#hence the very brief baseball scene
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jackie and wilson.
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pairing: luke castellan x unclaimed!reader
summary: you haven't been given a quest, but you have made it your personal mission to make luke castellan smile
word count: 5.3k
content: fluffff, loser!reader, happy!luke if you squint and a sprinkle of loser!luke, brief mentions of suicide but nothing heavy, we finally find out which state reader is from
notes: this is so cute i love them.
PART III — she’s gonna save me, call me ‘baby’, run her hands through my hair
Wading through a misty green lake with Luke Castellan was not on your camp bucket list — something you’d produced with a young girl called Silena who you’d met in the arts and crafts cabin — but alas, here you were; knee deep in pond water and ankle deep in whatever sludge lived at the bottom, hands searching blindly along the floor while you tried your best to keep your chin dry.
You probably wouldn’t have been there if you were any good at Volleyball — which really doesn’t make much sense with the given context.
Okay, here’s what happened. It was Saturday at camp halfblood — and while you had been there for a solid three days now, you were yet to experience the joy of the weekends. Not that you knew they were any different, not until Travis Stoll approached you after breakfast.
“Heyyyy, uh...newbie.” He chuckled, sidling up beside you while you were occupied with deciding whether your camp shirt was better tucked into your shorts or left hanging over them.
You turned to the boy with an amused smile, reminding him of your name. He snapped his fingers at you, “I knew that. I did. I just prefer newbie.”
“What’s up, Travis?”
He dropped his finger guns, rocking back and forth on his feet and looking at you sheepishly, “Well, me and a few friends were gonna chuck a ball around on the beach and we need an extra player to make it even. Now that Luke’s not an option.”
He muttered that last bit low and under his breath, not in hopes that you wouldn’t hear but in hopes that Luke wouldn’t — there was no telling how far he was from you at any given moment, but he wasn’t going to tell you that, so he just put on his charming Stoll Smile and said, “So, wanna join us?”
You didn’t have anything to do that day, and since you’d assumed you were in for another long eight hours of finding out what you were good at and failing, a friendly game of ball (which you were safe to assume was volley, per what Luke told you yesterday) seemed like a great idea.
Only it wasn’t — friendly, that is. You wandered over to the net set up on the beach with Travis at your side and a taller girl with curly blonde hair narrowed her eyes at you in suspicion, “How good are you at this?”
“Uh —“ You shrugged, shaking your head slightly, “I’ve never played. We don’t have many beaches where I’m from.”
“You don’t need a beach to play volleyball, newbie.” Connor Stoll appeared out of nowhere, grinning at you, “But it’s easy to pick up. You can be on our team.”
Their team consisted of Connor, Chris, Poppy from the Demeter cabin, Evie and Evan (twins from the Ares cabin) and now, yourself. Apparently it was a lost cause whenever the Stolls were on the same team, so Travis was on the other side of the net with the blonde girl from earlier — who’s name you’d learnt was Sabine, and who’s godly parent was Nike, which did not decrease your nerves even a little bit.
“It’s pretty simple once you get the hang of it.” Evie explained to you once she noticed your unsure eyes. “Just don’t hit the ball twice in a row, Sab’s a stickler for that rule.”
“Other than that, we’re pretty lax.” Her brother tagged on, smirking at you, “This isn’t the Olympics.”
“Tell her that.” You side eyed the blonde on the other side of the net, who was cracking her knuckles and discussing strategy with Travis and Brynn, an Athena kid with a bright blue buzzcut.
The twins let out identical chuckles, sharing a look before patting your shoulders, “You’ll be fine.”
You didn’t have time to quip that the pair of them talking at the same time was a little foreboding before the game was on, and a volleyball was heading straight for you.
To be fair to you, you lasted longer than expected. Maybe it was your battle instincts kicking in, but you hadn’t missed the ball once — sure, your defence lacked any real strategy and was more you hitting the ball in whatever direction and hoping for the best, but it was working, so why complain? You wouldn’t qualify for varsity, but at least you were one upping a Stoll brother — the same couldn’t be said for most campers, you knew that much.
You actually thought you were getting pretty good, too. Your team was up by a few points (no thanks to you, all thanks to Evan. Seriously, he was like six foot four) and Sabine was getting angry. Every now and then she’d turn and scowl at Rhea, one of her teammates, and the girl would just shrug in response before returning to her position. But then, just when you started to get confident with it, Travis got you.
Hard, too. You were paying close attention to your feet, making sure you didn’t trip over any sand when you had to move, and unfortunately didn’t notice the ball coming at you until it clipped you in the face. You went down onto your ass, both hands flying to your nose and groaning when you felt a warm trickle of blood slide through your fingers and down your hands.
“Holy shit, newbie.” Travis sped over, dropping to his knees next to his brother and hovering over you, “I am so sorry, are you okay?”
Your speech was muffled and nasally when you replied with a swift, “No, asshole!”
“Shit.” He muttered, looking between Connor and Evie, “Uh, I can take you to the infirmary if you want —“
“I’ll take her.” Evan interrupted. He was crouched somewhere behind you, looking at your teammates over the top of your head. You felt his hands flatten on your back as he pushed you up to stand, the rest of the group joining him and wincing when some blood dripped onto the sand.
“It’s okay, you don’t have to —“ You held out a hand in his direction now that you could see him, only to press it firmly back against your face when your nose simply started to gush once the pressure had been removed.
“Yes,” He nodded, “I do. Let’s go.”
You let him lead you, sending an apologetic look to the remaining teens on the sand — you were pretty sure it looked nothing like an apology since your hands were covering half of your face and there was blood seeping through your fingers, but it was the effort that counted.
You didn’t receive as many looks as you thought you would’ve on the walk to the infirmary, although you assumed demigods had gotten worse injuries than a nosebleed before, so it wasn’t exactly odd. When you got there, you stopped on the porch and tried to speak to Evan as best you could without letting any more blood spill.
“You can — you can go.” You said through your hands, “I got it from here.”
He looked a little unsure, but you nodded firmly and he turned back the way he came. It was pretty embarrassing, walking into the infirmary with a bloody nose on your third day at camp, but the Apollo kid who took care of you said it was only a matter of time before you shed first blood, and that you’d better thank the gods it was a volleyball and not a hellhound that did the damage.
They stopped the bleeding with some sort of special gauze and told you to be a little more careful before sending you on your way — which was when you found Luke.
You didn’t even see him at first, more focused on folding the gauze you’d been given into a perfect square while you stepped off the wooden porch. But then a voice muttered your name in slight shock and confusion, and you looked up to meet those baby brown eyes you couldn’t help but love.
You grinned, “JoJo.”
Luke shook his head, “What were you doing in the infirmary?” His eyes tracked all over you, assessing for any visible injuries. When he found none, he turned his questioning gaze back to your face.
You sucked in some air through your teeth, embarrassed, “I, uh, got hit in the face with a volleyball. Turns out, I’m awful at it.” You let out a weak chuckle, and Luke rolled his eyes in amusement.
“Of course. I thought baseball was your thing?”
“It is.” You nodded, “But there’s nobody out here to play with, so…” Then an idea sprung, and your face lit up so visibly that Luke took a tentative step back, “Hey, why don’t you come watch? We’re playing on the beach.”
“Oh.” The boy paused, eyes sliding to the beach and back to you, “I don’t think so…I, uh, tend to spend my weekends alone.”
“You spend your everything alone.” You pointed out with a raised pair of brows. He pursed his lips. You sighed, “Come on. You don’t have to play.”
He looked as if he was thinking about it, and your hopes were raised a little. You liked Luke, you wanted to know him better and one day consider him a friend rather than a guy you harassed every day. But you were very aware of his aversion for all things social — the comment Travis made about Luke not playing with them anymore saddened you, and it pained you to imagine Luke all alone while his brothers and friends still had fun around him. But then his face dropped, and so did yours, Luke shaking his head no.
“I just…” He shrugged, “I don’t really…”
“It’s okay.” You interrupted before he could spout out his excuse. He didn’t need one. “We can do something else.”
“Oh, I —“ Another shake of the head, “You go back to them, don’t let me ruin it.”
“You aren’t ruining anything.” You said plainly, and you thought that those four words hit Luke a lot harder than expected, because he had this pensive look on his face that didn’t fade until you spoke again, “Listen, I know baseball isn’t exactly a camp sport, but I’ve got a ball. This place has gotta have bats — I mean, if it’s got swords, it’s got bats, right? So we grab them, we go off somewhere and take turns batting. I need to stay in practice anyway, if I’m gonna make varsity.”
You sent him your shiniest smile paired with some doughy eyes, and after squinting at you for a solid ten seconds, Luke agreed to your idea with a hesitant nod. You weren’t exactly expecting him to jump up and down in joy, so you took the liberty of doing that before asking him, very enthusiastically (because if you stayed positive, maybe it would rub off on him), to go look for a bat while you grabbed your ball.
