhile, as he looked upon the destruction he’d wrought, the corners of his mouth automatically lifted in a smile, and he couldn’t pull them down.

“What an idiot!” he said thoughtlessly, before floating into the center of the ruined library.

There wasn’t much left of Q or his chair. One leg was twisted in the spokes of the wheels, and the rest of his limbs didn’t seem to be around. Eric averted his eyes from the flayed red void that used to be the old man’s face, swallowing down the smell of blood and burnt paper behind his smile.

“Don’t touch,” Mira said with a cough. She grabbed Eric’s arm. She had never touched him so forcefully, although it didn’t seem to be in anger. He thought he liked it, even though his arm was too numb to feel the pressure of her fingers.

“Why would I touch them?” Absentmindedly, Eric took another step forwards. Mira pulled him back before his shoe glanced the blood.

“Come on,” she insisted. “Let’s get out of here. Better not give Akane a chance to beat us.”

Akane. That was the name she noticed was omitted from the death count. Someone who was still a threat to them. Of course.

Eric stared at Sean as they escaped the library. He was drenched in Q’s blood, and his helmet was charred, with a piece of Q’s wheelchair having lodged itself in an eyehole. The kid had never counted as an actual participant in the Decision Game. His death meant nothing, but there he was, twitching with the last shreds of life he had.

Eric rubbed his eyes with shaking hands when he thought he saw Sean reach his arm out to him. When he opened them again, the library door was shut, sealing the dead behind the facility’s walls.

—

Eric’s fingers kept slipping off the keys as he tried to plug in the X-Passes. After misspelling the word “blue” three times, he needed Mira to sub in. She did it without complaint; what a relief that she didn’t seem to hate him.

He dictated the passes for her, reading them off the scoreboard on the wall. Seeing the names written up there in that cold, clerical font, it hit him that six people had really died here. A bitter lump rose in his throat, but he swallowed it down as the rumble and shriek of the X-Door opening reminded him what that meant.

Mira took a step back as the door opened, and Eric caught her hand in his. She looked over at him hesitantly. He smiled back. It was okay. Six people had died, but it was all so Mira could escape.

Everything bad that had happened, had happened for her.

He ran out the X-Door once it was open, laughing with glee, and Mira struggled to keep pace. Their bracelets unclasped and clattered to the floor behind them as they ran, leaving all evidence of their ordeal squarely in the past. Now, the future was waiting for them. In the antechamber before the lift, they found duffel bags containing their wallets, Mira’s favorite necklace and other valuables they’d brought to Dcom, a change of clothes for both of them, keys to a truck, two plane tickets home to Nebraska and two keycards to a room at a nearby motel.

“Are you tired?” asked Mira, leafing through her wallet to make sure nothing had been taken.

“Nope!” Eric lied.

“Good. That means we can head straight to the airport.” She placed the keycards in her wallet and hid it in her back pocket. “The motel is probably meant to be a secluded place where the winning team can clean up. But you didn’t touch the bodies, so there’s no need for that.”

“What bodies?”

Mira smiled slyly. Beautiful. “Keep that attitude up and we should be fine.”

The night sky was cool and dry and huge and oppressive. Eric scrambled to get inside the truck when they found it waiting for them not far from the exit point. Something about the enclosed space was comforting.

Mira insisted that Eric drive. “There’s debris in my bra and it itches like hell. I’m getting in the backseat. To change.” She reached over him to angle the rearview mirror down and gave him a long, lingering look before slipping into the back of the truck.

Despite how intently Eric focused on the path before him, there were no roads or signs in sight. Zero had prepared them for the endless desert with a map and a compass, but their directions scrambled into alphabet soup in Eric’s mind. Eventually, Mira begrudgingly hopped into the passenger’s seat, taking over navigation. After what felt like hours of aimless circling, they happened upon a road.

The hour was late and the road was barren. Cars still passed them occasionally, signs of human life that sent a shiver through Eric; under the eclipse, their shiny metal roofs looked soaked in blood. Eric could almost smell it.

—

The TSA were the reason Eric hated flying. They had a way of making him think he was guilty of something. He would always sweat under the metal detectors, convinced he’d somehow forgotten about the automatic rifle he was carrying or the dead body stuffed into his carry-on.

And now, it wasn’t just paranoia. He really was wilting under the airport’s fluorescent lights, and he was sure the agents could see that. He was shaking, like he had been ever since he saw another person step out of their car in the parking lot. And he was sure there was something, something staining his clothes that would make him unfit to be seen by human eyes, much less to fly.

Luckily, he had that unyielding smile to carry him. He stepped confidently through the metal detector, grinning so hard it dragged an eyeroll from the agent operating it. She waved him through after the beep and he barely kept himself from toppling forwards as he passed her, bowled over by a sense of relief. A sound like rushing water filled his ears, drowning out most of the airport’s ambient noise, and he could only stand there recovering until he noticed that Mira was still talking to the agent inspecting their bags.

Why would they be hounding Mira? She was the picture of innocence. Eric tried to look intimidating as he stormed towards them. His face was hot and red, but he feared his smile was undermining his image. Mira turned at his footsteps and gestured towards him with a chuckle. “My boyfriend. Can’t stand getting to the gate any later than three hours early.”

The agent gave a salute as she gathered up their duffel bags and beckoned for Eric to follow her into the terminal. “Enjoy Nebraska, folks,” he said with a grimace.

Mira offered Eric his bag, and when he didn’t take it from her, she frowned and slung it over her other shoulder. “We were just making small talk,” she said. “It didn’t mean anything.”

“But you didn’t do anything wrong, Mira!” Eric sputtered. “You’re innocent!”

“Yeah, and making small talk can help convince people of that,” said Mira. She spoke slowly, like she thought Eric’s hearing was impaired.

Which it was. The rushing sound was only getting louder. “They should just leave you alone. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

Mira grabbed his sleeve with a huff and sped her pace. She dragged him forwards for a while, before stopping in front of a deserted gate and double checking to make sure no one was nearby. She leaned in, her lips by his ear. So close. “You’re doing a shit job of acting natural,” she whispered. “Try to keep it together until we’re out of public, at least.”

“You’re a good person.” Eric couldn’t stop himself from babbling. “You would never hurt anyone.”

