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steve0discusses · 5 years

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Yugioh S2 Ep 42 : Hello, Darkness, my Old and Also Relatively New Teenage Shadow Magic Friend

Recently, on Yugioh, we asked ourselves, (well, I asked myself since I assume most of you have seen this show before) how does it matter at all if you lose your memories of someone for like, ten minutes, when you will obviously have to run into them again once the duel is over? And if you have lost the memories that they ever existed then what would it matter since you would not know that you had known them?

This is how - They become shadow people and you literally can’t see them anymore for what I assume is the rest of your life. I don’t know how that works since they can still like write things down on pieces of paper or I dunno, communicate entirely through texting like most kids do who haven’t been cursed with eternal invisibility.

But don’t think too much about the logic, because people can now be erased from your life via cards, AKA Yugioh is gonna throw us another heavy handed take on depression, get ready. And honestly, it’s not a bad take. Good on Yugioh for this fairly accurate metaphor of what sadness can feel like. Like, sometimes people feel like their friends don't like them anymore, although they may be surrounded by people the entire time who are rooting for them and want to help them, but they just can’t see them. I think every person in the world has been through that at some point. You don’t often see it addressed in a kid’s show, although it really should be, because it happens so often.

Probably shouldn’t have started out with Tea for this example though. Like for reals, when have Mai and Tea ever hung out? That one time Mai told Tea to take a shower because she smelled like a boy? Or...

...That’s it. That’s the last conversation I remember these two having one-on-one. Most of the time Mai has been on screen is with Yugi and Joey instead. Mai and Tea shared a tent once. That’s it.

Lolmao I can’t believe Mime came back.

So now, canonically, BDSM Mime got stranded somewhere in Japan and now Marik doesn’t have any memories to even go and pick him up. He’s just forever trapped in this country now like Shenmue.

(read more)

Mai seems to remember that she used to know someone, so it’s more of like you get the feeling of losing a friend. Like basically every time you lose a monster you feel like you broke up with someone, but you can’t remember who. I can’t really relate to that feeling, but I’m sure this has happened to Mai at least once or twice for reals before this tournament. This is the girl who forgot she set herself up to get engaged.

Again, if you just thought it through for like 3 seconds, you’d have enough evidence to say “Yeah but this is all in my mind, I am standing in weird ass purple fog” but that’s the Shadow Realm.

After Tea’s memory is dissolved, next comes the threat of losing the memories of Joey Wheeler, AKA the vague love interest that she was very mad at up until about 5 seconds ago.

Also please admire how far the storyboarder went out of their way to avoid looking up Mai’s skirt. Straight up, they did not even bother to try and cover up those panty upskirts in Sailor Moon, but the storyboarder for Yugioh was so extra that they said “Hell with it, I’m gonna try” and so Mai’s legs are like double jointed and sprawled in the weirdest ways sometimes to cover that crack.

I mean, it’s still a pinup--there’s no way around this character design--but I really think they were trying to not go too far, but then ended up making it kind of worse sometimes. It’s just what happens when you have a love affair a lot of extreme low angle shots but none of your girls wear pants because it’s 2001 and everyone’s wearing tube tops and minis.

Which was a thing. I’ll admit it, I lived through it, 2001 was kind of a slutty time, it was the era of the glittery backless diamond shaped halter top. Which, while time has tried to forget, I will never forget the 20 minutes I spent in a dressing room trying to figure out how to put on a backless diamond shaped halter top only to realize that I was putting it on sideways.

Now, stepping away from confusing 00′s fashion and back to the show. Mai losing these pile of kids might mean more to me if Mai had been hanging out with them this whole time, but it really does feel like they’re closer to Duke Devlin than they are to Mai Valentine, because Duke at least shared a school with them so I can assume that in the past they’ve passed each other in the hallway or talked on occasion. But, Mai is an adult who never comes in contact outside of cards, and when she does, she only ever pushes them away.

It’s especially that-Yugioh-brand-of-tragic because in the mind of all of the characters on this show, we’ve just kind of assumed Mai has had a life and friendships outside of these couple of kids. But this episode we realize there’s just...no one else but the people she sees at these rare tourneys. As we see here in this flashback to her childhood, in the most anime PJ’s ever drawn.