Chris caught you exiting the Hermes cabin while he was filling up his water bottle using the outdoor tap not far from the porch, asking you what you were doing with a baseball. You explained that volleyball was definitely not your thing and ignored his chuckle of agreement in favour of informing him that you would be teaching Luke how to become the next Babe Ruth. He raised a brow.
“Really?”
“Uh, yeah.” You replied, a little put off by his reaction. “Is that a problem?”
“No, no.” He backtracked quickly, hands raised and water sloshing around his bottle as the movement, “I just…I dunno. Luke’s been a little off recently. If I were you, I wouldn’t meddle in it.”
“Meddle?” You asked, shaking your head, “In what?”
“In his…” He puffed out his cheeks, trying to find the words, “His funk.” He shook his head then, eyes glossing over as he thought about it, “He failed his quest, he’s a little butthurt, but…he’ll get over it. Y’know?”
You didn’t know.
“I just don’t think he needs babysitting.” He firmed, looking confident in his wording now that he’d found it, “He’s just gonna talk your ear off about how much he hates his life until you’re borderline suicidal. I wouldn’t bother, personally. He's a big boy, he can get over it.”
You rolled your lips over each other, staring blankly at Chris as he sent you a polite smile and walked back to the beach. Slowly, your eyes narrowed, and your brows pulled together. But you didn't say anything, you just turned around yourself and walked to where you’d asked Luke to meet you.
He was tossing the bat between his hands when you got there, dropping it in his left when he spotted you and nodding, “Alright, where are we doing this?”
You stopped, snapped out of a stupor you didn’t even realise you were in and blinking at him. For the first time since you’d met, it seemed that he was more focused and lively than you were. It irked him a little bit, and he frowned, “Sunny?”
“Sorry.” You responded immediately, shaking your head to rid yourself of your spiralling thoughts, “I just…uh, let’s go somewhere clear. We don’t wanna hit anyone with the ball.”
Luke led you to a clearing in the woods, explaining that the wood nymphs would be able to help you if the ball got lost in the foliage, so there was no need to hold back the arm you’d been bragging about for the entire walk. You just smirked, raised the bat level, and nodded at him to serve.
Yes, you were a thousand percent better at baseball than you were at volleyball. You knew that, of course, but it was nice to be reassured. Luke wasn’t half bad either, but you were also a really good runner, so you kept having to remind him that an average level fielder wouldn’t have a chance against his bats — you just so happened to be way above average.
Plus the wood nymphs were very helpful — apparently they didn’t get to watch many demigod activities other than capture the flag so it was refreshing for them to see you two play, and to actually be able to help.
All in all, you were having a great time. Which of course meant that you were long overdue for something going wrong. Of course.
“I can’t find it.”
“What?” You asked breathlessly, staring at the tree nymph who shrugged at you plainly.
“It rolled into a pond, I think.” He sniffed indignantly, “And I am not climbing into a pond.”
“Oh, and you expect us to?”
And that, kids, is how you ended up knee deep in pond water and ankle deep in something else — with Luke Castellan right by your side.
“This is so gross.” You whispered, grimacing as your hands ran over the murky bottom. You couldn’t see anything but your own reflection when you looked in, so you were replying on touch alone to help find your ball. “I can’t believe this. My lucky ball and it falls into a pond! Not so lucky anymore, huh? Yeah, lucky my ass.”
“Hey, Sunny?” A slosh of water rippled over you and you had to straighten up to avoid the tiny waves splashing in your face. They only increased at your movements, but you were too busy glaring at Luke to notice. He pressed his mouth together, holding in a chuckle, “You’re not being very sunny right now.”
You huffed, flinging your arms out at your sides and wincing when you splashed water on yourself by doing so, “I —“ A huff, “I don’t feel very sunny, Castellan. I am wading in sludge.”
He actually had the audacity to let a tiny grin slip through, “Wow, the last name? You’re acting like me right now. It’s weird.”
“I can’t believe this.” You repeated, narrowing your eyes at the boy, “I’ve been trying to cheer you up since the day I met you and when you finally do, it’s because you’re relishing in my pain? Fuck you.”
As if he was trying to piss you off, Luke laughed. He actually laughed, exactly like he had yesterday and if you weren’t so annoyed you’d be smiling at him for it. But you were annoyed, so all you did in response was send a wave of pond water at him and drench his front.
He stopped laughing. You started laughing.
“Okay, is that how you wanna play this?” He asked, stepping closer, “Is it?”
You grinned, stepping back. The water moved when you did, and the paired struggle of your’s and Luke’s legs under the water just increased the waves that oscillated around your knees. It slid up to your thighs and threatened to wet the denim of your shorts, but you were too busy prying your foot out of whatever the hell lived at the bottom of the pond so you could escape Luke’s wrath.
You shook your head, “You don’t wanna do this.”
He nodded mockingly, “I think I do.”
Then it was on. He lunged for you, and you dived to the left in a swift attempt to get around him. Water was splashing everywhere at this point but neither of you cared — especially when Luke’s hands were mere inches from your arms, waiting for your ankle to snag on some algae and pull you back so he could push you over. You were smarter than that though, so you did a swift one-eighty, dragging your hands under the water with you as you did — the wave that accumulated from the momentum doused Luke from head to toe, his curls sticking to his forehead. He wiped them away and blew hard from his mouth before forming a weak glare in your direction.
Your jaw trembled as you held in what you knew would be some serious chortles — but it was silent. The only noise apparent was the settling of the waves now that you had both stopped moving and Luke’s heavy breathing in front of you. He shook his head, stepping forward slowly, and you braced yourself for what was about to come.
“Hey!”
You paused. You shared a look with Luke before looking confusedly at the form that had appeared suddenly between the two of you. It was a girl by the looks of it, only she was made entirely of the water the two of you were standing in. She glared between the pair of you, hands on her hips.
“I don’t appreciate all this splashing.” You felt suddenly like you were being berated by a school teacher for talking too loud during class, “Are you trying to drain my pond? Are you?”
“N—No.” You responded, shaking your head, “We were just looking for — ”
The water nymph held up your ball with a stern expression, “This? Yeah, it looked like you were.”
Her sarcasm was not lost on you, and you tried your best not to meet Luke’s eyes, knowing they would fail you the second you did. Instead you looked at the nymph before you and took the ball from her outstretched hand, “Thank you. And, um, sorry…about the splashing.”
She folded her arms, lifting her head and straightening her shoulders, “That’s okay. Now get out.”
You were both quick to exit the water, although not too quick that you made anymore of it splash onto the rocks. Once you were out, the nymph nodded in satisfaction and melted back into the pond, and you and Luke were finally able to breathe. Then, you both burst into laughter.
“Oh my gods.” You huffed, shaking your head and looking down at yourself, “Did we just get into trouble?”
“With a water nymph?” He finished, shrugging off his wet shirt and wringing it out, “Yeah. How embarrassing.”
Your mouth was suddenly very dry. You knew Luke was strong — he had to be to fight a dragon and come back alive. To be known as the Best Swordsman in Camp. To be trusted by so many campers despite his newfound, distanced demeanour. But damn.
You blew out a long puff of air, hoping your reddened cheeks could be excused as some light sunburn. You weren’t as soaked as he was, but you still wafted your damp shirt from your body in hopes that it would dry — and also to give yourself something to do that wasn’t ogling at Luke’s lean figure.
He spread his shirt out on a rock, ensuring the sun was hitting it right before lowering himself to the ground on the dry grass a few feet away. He leant back on his hands, face to the sky, and revelled in the warmth. You stayed standing, fiddling with the button on your shorts, staring at him. At the scar on his face, at the rest of them along his chest.
He cracked one eye open, glancing at you, “What?”
“I, uh.” You licked your lips, “Nothing. Nothing.” You muttered, taking a seat beside him and crossing your legs. Your gaze stuck firmly to your lap and you waited for his to return to the sky. It didn’t.
“You can ask me.” He said then, shrugging.
“What happened on your quest?” You let slip, and when he stayed silent for a second too long, you realised that maybe that wasn't the question he was giving you permission to ask. “I’m sorry. I know it’s none of my business, it’s nobody’s really. But Chris told me before that you’re in a funk and that seemed like a gross understatement but then again I’ve known you for, what, three days? He’s known you for years, so surely he’s right. But you just seem like it’s more than a funk, and I don’t know what to believe because I don’t know what happened but I also don’t want to ask because it’s none of my business and it’s also very clearly a sore subject because of what happened with Dean. Not that I think you’re gonna fly off the handle or anything, but it’s definitely a touchy subject and I can’t just go demanding all the details just because I wanna be your friend and— ”
A hand over your mouth stopped you from continuing what Luke was sure to be a very long tangent. He looked at you, half in shock, half in amusement, and huffed out a laugh, “Sunny, you need to calm down.”
You couldn’t respond, but you did nod. He removed his hand slowly and you swallowed your embarrassment. Luke sat up fully, straightening his back and clearing his throat, “Uh, okay. Have you heard of that Hercules story? With the golden apples?”
