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fndmfrenzy · 9 months ago

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higuchi death note appreciation post where i dump all my favorite higuchi things (mostly manga, some anime mentions). it's gonna be long, self indulgent and probably not that interesting.

here's all the moments where he's being rude to his coworkers. mainly takahashi and shimura. (also talking shit about his coworkers to misa)

i like this convo with rem, where he gives his motive rant. shame it was cut from the anime, but i get why they did it. also mostly unrelated but i think it's funny that out of all the people who act as kira light would be the only anti-kira one if he wasn't kira. like, if they never had anything to do with the notebook, but kira still existed: misa, higuchi, mikami and takada would still be pro-kira, but light definitely wouldn't if it wasn't him doing the killing :P

oh i love this panel. he's so silly

also: higuchi being so obviously kira at the meetings. bro do you think you're good at hiding it??? you're shit

special mention for L calling higuchi an idiot. light, you're too nice.

oh they read him. it's actually so embarrassing.

oh brother, this guy STINKS. everyone hating on him, so real. and he believes rem, misa and mido are on his side but they're actually not.

he's the biggest murder fan. his only rival for that title in death note is light (and maybe mikami? but mikami mostly kills criminals while light and higuchi target their opps)

i like the whole misa interview. there are no thoughts in higuchi's head. he seems really bored. isn't it in his interest to find out more about L? does he actually not gaf cause he wants to talk to misa in private anyway? or he's pretending to be disinterested to avoid looking sus? is he just stupid?

also something i thought about: higuchi going to the bathroom at the same time as misa and it not being relevant at all. in universe it's a coincidence (i mean misa decides after him so that's not the coincidence, but HIM going in the first place is random) but it's VERY convenient for rem. since she HAS to follow him the conditions for her to actually be able to talk to misa have to be very specific.

if misa was the only one to leave to the bathroom higuchi would notice rem going after her, since she's always near him. so higuchi goes first. i imagine rem waits outside (that's actually funny... think of the hijinks of girl shinigami & guy combo. ever though why light-ryuk and misa-rem are boy-boy and girl-girl? yeah i don't know what point i'm trying to make) or she could even stay in the meeting room and that's fine. so when he gets back she's either already there or she comes back after him but before misa (the second option seems more realistic since rem and misa have a whole ass conversation there, but it's more suspicious). did i think too much about this? probably.

btw i love how he looks in those panels. he looks so ugly lol. ugly-cute. somehow endearing.

the whole date with misa is amazing. misa is making it so awkward and it's awesome. like, from his perspective she wanted to go out with him but then she keeps calling him a creep. he's trying to play it off, but damn. misa you'll always be famous to me.

i actually prefer this scene in the anime, cause it feels longer. also love higuchi looking nervous after coming out as kira. they made him look more rapey in the anime, lunging at misa, but i like how they both look in this shot so it's forgiven i guess.

also i wonder if they actually went for dinner or were they too excited about kira stuff. misa would probably want to leave after getting the evidence, but isn't it weird? ohba i need answers.

this exchange is funny to me. wedy being annoyed that higuchi owns so many cars and L knowing the exact number. yeah i like that higuchi is a car guy.

bonus trivia: his car is a Porsche 911 and the gun is a Smith & Wesson .357 Magnum revolver. i think they have different models and i don't know which one exactly he has (my knowledge about guns is zero and they all look the same to me).

him being lefthanded is a cute little detail. like, i don't know why would you give a side villain a trait like that? well, i guess i could say the same about all the little trivia we get in the guidebook about the side characters or even the yotsuba character profiles in the main manga where they say what school they went to or their hobbies. it makes the characters feel more human/complex, i like it.

anyway, the only inconsistency with higuchi being lefthanded is him using the phone. it's usually in his right hand (i wouldn't hold the phone with my non dominant hand). my answer is artistic liberty. and i think it's basically confirmed since a lot of righthanded characters (namikawa, light i think?) for some reason hold the phone with their left? or maybe i'm the weird one and it's normal to hold the phone with your non dominant hand.

not related to him being lefthanded, but when he shoots soichiro he's holding the gun sideways. it's called the side grip and wikipedia states that: "Shooting a gun in this way has no practical benefit under most circumstances and makes proper aiming very difficult, but the style has become somewhat popular in hip hop culture and among street criminals [...]". it's meant to make him look cool and like a gangster. is he doing it on purpose? maybe he saw it in a movie (cute...)

higuchi yelling at the guy from yoshida pro. i love the voice acting here in the anime. i really like both his japanese and english voice... death note dub is good but i deffo prefer watching og ver.

classic kira stuff: predicted killings to prove you're kira. pages above show misa, higuchi and light doing it. i know it's a pretty obvious thing to do but i think it's fun.

the whole plot to catch higuchi is great. ofc it's my favorite part. i love him panicking and just making his situation worse. i kinda feel bad for him cause he's getting played badly.

there's so many things here that i like. higuchi being pragmatic enough to write matsui's name after his fakeout death. him realizing he can't ask his coworkers for help without revealing he's kira. him weaseling out of getting surrounded by 4 people and shooting soichiro. THE CAR CHASE. the car crash (lol). btw he looks relatively unharmed after crashing his car like that.

also i love the way he drifts his car in the anime. it looks way too cool. making a lame guy do something cool is fun.

his last ditch effort hostage/attempted suicide plan. i get secondhand embarrassment everytime. i love how he realizes it's ridiculous and gets so resigned and tries to pull the trigger (sad those panels were cut from the anime. actually a lot of characters' internal thoughts were cut and i wish that wasn't the case)

actually it's kinda sad that the only thing that matters to him is his job. guy doesn't have a life outside it lol. like, he's more afraid of losing his position at yotsuba than idk... getting executed for being a mass murderer?

special mention for light writing down higuchi's name with blood. it's more of a cool light thing, but i'm including it in my higuchi post (if i were to make a light one it would be the whole manga). i love love this scene. helicopter light is awesome.

i like matsu mimicking higuchi here. even using the left hand.

#death note #higuchi kyosuke

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batsplat · 9 months ago

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have you ever done a ranking of your fav vale podium celebrations (or celebrations in general)? Would love to hear your thoughts <3

I love ranking dumb things so I HAVE done this, years ago actually, but I've not posted it on here! going over my list and I stand by the order with two minor alterations. I won't just limit my picks to podium celebrations but WILL exclude all his title-winning celebrations, because that feels like its own thing. so here goes

next off list *deep breath*: first win, brno '96 (so thrilled he almost rode into the wall, bless); playing the violin, donington '05 (just slaps idk man); bowling, jerez '07 (cute but also kinda funny in hindsight given how the rest of the season played out); hazing your baby teammate, catalunya '09 (like it's not even anything specific it's just SO hammy); superman, assen '97 (jorge martinez saw that shit and was like ENOUGH I need to retire NOW); bike medical check, catalunya '04 (endearingly corny and quietly ominous); 46 yamaha wins, sepang 2010 (delightfully stupid dick measuring contest with jorge); serving the champagne, brno '05 (it's silly and it's sweet, especially uccio correcting valentino's tea towel placement); beachwear, mugello '98 (this one HURT to leave out, not least because of the poor veteran valentino was upstaging)

and here's my actual top ten:

10. empty grandstands, andalusia 2020

idk this one's just so quintessentially valentino to me; I'm glad he had something fun like this for his very last podium. he parks the bike on the side of the track, gets up on... whatever you call those things, barriers? and then he wildly gesticulates in celebration at an entirely empty grandstand at the height of the pandemic as if he's being serenaded by fans. I like that it was at jerez too, feels like a full circle moment for a celebration featured later on the list - one that's also about like... subverting expectations in 'communicating' with the 'crowd'. it's just so FUN, the vibes were incredibly off back then (to put it mildly) but he did his thing and it did low key cheer me up at the time. which is the classic valentino magic, isn't it

9. tricked them all, welkom 2004

another one of the simpler, more spontaneous celebrations - valentino stopping at the side of the track after winning his first ever race with yamaha. he kisses the bike, he briefly sits down and buries his head in his hands. the commentary thinks he is crying, overcome by the magnitude of what he achieved - but in his autobiography he says he was laughing (x)

“So I was right!” I thought to myself. “I can’t believe it, I tricked them all, what a show!” I kept repeating.

it's just such a pivotal valentino moment... and in its own way, it's a very memorable celebration. an intimate *cough* moment with the bike, a genuine outpouring of emotion from a man who had won pretty much everything there was to win the last few years... but was now attempting to achieve something almost nobody thought he'd be capable of. he WAS right, he DID trick them all - and he certainly put on a show

8. robin hood, donington 1998

listen. I'm a lesbian. this gets as high up the list as it does on sheer concentrated power of lesbianism. I don't even have a lot to say about this one, I just think it's neat how he was winning everything and also winning everyone over while swanning around like THAT. valentino charmed his way into the hearts of the british to such an extent that they would terrorise anyone who looked at him wrong for the next decade plus, and it all started with some remarkably dyke-coded behaviour. look at him with his cap and his bow and his arrow. no wonder he had them all eating out of his hand