“Tell yourself that.” Mira grasped his hand harder and started again towards their gate.

Eric followed. If public displays of affection like this were part of acting natural, then he shouldn’t have a problem with it. Still, he couldn’t shake the feeling that a terrible mistake had just been made, that he was somewhere he wasn’t supposed to be.

They sat down at their gate, surrounded by people working on their laptops or talking or napping while they waited for the flight to board. The people blended in with the blue of the carpet under them and the sterile gray of the walls behind them. Eric knew they were all staring at him, like they hated him. Under their scrutiny, sweat dripped into his eyes and his teeth chattered. He flashed an appeasing smile at all the blurred shapes judging him, the same smile he’d been unable to shake for hours.

It finally fell as he set eyes on two people sitting rows away.

They were the only clear image in a sea of confusion: a young boy asleep, his head resting on the back of his grandfather’s wheelchair. The old man held the boy’s hand as he drifted off to sleep as well. Both of their chests were rising, falling. Peaceful, and alive. A hallucination. An impossibility, given that they were in the room with a killer.

He stood up like a shot before he even realized he was doing it. “Mira, get away.”

Mira sighed. “Eric, stop this.” She grabbed his wrist and tried to pull him back into his seat, but he shook her away like he thought he’d burn her.

“Get away from me, it’s not safe. I-I’m dangerous!” Eric swallowed painfully as the truth came crashing back onto him like a ton of bricks. He backed away from Mira into the thoroughfare, raising his voice so she could still hear him. “I killed them.”

“What are you talking about?” said Mira through grit teeth.

“Sean and Q!” He pointed at their analogues. “I killed – I fucking blew them up!” The boy and the old man remained asleep, but for the other passengers, Eric’s pointing arm drew a line straight to him. “God, fuck… I…” He brought his other shaking hand up to his forehead, wiping away the sweat stinging his eyes, then grabbing a fistful of hair. He pulled hard enough to tear away some strands, but he couldn’t feel the pain. He couldn’t feel anything but the blast of heat from the explosion on his face, the ringing in his ears as Sean screamed, a tug in his gut as he remembered the gaping holes in Q’s torso where his limbs used to be.

The only thing in his stomach was the beer he’d drank in the lounge, but it was enough. The alcohol burned its way back up his throat. Eric was thrown to his hands and knees by the force of his retching, and brown bile splattered onto the floor.

His fingers twitched against the soiled carpet, his left index finger gripping the cold trigger of a grenade launcher, the rest curling around a skinny neck, squeezing against the neckline of a helmet, snapping an arthritic spine. “Q… Sean…” He felt hard tile under his knees, vomit and overflowing water soaking into the fabric of his pants. “Chris…” Even though his legs had given out entirely, he imagined standing up and seeing his reddened face in the bathroom mirror. He saw Dad’s haggard beard and the wildness in his eyes.

Eric would avoid mirrors for the rest of his life if it meant never seeing that.

A kindly hand – thick-fingered, no long nails, not Mira – touched Eric on the arm. Eric thrashed as he brought his hands up to hug himself, shaking the stranger off. Other bystanders were not so charitable. He heard the beeps of people dialing their phones. There were footsteps, running back in the direction of the TSA. So many people gathered, ready to see him get tasered, arrested, committed, shot.

“I did it to protect us, Mira. Zero said ‘Kill one’ so I did!” He couldn’t stop himself from confessing, confessing, confessing. “But I was so angry… that little shit, he made me so mad. It was his fault!” A body appeared before him, small and covered with no blood, but lifeless all the same. Its face was blond and familiar. “It was Chris’s fault!”

His voice gave out on his brother’s name, rasping into a whisper. He’d been shouting and hadn’t even realized it, attracting a massive crowd which closed in around him. With no voice left to defend himself, Eric melted into violent sobs. The TSA arrived and he had no strength to resist them as they hoisted him up by the shoulders and dragged him away. He hung loosely in their grasp, just barely finding the strength to lift his head and catch what was surely his last glimpse of Mira, distant, disappointed and hating him.

Then a stabbing pain entered his neck, and the image of Mira turned to blackness.

—

He felt his whole body as he woke up. He wasn’t in pain, just very heavy. Denial couldn’t be the wind under his sails anymore. His voice rasped as he groaned, overwhelmed by the feeling of humanity returning to him.

“Hmm. You’re awake.”

Slowly, Eric turned his head. “Mira?” She sat next to him, regarding him coolly. The wall behind her was a warm white, the seat under her a rich cream. A small window framed her face, wisps of clouds floating by in the background. She was angelic, saintly, even; he felt like she’d saved him and taken him to heaven. “We’re on the plane?”

“Private jet, actually.” Mira gestured around her and Eric turned to look. The cabin was small and the rows were empty, besides them and a man sitting in the very back. He wore a red and black suit. It wasn’t clear whether or not he was watching them behind his sunglasses. “Pretty nice, right?” said Mira. “Free the Soul really came through. Dressing up as TSA and tranqing you was brilliant.”

“Free the…” Eric groaned and pressed the heels of his palms into his eyes. “I’m sorry, whose jet is this?”

“I’m not really sure, to be honest,” said Mira. “No one ever explained to me how these guys worked. Hell, you just murdered their leader. For all I know, this jet belongs to you now.”

Eric cringed as he remembered. He was a monster. He’d ended the Decision Game by killing two people. Some would say it was the right thing to do; someone had to have died or else none of them would have ever gotten out of there. But now he was out, and for the rest of his life, he was going to be a person who had killed. With that guilt weighing him down, his breakdown at the airport would not be his last.

He hoped she was kidding about the jet being his. The seats were the softest things he’d ever sat on and it looked like there was a fully stocked bar. Not to mention the beautiful woman in the seat next to him. All things he certainly didn’t deserve.

He looked at Mira with a pleading grimace. “Mira,” he said, “do you hate me?”

Mira exhaled through her nose and rolled her eyes. A laugh. “Hate is an awfully strong word for me,” she said. “I don’t think I’ve ever hated anything.”

“But are you mad at me?”

“I mean, I’m still a little annoyed.” Mira sighed and flicked a strand of hair over her shoulder. “But really, it’s on me. I have practice making myself look guiltless. You don’t. I should have coached you before we got to the airport.”

