#the fly is a reference to the game intro

[berryispunk]

Like A Song Stuck In My Head

Before @thedrabblecollective's challenge kicks off tomorrow—and after meeting the characters yesterday—here’s the intro story you’ll want to read before diving into the drabbles themselves.

pairing: Frankie Morales x ofc (Firefly)

tags: alternate universe, takes place after TF events, all the music references, rockstar! Frankie, dual POV, addiction, drug mention, cocky Frankie, strong female lead, ANGST, strangers to???, falling in love, some harder themes, dive into mental health (later), emotional turmoil, eventual smut for later chapters, curse words

general summary: Like a Song Stuck in My Head follows Frankie , as a troubled guitarist chasing a second chance, and Firefly, the sharp-tongued bartender who sees through him. What starts in a dive bar becomes something deeper—until it all falls apart. Some connections burn fast. Others never fade. Some songs never leave you, even when the music stops.

word count: 2,5 k

moodboard done by my dear friend @guelyury. gracias, bonita!

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Firefly’s seen plenty of boys with guitars. But none like the one on stage tonight—wild waves for hair, sweat-slicked and electric like a live wire, half-drunk on adrenaline and something sharper. Frankie Morales, lead guitarist of Thorns of August, doesn’t just play—he moves like the music’s tethered to his soul, like it’s the only thing keeping him from flying apart.

She wipes down the counter with a practiced flick, half-watching from behind the bar. Not that she’ll ever admit it.

Donna leans in beside her, arms crossed, gaze steady on the stage. “The boys are good, right?”

Firefly shrugs. “Guess they’re decent.”

Donna smirks, all tough-love and mischief. “Guess the fish boy’s got an eye on you.”

That’s when she looks up—and catches Frankie’s gaze locked on hers like he’s been watching her all along. He doesn’t look away. Just smirks, cocky and smug, before turning back to his guitar like she hasn’t just caught him staring. She rolls her eyes, but there’s heat curling low in her chest.

After the set, he swaggers over, guitar still slung across his back like a weapon or a trophy. Pupils blown wide, jaw tight—wired as hell but humming with something she can’t name. He taps the bar with two fingers.

“Whiskey. Double.”

She gives him a once-over. Band tee snug, silver rings, that look in his eyes like he thinks she’s already fallen.

She pours the whiskey. He knocks it back in one go. No wallet.

“You gonna pay for that?” she asks, cool.

He grins. “I already did. Just played your sad little stage, didn’t I?”

She doesn’t blink. “If you don’t pay, I’m throwing you out. Couldn’t care less if you’re Mick Jagger’s long-lost bastard.”

He laughs—slow, full of bite. Peels a crumpled twenty from his back pocket and tosses it onto the bar like a challenge.

“Are you always this uptight, hermosa?”

She meets his gaze, unflinching. “Are you always this insufferable?”

—

She walks away before he can come up with something clever, sliding down the bar to serve a pair of regulars who actually tip. Doesn’t spare him another glance. Frankie watches her go, elbow braced on the counter, still riding the high—everything too bright, too fast, too much. But somehow, she cuts right through the noise.

It’s the way she moves—like she owns the place, like the world doesn’t get to touch her unless she says so. The sharp line of her jaw. The tattoo curling over her collarbone. No rain, no flowers.

And the way she doesn’t smile when she doesn’t mean it. That part floors him.

He thinks about tossing out something flirty, one of his usual throwaway lines. But it feels wrong here, flimsy—like trying to play a song with all the strings snapped. She’s not playing the same game. And it bothers him.

Later that night, the crowd’s thinned to the half-dead drunks and the regulars too drunk to find the door. The stage is dark, gear packed, Benny’s laugh echoing somewhere near the exit. But Frankie’s still at the bar—leaning, lingering. He’s not sure why. He tells himself he could leave, find some girl if he wanted to. He’s done it before. But tonight, he doesn’t. Tonight, he stays. Eyes drawn to the fiery redhead behind the bar who hasn’t smiled at him once.

“You still here?” she asks without looking up, wiping down the counter like she doesn’t care if he answers.

He shrugs, trying to look cooler than he feels. “Band’s packing up. Thought I’d keep you company.”

She flicks a glance his way. “You look like you’re two seconds from kissing the floor.”

He grins, all teeth. “Wouldn’t be the worst way to go.”

She huffs out something like a laugh, but it’s dry. Noncommittal. Still, he takes it like a win.