7. chicken, catalunya 1998

redefined commitment to the bit. everything about his whole 'inventing a fake sponsor to fuck with the press' saga is obviously just. excellent. all the comedy hijinks where they're getting someone to act as osvaldo and trying to continue stringing the sceptical press along... something about how he managed to still treat the whole thing as a game, still had fun with his friends, didn't take himself too seriously. obviously this celebration is a culmination of sorts of that whole ploy - valentino riding around with his imaginary chicken sponsor to the delight of the crowds. I'm always a fan of a recurring bit, so I also like the continued chicken-themed celebrations over the years. let him be a silly little guy y'know

6. speeding ticket, mugello 2002

this one is just pure camp. what can you even say. like it's such an annoying lame bit that crosses the line again to be incredibly funny, classic valentino style. this race set off valentino's mugello streak after he'd crashed out of his home race in 2001... also low key the speeding ticket was a good idea, given it kept valentino away from a rather dangerous track invasion where one rider was dragged off his bike. so he just stayed out of trouble, did his silly camp theatrics and continued to rack up wins at the circuit for the next six years. so deeply lame. bless

5. portaloo, jerez 1999

this one I confess I didn't really Get when I read about it the first time. kinda went... okay, that's cute, but I also don't really know what the point is. so it's been a bit of a slow burn for me. think it's one that helps to actually watch and then read a bit about the crowd reaction... it's just a classic case of subverting expectations, right. this entire crowd is going nuts at your victory, you're known for your zany post-race celebrations, and then you just... dive into the portaloo. he has to sell it too, I reckon, like it just wouldn't work the same way without his earnest little dash. and so the crowd goes quiet - until erupting with even more volume once he emerges. just that feel for engaging the crowd... for toying with them and winning them over all the more as a result

4. donkey ears, misano 2009

huh, this one really has snuck up the order for me. idk I just find everything about it annoyingly endearing. I like how valentino was willing to take the piss out of himself after his indy crash (which he very much should because it was extremely stupid). I like how he showed up to his home race with a donkey helmet because he'd been such an idiot. it's a tense moment in the championship given that the indy crash having very much reopened the contest. so you've got valentino really committing to this playful way of bouncing back from an embarrassing failure... smart too! it takes the sting out of things, right, just defuses the optics of his big error by gently mocking himself

The donkey is because I was stupid to crash at Indy. [...] [In this race] I was in trouble, I found myself fourth and I didn't feel confident with a full tank. So I took my time to put some more temperature in the tyres and then I attacked. Today, I was the flying donkey!"

I like how he gets his crew to wear donkey ears to greet him in parc fermé. I LOVE him mock-formally shaking the hands of his team - including obviously with luca - before giving them all a proper hug. unfortunately just unavoidably very sweet. and I like him imitating donkey ears to the camera

and OBVIOUSLY I love him putting on those bloody donkey ears for the actual podium. the way he gets down onto his knees in front of the adoring crowd. wonderfully annoying

just something about these later celebrations, when he wasn't doing them as often anymore,,, it's almost strategically recapturing that sense of whimsy, right - using this old part of his repertoire to regain a measure of authorial control. helps bring to the forefront what the celebrations are actually doing for him in practical competitive terms, what he's getting out of them beyond just having a laff. and of course I love how big a fan of these celebrations jorge is (x, x):

Rossi's donkey. At Misano my Captain America was replaced on track by Rossi’s donkey - the one he put on his helmet and the ears he wore onto the podium. It is one of the funniest celebrations I have seen Valentino do and I laughed when I saw him get the helmet out. He is an expert at turning things around, and that wasn’t the only occasion he put that talent to good use this weekend. On the podium he tried to hush the fans who were whistling at me. Personally I saw their reaction as normal because they were defending one of their own.

one of THE key moments you need to get their dynamic imo. jorge understands exactly what valentino is doing here and they're in the middle of a title fight and jorge really does think it's GREAT. it's sort of the precursor to the misano fish helmet to aragon shark fin 2015 dynamic, right, where jorge is such a keen student of valentino's... and he also is so determined to be magnanimous and honourable and all that other stuff - which is why him glazing the celebrations makes it all the way to his biography. and the helmet makes him laugh, because it's funny! jorge might know what valentino's game is, might be taking notes on exactly what he's doing - but nobody's completely immune

and now *drum roll* my top three in just. a little more detail:

3. kissing the corkscrew, laguna seca 2008

okay, picture this. you are currently leading the championship, but your main rival (who kicked your arse the previous year) has won three races in a row and is steadily closing in on your points tally. he's doing his thing again all weekend, looks ridiculously dominant to the point pretty much everyone is framing this race as a fight for second place. you spend the night before the race plotting and scheming how to make up the difference, and you tell your best friend you will not let your rival win the race whatever happens - even if the both of you have to crash. you go out there and - with all your cunning and guile and ruthlessness - somehow prove yourself capable of hanging with your rival as you gradually infuriate him. on lap four, you plunge down a terrifying blind corner and go off-track as you make an overtake, bumping into your rival and only by some miracle keeping the bike upright. around twenty laps later, you finally break your rival and manage to tease an error out of him that makes him tip the bike into the gravel. you ride the remaining laps in utter tranquillity - not only are you under no threat, but the two of you ran so ferocious a pace that your rival can finish in second even after crashing. you win the race. the championship momentum is back on your side and you have finally managed to drag down your toughest rival down to your level. you know just how much he will have hated that. so, what do you do to commemorate this moment? well, of course you go back to said terrifying blind corner where you almost crashed on lap four of 32. you get off your bike. and you kiss the ground

idk, there's just something beautiful about the presence of mind valentino had to have in order to know that this overtake would be the defining image of the race - to pay tribute to it immediately and reinforce the memorability of that moment in everyone's heads. was he thinking about doing this while cruising home to victory? planning it out while the laps pass by? or was it really just a spur of the moment thing? it's my favourite of the spontaneous celebrations - because of course it could only ever be spontaneous, because he never could have expected to win that race, and certainly not in such a memorable fashion

and then the second part of the celebrations: how valentino decides to really, really, really rub it in. these are for my money quite possibly the most triumphalist celebrations of valentino's premier class career (catalunya 2009 is the only one in the same league), to the point where the eurosport commentators commented on how unusual it was for valentino. back in the day, during his prime, he really did go for a bit more of a cheery but cool tone for his celebrations - almost as if minimising the effort it took to take the win. all just a bit of a laugh, right? no ecstatic fist pumping on the bike, no sign that the victory had ever been in doubt... but here, valentino goes all in. he makes no secret of how delighted he is, no secret of just how much he loved beating casey. interrupts casey during his post-race tv interview in front of lurking cameras and microphone, grins his way through parc fermé and the podium. no playing sly here - he's making a point to savour it. and in commemorating the most memorable moment of the race, in getting a rise out of casey, valentino has gotten exactly what he wanted. together with the race itself, it is this post-race theatre that changes the complexion of the season, that has helped immortalise the episode

which very much includes all the ways valentino interacts with casey directly! the way valentino just REFUSES to leave well enough alone and keeps nagging casey while casey is trying so, so, so hard to not say something he will come to regret in the coming weeks. a task he is ultimately unsuccessful at, but my god is it a brave effort to not strangle valentino then and there. it's fantastic stuff because it's also a pattern of behaviour reserved entirely for casey - latching onto his defeated rival is NOT actually part of the valentino rossi playbook. the closest he gets is interrupting jorge's tv interview too in catalunya 2009 (which is how you know it's a deliberate ploy lol), but after that if anything it's jorge who is initiating communication...

whereas at laguna, obviously casey has less than zero desire to talk to valentino. and obviously valentino is 100% aware of this. valentino usually isn't the sort to get in someone's face like this when he knows they're pissed off at him - he's more the avoidant type - but he makes an exception for casey. partly it'll be because he knows casey isn't doing himself any favours with his on-camera behaviour, partly because it's his chance to twist in the knife and make the experience as hellish as possible for casey - but partly I reckon he's just getting a genuine kick out of casey's reactions. beautiful, isn't it

hell. hell! hell <3

2. prisoner of your own success, brno 2003

look, I've yapped extensively enough about this celebration by now that there's probably not much new for me to say. to make an analogy circa two people reading this will appreciate, you know that episode in revolutionary girl utena where a flashing pointing finger directing the viewer's attention to the symbolically important objects on screen? this is valentino's in-universe equivalent. flexing those authorial muscles to make everyone aware of The Themes. something charming about how it's like. zero subtlety. just valentino turning to the camera and explaining to you, the audience, what character arc he's currently undergoing. you see, he's unhappy at honda - he's feeling trapped, if you will. like his individuality is being suppressed. he had a big cock-up at the sachsenring that made him reevaluate how he tactically approached races - from now on he'd be "taking no prisoners". he feels the media is being too harsh on him, almost as if they're punishing him for how dominant he was the past. which would make him a 'prisoner of his own success'. if you will

here's a post that just like,, has a few relevant quotes from the commentary and the autobiography and all that. key detail about that weekend is that after sulking/partying with his title rival on ibiza during the summer break, valentino shows up to the paddock with his snazzy new hairdo. which obviously the commentators speculate during the race is a form of mind games

dyeing my hair red to psych out the competition. like a pro. the race itself is obviously fantastic, but I love that he had celebrations this elaborate planned out for a race he won by *checks notes* .042 seconds. I mean. come on, could've easily gone wrong. in the end, however, valentino plot armoured his way to reversing the defeat from a few weeks prior - and immediately does this whole chain gang routine, which is just another elite camp bit. and crucially it's also a bit of a throwback! the planned celebrations had petered out a little at this stage of his career, as if he'd grown out of them... both the hair and the celebrations are recapturing his wild lesbian youth from the days before he became a honda factory man

he's got to break free, you see, got to express his identity again. and "prisoner of my own success" is just. such a funny phrase. deeply insufferable. the way he carries that stupid ball and chain around with him, on the bike and off it... how sete has a kick at it during the podium ceremony... how valentino's still holding that blasted thing mid-champagne spray...