“The airport?” Eric bit his lip. She couldn’t have forgotten already, could she? “No, that’s not what I mean. Mira, I…” Now that he was lucid, it was harder to get the words out. “I killed two people.”

“One.”

“Huh?”

“Sean isn’t dead,” said Mira matter-of-factly. “Maybe ‘broken’ is a more appropriate word. He’s a robot, Eric. I put it together.”

She was inscrutable. She’d said a lot of weird things like this before, things that Eric had assumed were jokes. He’d genuinely thought she was the funniest person he had ever met, with her imagination and deadpan delivery. After the things Eric had seen the day before, he was starting to believe she had never been joking at all. “Oh,” he said. “That does kind of make sense.” It didn’t.

“He might be worth going back for, actually. See if he’s at all salvageable. And I guess Akane doesn’t deserve to be trapped there either… Stop pouting, Eric. I’ll spell it all out for you in simple terms later.”

Eric bit his lip and turned his head. He’d been so afraid of Mira despising him, but at least that would have made sense. She was looking at him with this calm, gentle, almost pitying look, and his brain couldn’t reconcile it. “But Q… Q is definitely dead, though,” he muttered. Did she not believe that either? Did she love Eric so much that she could ignore it? Or was she just that heartless?

“It’s funny that you’d think I’d care.” As Eric was starting to worry about what kind of woman he’d fallen in love with, Mira’s hand shot out and landed on his thigh. The touch was new and intriguing, the last thing he’d expected. And it made all his worries flicker out of existence. “You’re certainly not the man I thought you were. But the most surprising thing is that I think I like it.” Her other hand went under his chin, moving his head to meet her gaze. “You’re ruthless,” she said with a glint in her eye Eric had never seen before. “It’s quite something to see.”

Mira kissed him then with more passion than she ever had. Tongue, too. Eric worried for a moment about the man sitting in the back row, but eventually the world around them melted. Their surroundings didn’t matter anymore. The past didn’t, either. He smiled against her lips and let himself forget once again.

—

They got back home and made love for two days straight. Mira was commanding and intense, everything Eric had ever wanted. At the same time, her stark lack of experience eased his own insecurities. She tested out several pet names for him; as she purred them into his ear, he felt like he was worth something for once. They paused only to cook breakfast together, watch the new episode of Mira’s favorite reality show that she had missed while in Nevada, and sometimes just to rest and chat. Mira would lay her head on Eric’s chest, listening to his heartbeat, and mention things like Q or Sean or the Decision Game.

But none of that mattered. The past was all a dream. Nothing existed but her and now and domestic bliss. Eric would just laugh when she tried to bring up anything else.

“What happened to you?” Mira asked him. “How did you get to be so… happy?”

It wasn’t happiness so much as it a delirium. But it was a good one. In Eric’s eyes, Mira’s apartment was awash in pinks and gentle yellows and she was haloed in a soft, hazy blur. His head felt stuffed with cotton and he could hear those distant waves behind his eardrums. It was a trance. It was wonderful. He never wanted it to break.

As their two perfect days wore on, Mira’s eyes dulled with boredom. She lamented, “You have more important things to teach me than this.” Eric supposed he knew that this couldn’t last and that soon they would have to get back to their lives. But that life would be perfect, too: booming careers, a happy family, and so much love, forever and ever and ever. They were happy, and nothing would be able to stop them.

Not even a knife across his throat.

#submission #zero escape #zero time dilemma #zero time dilemma spoilers #ztd #dcomexperiment #lightphieric #zecret santa 2022

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findroleplay · 6 months

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Hi 🌱I'm Rain[he/she/they] I am looking for someone who wants to write a good mix of nsfw and sfw, so please only interact if you are 18+

I prefer f/f but can be persuaded to write other stuff too if I'm interested in the characters :] I'm a little new to online rp ettiquette, but I've rped with irl friends before, so I might be a little oblivious to certain terms ^^ but am willing to learn.

I'm mostly interested in writing cc/cc or oc/cc, but if you have a cool idea I'm definetly open for more original stuff too. I like fantasy/supernatural stuff and am more than kink friendly.

Some of the fandoms I'd like to rp:

-Zero Escape (Akane x Junpei,Carlos & Phi)

-Umineko When they cry (Ange x Mammon or Jessica x Sayo, please no last chapter spoilers)

-I was a teenage exocolonist (anything including Tangent and/or Sol)

-PJO (Reyna x Oc , Annabeth x Oc)

- and generally everything that includes cool humanoids like werewolfs or something similar. I also like AU stuff

Please interact with this post if you are interested in rping :)

#rp #roleplay #fxf rp #oc rp #fandomless rp #original rp #stranger things rp #fantasy rp #supernatural rp #PJO rp #I was a teenage exocolonist rp #Umineko When they cry rp #zero escape rp

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trash11037 · 2 years

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Sims fandom Save/world

This is the list i have so far, the format goes

show name

TOWN

-family

*any extra information

the list will be under the keep reading as its quite long, around 233 sims when i last count it but that may be a little off

as always feel free to comment more characters that you believe deserve better from any shows/games, or if you think a different town would suit the characters better (i dont own the wedding or highschool pack though so any towns except for those ones are fine

ALSO SPOILER WARNING BELOW FOR THE FOLLOWING

AI the somnium files, danganronpa kindergarden, possibly mystic messenger?

this is because this list names a few characters introduced or revealed later

Camp Camp

GRANITE FALLS

-Max, David, Gwen, Nikki, Neil, Space kid, Harrison

*David is the parent of Max and Harrison, Gwen is the parent of Nikki and SK, Neil is just here to not separate the group