“You get high like this every show?” she asks after a beat, genuinely curious now.

He leans in, cocky. “Only the good ones.”

“Then that explains it.”

That makes him laugh—rough, real. He rests an elbow on the counter like he plans to stay a while, like maybe he belongs here now.

“What’s your name?” he asks.

“Firefly.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Bullshit.”

She shrugs. “That’s what people call me.”

“You got a real name?”

“Yeah, but you haven’t earned it.”

That hits somewhere deep. He covers it with a smirk, but inside, it throws him off balance. People usually hand him what he wants. She just tossed him back on his ass without even trying. 

He doesn’t know it yet—not through the static in his head or the ego propping him up—but something shifted. And in the weeks that follow, he keeps showing up. Even when they’re not playing. Even when he says it’s for the drinks.

It’s not.

—

It starts on a quiet night. The kind where the jukebox hums low and the only customers left are nursing heartbreaks or hangovers. Frankie’s at the bar again—this time not high, not vibrating out of his own skin. Just tired. Guitar case propped beside him like a loyal dog. She slides him a soda without a word.

He nods. “Thanks.” No smirk, no wink. Just that low, scratchy voice that’s somehow softer without the coke in his system.

She leans in, arms crossed. “So what’s your story, Guitar Boy? You always this broody when you’re sober?”

His smile twitches at the corner, crooked and real. “Only when no one claps for me after a show.”

She rolls her eyes, but something in the stillness makes her pause. He’s not performing tonight. Not selling the charm, not trying to win anything. Just sitting there, present. So she cracks, just a little.

“I used to study literature,” she says, fingers absently tracing the condensation on his glass. “Had this whole big idea of being a teacher. A writer. Romantic kind of broke, you know?”

He doesn’t interrupt. Just watches her, like he knows better than to speak yet.

“Then my mom got sick. Bills piled up. Took a break from school to help out. Never made it back. Ended up here, in a city I never meant to stay in, behind a bar I didn’t plan on working at.”

She shrugs like it doesn’t sting anymore. Maybe it doesn’t.

“But... I don’t know,” she adds, quieter. “I’ve grown to weirdly love it. The noise. The chaos. Donna. Even the semi-decent bands that roll through.”

He lifts a brow. “Semi-decent, huh?”

“Don’t flatter yourself.”

But the corner of her mouth curves, and this time the smile isn’t forced.

After that, he starts showing up more often. Not every night, but enough that she notices when he’s not there. Always sober now, or at least trying to be. He comes in quiet, nursing a soda or nursing nothing at all, just resting in the hum of The Shack like it’s the only place that doesn’t expect anything from him.

They talk. Not deep all at once, but in fragments. He’s a better listener than she expected. When his pupils aren’t blown wide and his hands aren’t jittering, Frankie has this way of being still—really still—like he’s storing everything she says to turn it into music later.

One night, she tells him about her favorite poetry book. Just mentions it in passing while wiping down the bar. Doesn’t expect him to care.

But a few nights later, he walks in, looking sheepish, a little unsure, and drops a worn copy of the exact book on the bar between them.

She blinks. “You can read?”

He chuckles, fake offended. “A few words, yeah.”

Then, almost shyly, he adds, “I read some of it. It's kinda like songwriting, just… quieter.”

It catches her off guard. The honesty. The humility. For a moment, her armor slips—and she lets herself smile. Not the sharp one she wears with drunk guys and rockstars. A real one.

He doesn’t try to kiss her, doesn’t push. Just sits there with his soda and the book between them, like maybe that’s enough.

—

The weeks blur.

Frankie doesn’t know when the shift happened. Maybe it was the way she said you haven’t earned it with a half-smirk and fire in her eyes. Maybe it was the book—how she lit up talking about it, how her voice softened like she forgot to keep her guard up.

So he buys it. Reads it. Not all of it, not at first. Just enough to underline the lines that feel like her. He keeps a notebook in his bag now, scrawled with half-finished lyrics and fragmented thoughts that make no sense unless you’ve been inside his head for weeks.

“you speak like everything’s temporary / but your silence stays with me.”

“she keeps her name locked in her teeth / dares you to ask for the key.”

She haunts him. Not like a ghost—no, Frankie knows ghosts. She’s worse. She’s alive. She’s red hair under cheap bar lights. She’s rolled eyes and soda cans slid across the counter. She’s the only thing that makes him feel sober when he’s high.