open wide

valentino brings back the celebrations later that year when he seals the title - carried aloft by fans dressed in convicts' garb while sporting a massive novelty lock and key. back in brno, he had told yamaha under the cover of night that he would sign for them. when he seals the title, his last for honda, he is freed from the expectations of the press and the fans that had been weighing on him all year. he is about to liberate himself from honda. the novelty lock is now open... whatever that might symbolise. and the following year is about truly embracing his own identity, for better and for worse. beyond being a fun celebration, it functions as a neat little thematic road map for what's to come. plot significant celebration. imagine having plot significant celebrations

1. sweeping the grid, sepang 2004

sue me, I'm horrible, but this one will always come top of the pile for me. this is another one I've talked about way too much by this point - but to me it really is the definitive marriage of joy and cruelty that valentino so thoroughly embodies. he's having fun! coming up with a little joke with his team :) but of course the whole thing is also incredibly, shamelessly malicious. valentino is obviously on one that entire weekend... or, well, he's on one that entire month tbh. he's already exhibited some generational malice in the press conference that started off proceedings, he's doing his thing that entire weekend to unsettle poor sete as much as possible - and eventually he wins the race in reasonably straightforward fashion

which in itself is already enough to swing the title fight back to being basically wrapped up (though I'd still advise keeping the risky last lap phillip island lunges to a minimum, but you do you), so you'd think that'd be job done. except valentino is still feeling furious and vengeful towards both sete and honda. so after blatantly ignoring sete's outstretched hand on the cooldown lap (to the surprise of one of the commentators, who said such unsportsmanlike behaviour was unlike valentino - which... buddy), valentino then stops at the side of the road for another one of his fun little celebrations. this time, it's reenacting the sweeping of the grid that had given him that nasty back-of-the-grid penalty the week before

similarly to misano 2009, what valentino's doing is defanging his own mistake from the previous week - he's reducing its power, drawing attention away from the self-inflicted nature of his precarious championship situation, making his setbacks into jokes better than anyone else can. except unlike in 2009, valentino does not primarily blame himself for his recent humiliation. valentino's pre-planned celebrations are generally about himself, not his rivals - but he makes an exception here to mock sete and honda. to show them that nothing is forgiven. the sete rivalry is about valentino gaining more agency in his story, including in torturing his rivals, so it feels right that this gleeful malice really comes to the fore here too. I didn't include jerez 2005 in this post because that's more... valentino reacting to the crowd in his celebrations rather than doing his own thing (though obviously I'm also a massive massive fan of that energy and dearly wish valentino had been booed more often). and well, that's the same vibe of valentino just relishing how much torment he was causing sete, the spanish crowd... the fourth wall break when he's mocking sete's injury, just properly embracing the nastier side of his celebrations. joy and cruelty, cruelty and joy - these two things were never really in opposition to each other for valentino

and just to mention my favourite detail, the cleaning company valentino and co invent to 'eliminate dirt from the world championship':

as in, they're cleaning starting grids... but they're also taking action against dirty rats. naming no names. lovely, isn't it

the whole thing's mean-spirited to a somewhat cartoonish extent - especially when you consider what a tight timeline they were on here. seven days between qatar and sepang, both flyaway races, like logistically it's honestly kinda impressive they made this happen. what the power of spite will do for you, I suppose. I also love that jb has one of these shirts. I love jb being completely ride-or-die in getting revenge on sete, helpfully commenting that it's dangerous to piss valentino off. watch out :) get yourself a crew chief who will enable you in psychologically torturing your opponents

and, remember, all this came in the third-to-last round of a tight title fight!! with a slender fourteen point lead in the championship, a mere week in between races including quickly nipping back to italy to attempt to address the hole in his finger... and valentino's spending his time coming up with custom shirts to take the piss out of his enemies? fantastic sense of priorities, 10/10 no notes

#underrated bit of jerez '05 is when they interview jb live on air and he fully goes 'yeah i didn't see what happened in the last corner :)'#like it just adds something vale ended up with a crew chief who's also so messyyyy idk... the stuff he used to say about jorge/casey/dani #theyre always saying how no nonsense this lad is and he's letting his charge brainstorm mean shirt ideas at the back end of the title fight #//#brr brr #//clt #batsplat responds #//brr brr

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swaps55 · 1 year ago

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As I was traveling when the reveals happened, I was remiss in sharing the absolutely lovely gift @jackwillwrite wrote for me for The Big Place Exchange!!!

drag you home, rated T, Joker & Kaidan

One thing about Kaidan - he’s a nice guy, sure, but when he opens up, really opens up, he can be a downright pain in the ass. It’s a good thing because Joker’s equally, if not more of, a pain in the ass. [The story of how Joker and Kaidan become friends, told in a few snapshots from pre-ME1 / ME1. Blasto is involved.]

I ADORE this story, please read it!! It's Joker's POV, and it brings the sweet, brings the snarky, and basically everything I love about them being friends!

For me, this exchange was the year of Joker & Kaidan. It's what I wanted to read and what I wanted to write, and I got my wish on both accounts. My giftee this year was @cr-noble-writes, and you have NO IDEA how hard it was not to tell him everything about this silly crack fic the entire time I was writing it. So here is my Joker & Kaidan hijinks fic, which contains every batshit trope I could think of plus a few more just for fun.

The Art of Chair Maintenance, rated M, Joker & Kaidan

A poker game on Omega goes awry. AKA, Kaidan and Joker walk into a bar on Omega and wind up on the run from the vorcha mafia over a bottle of whiskey and 5,000 credits. Joker exhales. “Well, uh. I may have gotten us an invite to a backroom poker game at Afterlife.” Kaidan rests his hands on his knees and eyes Joker warily. “Why would I want to play poker on Omega.” “You love poker!” “On Omega? Are you kidding? They play poker with guns on Omega.” Joker gestures to the arsenal at Kaidan’s feet. “Look at all the things you have in common.”

I still have a lot of reading to do, but so far every fic I've read has been phenomenal, including:

le temps des cerises, by @dandenbo, a shenko control ending fic that is stunningly gorgeous and will make you want to stare at a wall in the best way.

but oh! the things I learned from her (when sorrow walked with me) by sildominarin, a post-war mshenko falling together that comes with such a delicious ache as well as some deeply funny moments, all backed by the power of friendship.

And I Know It, by @timptoe, an UTTERLY delightful Ashley & Kaidan friendship fic that involves the best t-shirt ever

Common Ground, by viggorrah, in which Jack & Kaidan discover they aren't as different as they seem.

There are SEVERAL more I cannot wait to read. This exchange is a treasure trove of excellent Kaidan-centric fic. Thank you, @mallaidhsomo for running it!!

#fic recs #my fic #the big place exchange

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loki-zen · 3 months ago

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re: Hollywood and vaguely gesturing at genres of white people

I saw the new marvel movie, because I’d heard they’d turned down the whedonic hijinks and given it a darker tone. I’d say it was maybe a 60% quip reduction from when I gave up on the franchise, should’ve been 85%, but a big step in the right direction. The tone is darker, but not necessarily dark as such, I don’t feel like addressing themes of grief and trauma was historically seen as fair game in action/adventure movies. But yeah, at least closer to the mix of jokes/action/emotions of something like Lethal Weapon 1 rather than an obnoxiously zany romp like Thor 3 the Thor-d One. Still a flick, by any standards, but not bad for the kind of movie that’s a flick.

anyway, I’m not Russian, I’m half Polish by ancestry and like 4th generation US citizen, and we’re pretty Americanized. Nonetheless, there’s something about the way that this movie portrays Russians/Slavic people by waving a hand vaguely at some stereotypes and a sort of generalized Russo-Ukrainian-Polish accent that was funny/awkward to be on the other side of. Like, oh, yeah, that’s how other ethnic minorities must feel all the time. Also one of those things that reminds me that I kinda am an ethnic minority in America, albeit in the vaguest way possible and that hasn’t directly translated into social ostracism.

as a 3rd random aside, it cracks me up that every time Florence Pugh is in a big film there’s this wave of posts from girls sad that their bf compared the gf and Florence to one another, and then comments full of straight men going “but she’s hot, that was a compliment”.