You nodded, afraid to speak in case you went off on a rant again. He nodded with you, “Yeah, well, my father sent me on that. The exact same quest…except I failed.”
That explained the scar, and the dragon story he’d mentioned very briefly yesterday. He started to go into a little more detail about his quest — and suddenly you were overcome with this…angry sort of sadness.
Hermes sent Luke on a quest that had already been done. After hearing Clarisse yap your ear off about Kleos, you understood why he’d been a little bummed. Honestly, if it were you, you wouldn’t have even gone. What’s the point in doing a quest that’s already been done? But you didn’t say that to Luke, who seemed a little deep into his story. You just simmered in your irritation while he continued to explain his battle with Ladon, and his ultimate failure.
“I refused to leave the infirmary for a week.” He chuckled, but it was a little sad. “I mean, I’m supposed to be a leader here, and I fail my first quest? Some demigod I turned out to be.”
Without even thinking, you shook your head, “You didn’t fail.” Luke looked at you, confused, “You battled a dragon with a hundred heads and lived. That doesn’t sound like failure to me.”
“But I didn’t get the apples.” He explained. “I disappointed my father.”
“Your father…” You said slowly, unsure of how your next words would land, “Who I’m going to assume had never spoken to you until the day he gave you your quest?” Luke nodded after a brief pause and you took that as permission to continue, “So who cares if he’s disappointed? He clearly doesn’t care if you’re mauled by a dragon.”
“Exactly.” Luke replied, brows pulled together in the way they had been when you’d first met. Angry, irritated. Disappointed. “Everyone keeps telling me to get over it. That demigods have failed quests before and it just means I need to try harder next time but…why should there be a next time? Really, if you sit and think about it for a second, why are we even here? To train, so we don’t die whenever monsters come and attack us? And who’s fault is that? Maybe if our parents were good people, there wouldn’t be any monsters trying to murder their kids. If they cared, even a little bit, they’d do more than just claim us and leave us to die!”
He scoffed, looking in the direction where you knew the rest of the campers resided — playing games, building weapons, dedicating every waking hour to becoming the best of the best. And for what? For glory? For a pat on the back from a parent who can’t even be bothered to raise them?
“They don’t get it.” He said then, turning back to you, “They think this is all okay. They’re too invested to realise that they’re just being used. They’re so focused on getting a shred of recognition from the gods that they don’t understand that it’s never gonna come.”
“So…” You finally spoke, your first words in a minute, “What do we do?”
Luke shrugged then, “I don’t know yet.”
It was silent for a long time after that. Luke stayed staring at the floor and you led back to stare at the sky. He was right, wasn’t he? Sure, you’d only been in this for a little while, but you weren’t stupid. You knew the gods didn’t care — you’d figured out that much when you got to camp. A dumping ground for demigods. Demigod daycare, except mommy isn’t coming to pick you up at three o’clock. Luke deserved to be angry, he deserved to mope — they all did.
But they wouldn’t. You could sit there and curse the gods for hours on end, but that was still half of you. And that, you thought, was probably the worst part of it all.
You were so caught up in your feelings that when the tree that had been shading you phased into a nymph and walked away, you jumped halfway out of your skin, “Jeezum crow.”
You looked at Luke, expecting him to either share the same dumbfounded look on his face or be laughing at you — something he seemed to be doing a lot of today — but instead he was staring at you, slack-jawed and wide eyed. You blinked, “What?”
“You’re from Vermont.”
Your mouth snapped shut, and his expanded into the grin you’d been hassling him for since you’d set your sights on him. You sighed, “Fuck.”
He let out a disbelieving laugh, “You’re from Vermont! Holy shit. I should’ve known it when you called me a flatlander.” He threw his head back, and you shook yours at his dramatics. But he didn’t care, he just pointed at you, “You’re a fuckin’ woodchuck!”
“Oh my gods.” You groaned into your hands, pulling yourself to your feet in hopes of escaping his sudden glee. “Is that so bad?”
“No.” He laughed, following you, “I’m just amazed that I figured it out. I’m a genius!”
“Okay.” You sent him a blank look, but it only lasted a few seconds before your tiny smile was fighting through, “It’s not like you’ve discovered the meaning of life. Calm down.”
“Never.” He shook his head, “This is my greatest achievement.”
“You fought a dragon.”
“Screw the dragon!” He gripped your biceps, grinning at you, “You’re from Vermont!”
“You’re not funny.”
“And yet you’re laughing.”
“I am not.”
“You are.”
“I’m not!”
____________
“What’d you do to him?”
You threw a piece of salmon into the fire, glancing at Chris, “I’m getting deja vu. Haven’t you asked me this already?”
“Yeah, but…” The boy looked behind him, back at the Hermes table, where Luke was perched on the end and waiting patiently for you to come back from the hearth before digging into his food, “This time I mean it. I mean, he still isn’t talking to us, but he’s sitting on our side of the table again. You can be honest with me…” He sent you a grave look, “Did you give him a BJ?”
“What? No!” You threw a pea at him. “I just listened to him.” You tried to be a little serious, but clearly Chris wasn’t getting the hint, so you relented, “And doused him in pond water.”
He laughed at that, nodding proudly. You turned back to the fire, asking Aphrodite to get rid of your split ends. You’d given up on praying to your father, deciding to go through every Olympian until one of them answered. So far, only Hera had responded — you assumed so, anyway, when a cuckoo woke you up from your afternoon nap. That wasn’t very helpful, but at least it was an answer. You didn’t suspect campers prayed to her often, so she probably appreciated the sentiment.
“So…” Travis smirked, wiggling his eyebrows at you once you sat down. He sent this look around the group, but even Connor gave him a weirded out look in response. He huffed, “It’s team day tomorrow.”
A collective ohhh seemed to hum around the group, but you were still confused. You sent a questioning look to Luke who said, “For Capture the Flag. Tomorrow is when all the cabin counsellors gang up and decide on the two teams.”
“Then we have five days to strategise.” Travis continued on very dramatically, hands splayed on the table, “And on Friday…we battle.”
That seemed to lift the energy up a bit, the people around you sharing mischievous looks. They started to discuss amongst them who would be the best cabin to ally with, Lana turning to Chris, “Who are you gonna pick?”
Chris went to speak, but paused. He seemed to think about something, looking slightly scared but still turning to the boy across from him anyway, “I thought maybe…Luke would like to reinstate himself as team captain this month.”
Right, you’d completely forgotten. During your spear lessons with Clarisse, you’d asked her why it was so important that you be amazing at fighting quickly if monsters couldn’t get into camp. She’d then explained the whole situation that was Capture the Flag — how it was a bigger deal than the super bowl around here — before briefly mentioning that Luke had always been Hermes team captain, but stepped down for the last game because his scar was still healing from his quest. Chris had taken over for him, and based off of the looks the people around you were sporting, you assumed they weren’t expecting him to give up his title so quickly.
You couldn’t blame them. Luke hadn’t exactly expressed much desire to captain this time — he hasn’t expressed much desire for anything these days apparently. You were all waiting for him to let Chris down easy, but instead he looked up from his plate with an indifferent nod and said, “Yeah, sure.”
Nobody said anything. Except Chris who, when Luke stood to rack up his empty plate, looked at you gravely and asked, “Was it a handjob?”
🏷️ @katherines-imagines @lovingjasontoddmakemewanttocry @jennapancake @cobaltskiez @loveryoushouldcomeoverr @m00ng4z3r @mischiefmoons @woodlandwrites @theo-notts-doll @iammightsadyall @fennecswife @csifandom @tsireyasgf (just ask to be removed/added!)
#sunny!verse#@lia’s works#luke castellan#luke castellan x reader#luke castellan x you#i am a hoe for loser!luke#i also know nothing about baseball#hence the very brief baseball scene#its just like rounders im pretty sure#but im not too confident on that#also reader maybe gets claimed in the next part#wink wink
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Saiki K. - A list of Never-Adapted Chapters
As stated, a list and brief kinda long summery of the chapters never adapted into the anime. Only a few have good reasons aside from time though. (Also a list of reasons for anime only viewers to give the manga a read *cough*)
Warning: I spoil every single one of these chapters. So if you’re lazy and only want to read the non adapted chapters, go ahead and just read the chapter number/name, and avoid the summery. You will be missing a HUGE amount of unadapted scenes if you don’t read the whole manga though, which are present in nearly every chapter, adapted or not. They were likely cut for time like a lot of the chapters, but many add depth and important character development, and actually explain certain dynamics between characters present that were glossed over in the anime.
Reblogs appreciated...this took me so long qwq
Under the cut for sheer length
Chapter 0.1 “Telepathy”: A chapter mainly detailing info about Saiki’s telepathic abilities, and the plot revolves around him stopping his class from believing Nendo stole everybody's wallets.
Chapter 0.2 “Telekinesis”: A chapter mainly detailing info about Saiki’s telekinetic abilities, and the plot revolves around Nendo “saving” him from being bullied, and him realizing that Nendo actually isn’t a delinquent, and is a good friend. Interestingly, Saiki is able to hear Nendo’s thoughts during this chapter, in which he is internally telling Saiki to run away while he takes the attack from the bullies.