-Preston, Ered, Dolf, Nurf, Preston, Nerris, Nerris Parents

*theres no plot to that one I just love nerris parents

Rwby

BRITECHESTER

-Ruby, Weiss, Blake, Yang, Zwei

-Jaune, Nora, Pyrrha, Oscar,Ozpin, Emerald, Mercury

Voltron

-Keith, Lance, Hunk, Pidge, Shiro, Adam, Kosmo

-Allura, Coran, animal to be all the lions

-Matt, Adam,

AI the somnium files

-Date, Mizuki, aiba, Tama, Ryuki

-Iris, Hitomi, Manaka

-Pewter, Renju,

-Amame, Kizzy, Shoma

-Boss, Bibi

Deltarune

-Suzie, Kris, Ralsei , lancer noelle

Undertale

-Frisk, Papyrus, Sans, Undyne, Alphys, Napstablook, Toriel, Mettaton

Sims 2

STRANGERVILLE

-Pascal, Nervous and Tycho

-Ripp, Ophelia join the Smith family

WILLOW CREEK

-Remake the Goth family

-Remake the Lothario/caliente

-Pleasant family

Mystic messenger

WINDENBURG

-Jaehee, MC Married and owns a coffee shop with a cat

-Saeyoung, Saeran

-Rika, Yoosung

-V, a guide dog

-Jumin, Liz

-Zen

Danganronpa

BRITECHESTER

-Makoto, Sayaka, kyoko, Aoi, Sakura, Taka, Mondo, Chihiro

-Hifumi, Leon, Hairguy, Celeste, Byakuya, Mukuro, Junko

-Nagito, Hajime, Chiaki, Gundham Tanaka, Sonia, Kazuichi, Imposter

-Fuyuhiko, Peko, Mahiru, Teruteru, Ibuki, Hiyoko, Akane, Nekomaru

-Shuichi, Kaede, Kiibo, Maki, Kaito, Rantaro, Gonta, Kokichi,

-Korekiyo, Tenko, Angie, Himiko, Ryoma, Kirumi, Miu, Gonta

-Kokichi, Usami, Tsumugi, Monotaro, Monodam, Monosuke, Monokid, Monophanie

Omori

Willow Creek

-Omori, sunny, Mari, Mewno

-Hero, Kel, Hector

-Basil, Aubrey

(build the hotel in Oasis spring)

LIS 1,2 , 3

1 Britechester, 2 willow creek, 3 Bridleton Bay

-Nathan, Victoria, Taylor, Courtney, Dana, Juliet

-Rachel, Max, Chloe, Kate

-Sean, Daniel, Estaban, Chris, Mushroom, lyla

-Alex, Gabe, Ryan, Steph, Valkyrie

Kindergarden

Newcrest

-Nugget, Jerome, Monty, Cindy, Buggs, Lily, Billy

-Ted, Felix, Penny, Carla, Ozzy, Alice

Persona 5

Mt. Komorebi

-Akira, Futaba, Sojiro (owns a café in Windenburg)

- Ann, Haru, Ryuji, Makoto, Yusuke, Morgana

-Akechi, Sumire, Maruki (therapy house)

Portal 1 and 2

EVERGREEN HARBOR

-Glados, Chell, Wheatley,

Homestuck

-John, Dave, Rose, Jade

-Arcadia, Tavros, Sollux, Karkat, Nepeta, Kanaya, Terezi

-Vriska, Equius, Gamzee, Eridan, Fereri

Spy X family

Brindleton Bay

-Anya, Loid, Yor, Dog

TOH

Strange town

-Luz, Eda, King, Amity, Willow, Hunter, Gus, Lilith

Gravity falls

Strange town

-Soos, gruncle stan, ford, Mabel, Dipper, Wendy. Possibly bill.

Zero escape

Newcrest

-Ace, Snake, Santa, Clover, Junpei, June, seven, Lotus (no 9th man sorry 8 sim max)

-Sigma, Quark, Old man junpei, Dio, Phi, Alice, Luna, K, old lady Akane

-Emopei, Carlos, Akane

-Simpma, Diana , Phi

-Eric, Mira , sean, Gab

#sims 4 save file #sims 4 #sims 4 fandom world

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i0n4 · 4 years

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carlos meets akane’s smart goth brother that cares a lot about his sister, or alternatively, aoi meets akane’s fit american firefighter friend that cares a lot about his sister

#zero escape #zero time dilemma #carlos (ztd)#aoi kurashiki #carlos x aoi #idk ?? what to call this ??#caraoi #this is super dum and also not my normal style sO thank you for putting up with me omg #I do be shipping them though 👀👀#also need to draw more of the outfit designs I had for aoi and clover #akane kurashiki #clover field #junpei tenmyouji #doodle #zero escape spoilers #999 spoilers

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marshvlovestv · 3 years

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Eric in the Pod Room - An impassioned defense of a man at his worst

Big tw for discussions of suicide, suicidal ideation, and mental illness, and lots of me projecting my own issues onto a terrible fictional character

I’m in a really bad place mentally right now and I’m immersing myself in a Zero Escape Let’s Play series to distract myself from it. It definitely isn’t the healthiest thing for me to be hyperfixated on right now - the series has a chummy relationship with the concept of suicide, after all, and suicidal thoughts are my worst symptom at the moment. But you know what, it’s twisted, but I’m so dangerously comfortable with my own suicidality at this point that the themes of suicide in Zero Escape almost feel warm and welcoming, to the point where I’d even consider them a factor in why I am so obsessed with the series.

I was working on a larger meta, which most of this post is an excerpt from, about the many suicides from Zero Time Dilemma specifically - none of them influenced by Radical-6, all of them with some interesting psychological analysis to be done concerning them. But the Let’s Players have reached the Pod Room, the puzzle that seems to singlehandedly give players the most reason to hate my favorite character. They turned out to be no exception, and they spent the length of the puzzle going on and on about how they despise Eric. I got really tense and upset and thought, “You know what? Forget about Diana, Carlos, and Delta. I can talk about them later. All I want to do right now is come to Eric’s defense. I want to talk about my boy.”

Like, I get it, you know? The first time I saw the Pod Room, I wasn’t the biggest fan of Eric, either. He bullies Sean, he actively refuses to be of any help in solving the puzzle, he makes lewd comments about Mira (and for the record, the problem I have with this is the fact that he says these things around a child, not the comments themselves; people should be allowed to experience and express sexual attraction and that is a hill I will die on). After the puzzle itself, we learn about Eric’s deepest trauma and after that I see people either feel bad for hating him and begin to sympathize with him fully, or go, “Yeah, that sucks for him, but it still doesn’t forgive a damn thing. He’s the worst and I hate him and I hate this game for making him exist.” I am firmly in the first camp, if you couldn’t tell.