But she never lets him all the way in. Even when she laughs at something he says. Even when she leans closer without realizing. Even when she tells him about the professor who once said her words made people feel too much. She always pulls back, just before it gets real.

It drives him mad. Not angry-mad. Addict-mad. Desperate for a hit, and she’s the cleanest thing he’s ever wanted.

So when show night comes, and the green room smells like sweat and spilled beer and Benny passes him a bump, Frankie doesn’t hesitate. The coke floods him like always—confidence, chaos, clarity, then none at all. He’s wired by the time they hit the stage. Sound blaring, blood boiling, eyes darting for her even while he’s mid-solo.

He spots her eventually. Behind the bar. Laughing, not at him.

Some guy’s leaning over the counter, too close. Talking with his hands. She looks uncomfortable—but polite. Frankie sees red. Doesn’t care that the guy’s just a customer. Doesn’t care that they’re mid-set. He drops the guitar mid-song.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” he snarls, stumbling off the stage.

It happens too fast.

The guy mouths off. Frankie swings. Benny jumps in. Chairs scrape. Bottles crash. Someone throws a punch that wasn’t even meant for them. Suddenly the whole bar erupts. Santi grabs Frankie from behind, pinning his arms before he can lunge again.

“Enough, man. ENOUGH!”

Frankie’s breathing like a wild animal. Coked out and furious. Mind buzzing with static and the taste of blood.

And then—

He sees her.

Across the chaos. Still behind the bar, where she ducked for cover. Her eyes on him, not scared. Worse–disappointed. Like she’s watching something she’d hoped wasn’t true unravel right in front of her.

Donna’s voice cuts through it all. Sharp and final.

“Get out. All of you. You’re done here.”

Frankie doesn’t hear what else she says. Santi’s dragging him toward the door. Benny’s bleeding from the lip. The crowd’s yelling. Cops are probably on the way.

But all he can think about is her gaze.

It follows him out the door. Lingers in his chest even when the cold hits. And for the first time in a long time, Frankie feels something worse than the high wearing off.

He feels shame.

— 

The bar smells like stale beer and regret.

Firefly unlocks the door with a click that echoes louder than it should. Her head throbs from too much adrenaline and not enough sleep. She barely drank last night, but she feels hungover anyway. Emotionally wrung out. The kind of tired that seeps into bone.

She steps inside slowly, like the chaos might still be waiting for her.

The place is trashed. Not totally wrecked, but enough—a few chairs overturned, a crack in one of the front mirrors, and a smear of something dried and dark on the floor near where Benny got hit. Donna stayed late cleaning up most of it, cursing under her breath the whole time. Firefly stayed too, silent, scrubbing until her hands ached, not saying much. Not about him.

The cold air clings to her skin as she props the door open to let in some fresh light, grabs the broom, and starts sweeping. She’s barely a few swipes in when she hears it.

Boots on pavement and she freezes.

Frankie stands there, half-shadow, hands shoved in his pockets like he’s trying to hold himself together with nothing but denim and shame. He looks like hell. Hoodie, sunglasses, hair a mess. The whole hungover rockstar programm. She knows he’s sober—can feel it, somehow. But that doesn’t make it better.

Her heart sinks so fast she almost misses it.

But she straightens, shoulders squared and voice flat, despite her inner turmoil.

“You’re lucky Donna’s not here.”

He flinches like she slapped him. Takes one hesitant step closer but doesn’t cross the threshold.

“I just…” His voice cracks, then clears his throat. “I just wanted to say I’m sorry.”

She stares at him.

Not because she doesn’t believe it but because part of her wants to and that’s the worst part.

“You should go, Frankie.”

“Please,” he says, like he’s begging now. “Just—just let me explain. Let me—”

“No.”

It’s final. Her voice doesn’t shake, even if her hands grabbing the broom do.

“You think I haven’t seen guys like you lose it before?” she says, eyes icey. “You think I haven’t had to clean up after someone who let the high talk louder than their heart?”

He swallows hard, but doesn’t argue. Just stands there, all wrecked and quiet, which is even more deafening somehow.

She doesn’t wait for him to answer. Doesn’t give herself the space to waver—because if she stays in that doorway, looking at him all shattered and sorry, she just might. But this was never her battle to win. Never hers to fix. And it never will be.

Firefly steps past him, into the darkened bar, and flicks on the lights.

Fluorescents hum above her as the door creaks shut behind her, echoing in her ears.

He doesn’t follow. Thank God, he doesn’t follow.