Chapter 0.4 “Precognition”: A chapter mainly detailing info about Saiki’s precognitive abilities (are you noticing a theme among the volume zero chapters?), and the plot revolves around him receiving a precognition about Nendo’s supposed funeral. Saiki follows Nendo around all day as they hang out in preparation of his date, and it’s (obviously) revealed the girl did it as a dare. Saiki uses his teleportation to apport a bowling ball Nendo had bought with the girl’s phone, and sends a message telling Nendo that she was simply busy and had to miss the date. The two go to Nendo’s house and it’s revealed the memorial was for Nendo’s already deceased dad, not him.
Chapter 0.5 “Teleportation”: A chapter mainly detailing info about Saiki’s ability to teleport/apport, and the plot revolves around Chouno attempting a magic show with a new assistant, after firing Ike-san (still homeless at the time) for making mistakes. His assistant, however, is purposely sabotaging him. Part way through, Ike-san shows up and thinks about how he should’ve been a better assistant, and his makeover is revealed. Near the end of the show a trick is attempted to where Chouno’s assistant is meant to teleport out of a box, but of course she does nothing. It is noticed that her and Ike-san have swapped places, due to Saiki apporting the two of them, and Chouno and Ike-san reunite.
Chapter 0.6 “Clairvoyance”: A chapter mainly detailing info about Saiki’s clairvoyant abilities, and the plot revolves around Kaido accidently spotting Saiki teleporting from a distance, and trying to find out who it was. Unfortunately, the drawing he is using to ask around for the “Trickster” looks nothing like Saiki. At the end of the chapter, Saiki appears before Kaido with the face of his crude drawing, and teleports out, to appease him. (Interesting tidbit about this chapter is that the mysterious stranger from the birthday arc appears in the class while Saiki uses his clairvoyance to watch Kaido. He also appears in the background of chapter 41 (the telepathy silencer movie chapter), but not in the anime equivalent.)
Chapter 0.7 “Astral Projection”: A chapter mainly detailing info about Saiki’s ability to astral project, and the plot revolves around Saiki using telekinesis to deflect a stray baseball from hitting him, but it instead hits Nendo, subsequently knocking him out right before he was due to play in a baseball game. Thus, Saiki uses astral projection to take over Nendo’s body and play in the baseball game for him.
Chapter 8 “ Fighting for a RePSIval!”: Saiki and Nendo end up stopping a failing musician from jumping off a roof due to his enormous debt. Nendo gets the idea to help the man gain money by selling the CDS of his music he had ordered in bulk, which were the result of the debt, due to them not selling. He performs live in the park, and Saiki accidently uses his telepathy to project the song to everyone in the are, causing them to believe it became stuck in their heads due to how good it was.
Chapter 00 “Special One-Shot: The DiPSIster of Psychic Saiki Kusuo”: This chapter falls in-between 8 and 9. It is a collection of oneshots set in a slightly different universe (likely a pilot or a very early storyline) in which it details information over several of Saiki’s powers, much like Volume 0.
Chapter 32 “ExPSIbition! Jump Festa”: Saiki goes out to Jump Festa to purchase merchandise due to an errand from his mom. There he meets Kaido, and the whole chapter’s gag is subtle advertisement for Jump Festa. The pair run into a crying child, who had lost his mom. He smartly refuses to go with Kaido to a help desk due to stranger danger, but Kaido comes back in his cosplay and since the kid vaguely recognizes him after he “proves” he really is that character (with Saiki’s help), the kid is returned to his mom.
Chapter 73 “PubliPSIzing the Popularity Contest Results!“: Saiki ends up in an alternate universe to where people’s popularity is shifted. (The chapter is based on the popularity poll that was held, hence that being the joke). Saiki is the most popular in this world, and he is bombarded with people until he hides away in the bathroom and transforms into Kuriko. This allows the original world’s Saiki to return, and he briefly explains why the world is this way, before sending Saiki, as Kuriko, back.
Chapter 88 “Press Play! A "Making Of" PSItory”: Saiki finishes watching a movie, and he remarks about how he loved it due to the quality of the acting and would like to visit the place it was filmed. Shortly after, he teleports to the location while returning the movie. He then decides to use his psychometry to see how the movie was filmed, and slowly it is revealed that the actors themselves were quite bad, especially the child star who Saiki believed to be a very good actor. The reason the movie was so good is revealed to be because the scenes in the movie were filmed as a supposed to be “behind the scenes”, and those were put in place instead of the actual filmed scenes.
Chapter 95 “The PSInnacle of the Golden Age of Heroes! A Fun Party Game”: Kaidou, Nendo, and Kuboyasu visit Saiki’s house the same day the game “J-Stars Victory Vs” was supposed to be arriving for him. A package arrives at the door, but instead of J-Stars, it is “C-Heroes Vale Tudo Battle”, a ripoff game by Saiki’s dad’s manga company. Kaido, Nendo, and Kuboyasu are all enamored by the game and reveal that they love Cognac, the magazine the game is for, and they all play the game. At the end of the chapter, the actual wanted game arrives, and the trio are just as excited and want to play that instead.
Chapter 102 “The Achromatic InviPSIble Boy”: (My personal favorite chapter) Saiki turns himself invisible to avoid running into his friends on the way to school, and winds up inside an empty storage room in order to wait for his invisibility to wear off. Unfortunately, a group of girls decided to use this room to change due to the peeping tom that’s been rumored around the campus. He hides by gripping onto the ceiling and waiting for them to leave, but when his invisibility is about to wear off the girls have still not left. After some time spent dodging and hiding, the door is opened by Saiki, revealing the actual peeping tom. The girls chase after him and Saiki uses the opportunity to escape.
Chapter 118 “The DiPSIster of the Rental Video Store”: Saiki, due to being bored, decides to go to a rental movie store to rent a movie to watch. Unfortunately, the current cashier is one that Saiki doesn’t favor very much, because she is high on his list for potential spoilers, but he remarks that at least the manager, a man who has seen nearly every movie, isn’t there. But (lmao), the manager switches positions with the cashier shortly after. Saiki then runs into Takahashi, who is purchasing pornography. In exchange for not telling the school about this, Saiki asks Takahashi to check out his movies for him. Takahashi gets caught like the dumbass he is and the plan is ruined.
Chapter 133 “An ExPSIlent Wife and Mother!? Mom's Class Reunion”: Saiki starts the chapter off by explaining how his mother is scatterbrained, and showing examples of it. Kurumi than remarks that she is going to her class reunion, which is being held in the city near her this year instead of way out in the country, meaning she can attend. When she arrives she starts getting reintroduced to her classmates who she hasn’t seen in 20 years, and talking about how different they are. Only one of the attendees, however, is actually from her class, and he reveals that the whole event is a plan to get closer to Kurumi, in order to use her for her eldest son’s wealth. Saiki, who had come to watch after having a bad feeling about the event, follows him into the bathroom and threatens him to stay away from his mom. Before he can finish, Kurumi accidently stumbles into the men’s bathroom, and her former classmate claims that her youngest son had attacked him unprovoked. Kurumi attacks the man, claiming her son would never do such a thing.
Chapter 134 “Kaidou and Kuboyasu's PSIpicions”: (The BEST Chapter) Kaidou and Kuboyasu are talking near their lockers about how neither of them got any chocolate for valentines day, and the conversation strays off to talking about Hairo. The two remark that they never see him talking to or dating girls, despite his popularity, and joke that he must be gay. The two are later found following Hairo, and bring up incidents that add to their growing suspicion. They soon find Hairo talking to Nendo, and begging the latter to join his club, stating that it has to be him. The conversation is normal, but Kaidou and Kuboyasu keep mistaking parts of it as being dirty. They watch Nendo and Hairo have a sumo match, and confront him after it, stating that it’s fine if he his gay, they were just curious. Hairo laughs it off and says he isn’t, but after another risque seeming scene (including an omake where Hairo and Nendo remark about keeping their relationship secret and how Hairo is willing to come out for him 🤔 ) the duo agree to stop thinking about it.
Chapter 165 “Train DiPSIster”: Saiki decides to take the train to a coffee shop 30 minutes away from his house instead of teleporting, claiming coffee jelly tastes much more satisfying if there is effort put into travelling there...though he does plan to teleport home. He explains how annoying train rides are for him, due to his telepathy, and how if someone playing music loudly is annoying for you, how much worse it is to listen everyone complain about said music. Over the course of the trip, Saiki begins to get anxious due to the crowds and his telepathy, and is relieved when several people get off. Unfortunately, he receives a precognition about the train stopping, and ends up saving a man from jumping in front of the train. Saiki winds up teleporting to the coffee shop.