Lest we forget: This is the route at the end of which Eric commits suicide. A murder-suicide, granted, but still. He takes his own life. The Pod Room is the start of Eric’s descent into rock bottom and I just... can’t hate him for that, especially not when I recognize some of myself in him. I have never killed another person (I promise); I don’t have homicidal thoughts. I don’t know personally what would compel someone to commit a murder-suicide and I don’t even want to speculate. But his homicidal tendencies aside, Eric and his suicidality have always spoken to me personally.

I’ve done plenty of analysis of Eric in the past under the lens of personality disorders, and my most general conclusions are that he suffers from PTSD, dependent personality disorder, and possibly borderline personality disorder as well. Suicidality is highly correlated with all three of those disorders, and as such I find it highly unlikely that his decision to kill himself in this route is a spontaneous one. If he is anything like me, when he isn’t actively, imminently suicidal, he probably still spends a lot of time imagining worst-case scenarios in which suicide would be a no-brainer. For me, my worst-case scenarios often involve the loss of my parents; they are my Safe People, people around whom my AvPD symptoms are less extreme and my behavior is less inhibited, and I seriously fear for my ability to function without them in my life. Sufferers of many different personality disorders have “special people” like this in some way or another. DPD and BPD have, respectively, Depended People and Favorite People, the objects of the sufferer’s attachment. Mira clearly fulfills both of these roles in Eric’s life, and lots of his worst-case scenarios must involve the loss of her.

Before her death is even confirmed, we can see how much he struggles to function without her there in the puzzle room. I read Eric’s behavior in the Pod Room as him flailing in the absence of his special person. The Let’s Players I’m watching have even made derisive comments about how he doesn’t even know how to be a person, and I’m sitting here like, yeah. You’re right. He doesn’t know how to be a person, not right now. His identity and self-worth are tied to a person who has disappeared under mysterious and stressful circumstances; without her, he feels useless and helpless, which is why he’s overwhelmed by something as simple as a sliding block puzzle. Without her, he loses his grip on his self-control, which is why he has no filter to stop him from saying inappropriate things and why can’t stop his worse impulses to mistreat people. I’m not trying to say that anything he does in the Pod Room is right, but there is a reasonable explanation for why he acts the way he does.

And then, they find Mira’s body. One of Eric’s worst-case scenarios has come true, and in the process he has lost not only the person most important to him but the very sense of self that said person helped him feel. It’s just as bad as he always imagined, and even worse, she was killed in exactly the same way his brother was, triggering a PTSD flashback. His trauma is further compounded by being shown graphic video of Junpei and Akane’s deaths (and later just being shown their dismembered bodies in person).The devastation he must be feeling in this moment is beyond what I can even comprehend and I fully understand why he snaps.

Again, I don’t want to speculate as to why his mind goes “revenge first, suicide second” and why he kills people he could be reasonably sure are innocent. All I can say for sure is that, when he does ultimately kill himself, it’s not out of guilt and it’s not out of fear of consequences. His last words are promising Mira that he’ll be with her soon. The suicide is about her. It was always about her. It’s not just that he’ll miss her; he genuinely cannot picture a life for himself where she is not a part of it, at least not a good one.

(Quick sidenote here to talk about one other thing that Eric does in this route: shooting out the X-Pass authenticator. Once Mira’s body is found, six people have died, meaning that Eric, Sean, and Q are free to leave. But Eric shoots out the authentication device before this is possible. When this happened in the Let’s Play, the players called him an idiot for destroying his own means of escape, which really annoyed me. Here’s the thing: Eric is already actively suicidal at this point. He destroys his key to the outside world because he can no longer imagine a life for himself in the outside world. Shooting the authenticator was in itself an act of suicide, even though he wasn’t pulling the trigger on himself.)

All of this is not to say that Eric is okay in the true end and should be left to his own devices. He’s a man in pain, a man in constant crisis, and he’s in desperate need of intervention to prevent him from harming himself or others. I like him and Mira together and she will likely always be a special (Depended, Favorite) person to him, but he can’t and shouldn’t rely on his relationship with her to keep his head above water and keep him from acting the way he did in the Pod Room. Eric needs professional help; but call me optimistic, I think that learning from Sean about how he acted on the other routes, what it looks like when he is truly at rock bottom, might inspire him to seek that help.

Anyway. Sorry for the rant, I hope it was interesting at least. I’m going to go refill my medications and schedule an appointment with my therapist because, as fun and cathartic as this was to write, it’s definitely not healthy to get this riled up over fictional characters; plus, I can’t rightly advocate for a fictional character to get help when I’m not taking care of myself, can I?

#zero escape #zero time dilemma #eric ztd #suicide #suicide tw #don't worry about me btw i'll be fine #i know this gets really personal but feel free to like rb interact whatever #i'm not shy about this stuff

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dead-batterie · 3 years

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Hey can we talk about the fact that if you go Q-Team executed, correct antidote, Shoot: Blank, and then Don’t Drink, all of C-Team survives? That’s six X-passes, even though we never get to hear D-Team’s. But Junpei, Akane, and Carlos should all be able to get out alive and well, if a bit more traumatized.

#zero escape #zero time dilemma #I feel like we don’t talk about the bad endings in vlr and ztd enough #because there’s plenty of safe end/knife end/sub end/axe end fics #but there’s plenty of open ended timelines in both vlr and ztd

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spectralarrovv · 7 months

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the ending spike chunsoft was too scared to give us

#had to give them clothes because tumblr SUCKS!!!!!!!#matt rambles #my art #zero escape #zero escape zero time dilemma #ze #ze ztd #ze spoilers #junpei tenmyouji #akane kurashiki #carlos ztd #c team #junepei #akane x junpei x carlos #suggestive #?

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atpsynth4se · 3 years

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Tagged by the @villianbean

3 ships- idc about ships im normal but kaeya/jean/lisa and junpei/akane/carlos are bi4bi4bi so i guess they have rights

Last song- echo x hibikase mashup live version (giga-p x crusher-p)

Currently reading- blame! manga, again...

Currently watching- tenchi souzou design-bu, supposedly

Last movie I watch- i dont remember i havent watched a movie in ages but maybe the netflix blame! movie

Food craving- deviled eggs

Tagging @rootbeerfloats @allstarsmash @aligura @bismellah and @bisexualmutual

feel free to do or not do it or do it and say i tagged you

#fathericraveviolencecore

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polyamships · 1 year

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Prompt #6: Shopping Together Ship: Akane/Carlos/Junpei CWs: Reference to sex

#fandom: zero escape #ot3: carlos x kurashiki akane x tenmyouji junpei #fanwork: fanfic

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kilannad · 3 years

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For Want of a Snail Easter Eggs!