I cannot explain it, she really is just gorgeous. Even in the silly baggy Russian gangster outfit with the slick-back hair and the big chunky chain necklace, I’m into it. (I may not be an entirely typical straight guy, but it’s always consistently funny how bad straight men and women are at making a mental estimate of one another’s aesthetic preferences)

there is that, I suppose: Florence Pugh, Scarlett Johansson, Dolph Lundgren, Anya Taylor-Joy — Hollywood doesn’t know what Slavic people are, but it does think we’re very good looking. I’ll take it

yeah i mean beats my ethnicities

#i guess i got some scottish and such in there and they quite like that #but otherwise it's either like Nope or romanys im not sure USAmericans know that that's a thing mostly

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mulders-too-large-shirt · 4 months ago

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s7 episode 8 "the amazing maleeni" thoughts

last episode was…. interesting!!! but this episode sounds silly. and i’m ready for a silly one.

this episode description mentions a magician!! i bet scully would love to try and figure out how magicians do their tricks. actually, i bet they both do that, and it’s probably annoying to everyone else in the audience.

(post-episode thoughts: giggling and blushing at the blatant flirting through magic tricks. and the scooby doo level hijinks and trickery that went down. this show sure does love a twin reveal, and it gets me each time. observe how our two very badass agents are actually giant fucking dorks. and revel with me in the range this show has, from emotionally devastating to high alien camp to straight comedy, or sometimes all at once)

let’s dive in!!!

we open on a fairground- coney island? or something similar? and a worn out sign for the amazing maleeni. side note, the library of congress has a collection of magician’s posters from the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and you can look at some of them online, and they are SUPER cool

is this him? maleeni himself? sitting in a van? yes, it is!

a staff member shows up and says that he is not getting his full paycheck!! this is so sad. he still promises that this will be his greatest show ever. “right on”, says the staff guy in a voice not unlike that of john mulaney

he has begun his performance. talking about his ancient art. he seems to really be a scholar of magic as he rambles on about the greatest performers there have ever been…. and this guy heckles him

“bosco had only one contemporary rival, a slightly older frenchman named conus” <- bro, i wanna sit down and queen out with maleeni. the academic history of magic sounds like just the sort of thing i want to listen to. and his tricks are cool!

“practice though i have, i have been unable to even get married” <- this guy is funny!! they aren’t appreciating him!! stop heckling him!!

he just made oranges appear!

this heckler dude is a flop. he’s talking about reattaching a severed head as dedi did. “western history knows three previous attempts at recreating this noachian feat, each of the three ending in tragedy. this will be the fourth” <- bro... you really provoked him into doing something crazy.

look at the camcorders the audience members pull out!! how vintage!!

staff guy is just watching this go down…. it’s all fuzzy on the screen as maleeni's head rolls around. all the way around, in fact. wonder how they did that with early CGI. crowd is very pleased, but not heckler guy.

after the performance, staff guy tells him he rocks, and goes to deliver his money. but mr. maleeni is solemn. no. wait. his head fell off!! a drastic change in the tone of this episode!!! poor john mulaney sounding guy!!

everyone cheers as we watch the intro, even though it is very short today.

hehe, i am filled with warmth and optimism.

mulder is here!!! a likely place for him to be. peeking into the van. and scully is here, too!!!

“neat trick, huh?” “i can think of a neater one: how you convinced me to drop everything and get on the first plane to los angeles” <-LMAOOOO, it's so important for scully to get his ass

BAHAHA, THESE FUCKING NEEEEEERDS, I’M CRYING

“you think this was a murder?” “don’t you?” <- they’re both confused!!

“mulder, his head was cut off” “ah, observe the nearly complete absence of blood. observe the paucity of fingerprints, as evidenced by the LA PD’s liberal use of lycopodium powder” <- LMAOOOO HER FACE WHEN SHE’S LOOKING AT HIMMMM and she asks why he’s talking like that, bahahaaa

my first thought was “did he want to be a magician as a kid?” but then i remembered he wanted to be an astronaut. but THEN i remembered kids usually want to be lots of things… children are so complex. so he definitely had a magician phase.

his hypothesis is that maleeni performed a magic trick that kills everyone who attempts it. “can i see that camcorder again?”

camcorder time. let us view the trick. scully notices the heckler and how he leaves, seemingly angry.

LMAOOOO, NOW SHE’S GETTING INTO IT. how will they find the heckler if he doesn't even show his face in the video? “ah, but observe: his discarded soda cup” <- these two are fucking losers and they were made in a lab for each other.

where are they off to now??? they find the heckler!! who is also a magician! his name is labonge. and he has a criminal record for pickpocketing.

oh, now this guy is magician lore dumping. and he….. flips his hand all the way around? dislocates his shoulder? girl, i don’t want to see that. BAHAHA, scully laughs and mulder looks like he’s gonna gag

“did you like that?” “yeah” she says <- LMAOOO

is this magician hitting on her? while doing coin tricks? anyway, he thinks it’s soul that separates the greats from the hacks.

“that, and i hear maleeni racked up some pretty big gambling debts” <- BAHAHA

she says they’ll be in touch and he says “please do”, BAHAHAAAAA oh poor boy wanted her baaaad. don't we all. get up.

and he steals their badges!!! lol he was getting silly

autopsy time!! scully thinks professional jealousy or hatred between magicians could be a good reason for murder….

“alright, i’m stumped” hahahaaaa. you've bested her!

his head was sawed off!

but he died of coronary disease?? so he died.... and someone sawed his head off super quick and then attached it with spirit gum. this makes mulder giggle.

and it’s been over a month since he died! “and yet he performed yesterday” “well… somebody performed yesterday”

cut back to labonge!! who is in a bar. looking for cissy alvarez. who he did time with. he used to play poker with maleeni. “i’m the guy that made his head fall off” <- LMAOOOO WHAT? is he being fr right now? everyone stops and listens to him.

maleeni (also, apparently, known as pinchbeck) owed cissy $20,000. “how would you like to get back what you owed? times ten?” “doing what?” “magic”

what is he plotting...? cissy’s men start to come in for him… labonge lights his own hand on fire!! and then he pulls out a wallet! that he somehow stole from cissy!!

crime!! magic crime!!!

the agents are visiting a bank?? looking for pinchbeck. and someone points him out to them! saying he is a poor man.

OMFG, it’s maleeni in a neck brace?? what is going on.

“good morning, mr. and mrs….” “agents!” mulder corrects quickly BAHAHA. oh. come on. a "mistaken for husband and wife" gag is always gonna kill me.

so this guy says the amazing maleeni, aka herman pinchbeck, was his twin brother!

(author's note: it might sound a little confusing from here on out, but i will refer to this banker twin as "pinchbeck", and the deceased maleeni as "maleeni". i hope this makes sense, because writing it in the moment was hard, as was editing it for clarity)

and he claims his neck was injured in a car accident. mulder asks if it’s related to the magic trick he did. no! because that wasn’t him! he was in a bad car accident in mexico. “oh, bad mexican car accident. in mexico” <- MULDERRRRRR KNOCK IT OFF.

scully asks if he knows magic, and he says he used to perform with his brother. he asks mulder to pick a card. he looks at it and then leans over, showing it to scully, and something about that is so endearing to me.

he performs the trick, and it is indeed his card! he says he quit because his brother wanted to be the best magician in the world, and he knew they never could become the very best.

mulder proposes a theory…. pinchbeck's brother maleeni died of heart disease and pinchbeck performed one final trick for him. pinchbeck says he only wishes it were true.

the camera pulls away…. revealing he is in a wheelchair! with no legs! “it was a very bad car accident in mexico” WELL!

mulder is gagged. HE LEFT AND HE RAN HIS HAND OVER HIS FACE, BAHAHAHA, oh my god... did he apologize for saying such a thing?

they go to consult labonge. he wants to know what he gets in return for helping them. “the feeling of pride that comes from performing your civic duty” <- LMAOOOO

mulder promises instead to let labonge root through the secrets of his least favorite magician. and he reveals maleeni’s van.

LMAO, WHAT? HE PULLS DOVES OUT OF A HAT AND THEN PLACES THE HAT ON SCULLY. mulder is not paying attention to this.

scully... in magician hat...

LMAO, his little hand flourish

are they tricking him into spilling his secrets here? because if so, it’s working.

he lifts up the floorboards (can they be called "floorboards" on a van?" and finds nothing down there… but mulder finds a marker! labonge must have left it there when he lifted the boards up!! he's setting them up!!

back at the bank, pinchbeck goes to pick up some money. he asks to see the guard’s gun. he’s thinking of getting one since the accident. then gives it back to the guard. something is afoot.

in comes cissy to see pinchbeck!!! he says his brother maleeni owed him a lot of money. he must pay up- cissy knows where he lives.

the guards are driving away…. they hear a thunk in their car. he grabs his gun…. but i bet it’s gonna be the bang gun….

who is in the truck!!!! oh shit!!! the gun does seem to be real!! bu it doesn't fire!! he shoots…. but whoever was in the truck is gone!!!

it’s labonge!!! he drew fake tattoos on himself and then wipes them off after making his escape!!

is this whole thing a bank heist?

scully finds cissy!!! they found his fingerprints on the marker! he denies having killed him. scully says he shouldn’t leave town. it is very ominous. they depart.