Why does every flashback look like everyone's straight out the American Girl Doll collection? Like Pegasus and Cecilia were in turn of the century clothes. the Kaibas were dressed like little newsies when they were orphans, little Mai looks like she owns a horse in matching ribbons.

And as it turns out, do you know the reason why Mai hates friendship? You’ll never guess--her Parents. Ah, Neglectful Parents, strikes again, that old Yugioh chestnut. It’s like I’m watching Once Upon a Time again. At least these neglectful parents didn’t lock her up underground and tattoo her eyes. Instead, these ones just worked a lot and she got kinda lonely.

Are there any good parents on this show? I assume if anyone’s parents are good we just never see them, right? Is that why we never see Mr Muto?

Anyway, Mai moved around a lot, her parents were always busy, and it rained like constantly--so Mai decided to get a job on a cruise line, where she became a card shark. And also where she randomly got engaged and then forgot.

I don't remember her tent looking like that but I’ll allow it.

You could have chosen any friends out there Mai, traveling the world on a cruise line, doing cards all over the planet, and you chose these guys? The ones with multiple curses? Like you nabbed both Yugi and Bakura in one go? Congrats!

Anyway she very quickly forgets Joey so Rip MaixJoey that was a good one and half episodes, surely the longest relationship on Yugioh!

So, Yugi decides to activate the millennium item chatroom, where apparently he could just butt into whoever is getting cursed at the moment. And mind you, he could just solve the duel but like, there is a card game going on, and although it’s super duper cursed, we gotta make it fair. Yugi’s just here to give some good advice and then bounce.

No laser fights today. He still isn’t aware he can do that.

freakin love this blue yellow color combo PS.

So something that I do like about this, is that the real threat here in these Shadow Duels is not the duel really--it’s to Mai’s relationships more than injury Mai herself. Yes, she does die if she loses, but the more she loses, the more she loses people in her life, even if she wins. The loss of the people is more scary to her more than the fear of dying.

And this hearkens back to the first time we dealt with the Shadow Realm with Yugi and his Grandfather. Yugi was over that duel in about 15 minutes or whatever the time limit was, and after the initial shock he brushed himself off and may have appeared fully recovered, but it took him almost an entire season to get his Grandpa back in his life.

So if you look at these curses as akin to getting an illness, when you lose a relationship because of illness, that can be a pretty terrible symptom that you don’t really see coming. Happens a whole lot though. In Mai’s case, if she does lose, she also loses the opportunity to repair what she’s lost, which is probably the greatest fear of someone who may be going through A Time.

Like honestly, the Mai duel is *kind of a downer* and I was just talking to my Bro about how of all the shadow duels so far, this is the one that is most clearly “I’m just going to fight you with straight up depression” and how apparently Marik is just so far into his own downward spiral that he no longer cares about who he drags down with him. He’s just given up trying to be better at this point. Like his only ‘friend’ left is BDSM Mime clown. That’s a pretty intense rock bottom, honestly.

But on a positive note, what Yugi points out to Mai is “You’re in this now, but we will get you out of it, no matter what he curses you to believe.” and of anyone here, Yugi’s the only one that can actually reach out and speak to her because he’s the only one who has been through it before and thus knows how it works.

Being cursed with heavy handed illness imagery AKA Shadow Magic does have that perk. You can help out the similarly cursed. Even though he could have probably launched at least a couple fireballs at the problem to help her out also.

Holy hell they actually edited out all the little details on this duel disk here. Good on you, animators. Good on you. I’m glad someone did it. Hope that saved at least one of you from carpal tunnel, you poor overworked animators that had to draw every line on these crazy complicated character designs.

So Mai, spurned onward by the ghostly voices of her forgotten friends figures out how to steal Marik’s God Card.

Again, everyone on this show is obsessed with these awful cards and they feel like they must play them to win when honestly--look how much this card sucks.

If this God Card ends up killing her it’ll only prove my point that all these cards are just fundamentally hella bad.

Same with Odion, he could’ve won just fine without playing a God Card but leave it to these dummies to just go crazy with the one of three cards that has been prophecies to kill them. Like, when Odysseus gives you a bag of wind, just don’t open the bag. That easy.