Chapters 176 & 177 “PSIolving the Biggest Riddle!”: Saiki shrinks himself to retrieve his mother’s wedding band that had fallen down a drain, and when he jumps down, he remarks that the sink had become essentially 80 meters tall due to his height. He lays down in his bed afterwards, deciding to take a nap while he returns to normal size. When he wakes up however, he is much taller than normal. Due to the fact his body keeps growing, to avoid destroying the house anymore, Saiki teleports away to an island to hide, but he realizes that he teleported to an island closer to land due to his height throwing off his teleport. He hides under the water to avoid being caught, but ends up having to teleport away to avoid being seen. He accidently ends up on land, and nearby is a tribe of people, who are speaking a strange language. Before they approach him, Saiki ducks into his shirt, remarking that he feels embarrassed and is at a loss. He ends up floating and crashes to the ground once he reaches a certain height. It eventually clicks and he returns home, normal size. He had realized that his growing and shrinking powers were the same, but growing happened slowly, and shrinking happened quickly, hence why he would return to normal size slowly. The cause of this issue? The off comment he made about the sink “Becoming 80 meters tall.”
Chapter 201 “A Miraculous InvenPSIon”: Saiki notices his dad using a tablet and asks him what it his, to which Kunihara explains. Once he remembers he has work, Kunihara runs off, but not before offering his old tablet to Saiki, saying he can use it to read books and buy things. A little while later, Saiki is amazed by the tablet. He remarks about the shopping sites he an use to buy not only physical copies of books on, but digital ones as well. He keeps thinking about how amazing the online shopping sites and recommendations are, meanwhile he performs basically the same exact thing to his mom, when she requests he go out and buy groceries, as he instantly apports them for her, and also added foil because he had a precognition about her running out. While searching for appliances, he stumbles on the coffee jelly maker he owns, and finds out it has shitty reviews, but everyone recommends a newer model. He looks for the cheapest price of it, and finds an ad claiming to sell it for 100 yen. However, he falls for the trick of a ridiculous shipping fee, and his father laughs and remarks how just like his mother, he got scammed. Angry, Saiki teleports to the factory and threatens them into giving him the model for 100 yen, claiming that he doesn’t have to pay the shipping fee if he picks it up himself.
Chapter 229 “No Need for Bath Salts! Taking a Dip in the PSIcret Hot Spring”: Saiki decides to take a visit to a secluded hot springs in the mountains to relax himself, but unfortunately two strangers decided to hike there at the very same time. He cannot just teleport or walk away, since he didn’t bring his clothes with him, having teleported there to begin with. To make them leave, he decides to heat the hot spring up, so that the two men get overheated and decic to leave. One of the men, however, decides to try and stay in the water that is slowly gaining heat, in order to outlast Saiki. The man eventually gets out and faints, and to avoid having to help them, Saiki feigns having fainted from the heat as well, causing the two men to leave on their own.
Chapter 243 ″Welcome to PSIberspace”: Saiki’s dad has a new VR headset, and while he has to leave for work he offers it to Saiki to play with. Saiki is enamored by the horror game his dad was playing, being that it’s able to surprise him. The jump scares, however, cause him to accidently use his telekinesis, which is actually blowing stuff up at his dad’s workplace, instead of his house.
Chapter 245 “Trending on a Streaming PSIte”: Kaidou, Nendo, Kuboyasu, and Saiki are all hanging out, and Kaidou mentions he has a camera and wants to become a youtuber (Yotubo-er is what it’s called). At a café, the group suggests video ideas, such as Teruhashi. In order to prevent this plan, however, Saiki uses telekinesis to stab french fries into their eyes when Teruhashi ends up walking by the café. On the walk home, however, Saiki receives a premonition about all the video ideas they suggested becoming popular, including one of him using his abilities on the french fries. He obtains the camera from Kaidou and deletes the footage, which had been recording due to the camera being on the entire time.
Chapter 255 “APSIsting In Mediating A Long-Term Marriage!”: Saiki and his parents go to visit his grandparent’s, only to learn the pair is fighting, and his grandmother would like a divorce. The start of the entire fight is revealed to be because Kumagoro left the toilet seat up, and Kumi explains how she’s had to put the seat down for 40 years. The reason she was so adamant to divorce as well was because Kuusuke had pushed her to it. Kumi gets ready to leave the house, especially after Kumagoro purposely leaves the lid up one last time. Saiki stops her and tells her to put down the lid one more time, only for the words ‘I’m Sorry’ to be written on it. The fight is resolved.
Chapter 264 “Please Go Watch the Live ActPSIon Movie!”: A manga Saiki reads is getting a live action movie, and he is particularly upset about it. His dad happens to be the editor for the manga, and takes him to the filming set to change his mind. (By the way, this is the best chapter for showcasing Kunihara’s shittiness as a father. He physically attacks his son several times. Missing, of course, but he still actively attacks him. Kunihara is a horrible person, let alone father.) Saiki views the set and is perturbed by the actor choices, specifically Makoto as the lead character. He is even more upset to learn that the movie features an original character (like a badly written wattpad fanfiction), and that the end of the movie even features the death of the main character, and Kunihara explains that it differs from the manga greatly. He explains to his son that the changes make the movie better, and Saiki ends up agreeing after he winds up viewing the actual live-action movie.
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Experience of living in different cities
In my life of more than 7 decades, I have lived in some 8 cities starting from Ahmedabad, Pilani, Delhi, Mumbai, Pune, Yokohama( Japan), Muscat (Oman) and Bangalore, in that order. I will make an attempt to pen down the “trivial”, but not so common, features of my experience.
I was brought up in Ahmedabad from 1954 to 1967, which were mostly my student days. We lived on the outskirt of the city and our society of bungalows was surrounded by open fields where still farming was going on. Other than school and college, I was busy playing different games with my neighbors. I enjoyed Gujarati snacks and would take extra efforts to get them. Our neighbors were very kind and did not complain of our cricket or other games played anytime of the day. City had a very good bus service and it was our main transport. Our bungalow had a few tenants like us but it did have a problem of water and sewage. Water supply was short and erratic, and septic tank sometime spilt over. We loved the festival of Navratri ( Garba/Dandia) and kite flying on Makarsankrant.
I shifted to BITS, Pilani hostel for five years from 1967. The change from day scholar to hostel life was huge. I could do what I wanted and when I wanted (freedom) except class attendance. Other than academic pursuit, I was able to indulge in sports/games. I learnt how to play basket ball, table tennis and contract bridge. I improved my ability to play carom, cricket and hockey. Being confined to the campus for a couple of months at a stretch, I enjoyed food in the mess and also outside at Nutan market/dhabas. I was introduced to black (udad) dal, lemon rice, mawa mutter, stuffed parathas and stuffed capsicum/tomato in the mess. Outside the campus got to taste Titar (partridge), reportedly a banned bird. I was bombarded by Hindi movies as every Saturday a movie was screened for students. I probably saw more than 125 movies in BITS in five years, compared to less than 20 movies seen earlier. Initially the old movies were screened in 16 mm in a quadrangle of the main building but later new movies in 35 mm in a huge auditorium. Once in a while, we escaped the campus life to see late night movie in a makeshift shed called Jayashree talkies.
After graduation in 1972, I lived in South Delhi till the late 70’s, initially as a bachelor and then a family man. Major problem of Delhi was public transport as I did not own a vehicle then. City bus (DTC), autorikshaw or yellow taxi were most unreliable and the operators ( drivers and conductors) most non-cooperative and rude. My wife, who joined me from Bombay, was most shocked as she compared this scene with BEST of Bombay. I did not face much problem as I used a contract bus to go to office. As a bachelor, I used to join others on most Saturday night’s for a party. The liquor law did not permit drinking in public so we sometime managed to cross into Haryana (Faridabad) and consumed beers and chicken. Returning after the fling was not a problem as “drive after drinks “was not an offence. In Delhi, we enjoyed different types of food –Punjabi and Chinese. Our favorite places were Lajpatnagar market, M block market in GKI, Narulas and Hongkong in GKI. Most tasty samosa was made by a small vendor in East of Kailash A block market. At residence, we faced water shortage and had to cook on kerosene stove.
We shifted to Bombay in early 80’s and lived there for 8 years. Biggest difference was a moderate summer compared to Delhi and very efficient city transport whether bus, taxi or autorikshaw. We also enjoyed the sea and its beeches- Girgaon, Dadar, Juhu and Malad. We, however, had to face some water shortage. We once again were able to enjoy street food like batata vada, Frankie, bhel etc. We also loved Irani café menu of maska pav, kheema pav, baida( egg) roti etc. We started going to Marathi plays often and enjoyed the change from Hindi movies. I got to own a flat in 1982 and a Bajaj scooter in 1984. That made life easy.