LMAOOOOOO, MULDER DOES A LITTLE MAGIC TRICK ON HER... BAHAHAHAAAAAA!! the way i rewatched it right away to see their stupid smiles….

she did not want him touching her nose or for him to make her do something as silly as pretend to sneeze, LMAOOOOO, but she says his trick is amazing!!! “the great muldeeni”, he jokes, and omfg, my face hurts from smiling….

(still smiling painfully as i edit this post)

this is an elaborate and touchy metaphor for misdirection. and it amuses me. mulder thinks labaonge is making them look in the wrong direction.

labonge was on the street when they went by!! he calls 911!! reporting a man with a gun threatening to kill somebody!!! and then he walks away!!!

then he goes in to talk to cissy!!! who calls him a son of a bitch- “you tried to frame me” cissy starts to attack, but labonge pulls out a gun. and the cops arrive and take him away!!

scully and mulder are back to see bestie pinchbeck. mulder grabs his wheelchair and walks him away, which is so wrong. he goes to toss him out of his wheelchair, and scully yells at him to stop, but!!!! he falls out!!! and has legs!!! HE is the real maleeni!!!!!!!

he says he was afraid for his life and that is why he did what he did. he owed a lot of money to cissy from the poker games that i suppose it was actually him playing and not the twin brother pinchbeck. scully asks why he didn’t just manipulate the cards… he refused to cheat because how could he live with himself! “who raised YOU?” <- LMAOOOOOO

trust that her navy father probably would not tolerate poker cheating and this projection on his behalf will not go far.

he says he went to his brother (who is pinchbeck, btw, are you keeping track?) for a loan and found him dead. it was an opportunity to become someone else. so he faked a trip to mexico. took time away from work. faked an amputation. took his brother's identity.

mulder puts him in handcuffs!!!! they go through his stuff!!

“my god. we gave you handicapped parking. we built you a ramp”, says his boss. LMAOOO. you know it took time to build a ramp!! but tbh they should have had one to be an accessible building anyway, so!!

also lmao at scully’s face while mulder rifles through pinchbeck/real maleeni’s stuff. she is in DEEP thought. she looks mad as fuck. lmaooo.

and he had access to the vaults!!! but everything seems to be in order. maleeni breaks out of his handcuffs…. because he was a magician.

it was at this point our agents discover there was an attempted robbery yesterday! "pinchbeck" who is really maleeni was the employee on duty for that!!! he is taken to jail…. and he isn’t even allowed a phone call…..

LABONGE IS IN THE NEXT CELL??? they were working together??? this whole time??

and the money from the bank is gone!!!

they find footage of cissy walking in!!! and the security guy sees his tattoos and thinks he was the dude in his truck!! but of course we really know that it was labonge with some sharpie marker!!

mulder pokes the ceiling with a cue!!!! and bags of money fall out!!! cissy swears labonge set him up!!! will the agents believe him?

maleeni and labonge have both made their bail. but the agents have arrived to bust them!!

and mulder launches into his new theory: maleeni’s twin pinchbeck died of a heart attack, which gave him and his young protege labonge the perfect opportunity. and labonge wanted revenge against cissy, who tortured him in prison. so maleeni played poker with cissy, made sure he lost big, giving labonge an in with alvarez when maleeni was presumed dead. and labonge planted the marker in maleeni’s van. maleeni ordered the attempted bank robbery to implicate cissy. labonge was in the armored car disguised as cissy. maleeni got the guard’s gun, switched the clip to fire blanks, and then they really robbed the bank, and planted the money in cissy’s place. LMAO at this scooby doo ass explanation. but i needed it. because there were plenty of twists and turns

mulder says they can both go free as long as the magic is over. “billy, let’s get the hell out of here”, says maleeni. so they're really friends...

mulder does more magic…. he stole maleeni’s wallet! why did they need the FBI for their intricate plan? ahhh!! he needed the badge number from when labonge took their IDs and his thumbprint from when he picked a card to get access to the digital money!! but they can’t do it without the card with his thumbprint that mulder stole back!!

scully looks amazed.

BUT SHE GAGS HIM BY TURNING HER HAND ALL THE WAY AROUND AND THEN REFUSING TO EXPLAIN, BAHAHA

the end.

ohhhh. these losers. said with SO much affection.

i needed this….. needed this one to go in my arsenal of silly time episodes. yeah ❤️

it was a caper! a heist! that our agents exposed!!! and they did bad magic and flirted along the way!!! isn’t it so great to be alive? to be known by another?

heheheheheeee…. scully in a magic hat… scully telling mulder his tricks are amazing…. hehe. i’m so pleased i feel like a fool.

NOT complaining. not complaining. i love when they are dorks together. i wish them a long future of it.

it’s so funny that this is the same show where all this terrible stuff happens. like the cancer arc and abduction arc and various tortures and murders and alien slavery plots. how do you reconcile that with this? it just makes me have to laugh if i think about it for longer than 5 seconds. they said "yes, we are gonna make a show about two people that are so emotionally distraught... but sometimes… JUST sometimes… we’ll do a silly one". and guess what? i’m here for it.

all of the heartbreaking moments- thinking of mulder sobbing in church, or begging that clone of his sister to come with him, or scully resigned to dying, losing a daughter she didn’t know she had, losing her sister, losing her partner over and over again- and despite that. we get silly magic trick.

and you know what? i’m not complaining.

i have been loosely plotting a vague alternate ending to the series (and no, i don’t really know how it ends, but i’ve heard whispers of a few things that are decidedly more in the sorrow filled category than this) and i feel justified in my rewriting to give it a happier end. because: don’t sit here and tell me that this show is all doom and gloom. it absolutely isn’t all of the time. come on now. i feel that i am taking part in a great tradition that includes the show runners themselves in seeing a sad episode and saying, you know what? we can change the vibe up in the next one. and so i will. and i shall. with pride.

so yes. when i write the “and they lived somewhat happily ever after” version i will incorporate my own angst AND my own cheesy magic flirting. i look forward to it.

overall, the plot to this episode was quite convoluted, and typing it out was very difficult, but i can't complain. i simply can't! i giggled the whole way through and audibly said "aww!" at certain points. because deep down these two are just losers. and it is important to remember that.

i am also curious to know how long it took the actors to learn their magic tricks. obviously they could hire pro magicians for labonge and maleeni but LMAO i'm imagining having to run mulder's card tricks over and over again...

#trying out adding the episode title in the header... so let me know what you think!!#a good episode!! not much else to say beyond it is adorable how much they love each other #but now i must sleep so everyone: have a lovely evening #and be sure to share your reactions to this episode! did the magic trick scene also kill you? tell me!#juni's x files liveblog #7x08 #the x files

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twstfanblog · 2 years ago

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*~ Halloween Hijinks ~*

A/N: Silly little thing I thought up and managed to finish on time. Happy Halloween everybody!!

Sam had agreed to let Yuu come to town with him, even offered to take a few of their friends if they wanted to come along. He needed to be at the docks by mid afternoon to pick up the massive order of props and materials for the upcoming Halloween Fair the school hosted. It’d take a while for him to get everything checked and settled, so Yuu would have plenty of time to explore the town until it was time to go back to campus. So, with permission from Crewel (And Crowley, but who cares.), Yuu and a select group of friends were set to accompany Sam.

But of course, Yuu could not just simply do things. They loved to have a theme, a motif, a little funny trick to enjoy at the expense of the masses. So in the ‘Freshest Firsties’ group chat, Yuu proposed a simple addition to their outing just to make it more fun. Seeing how most of them agreed, the plan was set.

Crewel had a massive roll of black fabric that was ‘The wrong shade’, so Yuu was free to cut and play with it as they wanted. They had made not only themselves and Grim, but also the rest of their friends matching simple cloaks and witch hats to wear to their outing on the town. Fastening the cloak, Yuu made sure it was completely covering their body, smiling once they saw it was. Looking down at Grim, the cat monster merely a black mess of fabric and a witch hat, Yuu picked him up, “Welp, let’s go distress the masses.”

Grim tilts his head, allowing his grin to be shown, “Yeah!”

~*~*~*~*~*~

Riddle was concerned.

He stood at the window outside of his office, Trey and Cater on either side of him. Outside, Yuu was twisting their body in a jerking motion that he supposed could be called dancing. He hoped that the bouncing shape on their head was Grim, but it was hard to tell when all any of them could see was a glimpse of blue fire under the oversized hat.

“Should…we go out there?” Trey looked at them, eyebrows creased in worry, his expression only deepening when Yuu started to add more movements to their strange dance.

Cat looks away from his phone, filming the weird performance for his own amusement, “Do you wanna go out there? #I’ve-Seen-This-Movie…”

Riddle sighs, folding his arms and raising an eyebrow, “Well, we can’t just let them…Wait…”

Two new figures were racing out from the dorm, matching black cloaks making them seem like they were merely floating instead of running. Once they reach Yuu, they all turn in a circle, revealing the new figures to be Ace and Deuce. One more brief twirl and hop dance later, the four of them raced off to the mirror, disappearing from view.