Anyway, tune in next week to see if Mai ends up blown overboard like the servants of Odysseus, or if she ends up devoured by a giant creature also like the servants of Odysseus. Or if she ends up dating Joey Wheeler. That part didn’t happen in the Odyssey, but I’ve read enough people comparing fanfic to Homer that I guess you could make it happen if you really wanted to.

Link to read these recaps from S1 Ep1

#yugioh #yugioh recap #photo recap #recap #s2 ep 42 #tw depression #mai valentine #yugi muto #marik ishtar #joey wheeler #tea gardner #seto kaiba #this dumb ass god card #So we got a Mai Flashback where we found out that she's got like no backstory #her backstory is that she's depressed she has no backstory #like all that was there was living on a boat for a couple years #that's it

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12freddostories · 7 years

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Where’s My Supersuit?

Game of Thrones / A Song of Ice and Fire SUPERHERO AU

Mostly gen, minor Jon/Ygritte, platonic Robb&Theon.

Dotpoint fanfic

(Don’t own anything, title is from the Incredibles)

Okay, so, this is a universe ala The Incredibles, in which ‘having’ powers is hereditary but the powers themselves are not.

Ned and Robb both play really traditional hero roles in canon, so I think they should have typical superpowers.

Ned has superstrength

Robb has flight

Arya with shapeshifting seems obvious, but tbh I think I prefer Arya with invisibility. A little less creepy and it’s easier to slip into the whole ‘no-one’ thing.

Sansa would probably have some form of telepathy. Definitely an empath, and she has a manipulation type power.

· She has to actually have physical contact to convince someone to do something, so she can be pulled back just by wearing too many clothes.

Bran has superpowers in canon, so I think a superhero au would have something very similar.

He can still be able to project and see what happens elsewhere.

Rickon hasn’t gotten his powers yet, because it’s an age thing.

Cat is not looking forward to six children with superpowers.

· She doesn’t have any herself

· Not to say she hasn’t occasionally brained some supervillain with her frypan, but she’s normally preoccupied with the full-time job of keeping a family of superheroes functioning.

She does take over PR whenever anyone’s reputation gets sullied, and is one of the main reason why the ‘Direwolves’ are so beloved by the public.

Jon was adopted after his parents were killed in action.

Aerys was a supervillain who did not take his son running off with a superhero lightly.

· Rhaegar wasn’t even a villain before he eloped with Lyanna. He was a civilian trying to distance himself from the family business, but he fell in love with her secret identity and totally had a crush on the superhero he saw on TV.

I don’t have any real basis for this one, but I love the image of Jon with superspeed.

· When Rickon does get his powers it’s totally superspeed too, and Jon’s saddled with babysitting all the time because he’s literally the only one who can keep up with him

They all have secret identities too

· Winter (Ned), Grey Wind, Ghost, Lady, Nymeria, Summer.

Together, they fight crime

(More under the cut)

However, Arya has a secret-secret identity.

She’s has a second costume that’s even more hidden then the first, and goes around as a sidekick to a superpower-less vigilante that’s willing to teach her more tricks.

The Hound wasn’t planning on taking on a sidekick during his midnight patrols, but a little shadow started following him.

· It takes several weeks before he realises the reason she is so good at disappearing isn’t a coincidence but a literal power.

At first Nymeria was upset that he was in ‘their’ territory, but when she sees him punch someone out using nothing but his own wits she asks him to teach her

· Invisibility in itself is helpful, but she also really wants to learn how to fight back because she’s very vulnerable even at her peak

· Plus if she’s 100% invisible the light travels through her eyes, so she has to either have a fraction of her eyes visible or be blind.

· Sandor teaches her how to fight without sight.

Also, Arya totally pulled an Odysseus (by accident) by saying “No-one!” when asked who she was. The Hound continues to call her that, much to her frustration.

Robb and Theon have been best friends since they were kids

Unfortunately, the Greyjoys happen to be supervillains

· The Starks might not have the same powers, but the Greyjoy family follows a distinct theme of super-intelligence (in the cartoony ‘build-a-death-ray-from-scrap’ way) combined with equally cartoony logic (‘a death ray is the most efficient way to threaten a city, which we must do for reasons’).

Rodrick and Maron are all for supervillainy

Asha isn’t ecstatic, but she has absolutely no objections to being a villain.