I am so so soooo sorry this took this long. It’s been months (???!) since I posted the last chapter and told y’all I would post some bonus easter egg content here and I just haven’t done it. The why and general updates will come in another post later today, but first; here you go!

(For the sake of this post, I'm calling Kyle when he's in Light's body Kyle and Light that get's switched to Kyle's body as Light. Going by minds rather than bodies, basically)

Who did the coin flip?

A hologram did! If you notice during the descriptions of the prologue, Carlos always says Zero has a "silent approach" and "disappearing silently" as well as "Strangely, though, the edges of his clothes seemed soft. Faded. Not quite there." Basically, Kyle recorded that same conversation twice, once for each side of the coin and then programmed it to choose randomly between which side of the coin is chosen.

Who killed Junpei?

In canon, Mira killed Junpei for... Reasons TM (? that never did make sense to me) but here, Kyle killed Junpei because he needed a way to get COVID Radical-6 out into the world. Why Junpei and not one of the others? Kyle had a thought experiment where he wondered what happened to the Rhizome 9 experiment in the timelines where participants of that experiment ended up dead. He was never able to figure out what happened in those universes.

Why Eric died instead of Mira?

This has more to do with Left than Kyle. Basically, Left had all his memories and so knew all of the strange little things Mira did that basically convinced him she was a sociopath. Left, being a good soldier, wanted to recruit her to FTS and so asked Kyle to keep her alive. Kyle said yes.

The more meta reason is that I just like her more and I'm not afraid to play favourites.

Which Light is on the moon?

Okay, so I got an ask about this awhile ago here; the short answer though is that Canon!Light (OG nonary games, SOIS, etc.) is put on the moon in his original timeline, just 45 years in the future. Kyle, and the FWS story, takes place in a different timeline. This is the timeline Canon!Light lands in when Kyle goes back to his [Kyle's] OG time on the moon.

How did the transporter get built?

Okay, I want it said that I hate the canon!transporter and literally everything about it. It is possibly the only thing I hate more in that game than Delta's entire existance and the stupid decision to make Phi and Sigma related. That being said;

For the life of me, I could not figure out a way to get Akane and Junpei into the timeline where they'd already died without it. So instead, I just edited the damn thing to make more sense.

Canonly, Dr. Klim wanted Kyle to come to 28 with them. In FWS!Verse, Dr. Klim experimented a bunch to try and make this happen. One of these experiments involved created an atom copier to try and send a version of Kyle into the past. The problem was that the transporter would only work when a transporter already existed. Kyle had helped with this experiment and simply built it when he realized that it'd be necessary to stop the fanatic.

Yes, this does mean that had Dr. Klim tried sending a copy of Kyle from the moon to 2028, it would've worked because the transporter had been built. Klim had no way of knowing this though.

Why called them I-Passes & and why name the game what I did?

Okay, so this is me just being a little shit basically. Someone on Reddit pointed out that they were called X-Passes as a hint that there were ten players, same with the name. (Deci)sions, deci is a word for ten. I is the hexadecimal for 18. I feel like I don't have to explain why 18 is a good number. And since there was actually nine players, I kept the nonary game and just added the decision part because I couldn't come up with a clever play on words like ambidex edition.

Do FWS!Verse find out about Light/Kyle + reactions?

I got this ask here, but again the short version; yes. After Sigma shoots and Kyle and Light switch back, Light explains that he was on Rhizome 9 after Clover disappeared post SOIS. Considering everything Kyle had just said, they figured out that this version of Light was actually from a Radical-6 timeline because Kyle had already lived through every Light said he'd lived through. Essentially, Light was in the wrong universe and had no way of getting back to his because his involved the world dying.

As for reactions... this Light is not the same Light that Clover grew up with. He is Light Field, but he is just slightly different from her brother.That shit is hard to deal with.

#That's all folks #hope this was interesting #ran out of word count for a closing sorry #FWS #For Want of a Snail #FWS questions #answers #zero escape fandom #zero escape fanfic #FWS Spoilers

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zecretsanta · 4 years

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Regarding the Events of the Past

To: @erisofimladris From: @akane-crashkey

I chose this because I really enjoy the Junepei ship and angst, but for the longest time, I genuinely struggled to find an idea that would work. I ended up rewriting my submission several times with different ideas. And then something happened to me that lead to me getting this idea. While this story isn’t the greatest or realistic, it’s true to my emotions.

JunePei angst, tw for alcoholism, emetophobia

Even though he hated the taste, he couldn’t stop himself from downing the entire 550ml bottle of vodka. The memories had been too much for him to bear. He had seen people engage in human organ trafficking like they were kids trading candy at a playground and to make things worse, Akane wasn’t here. She was away on a mission for crash-keys.

Normally, when things got this bad, Akane would be there for him, listening to him as he cried over what he’d seen; the suffering. He would rest his head on her shoulder and she would stroke his hair, all without judging him. Somehow, this always made him feel better.

Now that she was gone, Junpei’s emotions were out of control and the memories kept getting worse and worse until he couldn’t take it. He had told his therapist about these memories (Akane had signed him up for therapy against his wishes about six months ago) and his therapist had told him about focusing on something else to help the thoughts go away.

In Junpei’s case, he would focus on Akane and their shared childhood memories and bonds. With time, the memories would erase themselves from his mind and Junpei wouldn’t have to focus on them anymore.

Without Akane here, that wasn’t the case. The memories kept on getting worse and worse which was why he turned to alcohol. He had driven over to the liquor store to buy a medium-sized bottle of vodka.

After an hour, he had finished the entire bottle and its effects began to take place. The memories became less profound the more time that went on, and by the time he had finished the whole bottle, they were completely gone.

What replaced those memories were slightly less pleasant effects. Instead of the intrusive thoughts in his mind, he kept hearing an annoying buzzing sound that reverberated all the way throughout his skull. That lead to a constant feeling of nausea that hit his stomach. When he stumbled to the toilet to throw up, he kept tripping over his own feet. When that happened, all he could think about was how angry Akane would be if he managed to puke on the ground.