…

“...” Trey turned back to them, opening his mouth, “-”

“No.” Riddle turned around, walking away from the window and back toward his office, closing the door firmly behind him.

Cater and Trey stood in the hallway, sharing a glance before Cater smiled and shrugged. Tapping at his phone, he walks away as he starts to post the odd video, “Eh. I’m sure they’re fine…#Cult-Things-With-The-Boyz.”

Trey stood at the window, sighing softly, “I need a glass of milk…”

~*~*~*~*~*~

Leona laid in bed, glaring at the ceiling while the phone in his hand rang. Ruggie was late, later than he normally was anyway. He not only missed Leona waking up, but he had been awake for nearly 15 minutes and the hyena hadn’t shown up yet. He should have been there already with his lunch. In a move that wasn’t worry, he started to ring him up, and even that was taking forever.

Ruggie finally picks up the call, speaking in a nonchalant tone, “Y’ello?”

“Where the hell are you?”

“Uh…In the dorm.”

“Well, get up here already.”

“Uuuuuh…Can’t.”

“...” Leona sits up in his bed, looking at his phone with a puzzled expression, “What the fuck do you mean ‘Can’t’?”

“Just…Just come to the lounge and you’ll see…”

Leona kept on the call, walking out to the railing that looked over the lounge area, freezing at the scene before him. There was Ruggie, one hand holding the phone to his mouth and the other gripping the bag containing their lunch. But, circling around him like a group of over-sized vultures were three black-cloaked figures, a smaller shape skittering around the circle at a faster pace than the others. They walked in a tight enough circle that it seemed Ruggie wasn’t able to move freely enough to use his UM. Not to mention they’d every now and again do some weird movement that Ruggie would have to lean away to dodge.

“...Ruggie, what the fuck am I looking at?”

“Just come down here to get your damn food. I think I’ve been chosen for a sacrifice or some shit.”

“I’m not going down there-Oh.”

“What? What? You can’t just say ‘Oh’ and not-AH, WHAT THE FUCK!?” Ruggie threw whatever half caution he had to the wind, dipping lowing and shoving past Deuce once he saw a massive figure in black speeding toward them.

Leona gripped the railing, hoping his laughter was echoing and giving Ruggie a headache as Jack joined who he suspected to be Yuu and their other little friends. A brief greeting was only given in a matching full-body shake before the flock was off toward the mirror, leaving behind a heavily breathing Ruggie, a confused mass of bystanders, and a cackling Leona.

~*~*~*~*~*~

“Um, Azul?” Jade peeked his head into the backroom smiling before he bowed lightly, “There’s a bit of a situation happening in the lounge.”

Sighing, Azul put his pen down to give Jade his full attention, “And you need my help with it why?”

“Well, it seems your date-mate has descended upon the lounge with a coven of their dark brethren.”

“...” Azul reached up, pulling off his glasses as though that would help him clearly hear what Jade just said to him, “...What?”

“Your date-mate. In the lounge. Descended like a dark omen. Come see?” Jade clearly was enjoying himself, the wild look in his eye showing just how hard he was fighting back the laughter he wanted to release.

“...” He put his glasses back on, standing up and wordlessly following Jade out the door to the lounge. A part of him was thankful they had the sense to wear all black. All black was tasteful and he could maybe add a charge to the current patrons' bill for a floor show. Or, what he could claim was a floor show.

He supposes they were dancing, Yuu and their friends. It was an odd shifting movement that they seemed to time in perfect opposite sync. It was oddly hypnotic, but also clearly starting to distress the crowd. He steps closer, standing next to Yuu and whispering, "Darling? My sweet pearl, salt to my sea? What is this? Literally, what are you doing right now?"

Azul watches in mild annoyance, and a smidge of adoration, as a small smile crosses Yuu's face as they clearly gained amusement from whatever this event was. But they still don't stop dancing or speak to him, “Yuu…What are you doing- HEY!”

The biggest cloaked figure, that Azul could only guess was Jack, suddenly picked him up, moving him farther away from the group before returning to his place in their dance.

He was poised to start dealing out fines, heavy ones, when Floyd exited the kitchen. The tall mer had a note clutched in his hand that he passed to Yuu. The prefect held the paper high, signaling the others to stop their odd ritual and rush out of the lounge. Yuu takes a brief moment to run to him, kissing him on the cheek before running after their friends and out of sight.

"..." Azul turns to Floyd, calling out as he walks back to the kitchen, "Floyd what was that?"

"Oh. Shrimpy’s doing me a favor." With a shrug, he walked past the swinging doors, giving no further explanation.

…

Azul turned to Jade, the other Eel-Mer clearly struggling to hold in his laughter, "I'm serious, what was that?"

~*~*~*~*~*~

Something was wrong. Not at the moment but something was coming, Jamil could feel it. In the kitchen, he stood and judged Kalim’s knife cuts. The Asim heir wearing cut-safe gloves and muttering under his breath to remind himself of the proper grip and position for the knife. All in all, a very normal and calm cooking lesson…Something was wrong.

He sighed heavily, rubbing his temple, trying to think what could be bothering him. Kalim was standing in front of him, his homework was completed, and dinner was well underway (If Kalim would hurry up with cutting the peppers). What could it be…?

The door clicks open, calling both of their attention to it. Yuu stood in an all-black floor-length cloak, only one arm shown holding Grim up. Funnily enough with the cat monster in a matching outfit. Yuu stood silently, simply looking at the two of them.

Kalim and Jamil look at each other from the corner of their eyes before moving them back to Yuu. Kalim smiles, placing his knife down and walking closer to Yuu, “Hey, Yuu! You wanna stay for dinner? I’m helping.”

Jamil rolls his eyes briefly, crossing his arms, “That’s a word for it…”

Yuu didn’t speak, only holding Grim higher, letting the cat monster be in clear view as he clapped his paws together twice.

The kitchen was flooded by other cloaked figures, the three of them quickly descending on Kalim while the house-warden screamed in confusion. Jamil just barely grabbed at his pen before the other figures fled the room, leaving a frazzled Kalim lying on the floor.

Yuu rushes over to Jamil, pressing a kiss to his cheek before they run off, leaving the two Scarabia students in the silence.

…

Jamil looked at Kalim, after making sure the dark posse wasn’t coming back, “Are you alright?”

“Yeah…?” He pats himself down, standing up slowly as he checked himself over, “Yeah I-...” Kalim’s hands pat at his pocket, pulling the hidden seam of his poofy pants to look inside directly, “Oh. They stole my wallet.”

Well, at least Jamil knew what that horrible feeling was…

~*~*~*~*~*~

Vil stood at the main window of the Pomefiore lounge, wine glass in hand as he swirled his sparkling water. It took so much of his self-control to not scowl. He looks at the pack of idiots in the courtyard flailing around and scaring his dormmates. Rook had warned him that Yuu was doing 'something', the Florian saying as such with a smile before pointing toward the window.

He was busy, he really didn’t have the time to be dealing with…whatever this was. As of now, he was trying to make the decision on whether he should sic Rook on them or not. While he would probably take all day with it out of the pure joy of getting to hunt down the first years, Vil needed him for their site planning. Sighing, he turns to Rook, the Florian smiling and filming the odd performance, to order him to remove them from Pomefiore. Only for them both to look in surprise as a new dark figure flew down from the roof.

Only briefly seeing, potentially unbrushed lilac locks, did Vil realize that Epel had flown from his bedroom window to join the others in their dancing in the form of flying over them. The Pomefiore first year sprinkling what looked like glitter onto them in rather aggressive throws. The two third years watch as Epel dismounts his broom, the others circling and waving their arms over him before grouping together and rushing off.

Vil and Rook stood at the window, looking at the group of black fabric scurrying away and out of the dorm building's fenced area like a flock of confused deer. Blinking his eyes, Vil finally scowls and sips at his water, walking away from the window, “I should have just had you shoot them...”

Rook smiles, clapping his hands and opening the window to shout at the fading figures, “Beaute! 100 points!”

~*~*~*~*~*~

If he ignored the knocking they’ll go away. Idia knew he could only turn his game up so loud to drown them out without his own ears starting to hurt. But, whatever Yuu wanted he wasn’t gonna give. But he couldn’t deny that the knocking was starting to finally annoy him. He growled under his breath, the knocking throwing him off on his rhythm game enough to break his combo.

Idia throws down his controller, hair just barely flickering into red as he yells to the door, “Fine! It’s unlocked! Just come in like a- what the fuck?” Idia curled into his chair, trying to make himself smaller as way more people than just Yuu crowd into his room. Why were they all in black? What kind of curse game event did he trigger? Oh god was that glitter? He saw this movie with Cater, he knows how this is gonna end.

His hope rises at hearing Ortho’s update capsule hiss open. Now looking at them all together, Idia now realizes why Ortho asked him to make a simple cloak shell for him. Oh god, Yuu’s weird cult got to his poor little brother…

Ortho flies up to Idia, his hat in hand as his eyes creased in a smile, “Nii-san! I’m breaking my agreement with Yuu to tell you I’ll be gone for a few hours! Please make sure you eat and I’ll keep my text channel open for you to check up on me!”