· She is pretty much the only one with the common sense to wonder why death rays should be the first choice for a weapon, but she rolls with it.

· An article once commented that if she ever went fully into the business instead of just supporting her family, she’d take over the world in a week. She has the post printed on her wall.

Theon is not really okay with supervillainy, but he desperately wants to be

· He tries to get his father’s approval, he really does, but the fact that he quite clearly has a moral centre holds him back.

· The same article said that he seemed like a good kid, but if he doesn’t get away from his toxic influences he was going to end up doing something major and get a lot of people killed. Theon had almost cried because that was exactly what he felt like was going to happen.

Robb and Theon have both independently worked out the other’s secret identity

· They don’t admit that they know, although they do understand that it’s not a secret that they know

· Theon knows Robb is Grey Wind, Robb knows Theon knows he’s Grey Wind, and Theon knows that Robb knows he knows…

· It’s actually ridiculous at this point.

Jon: “You do realise Theon is a Kraken, right?” Robb: “What? That’s insane. How could you think that?” “The shirt he’s wearing now has a kraken on it they do not sell supervillain merchandise in stores that is custom made.”

Somehow the friendship works

· Theon pretends to buy Robb’s obviously bullshit excuses about having forgotten a dentist appointment whenever Grey Wind is needed to fly somewhere.

· Robb makes teasing comments about the ridiculousness of a family that builds giant lasers designed to look like giant sea creatures, and Theon can’t even ‘hypothetically’ argue with that because for a family of geniuses there is a distinct lack of intelligence

“Theon why the fuck would King Kraken build a secret base in the harbour and have gaudy decorations of giant octopi that are basically a sign saying HERE I AM?!” “…They’re kraken, not octopi. And, um, I wouldn’t know. No, seriously, I don’t know why, I don’t even get the fascination with krakens, at least the Direwolves don’t have anything more wolf-y than a coat of arms on their chests.”

At some point Jon is planning to rip Theon’s mask off mid-confrontation because really, if they’re going to be friends they should at least stop this I know you know I know tangle.

Tywin Lannister is basically Lex Luthor

He doesn’t have the same inherent problem Luthor does with superheroes existing, but occasionally has similar problems with them interfering with his plans

· The Starks are not quite sure if he has in fact been fooled by the Direwolves masks, or if is entirely aware of who they are but so far has not found an opportunity to use it.

· He knows who they are but won’t say anything.

· Superheroes are almost impossible to kill. If he were to blow up their house chances are one or two would die and the rest would be out for blood, which is a lot more inconvenient then them occasionally stopping giant robot acquisitions

Cersei is somewhat unaware that her father knows who they are. She is obsessed with working it out herself.

Tyrion has several theories as to the Direwolves, one of which is correct, but his plans coincidentally are not things that superheroes try to prevent — he goes more into legal business, if borderline shady, but never anything immoral. He also rather admires what they do and wouldn’t expose them should he be proven right.

Jaime just doesn’t care what’s behind the mask. He finds Winter frustrating, but sees him for who he is and doesn’t care if his name is Bob or Ned or Jake or whatever.

· The Lannisters do not in fact have a special preoccupation with the Direwolves, who aren’t even the only superheroes they deal with.

· They have similar stances to pretty much all of the superhero/anti-hero groups of Westeros.

Roose Bolton is ‘officially’ considered a superhero

· People are terrified to commit crimes anywhere near the Dreadfort

· Ned can’t even argue that it doesn’t work, because Roose definitely has less to deal with, but still

Occasionally Ramsay joins in, partly to ingratiate himself with his father and partly because he enjoys being able to wield his power over others

· At least Roose only attacks people for muggings or bank robberies or actual crimes

· Ramsay has been known to flay people for jaywalking

While Roose is registered as an anti-hero, Ramsay is a vigilante and has a warrant for his arrest.

· Roose is smart enough not to publicly admit they’re related

· He does chide Ramsay, but in general he doesn’t mind the fact the people of his city don’t so much as litter any more

Ramsay has superspeed, just like Jon

· His supervillain name is Bolt, which frustrates Roose no end because you don’t use versions of your real name if you want it secret.

Aerys Targaryen used to be one of the key villains in Westeros, before he was chased out and died in poverty

· ‘Winter’ didn’t take his sister’s death well, and his former super-hero partner and close friend ‘Stag’ had been equally distraught.