And the second she’s alone, it all crashes. The broom clatters to the floor and her hands tremble even harder. She presses her back against the wall and slides down to the tiles. The first sob rips out before she can stop it, raw and ugly and real.

She wanted to believe he was different. That the quiet nights and stolen conversations meant something.

That maybe she didn’t have to keep everyone at arm’s length forever.

But last night reminded her why the walls exist and why she can’t afford to let them fall.

thanks for reading 💌

drabbles masterlist

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tags: @speaktothehandpeasants @kungfucapslock @felix-enthusiast @kakiki3 @la-vie-est-une-fleur29 @capuccinodoll @almostfoxglove @jolapeno @whirlwindrider29 @sheepdogchick3 @mysterious-moonstruck-musings @brittmb115 @greenwitchfromthewoods @diabaroxa @glycerinrivers @biapascal @copperhalfcent @beaniebailey @thepilatesprincess @axshadows @kirsteng42 @joelsgoodgirl @ellenmunn @matchalov3 @canadianfangirl-95 @picketniffler @hotforpedro @tuquoquebrute @noovaarq @warmdragonfly @theanothersherlockian @littleluc @76bookworm76 @inept-the-magnificent @confusedpuffin @wheatmaze @rav3n-pascal22 @picketniffler @lostinmyownmaze

[mrshesh]

Omg hi!! So happy to see someone writing for mk. Is it alright to request (gender neutral) reader doing flirty intros with fujin and kung lao? Or maybe noob!

intros with fujin, kung lao & noob saibot - flirty edition!

overview: intros the reader could have with fujin, kung lao & noob saibot - flirty edition!

pairing: fujin, kung lao & noob saibot x gender neutral reader, romantic

genre: fluff, spice, slight angst

a/n: hey anon! of course! i had a blast writing this! thanks for the request. i hope you love it! (someone needs to catch the oppenheimer reference i snuck in here.)

x fujin

(Y/N): How’s the braid?

Fujin: You did a great job on it.

(Y/N): Can I become your braider from now on?

(Y/N): What’s it like being a demigod?

Fujin: Sometimes, I wish I could lead a simple life… with you. 

(Y/N): Your purpose is greater than that, Fujin. 

Fujin: I never thought I’d feel this way for anybody.

(Y/N): It hurts, doesn’t it?

Fujin: Like the wind, I must keep flying away, but I will always pass by you. 

(Y/N): You almost seem like a mortal to me. 

Fujin: How so?

(Y/N): Cause you’re bearable, unlike Raiden. 

Fujin: Your eyes are captivating, Y/N.

(Y/N): Have you seen yours?

Fujin: I guess they are pretty bright, aren’t they?

(Y/N): What’s it like to fly?

Fujin: A breath of fresh air. 

(Y/N): If I win this, you’re taking me flying. 

(Y/N): I can’t imagine the weight of the responsibilities you carry. 

Fujin: I certainly have a lot of people to protect. 

(Y/N): You protect them, and I’ll protect you.

Fujin: You’re strong and capable. 

(Y/N): Much like yourself. 

Fujin: Yet I’m not powerful enough to quit yearning for you. 

(Y/N): Could you blow a gust of wind my way? I’m sweating. 

Fujin: What’s got you so clammy?

(Y/N): Being around you. 

(Y/N): I wanna be as cool as you someday.

Fujin: You have a lot to learn, Y/N.

(Y/N): I bet you could teach me.

Fujin: You mean a lot to me. 

(Y/N): Not enough, by the looks of it. 

Fujin: You could learn something by doing this.

x kung lao

(Y/N): You’ve got an impressive physique. 

Kung Lao: Tell me something I don’t know.

(Y/N): Not even a ‘thank you’?

Kung Lao: Does this count as our first date?

(Y/N): Do you see me kicking your ass as a date?

Kung Lao: Bold of you to think you’re gonna win.

(This is based on an intro in the MK11 game!)

Kung Lao: Double date with Liu Kang and Kitana?

(Y/N): I’d rather just go with you. 

Kung Lao: You know I could never deny you that. 

(Y/N): Don’t get ahead of yourself, Kung Lao.

Kung Lao: I’m beating that prank, just wait!

(Y/N): Just admit that I’m the better prankster. 

(Y/N): C’mon, quit frowning so much!

Kung Lao: You like my smile that much?

(Y/N): And your dimples. 

Kung Lao: You need to know your worth.

(Y/N): That means a lot coming from Mr. Cocky himself. 

Kung Lao: My cockiness is justified. 