He laid over the toilet bowl for a while, wondering if there would be anything else that his body would force him to vomit up. Thankfully, there wasn’t, and he rested his head on the toilet lid, panting, as he flushed. After that, he washed his hands.

But hey, at least the memories are gone, Junpei thought to himself as the dizziness got too much to bear and he closed his eyes in an attempt to make it all go away. Eventually, unconsciousness overtook him and he passed out, hitting his head on the bathroom counter as he collapsed onto the ground.

====

When Junpei woke up again, he was surrounded by an annoyingly bright light, beeping, and an excruciating pain pounding in his skull. It took two seconds for him to realize that he was in the hospital. What happened to me? Junpei thought to himself, looking around for some semblance of familiarity.

His eyes latched onto Akane’s. Her eyes were red-rimmed and tear-filled, as though she had been crying for a while. This created confusion for Junpei. She was supposed to be on a Crash-Keys mission for the next three days. So why was she here? And why was he in the hospital in the first place.

“Junpei, why?” Akane asked, holding onto Junpei’s right hand. While he hadn’t realized it until now, there was an IV line placed into his left hand. “Why what?” Junpei croaked.

“Why did you do that to yourself?” Akane asked, bursting into more tears. She grabbed a tissue out of her sweater’s pocket and blotted her eyes with it. Suddenly, he remembered that he had drunk an entire bottle of

Vodka but he didn’t remember anything else after that.

Junpei then felt the memories, the ones of human trafficking, the ones where he investigated a child trafficking operation and the pain he had seen in their eyes. He remembered seeing Guy X, and how he had initially thought how disgusting it was as opposed to the fact that it had been an actual human once. He tightly grasps Akane’s hand as tears form. He faces the memories from other timelines, holding Akane as she slowly dies. Watching Snake die in an incinerator. Slowly getting poisoned and watching Akane struggling to breathe because Carlos failed to pick the right locker.

“To make them go away,” Junpei whispers, holding back a sigh. “It was too much to bear.” He ignores the searing pain in his head (which seemed to be getting worse by the minute) and looks at Akane with his tear-filled eyes.

“If it weren’t for our ESPER connection, you would have died, Junpei. You sent out a message through the morphogenetic field that you weren’t feeling well. I tried texting you and contacting you back but there was no response so I called the paramedics and they found you in the bathroom, choking on your vomit as you had a seizure. You could have died Junpei!”

The other shoe fell and Akane began crying, “I was so worried about you! I had to take a plane home and leave the rest of the mission to Aoi and Light, who had to join in at the last moment. You scared me so much and when I found out you were in the hospital, I felt so bad that I wasn’t there for you. Especially because I know you needed me.”

Akane blotted her eyes with the tissue, “You were in a coma for a few days because you hit your head on the counter when you fell and your brain began to swell. They thought you were going to need surgery and you’re so lucky that you didn’t.”

“Kanny, I’m so sorry,” Junpei apologized, trying not to cry because seeing his fiance so upset was making him upset as well. He now understood why his head hurt so much and why he had a line running into his hand. “I really am…” he whispered, tears slowly trickling down his face.

“No, I’m sorry,” Akane apologized, squeezing her fiance’s hand harder. “I should have been there for you. If it weren’t for that mission, you wouldn’t be here right now.”

Junpei looked at Akane with tears in his eyes. He blinked them away and focused on her eyes. He couldn’t let the memories overwhelm him, not now. “So, has anyone else been here to visit?” Junpei asked in an attempt to change the subject.

“Well, this so happens to be the hospital that Diana works at so whenever she has free time, she pops in here. Aoi and Light came back from the mission yesterday, so they stopped by for a bit when they got back, however they left rather early because they were tired. Sigma has been here whenever Diana’s been off work and Phi’s been here frequently as well,” Akane replied, giving Junpei a shaky smile.

“When am I getting out?” Junpei asked.

“Well you were in a coma for three days and they brought you out of it today; that’s why you’re not hooked up to all of the machines that one would expect you to be. Diana said you could probably be released in about a week or so. You did have some awful brain swelling,” Akane said.

Almost as if she heard her name or something, Diana popped into the room, her red hair tied up into a ponytail. She was wearing blue-green scrubs that so happened to have a small picture of a cartoon character on the right side of her chest. “Junpei, you’re awake,” she said.

“I guess,” Junpei said, scratching his head awkwardly.

====

“So, aren’t you glad you get out today?” Akane asked her fiance. In the week that he had been in the hospital, he had been put on a new dosage of antidepressant medication as well as Paxel to help control his Post-traumatic-stress-disorder.

“I guess,” Junpei says. While the time he had spent in the hospital had involved a lot of boredom, he had been under close monitoring due to suffering a brain injury. Thankfully, his condition never worsened and he was free to leave today.

On his bedside table, he had a vase of flowers, along with some cards, and a singular balloon. Aoi had given him a repurposed birthday card that said, “Getting a get well soon card is like a reward for not dying.” While Akane didn’t really like that very much, Junpei found it hilarious and couldn’t stop laughing when he saw it for the first time.

“We’re leaving this card in the trash,” Akane said, gesturing to his card from Aoi. Junpei shot his girlfriend a disappointed look. “I want to keep it,” he said, placing the card in the suitcase that Akane had brought for him.

“Fine, do whatever you want,” Akane said, rolling her eyes at Junpei. “Just so you know, you’re not allowed to put that atrocious card on our bedside table.”

“I wasn’t planning to,” Junpei said with a huge grin on his face. He wasn’t initially planning on doing it but now that Akane mentioned it, he planned on it. She wouldn’t be able to stop it.

“I know what you’re thinking,” Akane giggled, “If I see it out there, it’s either going to be going in the trash or you’re sleeping on the couch for a week,” she joked.

Junpei continued sorting through the things in his hospital room. While he had done most of the packing last night, he had a few things left to sort out. He generally preferred a cleaner environment and his own hospital room was proof of that. Even though Junpei had stayed at the hospital for around a week, the only proof that he had stayed there was the gifts on his bedside table.