Stag has since been nicknamed Stagger for his alcoholic tendencies

Aerys’s son Viserys is determined to reclaim his family’s fame

Viserys’s plans come to a halt when mob boss Drogo ties him up, duct tapes him to the streetlight across from a police precinct, and pins a note to his shirt detailing all his crimes.

His little sister and former second-in-command (in theory at least, although Viserys didn’t actually give her any power) ends up taking over his villainous army.

· Danaerys has the utterly fairytale-princess ability to talk to animals

· When she ends up with three gigantic monsters fawning over her, this ability is considered a lot more dangerous

She makes her way back to a home she doesn’t remember, but constantly stops to deal out her ruthless version of justice.

· And the thing is, most people agree that it counts as justice.

No-one is quite sure when it happens, but by the time she arrives in Westeros she’s considered a hero

Dany loves it far more than she ever liked the idea of being a villain

She keeps her family’s scary reputation alive, but makes sure to not be part of it

· She doesn’t always succeed

Being raised by villains means that Dany occasionally has moments where she doesn’t realise what seems obvious to traditional heroes, and has more than once murdered criminals in her justice crusade

· The people she murders are always the actual worst, though, not petty crooks like the Boltons slaughter

She toes the line between hero and anti-hero pretty regularly, but never touches villain

She does eventually work out what would secure her place as a good guy and is established as one of Westeros’s most powerful heroes.

Ygritte is a criminal

Jon catches her one day breaking and entering. He arrests her, and asks why.

· She answers very well about broken system and how being born on her side of the Wall town means that she hasn’t got any other opportunities and sometimes she’d like to eat.

· He ends up unlocking the handcuffs and telling her to run.

A few weeks later he’s about to stop a kid getting mugged when Ygritte shows up first and beats up the mugger.

The two keep running into each other, and they quickly learn to like each other.

They develop an alliance

· “I’ll give you information about the particularly vile crime rings I’ve heard of if you make sure it gets broken up.”

Then it turns into a real friendship.

Jon tells her his secret identity, and she never tells a soul

“You know nothing, Ghost.” “…Jon. My name is Jon Snow.” Without missing a beat: “You know nothing, Jon Snow.”

They start hanging out together properly and eventually start dating

Jon ends up meeting a lot of Ygritte’s friends

He’d always had a kind of simple black-and-white morality, seeing criminals as unambiguously bad, but now he starts to work out the deep seated causes as to why crime happens.

· He becomes one of the biggest advocates for better systems and against police brutality and the like.

· It frustrates the hell out of Ygritte that just because a superhero starts saying it, people are listening when they’ve been saying it for years and no-one’s cared before

· Then again, people are listening and she’s not one to complain if it works

Ygritte ends up getting her own costume

· She doesn’t use it any more than once every two or so months

· But sometimes it’s nice to run around kicking the shit out of people who objectively deserve it

Robb is amused because now Jon has no right to mock Theon’s criminal tendencies when he met his girlfriend robbing a place.

“There’s a difference between Ygritte and a supervillain, Robb, he builds giant robots out of scrap metal and there’s never even a logical reason to build a giant robot, surely there are other ways to do it.”

As it turns out, that something major the article mentioned that Theon was dreading he’d end up doing? He never does it, and instead ends up just straight up quitting supervillainy.

The event that triggered his surrender involved doing villainous activities near the Dreadfort.

· Ramsay was ecstatic to have a supervillain to play with, since normally he only deals with people who litter.

“One of the Krakens, I see. Strange family that all of you are called Kraken. Perhaps I should choose you a new name for you alone? It’s not like you’ll ever use that supervillain one again.”

Theon eventually succeeds in building a phone out of whatever scraps he can find in the cell.

· Super intelligence does come in handy.

· In this situation, the person you need to call is a hero.

· Robb didn’t even bother with an excuse when he got the call; he just found an empty room and threw himself out the window.

· He arrived at the Dreadfort quickly and ended up dragging Theon back to the Direwolf ‘den’, aka their form of Batcave which is basically a large treehouse that only Sansa could be bothered to decorate.

Theon spends over a week at the Den.

Jon asked if they ought to turn Theon in to the police, because he is a supervillain and a jail cell might be nice and safe.