We moved to Pune in the mid 80’s for a brief period and are staying there till date (more than 20 years) except our breaks to go to Japan, Oman and Bangalore. In first phase, we got to live in a bigger place, owned our own Premier Padmini car and telephone line at residence, all thanks to Thermax, my employer. The major sigh of relief was water availability and good round the year weather-moderate summer, monsoon and winter. These advantages remain even today. Pune offered the advantages of a village and city. Distances were short and day out picnic spots in the surrounding hills were approachable and affordable. I got introduced to music (performing arts) of all kinds –classical, light, gazal, filmy and non filmy. I was able to attend live performances of stars like Pt. Jasraj, Kaushiki Chakravarty, Shaunak Abhisheki, Hariharan, Raghunandan Panashikar, Jagjiy Singh, Alka Yagnik, Shankar Madhavan,Shaan, Sarod by Amjad Ali, dances by Hema Malini, Minakshi Sheshadri. Also new upcoming stars like Vibhavari Joshi Apte, Hrishikesh Ranade.Pune reintroduced us to Lord Ganesh and we love the ten day special festival of Ganpati. I was and am able to indulge in outdoor activities like walking, swimming and going to hills. We got introduced to YOGA-pranayam, Omkar, suryanamskar etc. We do it regularly even today. Our health received a boost as we got to know more about homeopathy medicines as my wife has seen lot of benefits to this alternative therapy. I was able to afford and enjoy different cuisines. My membership of a club once again enabled me to see a Hindi movie every week. Since it was free, one had the luxury to walk out of un-interesting movie without feeling guilty.
We moved to Yokohama, Japan during the 90’s. The change was huge-from “stone” age of Pune, India to space tech level in Yokohama,Japan. The weather was excellent and all the utilities-water, piped gas, electricity and land line were reliable and affordable. First time we used a Microwave oven and rice cooker with a timer. Only my daughter’s international school fee was a huge dent on my pocket but she had the best quality of education. We got initiated into Japanese food and loved visiting China Town for authentic Chinese cuisine. My daughter enjoyed the American fast food at McDonald’s and Pizzas at Shakey’s. Surprisingly there were more than fifty Indian restaurants in Tokyo area and we loved the Naan served there. The public transport (bus, train, taxi) was reliable, clean and convenient even for foreigners like us despite the language hurdle. We also enjoyed a ride on the famous bullet train (called Shinkansen) from Yokohama to Kyoto (400 kms). Like Japanese people, we also started visiting and appreciating the nature in the hills near Yokohama including hot springs and Mt. Fuji. We were surprised and shocked to find all public places-footpath, roads, stations, bus stops and toilets were spotlessly clean (clean like home). Another surprise was that weather forecast was very reliable and available in the lift lobby of the buildings. Being an island country, it would rain any time and this forecast helped. We also got introduced to huge superstores and malls. Some malls were part of railway stations e.g. Yokohama. We also got to know the vending machine culture of Japan. Many daily required items (soft drinks, coffee, tea, snacks, milk, beer, cigarette etc) could be purchased from vending machines which were all over- on footpath, near stations, lift lobbies, parks etc.Even train tickets were on a vending machine. We also made our first visit to entertainment parks like Disneyland. We also got used to the deep tub (OFURO) bath that Japanese used to keep warm during winter. I got introduced to Sumo, the Japanese wrestling and professional baseball.
We moved to Muscat, Oman for two and a half years in the late 90’s. Other than the high temperatures (summer could be + 50 Deg C), the life was very enjoyable. Oman was an exception in the Middle East and it honored Indians and Hindus. The biggest hurdle to mobility was a driving license and I got it fast luckily. I was glad to drive around in a Camry, poor person’s Mercedes. We were regular visitors to 200 year old Shiva temple and newly built Krishna temple, both built and managed by kutchi community. We were able to buy Indian vegetables and fruits easily and reasonably priced. There was easy access to Indian restaurants and street food. We got introduced to Kerala paratha (laccha paratha) and some tandoori roti from Pakistani outlets. We got introduced to Lebanese cuisine and we loved it. We could go out for dinner, which also offered Indian music or Egyptian belly dance. We were privileged to see Hindi movies on Thursday night, a day before they were released in Mumbai. We were able to drive down to Dubai in 4 hours (400 Kms) and enjoy the shopping. Driving was a pleasure as all had to follow the traffic rules and they were followed. Muscat had lovely road side greenery and flowers, and they were maintained with great efforts. Muscat airport restaurant was open for non-muslims during Ramadan and that was a big relief.
After retiring from a Pune company in 2012, I took a short assignment in Bangalore. We were lucky to stay in huge residential complex in Whitefield. First time in our life, we stayed in high rise building on the 11th floor. We enjoyed the famous Bangalore weather but had to face mosquito menace. The complex had a zero water requirement as it treated and re-circulated most of the sewage. It, however, gave a bad smell in parking area (basement). We had to bear bad water quality. We used aqua guard treated water for cooking and bought Bisleri for drinking. The water quality also reflected in poor quality of green vegetables. Another problem we faced was traffic jams- it took almost 90 minutes from our residence to reach the airport. Most facilities in our area were catering to IT crowd and hence it was re-adjustment for us.
In conclusion, I can say that present day life style is a mixture of what we picked up from different cities. Ironically my wife always wanted and wants things from the cities we left behind. For example, she wants palak, green peas and fulgobi (vegetables) from Delhi, Fish from Mumbai, Farsan from Ahmedabad, Miso soup and Yakisoba from Japan, Mysore pak from Bangalore. These small things keep us connected to the cities we had lived in.
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THE DUCK AVENGER PK2: #11 THE WEIGHT OF MEMORIES
This issue could be named Constant Internal Debates With Myself: The Issue. But it’s finally time for some backstory! Geena Onair opens this issue introducing their brand new program: What the Fuck is Everett Ducklair’s Deal?
Yeah, we’re all wondering that, so this should be fun. Also, the program has the much less accurate, but much more poetic name “the Weight of Memories”.
It opens with a recreation of a scene that took place many years ago. During a storm, Everett Ducklair was washed ashore at Goose Beach, half-dead and with no memory except his name.
I dig the hair.
Angus is visiting the place to interview the locals, starting with the man who rescued Everett, Eardin McEloin. Unfortunately, Eardin seems to have a case of stage fright, and the interview is cut short after Angus has to tell everyone who was rescued when Eardin fails to answer the question of who he saved that night.
Angus tells Donald, who’s been brought along as bodyguard/cameraman. He’s not happy to be stuck with Angus, and is wondering why Lyla felt the need to make him do this.
Or maybe he’s worried about Angus.
Well, it turns out that Angus is pissed over how the live interview with Everett went, and has decided to really start digging. Hence, Goose Beach, where Everett made his first known appearance and where he started building his fortune. Lyla was worried that might end badly, so she sent Donald along to make sure it didn’t.
Donald tries to look on the bright side. He might learn something useful! Provided Angus doesn’t get into a fight with the tavern keeper and his baseball bat.
Rough place, Goose Beach.
Donald tries to get out of the fight, mentioning that he has a green belt in quack fu.
…I have a green belt too, and I’m still not stepping between some asshole and a baseball bat. One of many reasons why I’m unsuited to be a superhero, I guess.
Luckily, a mystery woman decides that this fight is not on. Not until she knows why they’re asking questions about her father.
Tavern keeper suddenly changes his mind, and Donald is genuinely surprised that the quack fu line worked. Then Korinna steps out of the kitchen, asking to leave as she’s done for the day, and suddenly the entire incident makes a lot of sense.
I would like to remind everyone that this woman can read minds. Think louder, Donald, louder!
A bit later, Donald pretends to go to bed for the night, hesitating for a second as he feels like he’s being watched. Luckily for… either him or Korinna, depending, he decides it’s because he’s been spending too much time around Angus and goes to change into the Duck Avenger outfit.
Outside, Korinna decides it’s time to act.
Inside, Angus is surprised at how good the TV is. Looks like junk, but has every channel ever. He’s working on the interview he made earlier that day, with Everett’s adopted parents.
They look nice.
Anchor and Evinta ask if Agnus thinks Everett will watch their interview, and Angus s sure of it.
When Everett washed up on the beach, the two took him in as they had a free room and always wanted a son. And Everett was such a good kid.
This turns into a flashback of the first time they bring Everett home. It’s a pretty sweet scene, with just the right touch of awkwardness.
I love the hippie look.
Everett asks for something to do, and Anchor decides to take him along to his repair shop the next day. In three or four years, Everett will know everything he does.
A few days later, Everett somehow turns a B&W television into a colour TV. A few days after that, he pretty much does all the work, to Anchor’s annoyance. They close shop early, and head home in the rain.
*laughs helplessly at this mess*
I really like this page. Everett tries, but he doesn’t have a clue, and Anchor is probably starting to realize that he’s out of his depth. On top of that, if you know where this is going, or maybe even if you put the clues together, you also know that Everett is a) a grown (though probably young) adult at this point, and b) has two kids, and yet he’s slipping into the role of a teenager, no problem.
Like, what the fuck are that standards for “mature adult” at your planet anyway? Because I think I disagree with them.
It’s nobody’s fault, but it’s still messed up on every level, and it’s not going to get better.
In the present time, the Avenger is following Korinna, and considering whether he should approach her. They’re both fighting Everett, so he takes the chance that they might be able to work together, and flies down, right in front of her.
The already on edge Korinna does not take it well.