“...” Idia’s eyes glance at the lightly swaying group of the other first years, each of them adding in their own various movements like some type of hivemind boss. Looking back to Ortho he nods, “Okay…Be safe…Have fun…”

“I will, have fun in your game Nii-san!” Ortho puts the hat on his head, his sclera blacking out and his arms come out to form a perfect T-pose.

Idia watches in muted horror as the others copy Ortho, leaving the room in a single file with Ortho floating behind them. He didn’t care to figure out who double-backed to shut his door, even though he was thankful.

“...” Turning back to his computer he opened his chat window and sent out a message to Cater.

‘can you cm ovr? was jst swatted by a cult.’

‘LOLZ. They got ya huh babes?’

~*~*~*~*~*~

“Should we do something?” “But they look like they’re having such fun!”

“What’s happening- WHAT ARE THEY DOING TO WAKA-SAMA!?”

Sebek looked out the window, eyes wide as he watched his ‘friends’ circle around Malleus in black cloaks.

Lilia giggles, looking out in amusement, “It seems Malleus has been kidnapped by a dark coven. Silver just came back with a letter detailing their demands.” He gestured to Silver, signaling for him to hand Sebek the hastily written note.

Sebek snatches it from Silver’s outstretched hand, reading it over before his frown somehow deepens, “So we have to fight them!? That’s what we’re going to do right!? We can’t let them just keep Waka-Sama!”

Silver shakes his head, “I highly doubt Malleus is in any actual danger, Sebek. I think he’s just happy to be included in their game…” Looking outside, Silver couldn’t help but smile at how calm Malleus appeared to be in the middle of the circle.

“But their demands!”

“They only stated they would ‘take’ Malleus if the proper person doesn’t fulfill their promise.” Lilia joins Silver in looking out the window, “I must be honest, though. I may just let this game continue to see what happens. Plus, Malleus would love to spend the day with your friends.”

Sebek pouted, taking a glance out the window before sighing and leaving the room. Silver and Lilia sharing a look before shrugging. Only minutes later to laugh at seeing Sebek stomp out of Diasomnia with a matching black cloak and oversized witch hat. Lilia down right cackling seeing Epel throw a handful of glitter directly at Sebek's chest.

~*~*~*~*~*~

Sam braced himself on his knees, having stopped his laughter but still needing to catch his breath. Standing back up, he wipes a tear from his eye. Catching breath, he looked at the students in front of him, "...I'm guessing y'all are all set?"

The glitter-covered black hats all nodded, though Sebek merely grumbled and tried to brush the offending dust from his hands.

Shaking his head, Sam prepped the mirror for their trip, "The second we get into town, you kids scatter. I don't wanna be a part of whatever cult thing you got goin' on."

#twisted wonderland #twst #disney twst #twst wonderland #yuu oc #night raven college

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chosetherose · 2 years ago

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We knew it all along 🍊🩵

Taylor released Sweeter Than Fiction exclusive to the Tangerine vinyl at Target. She said this about it:

“There you’ll stand ten feet tall, I will say ‘I knew it all along’ 🥲 This song has always made me think of my friend Jack. It was the first song we made together and watching him challenge himself and make beautiful art over the years has been the thrill of a lifetime. How can he be 6 years older than me and also somehow still be my precocious young son? We may never know. “Sweeter Than Fiction (My Version)” is now available exclusively at Target on Tangerine vinyl 🍊🩵”

I find this funny for a couple reasons:

1. She created an orange (tangerine) edition with an exclusive track that repeats the lyrics “this life is sweeter than fiction”.

Let it sink in. Orange, which we picked up on as a stunting color, is the only version that includes this song. She is saying her true love is sweeter than the fictitious love we see in stunts.

2. She used the 🍊 emoji. And for some reason this makes me feel we are seen. She is aware of the hijinks that go on around here. (Extra giggles: @spade-riddles regularly uses the 🎯 emoji).

Looking deeper, the lyrics to STF are especially 👀 to me.

3. If you read this through a Tumblr Kaylor lens does it not sound perfectly like a redemption story? (Please I know we are just silly little internet people in all this but hear me out).

The first verse is about coming undone, watching us fall, watching our colors fade with a pain we thought would last forever.

In the second verse after the chorus, all we have is our shattered hopes. Then, they never saw it coming, but we were on to something and hit the ground running.

In the pre-chorus, the light comes on. We proved her right, them wrong. And it’s like we don’t remember when we thought the rain would last forever.

The chorus repeats including that we will stand tall, the rest is history.

The bridge says we’ll be one of many saying look at us now, you made us proud. Then goes into the sentiment of loving someone when they are down, like we’ve loved Kaylor’s true love in its deepest darkness.

4. Notably, Taylor highlighted “There you’ll stand ten feet tall, I will say ‘I knew it all along’”. This reminds me so much of this riddle from Spade.

♠️ My riddles aren’t chronological but they do foreshadow. Piece them together and see the picture. You’ve known all along so now, follow along. - 05/11/2019

And generally, highlighting those lyrics gives me vibes of change in the air.

Bonus:

Taylor described Jack as like her “precocious” young son. Ok but any adjective would have worked there. Why this one? Here is its definition:

Showing mental development or achievement much earlier than usual

It fits the theme of knowing something before others. 💅🏼

I’ll be dissecting this post for ages 😂

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aquaquadrant · 1 year ago

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Hello! I've been told to ask you this =D

What do you think about Jimmy as a minecraft player, what is he?

It's for a project =3

ooh a project, how fun :0

i should preface this by saying i’m not the BEST person to give this opinion, cuz despite how much i write jimmy, i uh… don’t actually watch his pov? i haven’t seen any of empires (except the hermit’s crossover in s2), i don’t watch his streams, and i don’t watch the one-off vids he posts on his channel. most of my knowledge of jimmy comes from his appearances in other pov’s life series episodes and how ppl portray him in fandom.

howEVER, that said, i’m curious how my interpretation would line up with other ppl’s. i view minecraft players as generally fitting into a few broad categories- tho there can def be overlap between them or a jack-of-all-trades situation. and this prob applies more to people who actually play minecraft professionally (ie. ‘play video games for a living’) than the casual player (such as myself hagshdha).

builders: have a creative eye and practiced skill in building to the point where they can, generally speaking, throw down a decent build on the fly (things that require a lot of planning/detail work often drafted in creative mode first). have good understanding of achieving a certain shape and color with their block placements. may or may not include terraforming ability. generally drawn to the game’s building aspect and spend a lot of time/care making things look good.

redstoners: have an adequate amount of base knowledge for how most redstone components work and interact with each other, tho they may occasionally still use tutorials or take inspiration from others (can only reinvent the wheel so many times). usually capable of making simple redstone machines/contraptions on the fly. generally drawn to the game by the possibility of farms and automation. some take it to extreme game-breaking lengths (doc).

competitors: have highly-trained skill in areas such as PVP, parkour, and/or any other multiplayer server type minigame. think hypixel and MCC. this isn’t to say they don’t have their own solo worlds for building or other projects, or don’t participate in smps, but their main draw to the game initially was competitive multiplayer and it features heavily on their channels. to me, speed-runners/challenge-seekers are a subcategory of this.

explorer: this type doesn’t actually show up often in popular mcyt bc it’s a largely solitary- and in some ppl’s opinion, boring- experience. but these are the players that spend hours in their solo worlds just traveling around, mining out massive caves, or doing any other kind of repetitive grindy work as a manner of relaxation. some ppl really enjoy this aspect of minecraft and it’s a major draw for them. special mention for kurtjmac, a mcyter who’s spent 13 years and counting just walking to the farlands in an old version of the game (tho he does other things on his channel as well).

and now for what category i think jimmy fits best in (which again, doesn’t mean he can’t build or do other things). i don’t have a good name for it rn so i’m just gonna call it ‘the sillies’ (affectionate).

sillies: above all else, they’re here to have fun. most, if not all, of their content is on multiplayer worlds (both public servers and private smps), and on these worlds they are extremely social, making a concentrated effort to interact with others even if not legitimately roleplaying. high amounts of pranks and hijinks abound, as well as ‘committing to the bit.’ lots of videos feature them doing some kind of funny little challenge, game, or mod with their friends. again, that doesn’t mean they can’t engage w the other aspects of the game or be skilled in those categories, but generally, it’s not their main objective and not how they spend most of their time.

that’s what i’ve got! obviously u could split all of these into many subcategories, and your average player is gonna be fairly well-balanced. but for our pro cubitos, i think this is a nice way to categorizing things (and it at least makes sense in my mind).