(Y/N): Don’t go easy on me!

Kung Lao: I won’t - I see what you’re made of.

(Y/N): So you’re admitting I’m winning?

Kung Lao: C’mon, sweetheart, you know you want me.

(Y/N): This is the fifth time you’ve asked this week. 

Kung Lao: Not one date?

Kung Lao: Well, you look stunning.

(Y/N): You don’t look so bad, yourself. 

Kung Lao: We are one good-looking duo. 

x noob saibot

(Y/N): I don’t think you’re all that evil. 

Noob Saibot: Think again, Y/N.

(Y/N): I see you, Bi-Han. 

Noob Saibot: Join me in the Netherrealm. 

(Y/N): You’re too weak to kill me.

Noob Saibot: You will be beside me eventually.

Noob Saibot: Death has no allies.

(Y/N): You don’t scare me.

Noob Saibot: You know I do, Y/N.

(Y/N): It’s painful to see you like this. 

Noob Saibot: Now that I’m more powerful than ever?

(Y/N): Now that you’re heartless.

(Y/N): You’ve become a vessel of yourself. 

Noob Saibot: I have become death himself. 

(Y/N): Bi-Han isn’t “death himself.”

Noob Saibot: I felt something for you.

(Y/N): Felt?

Noob Saibot: Death doesn’t feel. 

Noob Saibot: Your soul is the one I want the most. 

(Y/N): As long as you’re like this - you’re not getting it.

Noob Saibot: Dare deny your precious Bi-Han?

Noob Saibot: I used to feel.

(Y/N): I’m sorry I couldn’t protect you.

Noob Saibot: You’re the only one I felt something for.

(Y/N): What is it you want, Bi-Han?

Noob Saibot: I want your soul.

(Y/N): Even when you’re dead, you want me.

[opinions-about-tiaras]

Thoughts on Dropouts two big game shows and their host:

I get that both Game Changer and Make Some Noise aren't anywhere near as free-form improvisational as they appear. Sam Reich is playing a character in almost the same way Stephen Colbert used to. They edit the episodes, they cut things and move things around, and so on. It isn't straight-up reality show fake, most of the materiel actually is improvised on the spot. The bits aren't rehearsed.

But like... I would bet a lot of money that Sam did not actually trap three people in an escape room; the cameras almost certainly stopped after the intro was shot and they were all asked to give consent to the scenario, for example. You know? For insurance reasons if nothing else.

Having said all that, I've been rolling something around in my head for a couple-three years now... either as part of his genuine managerial and aesthetic preferences, or as part of the bit they're doing, Sam Reich REALLY seems to absolutely hate it, like REALLY hate it, when people get creative with his tasks and prompts, when they deviate from what he is expecting of them.

Which is really weird for what's supposed to be balls-to-the-wall improv comedy.

If he gives people a deliberately free-form task or prompt, he's fine with weird, out-there responses to that. "Sam Says: Go!" and Ally Beardsley is "You tell me to go? Cool, I'm flying to New York City like right now, tonight." But if any of the contestants try and get creative outside the bounds he sets, he shuts that right down.

A number of Make Some Noise contestants have, for example, tried to get clever by violating the spirit of the prompts they're given in order to either adhere to the letter of the prompts in a clever way, or re-interpret them to flip the bit on its head.

Brennan Lee Mulligan is asked to re-create sound effects for a movie clip using old-fashioned foley gear, and instead improvises a disaster sequence that actually does match what's going on on the screen. Vic Michaelis is asked to re-create the sound a musical instrument makes as closely as possible, and instead of trying to do it with their voice, they badger the musician brought in to demonstrate to play it again. That sort of thing.

Those people never, ever win the point when doing this.

Same deal on Game Changer. "Bring me a duck!" Instead of building a pile of boxes to retrieve the pile of rubber ducks that are way up high, the contestants draw a bunch of ducks for Sam and present them to him. They've fulfilled the task as requested! ... and he rips up the ducks and goes "no points for anyone."

Ally Beardsley responds to the prompt "Who can make the loudest noise on a gong?" by answering the question correctly: Brennan Lee Mulligan can. Nope! Shut down hard.

It was the Season 7 premiere of Game Changer that really crystallized this for me, honestly. Vic Michaelis completes the task "Take this standee of Sam Reich to the most remote location you can" by assembling over four hundred TV remote controls and surrounding the standee with them. This is clever, funny, fulfilled the task as presented, and they put in genuine effort to do it, all things you want from a Game Changer task... and Vic loses a point for doing it.