Akane’s face twists into a less playful expression and one that meant seriousness. “Junpei, if things ever get that bad again, you need to tell me. I don’t care if I’m not there, I will find someone there for you. But I don’t want to go through this ever again, okay?” Akane says, gripping onto Junpei’s left hand. The IV in it had been removed a few days ago as Junpei was no longer in need of intravenous medications.

“I promise,” Junpei said, kissing Akane on the cheek.

“Now what do you say to getting burgers when we’re out of here?” Akane asks, her face returning to the prior playful expression.

“I’m down for that. I’m sick of this gross hospital food anyways.”

#zero escape #erisofimladris #akane-crashkey #junpei/akane #zecret santa 2019

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kuipernebula · 4 years

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I was talking about this last night with someone but, here’s how I would fix Zero Time Dilemma

Carlos is getting booted from what was once Team C. In his place, the leader of the 999 team with Junpei and Akane is Ennea Kashiwabara, one of Lotus/Hazuki’s daughters. (For this reason, it’s now called Team E) She never met Junpei or Akane, having been in the other building and her mom probably not saying much about the Second Nonary Game to her. As an agent of SOIS, she’s been assigned to infiltrate and observe DCOM, based on a tip they received about the site. Unfortunately, this lands her in the Third Nonary Game, alongside Akane, who recognizes her because of Nona, and Junpei, who gets told who she is by Akane.

Junpei doesn’t get much of a change to his character - his change in perspective is important to bridging the gap between Junpei and Tenmyouji. Instead, Akane’s writing gets a big push - we finally get to see her drop her facade from 999, closer to what we saw of her in VLR and in only a few endings of ZTD. Analytical, observant, intelligent, and cold, she’s not the girl Junpei loved - but he still cares too much about her to let her self destruct here. The tension this brings them as they’ve both changed so much is brought to the forefront, alongside the shared secret they’re hiding from Ennea - that is, what happened in the Second Nonary Game.

Team D receives no lineup changes. Diana has a whole lot of potential, and makes perfect sense on the VLR team - she’s here to bridge the gaps surrounding Luna and Phi. The main changes to this team’s writing are the specifics of Diana and Phi’s relationship - God I hated that ending, and literally everything involving the alien machines - and bringing Diana’s writing to be more specific.

Also important to this team is the realization that, in at least one route, it’s not Sigma inside Sigma - it’s Kyle. At least one route, probably the one leading to the True Ending, we get the payoff for the Another Time ending of VLR, with Kyle being an unknown factor in DCOM, and Phi having to deal with being the only one who knows what she’s doing. Which... isn’t that different from usual, honestly, but a problem nonetheless.

Also we gotta hold off on Diana’s reveal of being Phi’s mom, if that even still is her Deal. Like, this is something that was kinda set up back in VLR, sorta? But we can make it less obvious from the get-go, and maybe even add more nuance to that relationship given how Weird it ended up being, especially with the Alien Bullshit.

Team Q is, to the shock of no one, getting the biggest changes. Eric, Sean, and Delta are all getting written out - Eric has no reason to be here, Sean made literally no fucking sense from any in-narrative perspective, and Delta... was a cool twist executed poorly. (”My motives are complex.” et. al.) Mira is still here, though - the serial killer that inadvertently lead to Everything because of Akane’s Dad’s false imprisonment? That actually ties her Perfectly to both the rest of the cast, but also to being invited here by Brother/Delta/Zero. She’s here because she’s perfect for a killing game.

Carlos is, instead, getting added to Team Q. He’s here because he’s perfect for DCOM - he’s a fire fighter, heroic to a fault. Give him some personal tie to DCOM and its actual, original mission, and he becomes the opposite of Mira - he’s here for the actual, original mission, and possibly the only person other than Diana who was. His sister’s deal can also stay, though I dunno if he personally should still be a Shifter. (If this is the case, his Shift X-Pass would become Space, Ideal, or something relevant to his personal connection DCOM) Also before you ask, he’s not the leader of this team, now.

The leader of Team Q is a character simply named Q, wearing a body suit not dissimilar to K’s. This suit looks similar to a Space Suit, rather than the futuristic robot suit of K, and they don’t answer questions to why they’re wearing it. Like Sean, they aren’t trusted by the team and act as the leader and protagonist of Team Q. Unlike Sean, they have their own X-Passes, even stealing some from Q/Delta - Clone, Self, Quest, Mark, Bro, Doll...

In actuality, Q is, depending on the route, either one of Brother/Delta’s clones, using the suit to hide their identity from Sigma, Phi, Akane, and possibly Ennea (we don’t know how much SOIS knows about Free the Soul at that point), or ??? from the Another Time ending.

Basically, the Floating Timeline from the original game is not because of Memory Drugs, but rather a function of how ??? (i.e. We) are perceiving the timeline. Whenever we’re in Q, our personality overrides theirs far more than should be possible, possibly because it’s a very early/young clone. Or possibly because they’re the first one we enter, in the prologue. (I.e. what replaces the coin flip) Whenever we’re watching E and D routes, we’re doing the same background semi-Mind Hacking as is typical for the game - we’re watching them, pushing them towards one or another timeline for information, trying and failing to save them, etc. This is also the explanation for how E and D know things they shouldn’t, sometimes - Us.

In the other routes, Q is simply the clone, as a way to keep a hand on the game should there be a need for direct intervention. Delta doesn’t want to get his hands dirty, or have a chance of actual death. This personality is very quiet and noncommital, which is pointed out as jarring when ??? takes over in the escape rooms.

In the True End Route, where we’re Q, is when we find out that that route’s Sigma is actually K - both of the wrenches in the plan have been played for that route.

As for Zero/Delta’s actual new plan... I dunno. I agree it needs a double-bluff on the explanation we heard from Dio, that’s kinda how things work, especially ideologies that evolve over time. And I like that he’s obsessed with chance and the butterfly effect - it would perfectly tie into him inviting Mira to the game, and the way this game doesn’t have fail safes like Akane’s games. But we’re taking out the alien bullshit and honestly his “kill a terrorist with a horrible biological weapon” plan doesn’t make any sense no matter how you spin it to me. Maybe go the social darwinism route - this is a small scale of his actual plan, to see who survives and who doesn’t, as way to figure out how plans for a large-scale purge of society. That this is highly uncomfortable is, in fact, the point - no one thinks he’s right or has a point, but he’s got them trapped so they have to deal with it.

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