Word of advice to... well, everyone. Do not jump in front of people in the middle of the night, especially while carrying weapons.
She uses her powers on him, and he finds himself waking up from the nightmare she put him in much later, at the docks. When he asks where Korinna is, a cranky sailor comments that there’s always a woman involved.
In another flashback, Everett nearly show up late for the opening of another repair shop, in a different town, as Anchor is expanding the business. Everett’s been looking for information about himself, but, obviously, he’s finding nothing.
Sometimes I think it might have been better for Everett if he didn’t recover his memory. Would suck for many other people, though.
In the present… well, in the present time, in the recording Angus made of the interview, Evinta explains that Everett was still not satisfied, needing to know where he came from.
There’s a brief interlude where Donald falls over with the camera, as he’s too tired to stay awake.
Evinta then says the next thing that happened was something no one could expect.
Angus has fallen asleep watching the interview, but is awoken by the tavern keeper, who drugs him and says he’ll take Angus to Profunda.
The Avenger arrives moments later, noting that something’s off. Angus would never leave footage unguarded like that. He presses play, and the interview continues.
The old couple explains that Everett had refused to go near the sea after he arrived. Nearly drowning does that to you. Unfortunately, one day there was a storm that hit unusually fast, and Earidan McEloin was stuck out at sea, with no one willing, and really, no one able, to go rescue him. It was that bad.
Everett refused to accept this, and took a water scooter to go rescue him.
Listen, there’s no need to glare at other people just because they’re not crazy.
This is very Everett. Not listening to anyone else, taking an enormous risk, quite possibly making everything worse… and it’s done with the best intentions.
So of course it goes wrong. Evinta calls it the worst moment of her life.
These poor people.
In Angus’s room, the Avenger finds himself surrounded by the villagers. Profunda wants to see him. The Avenger escapes them easily, though he does break a window in the process.
In a real flashback, rather than an interview flashback, because now we’re onto a part of Everett’s story that nobody knows, Everett is drowning. His last thoughts are of his adopted parents. Then he’s rescued.
Convinient place for the second attempt at drowning.
In the present, Korinna is pissed. The villagers failed at capturing… I assume Donald, because he was busy, and when the villagers tell her they wanted to capture the other, masked, stranger, she says that he wants to take her back to her father, and that’s not happening. The villagers want to help, and the Avenger is rather confused at what Korinna actually wants.
In the flashback, Everett is waking up to an AI calling him Zardoz. He’s rather confused about… everything.
Not sure how I feel about finding Everett adorable.
He gets up and finds a toy that triggers some memories. He starts walking, repeating the word “no”. The ship’s AI tells him he’s fine, but that for his own sake he should not go in that direction.
In the present, Korinna is leading the villagers towards the ocean. She shouts that the ocean will welcome them, and that she’ll show them the way to reach a better world.
The Ducklair family is not overly burdened with sanity.
At the beach, the Avenger block the villagers from getting into the sea and drowning themselves. Korinna offers the Avenger the chance to join her army, trying her mind tricks again, but the Avenger resists her this time.
Except that it was all a distraction. Korinna dives into the sea, telling him that she doesn’t need anyone. The Avenger follows, using the shield to create a mini-sub to protect himself from the elements.
In the flashback, Everett ignores the AI telling him he can still turn back.
And sanity takes another hit in three, two, one!
This issue aims directly for heartbreaking.
In the present, Korinna turns out to be an incredible swimmer. (A possible explanation for why Everett survived drowning twice? It’s an alien thing?) She reaches the same ship that saved Everett the second time and heads inside. The Avenger follows.
Korinna tries to activate the spaceship, but it’s been underwater for 17 years, and it shows.
The Avenger interrupts, mocking her about not knowing how submarines work.
She turns the mocking right back at him, asking if he doesn’t recognize a Coronian spaceship. He’s rather shocked at the news that he’s in one.
The ship starts leaking heavily, and the Avenger decides to put that on hold in favor of getting out of there. Korinna agrees, but decides they can talk while they walk. There’s something the Avenger should know.
The Ducklair family comes from the planet Corona. Everett abducted them when the girls were just children. Everett, in his cowardice and selfishness, separated them from their mother. Juniper and Corinna were put in hibernation, but something went wrong. The crashed, and Everett abandoned them. When he returned… well, we saw that.
The way Korinna tells this is so simple, yet very subjective. There’s no why it happened, only how it happened, and how she feels about it. I don’t think that’s something she left out on purpose, exactly, but more how she, who was a small child when it happened, remembered it and how she, now more grown up, tries to put it into context. She is missing several pieces, but you can’t blame her for not going to Everett and asking about it. Based on what she knows and what happened last time they met, that seems like a bad idea.
I’d also like to note that, while telling Korinna the truth would obviously be difficult, Everett haven’t told Juniper the truth either at this point. We know she’s recovered a lot, and some conversations are really necessary to have as soon as possible. “Why I kidnapped you from your mother" is definitely one of them.
Meanwhile, the flashbacks are the real story, but of course we don’t get all the information at this point, so we’re still in the dark about most of what happened before they crashed on Earth. All we know is that Everett felt they needed to be removed from their mother, while the girls clearly don’t feel the same.
Korinna asks the Avenger how he can be friends with her father after he stole their childhood, how can he think of returning her to him?
The Avenger focuses on the most important part.
Late to the party. I mean, this was revealed to you pages ago.
It’s facinating how the Avenger’s mind sometimes. Korinna tells him they’re all aliens = jokes. Korinna asks hard questions = wait, Everett’s an alien? It’s like he’s... deflecting? He’s not dealing with the alien reveal right now, so he gathers info via jokes. He’s apparently not willing to answer Korinna’s questions, so he decides to process the earlier reveal.
And it is a pretty good question. Why is he, if not friends, but at least going fairly easy on Everett? Considering everything, including the rather fond face he makes at the thought of Everett at the very end of the issue... seems like he’s not over that friendship.
Their conversation is interrupted as the old spaceship can’t handle the pressure anymore and a wall collapses. The Avenger starts to drown, but Korinna will only help if he promises to help her.
The flashback continues as Everett swims back to shore, to the delight of the entire village, but especially his parents. The delight turns to confusion as he gets to land and gives everyone the cold shoulder, accepting a blanket, but just walking off afterwards.
Evinta and Anchor gives him space, promising that they won’t abandon him.
He’s already lost to you, by his own choice.
In the present, Korinna decides to help the Avenger even if he’s currently unable to promise her anything back. She’ll call in a favor later. She activates the shield’s mini-sub and sends him on his way.
And that’s why I know how to fly an airplane. It’s Earth tech!
Korinna knowing how to use the shield is also interesting, because it suggests that they were somehow taught a bunch of stuff while in cryo.
The ship collapses right after, falling deeper into the depths of the ocean.
The Avenger reaches land safely, if a bit… well, half-drowned. The village recovers their minds, and heads back to the tavern. They leave Angus behind, because no one likes him. The Avenger gets him back to his room, before going to get some well deserved sleep himself.
Angus wakes up, having no idea what just happened, and goes back to work. We then get the last part of the interview.
Evinta and Anchor tells Angus that after the storm, Everett had changed. He was only focues on making money, and he was good at it. But the most important part is that their son turned bad. He abandoned them, and haven’t been back since.
The show then turns into a summary of Everett’s life since then, the busy businessman who seems to be surrounded by mysteries.
This transitions into Donald back at Duckmall, having watched the show with Rupert, who’s impressed that he managed to stand Angus for a weekend. Rupert also notes that Everett seems really determined, a hard guy.
Leading straight into the last page.
I really like this issue. It hits the emotional points really well, presenting both Everett and Korrina’s sides of the issue, even if Everett’s gets the “objective” treatment, being flashbacks rather than told by a character like Korinna’s is. But I think helps both characters. With the number of people Korinna hurts, getting her side is necessary. The facts build under that, showing that while it was an accident... well, if somebody accidentally runs you over with a car, that doesn’t mean they didn’t fuck you up for life. Being angry and wanting to stay away at all costs is a fair reaction, you know?
Even if, of course, she takes it too far, because if she didn’t... well, we’d probably be all on her side, and it might be foreshadowing about how she and Juniper thinks about people in later issues, when we know for sure they’ve both recovered from the cryo.
But by keeping the flashbacks to what happened after they came to Earth, it still leaves the question of whether Everett was right in taking them away.
And I think that, to a certain degree, it also shows that Everett had other options. He had people who might have helped. Regular, stable people who clearly wanted what was best for him. And he decided not to trust them, and deal with everything on his own. Focusing on making a ton of money, which would be very useful in protecting himself, his kids... sure, why not? That can only help, but considering the way he went about it involved pushing away everyone.
Again, he probably meant well, for everyone. Involving Anchor and Evinta might put them in danger. Might put the Ducklairs in danger too, because your son telling you that “btw, I am an alien and also an adult. With two children” would be a lot to deal with for anyone.
Which is another strenght of this issue, IMO. Much of this is up for debate, with maybe no right answers. It’s emotional, messy and allows you to sympathize with both sides.