· He had been waiting for Robb and Theon to admit they knew who each other were but not like this.

Theon reacts in terror because the Bolt would totally check prisons first, superhero aus mean that jails are so easy to break out of anyway.

So they let him stay for a while.

· There had been several moments of “really, Robb?” the first time each Direwolf found him, but they let it pass.

· Sansa had screamed bloody murder, which turned out to be because she was picking up on his emotions instead of being scared of him. She’d been the most vehement that he stayed there after that.

Theon spent the week building them a BatCave level security system, out of a mix of wanting to thank them, wanting some kind of safety, and wanting to build something.

· While he was at the Dreadfort Ramsay hadn’t let him build anything, and the unused superpower was itching beneath his skin.

· A phone out of loose screws and scrap metal had taken some effort, especially with three broken fingers and the constant terror that it would be found, but it wasn’t the buzz of properly building.

Jon had to train himself out of running everywhere, because Theon downright had a panic attack every time a blur darted into a room with him.

Robb offered to only walk as well, as a show of solidarity, but Jon told him not to worry, go ahead and fly. “I’ve got a secret identity, I can handle not showing my powers inside for a few days, I’ll just go for a run after school.”

Eventually they call Asha to come and get him.

· Theon’s security system came in handy, because she was close to fighting her way into the Den.

· She got herself caught in a solid cage which took the Direwolves some time to work out how to open.

Both Theon and Asha leave the Kraken family business together.

· Theon because he couldn’t take any more

· Asha because her level of paternal respect had dropped to non-existent after she found out where and why Theon had gone.

“Dad why would you send him to rob a bank in the Dreadfort you had to know this would happen! Was a mystic jewel of Qarth really worth that much when you couldn’t be bothered to get it yourself?!”

Since Theon keeps his super-tech-abilities, and has the itch to keep building, he starts to design gadgets that could help out Robb.

· Compasses, tracking handcuffs, protective gear.

· He quickly learns to branch into tech for the rest of the Starks, and basically redoes the whole Den to be high-tech.

· He may or may not end up the Edna Mode of this universe and help superheroes get costumes that actually work really well

· Sansa does the sewing and the actual clothing parts. She loves the opportunity.

“Robb I take back anything bad I ever said about your best friend this is incredible”.

· Cat also occasionally helps out with the sewing and is a bit more muted in her reaction, but is pleased because she and Sansa have been making the costumes forever. She is uncomfortably aware that all they protect is privacy. Armour is good.

Arya goes straight to Theon and asks him not to tell anyone about her secondary ‘No-One’ disguise as he makes her a costume for it. Theon already knew she was No-One and hadn’t even realised it was a secret.

Asha meanwhile decides she can’t be bothered going the long way round for respect anymore, since super-powered genius intellect, common sense, and ruthlessness can be a pretty lethal combo in basically any career she wants.

Jon’s secret identity works well normally, but he does a slight miscalculation.

As a kid he was never allowed to play sports because of his speed (plot points straight from the Incredibles) and he felt left out.

So one day when Pyp asks if he wants to join in their friendly soccer game he’s delighted at the opportunity

But since he’s never had to run while pretending that he doesn’t have super-speed, he doesn’t manage to reign himself in.

He doesn’t realise that he now has a significant number of friends who are well aware that Jon Snow is the Ghost.

After Robb eventually convinces him that yes, he can trust the new outfit that Kraken designed, no it’s not going to turn supervillain-y on him, Pyp absently tells Jon that the new Ghost costume looks better.

Jon is shocked.

“How long have you known?” “Well, since we saw it on the TV. Honestly making the sigil smaller is much better, with it splayed over your chest it just looked like you were presenting a target for bullets.”

Ygritte is similarly impressed with the new look.

Sam end up cultivating a social network to keep up-to-date with what superheroes are needed where, though, so it all works out.

I’m sorry, there isn’t even a plot to this. A timeline, sure, but not a plot. Still, I’m pleased with it. Likes are great, reblogs are better, and comments/tags are incredible.

#game of thrones #got fanfic #superheroes #Theon Greyjoy #Robb Stark #Jon Snow #Ygritte #Jon x Ygritte #i don't even know but this was fun #fanfic #dotpoint fanfic #superhero au

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