They colored outside the lines and must be penalized for it.

In fact, Reich referred to Vic's responses in a Polygon interview as "irrelevant to what I asked for," which is absolutely not the case for many of them. Sure, burglarizing his home is absolutely not finding the coolest free item on Craigslist. Everything else, though? Nah. Maybe Vic doesn't win the point, but they shouldn't be losing them either.

It's not a big deal, but it's so weird. Like, is he doing this out of a sense of fairness, "I can't give you a point for going way off the reservation when everyone else obeyed not just the letter but the spirit of what was asked." Is it "if I let these guys go any more crazy than they already go this is gonna cross the line from 'hilarious farce' to 'just plain farcical.'"

Or maybe I'm overthinking it, seeing something that isn't there. That's a possibility to.

[darkmagenugget]

Hiya! I'm Dusk! One of the main fronters of the DarkMage Nugget System, runner of of this account, and one of the main artists! Kitsune Shapeshifter as well. I have many forms. (She/They/It) Welcome to the DarkMage Nugget Tumblr!

Creator of Hyper City (With extra lore from friends and Aqua) where a lot of my friends stories are taking place. You can find my commission info here and are open! I do character art, emotes, and more!

Now also on VGen!

Illustrations, emotes, and character reference sheets are the current available options and more to come soon!

System Intros after the break!

Allow me to introduce the rest of the system.

Iris- (She/Her)

Iris is the host of the system. She has her own blog here ( @iristhedarkwitch - 18+ only). She is the witch of our system, and also one of the co-hosts. Specializing in transformation spells fictionally, and energy manipulation in practice. One of Dusk's girlfriends as well. And Aqua's girlfriend too. And Light's.

Aqua - (She/They)

Aqua is the writer of our system. Also has a blog of their own over here ( @nuggetofthesea ). She is an elf with (currently) 3 forms. A base, a sea, and a shadow form. She is the one responsible for most of the lore in Hyper City, and is usually the calmest of us and just loves hanging out by vibing in the room. Also Dusk's girlfriend. Also dating Iris. And Light.

Chaos- (She/Her)

Chaos is a gremlin. Is always interested in things that are high-energy and fast paced. She plays games on stream on fridays at 4:00 PM Pacific. She is also the most direct of us (Though speaks a little rough) and able to put things bluntly and deal with scenarios we wouldn't be able to otherwise. She can by hyper, but cares greatly for everyone in the system. Usually spending time with Aria. Has her own blog now @nuggetsoftotalchaos

Mira - (She/They)

Mira is the organizer of the headspace. A crystal fairy who is able to duplicate herself up to up to 30 of her at once, she manages the entire headspace and the thoughts and memories of system members. Keeping the memory archive as a collective reference for us to go back to. They do tend to be able to handle multitasking better than the rest of us, but tends to stay out of the front unless she is needed (or wants to troll us, because when she enters the front we all see what she sees. All 30 of what she sees at once). She keeps everything organized.

Aria - (She/Her)

Aria is a puppy. She's just a big strong puppy. She is the sweetest person in existence. She can't really communicate well verbally or over text. But can communicate through images, emotes, barking, and through me or Chaos. Would protect anyone physically if needed, but we try to not have that be needed. She is too sweet! If she shows up, give her headpats. She absolutely loves them. ^-^

Nova - (They/It/Fae)

A trickster fae that has found its way into our system. Rarely calls Dusk by name, and speaking with a scottish Accent, they are playful and tricky. But likes to fly free. Bound to it's "Little Fox" (me) in terms of willing to listen her, but will chime in at any time it wants. So if I ever speak with a scottish accent, that's Nova.

Nero - (Any Pronouns)

Nero is a chao. He is basically a Construct made by Nova in our headspace, and exists in here basically as an emotional support pet. But he is here. Initially a chao I just kept drawing with me in drawings for years, when I drew Nova with them it liked her so much that it decided it wanted him in the headspace. They like desserts and are often seen with different animal parts.

Star - (She/They)

Star kind of just showed up in our headspace randomly one day. She is a very sweet and polite bunny cat, and new to existing. Not quite sure what she likes or doesn't yet, but is always willing to try things to figure it out.