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Osomatsu-san 17 – 25 | ReLIFE 1
The idea for ReLIFE from now on: Once all 2016 shows are done (rewatches or not), expect the 2016 ranking.
(ep 17)
Apparently Jyushimatsu was pretty popular in Japan, so they went with an entire episode on him…
Cup Noooooooooooodle, LOL.
I didn’t get the Comiket one…both times I saw it.
Oh yeah. This “my little Jyushimatsu” was hella popular after the guitar scene. I think.
Philosophical Jyushimatsu…but it doesn’t work without the volume.
Is Jyushimatsu Pan Jyushimatsu Bread or an actual Jyushimatsu…okay, I know what it is now.
Baseball references galore, so I’ll let this page explain it.
Omohide IIRC is an old fashioned term for omoide (memories).
(ep 18)
Well, it was true that Iyami was the protagonist of the anime in one series, alongside Chibita.
I really don’t want to explain references you probably know, okay?
If you stop at just the right moment (NSFW), it reminds you that “this anime is at your own risk”. There also seem to be comments from most of the other characters, including “fight dayo!”.
Hujistu (sic), LOL.
Three way explosion shot!
Crab shell, LOL. Plus, you’re not, Jyushimatsu.
The phomosis is apparently a piece of skin on the…erhem. Check it up yourself.
Chargin’ my lazor!!! (Once you notice they animated Todo during that lasering, you have to appreciate how much they upped the budget on this…)
Second lazoring!!!
I went back a few times through the ep, only to find Osomatsu’s sign says “Prank successful”.
(ep 19)
If I remember right, the episode was called “Shonosuke Hijirisawa-san” by CR standards, but…there’s no name to this episode for AnimeLab. Update: It’s called “Untitled” by both. My mistake.
Matsuo Basho was a poet who made haikus, hence the “dayon” making it have too many syllables.
Suiton-no-jutsu unfortunately has no Naruto-related resources that are on it, so I had to use the Naruto thing to find something on it…the one about duckweed (on the link) is the one you’re looking for, apparently.
The ghost one…haven’t you heard about the ghost who counts plates, Okiku?
The “Jyushi” in Jyushimatsu means 14, hence the motif.
There sems to be a sad undertone to the Joshimatsu segment this time. Like Showa Genroku or something.
Michiko Yokote was on staff this time. No wonder the Choromatsu Rising part actually made me laugh both times I saw it.
(ep 20)
There was a flag on the title.
It’s a taco, not a kebab.
There is such a thing as horumonyaki, hence the yakisoba having “hormone” on the sign.
The pigeon is at least well animated.
The school segment is one of the more notable ones…in that it got even more boring the second time around. I know it’s meant to be funny by how spontaneous it is, but it really is a waste of timeto watch twice…part of the joke here is that they’re meant to be yankees (delinquents…Japanese delinquent have a very specific style that takes off after American schools).
Ichimatsu speaks in arrows for the CR subs, but he speaks in mashed keyboard keys in the AnimeLab subs. Doesn’t matter anyway because it’s gibberish, but nice to know.
“Funny” is subjective,so really, Iyami, just do what can garner you the most laughs.
Dekapana and Dayon are treating the sextuplets like novice rakugoka.
Why are Iyami’s audience all girls?...Oh, I answered this question myself on the TV Tropes fridge page.
(ep 21)
There’s something long behind the title (two of them, actually), but I don’t know what they are. Update: They appear to be hachimaki (headbands normally used to psyche a mahjong player – or person doing any sort of other activity – up) or mahjong sticks.
I know nothing about (physical) mahjong…so sorry, I can’t explain anything here. There is a Detective Conan OVA that explains this stuff though (though I can’t remember anything I learnt from it since I watched it a while ago…). Basically, I’m just watching for the sake of (second) completion right now.
ESP Kitty! Hello again!
Is this an Akagi parody?
Karamatsu dabbed!
Okay, now I’m sure it’s an Akagi parody.
I’d like that life too, except with bishonen, Choromatsu. Unfortunately, you speak the truth…
Shehkai Teio appears to be a pun on something that I don’t know…The crowd at the races looks hilarious, though.
(ep 22)
Apparently the name “Totty” was meant to be a one-off.
Where’d the skirt come from? Don’t tell me Totty raided his mother’s closet! Now that’s the lowest of the low!
“…they were thrown off their pace?”
What’s the song for? At least it made me laugh, which in this second runthrough seems to be a lot rarer than the first time.
The mixer is at a place called “Maruya”.
Latematsu can be read “Osomatsu”, if you didn’t get it.
How does Osomatsu fit in a pot?
“Shiei” meaning “Death Shadow”…at least with those kanji. Likewise, “Shiya” means “Death Arrow” and “Shiyu” means “Death Oil”.
Well, these guys have absolutely no geography skillls either…because the globe showed Iyami and co. were in India when they were hauling around Chinese stereotypes.
(ep 23)
Sibling sabotage. Also known as the “bystander effect”.
I wonder whether Choro was barfing at the Dayon girl, too.
I think the Dayon lady on the very left of the chase scene is probably the creepiest one yet…
I never liked vomit humour, by the way.
I still don’t get any of Jyushimatsu’s jokes…
Fear and Drunkenness in Las Vegas…kinda sorta.
There’s a flag on the back wall in the Dayon girl’s house which says “effort”. At least, by the Chinese standard of the word.
You can see the younger three brothers trying to fit in by stretching their mouths, LOL.
Did you ever notice the chalk Matsus are drawn by a person wearing a Matsu suit?
There was a post-ep scene, but it was just a reshowing of Osomatsu sticking a piece of tissue up Ichimatsu’s nose…what.
(ep 24)
Ongaku meaning “music”, so...
First I’ve heard of this song…welp, here you go.
“Bottom feeder” takes on a whole new meaning for the fish idol.
The…the feels…I know all your feels, Choromatsu…
Everyone! Are we all on the feels train right now?
Leaving that half…is surprisingly considerate of Ichimatsu.
Hey! It’s the couple from the Christmas episode.
(ep 25) [Trigger warning: Brief mention of seppuku…but you knew that already, didn’t you?]
Welp. Last ep. I may have complained about how the humour in this is pretty much sucked out by watching (most of) it a second time, but…every anime is an adventure. Remember that.
Wait, what’s an invitational?
Ichimatsu apparently got caught in the flow of “Nice!”s, only to get caught up in Karamatsu’s one. LOL.
The Koushien is a high school baseball tournament. For some reason, baseball is crazily popular in the Japanese world.
Owch, Osomatsu…
Karamatsu! He dabs!
A bean ball?...Oh, a bean ball. Okay. (I don’t quite get baseball, but I understand this, at least.)
French people don’t even play baseball…well, most of them.
Iyami’s shirt has 183 on it…or in goroawase, i-ya-mi.
Apparently Totoko did the male version of seppuku…which suits her character very well.
What in great Dante’s inferno, Karamatsu…?
Welp, that’s the end of that. The JRA special was excluded because I got bored of the series before even getting this far, as well as it not having anything I can talk about.
(ReLIFE ep 1)
Ah…the nostalgia only an anime can bring…It’s always extremely satisfying to see an anime of a manga you’ve known since it was an unknown.
Did you spot the cat on the TV a few seconds into the episode? It’s Hishiron’s LINE cat!
Haha, I know your feels too well, Arata.
The humour in this is quite quick, but it hits when it needs to.
Yoake was my Dazai (Bungou Stray Dogs) before I knew about Dazai. Why? Gadfly traits.
“Yoake” means “daybreak” and is apparently the name of a train station in Japan.
Interesting how they leave Arata in shadow until the reveal. The reason why I decided to start this series was because it was somewhat like Detective Conan.
I’ve always though the showing of a phone is integral to a show set in modern times, but in order for a show to be timeless, you can’t show too much of its or what model it is…That’s why “White Parasite” is the only one to feature a phone out of 3 Honeyfeed stories.
The iconic thing about ReLIFE is the clean, minimalistic designs, so the OP really suits this show.
A-hah. I thought they were organised according to hiragana character (roll number), which is fairly usual in anime…hence the thing I left on the ReLIFE Fridge page.
Formal speech is too formal if you’re using it with classmates (regardless of language)…so yeah.
Note Kariu and Oga are close in physical proximity to Kaizaki.
The Going Straight Home club, as I’ve mentioned in earlier times, is…no club at all.
Scanlations called Oga “Flashy Oga”, but “Showga” seems to work better than that.
Notice the word used in the CR subs is “pencil box”. Pencil case in Japanese is fudebako, the bako bit meaning “box”.
CR subs are acting up sometimes (they change font at the end of sentences)…what in Dante’s inferno…
Rules of Japanese: never use a first name unless given permission. For girls, it’s much more likely you can get permission. Of course, if you’re good friends, you can get permission easily too.
#simulcast commentary#osomatsu-san#relife#Chesarka watches Osomatsu-san#Chesarka watches ReLIFE#tw: seppuku
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