#hermitcraft #empires smp #solidaritygaming #back in my day minecraft only had two genders: miner and crafter #(LMAOOOOOO)#ty for the ask it was neat to get my thoughts down on this

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digi-dest-stories · 8 months ago

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Request

Posts for More Content w/ the trio:

What if

(Over)Protective

Meeting

Slide Evolution

~~~~

One would expect a boy like him to be lonely. And he had been - Terribly, terribly lonely.

Then he fell into the Digital World, and he wasn't lonely anymore.

His first friend had started out as a lizard, much bigger than himself, with a strange symbol on it's chest. It wasn't very friendly at first, but had took care of him and protected him. With every fight it got into, it grew, becoming larger and deadlier.

It should have scared him. But despite the anger, despite the aggression, it still cared for him. It held him in it's arms and carried him around or curled it's body around his in a protective, warm embrace.

So he felt no fear when he saw his first friend.

They traveled for a long time, just the two of them. They did not have a set destination in mind, just moving from one place to another. The other creatures feared them, more so his friend, and stayed out of their way.

But then, two other creatures crossed their path. They had heard stories of them from their soldiers and grew curious to see what could be causing so much destruction. His friend was... unhappy about the interruptions, to say the least.

After a while, the fighting between them had slowed to a stop. Instead of attacking upon meeting, they talked. It was small conversations every time, mostly answering questions that they had for him.

He enjoyed talking to them. It was funny, seeing their curious and sometimes surprised expression at his answers. Thus started his other friendships, friends who were just as terrifying and powerful as his first friend.

His second friend was a beautiful, but demonic woman. Most described her as cruel and vain, which he did notice at times, though she never behaved that way toward him. She was kind, almost motherly at times, pampering him with affection.

She tended to steal him away from the others, carrying him around the home. Showing him off to the servants, demanding praise for both him and her. It was funny, though he sometimes had to calm her temper when a servant was too slow for her liking.

She never seemed to like to share, even if she reluctantly did so with the others. But it was only with them that she shared him with, no one else. Anyone who tried to take him from her promptly got scratched at or spit at with poisoned words.

His third friend was a dragon, like his first friend, but much more intimidating. He led an army, a commanding force that no one dared to disobey. He was definitely scary at first, and difficult to approach. His presence was hard to stomach, in an almost physical sense.

But he still tried, even though the dragon would avoid him at first. Eventually, it seemed like he had grown to tolerate him, or at least stomach being around him, which was nice. The general would let him watch the soldiers train from atop his shoulder, occasionally even letting him give them commands.

The soldiers obeyed, though some seemed to dislike having to take orders from him. Most of them weren't that bad though, just asking them to do silly things that made him laugh. It even made his friend laugh - Well, laugh was stretching it. It was more like a small chuckle or noise of amusement.

These creatures, his friends - As terrifying and deadly as they were - had made his life so much happier. They lived together here in this castle, experiencing all sorts of fun adventures, hijinks, and other amazing things he never would have thought would happen before.

It was all new and strange. Sometimes the days would be fun, other times they would be scary. Sometimes his friends were good and other times they were... not so good. There was a lot of good and bad, ups and downs.

But that was life.

And this new life of his was just getting started.

~~~~

Sorry if this wasn't exactly what you were looking for. I tried my best.

#digimon #ficlet request #megidramon #lilithmon #dorbickmon #renamod writing

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kira-craxkships · 11 months ago

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Oooh,these crossover ships are so so so good. Hehe,I wanna go and look at them with a pinch on their cheek because they are so adorable.

Thank you!

CoseJenn started it all for me.I saw those DionxMedea and RoxannaxCassis family au's and thought wouldn't it be funny if Jennete was dating Lucas's cousin cause he is dating hers. <I don't like those au's anymore tho>

Tbh for YurixPsyche I spun a wheel and found them but they grew on me.

RashtaxFreya is my masterpiece.They are my sillies. I can't explain them and I won't even try to articulate why I love them.

RashtaxEros deserve their own post cause I have the scenario of how they work (they don't) and it's a bunch of crack and cartoony villain hijinks.

I made a chart. These are not all hapoening at the same time btw. They are just happening in different times. Like a Medea amd Psyche are not together while I am shipping Medea with Roxanna/Ruby

#freya van furiana #how to get my husband on my side #rashta #remarried empress #jennette margarita #your throne #eros your throne #yuri elizabeth #beware of the villainess #rashta iska #actually i was the real one #cosette weinberg #kira's crossships #eros orna vasilios

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snalz-artt · 2 years ago

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forgot to post this doodle SAY HELLO to the shittiest bbc ghosts/mcyt au ever conceived, thankyou @/luigra for helping hehe

i have A LOT to say so its going under the cut this is soso silly

basic bbc ghosts plot: A young woman inherits a huge mansion estate in england from a dubious familial connection and moves in with her husband. They plan to renovate the manor and guesthouses to make into a hotel/venue, but when she falls out a window and almost dies, she comes back to life with the ability to See Ghosts. With the house being very historic, there are quite a few interesting characters (the falling out the window thing might be their fault, actually). Hijinks ensue.

———

CLEO: Cleo is the Allison of the story, she inherits the house and falls out the window, now.. undead(?) they can see and interact with the cast of Ghosts they’re now stuck with. Making ZombieCleo one of the Alive characters was too funny, sorry.

SCOTT: Scott is Mike!! Cleo’s best friend/partner/chosen soulmate (like in double life), he Cannot see the ghosts but completely trusts they exist.

They get up to various antics as they try to renovate and market the place, usually while being hindered or helped by the ghosts. I haven’t thought of a good pun on the name Button House yet though..

The ghosts are not all from any specific series, but a selection of ghosts/dead characters from multiple mcyt sources ^^

JOE: Joseph Hills takes the role of Thomas Thorne. He is a dramatic regency era poet who mostly follows Cleo around, trying to impress her with his… unique poetry, that was considered before his time. Their ghost theming comes from Beetlejhost of course.

RANBOO: Ronald Booth is Pat, a 1980’s Scout Leader. To be honest, this is just because Ranboo is very associated with the 80’s aesthetic and can fit the silly yes-man subordinate role, and of course was a ghost on the dsmp (Boo).

BDUBS: Bdubs is Robin!! A caveman who lived on the land well before the house was built. He’s seen it all, which fits Bdubs’ storyteller theme!! This is also just a fun visual choice because instead of wearing animal furs he gets to wear a big mossy coat. He also talks in a quite a unique and funny way which could replace how Robin talks like. Yknow, a Caveman. There was also a tiny bit in.. last life? Where bdubs was a ghost? (We were running out of ghosts at this point.)

SLIME: Charles Slime is Humphrey Bone, a headless tudor nobleman!!! Slime has a pretty constant track record of dying dramatically in mcyt (dsmp, epic smp, slimecicle cinematic universe) hence getting to be a ghost here. He has a lot of comedy that i think fits pretty well with being a ghost and with the visual humour of having your body separate to your head <3

FLIPPA: Juanaflippa as Jemima!!! I had to get one of the Eggs in here, even if i dont know much about qsmp at this point its just too perfect for one of them to be Jemima, since we have Charlie why not have Juanaflippa ^^ This can fit the common bbc ghosts fanon of Humphrey being found family for Jemima, with Charlie and Flippa’s father-daughter relationship. Creepy little singing ghost girl!!!

QUACKITY/MEXICAN DREAM: Yeah ok we were really running out of mcyt ghosts at this point, if you dont know anything about the dsmp you would probably think im making this up- uh, quackity plays him, he died and became a very prominent dsmp ghost. He takes the role of Julian as a 90’s politician character (like quackity/md in el rapids etc) here. I GUESS.

GHOSTBUR: Im pretty sure that while alive Kitty didnt blow up a country or whatever but the innocent and kind character of ghostbur fits the role of Kitty pretty well, with both having poor/inaccurate memories of their lives and being very sweet. A georgian noblewoman! Instead of Kitty he’d be called Willy or something. That way one of the ghosts can still have an innuendo name. Thats important.

JIMMY: Jimmy (James) as Mary. A stuart era peasant who got burned in the witch trials. He could still have the power to make people smell smoke, i think it fits the canary thing a bit. AND SPOILERS FOR BBC GHOSTS, Mary being the First Ghost of the main group to get.. sucked away is just too perfect. While never explicitly being a Ghost, Jimmy has such a connection to death that i think im justified.

PIX: Pixie as Fanny!!! He used to own the house many years ago and is now a ghost that really wants it to be perfectly historically preserved. Pix was a ghost in empires s2 and an archeologist who wanted to preserve history of course, so this fits the really proper and old fashioned personality of Fanny pretty well. Also her love of animals fits pix having the ghost cat and the dodos…

SCHLATT: Schlatt as The Captain, a repressed gay ww2 Captain who never actually saw any combat. He can fit the leader role that the Captain does, especially the fact that he just assumes himself the leader, and the others kind of don't take him seriously. Schlatt was a ghost, Glatt, on the dsmp! He will be a bit less.. nice? Than the bbc ghosts captain, but could still have a good bit of development.

bonus convex as the plague ghosts, vex are kind of ghosty, right?

#art #au #mcyt #bbc ghosts #SORRY TO fans of either of these that dont know what the other is #but these r like two of my favourite medias #the thing about all the bbc ghosts characters (most brit comedy characters actually) is that they are all terrible #in their own special ways. So when i assign a mcyt to a character.. it is only out of love <3 #dream smp #<- for blacklist

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