Light - (She/They)

One of the artists of the System. Light is a very Lighthearted person as the name suggests. She is a Lesbian through and through, and just has everyone's best interest at heart. Girlfriend of Dusk, Iris, and Aqua. She doesn't like too many violent media. But isn't very afraid of much. She's a shapeshifter that usually just shapeshifts for fun rather than feeling. She has her own blog @nuggetoflight

Dark - (She/They/It)

Another of the artists of the system. Dark is calm and focused. She is usually just one to want a chill day. Just relaxing with friends. Sometimes enjoying casual cuddles with Dusk. Genderfluid Shapeshifter. She is also the newest system co-host. Has it's own blog @darknightnugget

And just some more examples of my character design work. These aren't part of the system (As far as I know) but are still characters I use often.

[thewertsearch]

Ask Comp 9/1

Anonymous asked: has sally been introduced to cursed tavros yet?

[ cursed tavros jumpscare :D ]

Cursed indeed - but mind you, I don't think I could do much better. My handcraft skills are nonexistent!

Anonymous asked: ol tavvy is down with the clown ;o) Anonymous asked: Please, if you will, imagine if when Vriska kissed Tavros, he told her that he was already dating Gamzee.

Heh. I really do think Gamzee x Tavros could have worked out, at least until Gamzee lost his shit. Hell, even if Gamzee did lose his shit, he'd probably still be less of a threat to Tavros than Vriska was.

Anonymous asked: Did you notice Gamzee referenced Earth in his rap? ("6 trillion hemos all up on one rock bleeding as equals") How do you think he learned about it? Some weird pre-game precognition or just his stoned mind being accidentally right?

This isn't necessarily a reference to Earth - but it wouldn't surprise me if it was, because Gamzee's cult seems fully aware of the existence of Earth.

The 'paradise planet' referenced in Gamzee's intro is stated to not exist yet, which is exactly how the narration refereed to Earth in Hivebent's intro. I believe that the 'rowdy minstrels' he's talking about are literally ICP, although he clearly isn't aware of that fact.

@wizardlyghost asked:

A sentiment shared by Eggman, every Space Player, and the villain of Muppets Most Wanted.

Anonymous asked: Now that you've passed where fedorafreak's gray, serviceable hand-held computing device's battery has died, you might appreciate the following short piece of fan art: www tumblr com/vastderp-placeholder/7741061457/savior-of-the-texting-world-rise-up

The fucking implication that the phone is the Player in this scenario is obliterating me.

Also, its God Tier form has wings. Was it a troll all along, or are wings a symbol of divine apotheosis in phone culture, too?

@clueless-rarito asked: Heeey paranatural reference! Hell yeah!

Is anyone else totally stoked to see Eightfold again? I know I am!

Anonymous asked: bilious sick 😭

English's trick made our Bilious sick. :(

Anonymous asked: One of, if not my absolute favorite, quotes/moments in Homestuck is Karkat’s speech to Jade about his failed frog breeding here. Just such a wonderfully tragic moment that stuck with me since the first time I read it.

In a comic chock-full of great lines, that last one might just be the best so far. This was one of the last scenes before Act 5's true finale, and it was an excellent pick.

@drakethedeep asked: One theory I've heard about the Denizen's Choice that tend to headcanon, Is that the choice is to be happy/free or to matter. That much as how God-tiers only grants survival by never having an impact, the denizens have thier playes coose between seeking their happiness and survival, or to struggle to achieve things that while objevtivly monumental, might not be worth the sacrifices needed to achieve it. I like this theory because of how it themes to fit the themes of Sburb.

I really like the space you're playing in, but I'm not so sure if all the Choices we've seen would necessarily fit this interpretation. After all, Davesprite implicitly chose the 'survival' option when he first met Hephaestus, and he's not exactly a happy camper. He didn't end up particularly free, either, since he was almost immediately bound to a Sprite, and later to the Battlefield.

I guess you could say he 'mattered', because he is he reason the Alpha Timeline exists the way it does - but, technically, everyone's actions contribute to the Alpha Timeline being the way it is. I definitely think there's something to this theory.

Anonymous asked: Without the Door to actually enter the universe, all you've done is make a really big frog.

I guess, when you think about it, there's not really anything they can do with their universe without that door. I suppose they could just fly towards their frog and hope for the best, but somehow, I don't think that'll achieve much.

@morganwick asked: Of course, even though he wasn't fooled by Gamzee using Terezi's "voice", Karkat still showed up on the roof anyway. Perhaps he decided he couldn't take the risk that Terezi was actually there and Gamzee might catch her unawares.

Gamzee's been having a lot of fun 'impersonating' Terezi lately. Just like before, I don't think he ever intended to fool Karkat with his transparent ruse - he just wanted to unsettle the guy. It worked.

@morganwick asked: If Typheus is the mailman, does that make him PM's favorite Denizen?

Maybe it makes him the head of her mail service!

We never saw any other mail Carapacians, and I kind of love the idea that they were operating out of a Denizen's Palace the whole time.

@bladekindeyewear asked: You said: "Mind you, I don’t know if it’s necessarily always a good or heroic thing to allow a Sburb Player full agency over their actions, nor is it necessarily a bad thing to restrict them, in certain cases." Oh I'm completely with you there. In fact, you might DEFINE Heroism as denying agency to those who would do ill, in part. This would make both "Heroic" and "Just" deaths result from trying to stamp your own intentions upon reality, halted by others. Neutrality would be ineffectual.

That's certainly part of heroism - but to me, it's not even close to all of it. A firefighter, for example, is heroic in ways which don't involve another person, as their only real 'opponent' is nature itself.

I personally define heroism as the will to do good, in situations where doing good requires bravery. 'Good', of course, is a fairly slippery concept, though, so that definition is just as ambiguous as any other.

Anonymous asked: Doctor Who anon here. Doctor Who has no canon for purely practical reasons. It's so massive - there's the show, but there's also the Big Finish audio dramas, the DW magazine comics, the Radio Times comics, the IDW comics, the Titan comics, the Virgin novels and short stories, the BBC novels and short stories. And no one owns all of it. The BBC don't even own the daleks or K9. And each piece of media will freely contradict others. No one has the right to decide what's canon, so they just don't. It's also because the people running Doctor Who the show have a deep respect for the extended media. In the 90s, it was the non-BBC licensed, fan-led projects which kept DW alive. Russell T. Davies, first showrunner of the modern era, wrote Virgin novels, so did Mark Gatiss. Nick Briggs, modern voice of the daleks, is the head of Big Finish. So they didn't want to decanonise that stuff, but they also don't want to be beholden to it when writing their own stories. So the fanbase tends to operate on tiers of canon. Basically something can be assumed to still be part of the show's continiuity until the show contradicts it. Big Finish would generally be considered the next highest "tier" of canon. The Doctor Who magazine comics probably wouldn't contradict the show, but the show could contradict them any time. The old books and comics are dubious. But that's all just fan categorisation. Officially, nothing has been deemed canon or not. In fact, rather amusingly, the only thing that has been explicitly deemed "canon" by the BBC is the Doctor Who: Battles in Time card game. That's officially canon. Nothing else. Not even the show.

I think I've heard of 'canon tiers' before, in the context of the Star Wars fandom. I think it's a good way to delineate how 'true' a given event is considered to be, especially in a large, complex shared universe - but at the same time, being consciously aware of these tiers might hurt your investment a little.

You'll never be able to escape the fact that your favourite stories or characters are effectively fanfiction, at least from the perspective of higher tiers. They have no influence whatsoever over the more ''real'' part of the story, unless they're promoted its tier some day.

I do like the idea that all the other Doctor Who stories are fanfiction of the card game, though. That's definitely going to be my canon, from now on.

@morganwick asked: Well, back in Act 4 you said that John and Dave would make S-Tier if and when "John [threw] aside his passivity to do something heroic, and…Dave [would] finally drop that poker face and do something sincere", which is why I pegged the suicide mission conversation as when Dave might make the jump.

I think, on reflection, it's almost always a heartwarming event that catapults a character into S-Tier.

In my opinion, that's one of the most impressive feelings that a work of fiction can inspire in you, mostly because it's really hard to get you invested enough for it to hit properly. Homestuck's pulled it off an extremely impressive number of times already, and we're only halfway finished!

Anonymous asked: It is so fucking awesome to see a new reader in the year of our lord 2024 2025 who's actually like. Engaging with the themes of the story. Lotta people just see it for the memes or the "totally random" plot but some of the shit you're reading into what's happening is like. Eerily similar to actual Hussie commentary. Gold star for reading comprehension, you do not piss on the poor Anonymous asked: Your homestuck liveblogs are lovely and insightful and make me remember a lot of details of the comic that have been lost to time. You will comment on something and I'll go "oh huh homestuck was better than I remember it being." Thank you <3 @honestlyvan asked: Truly your liveblog is the best kind of re-experiencing the experience. I'm surprised at how much your thoughts and reads parallel mine, it's kind of fun to see someone else's deductions go along the same routes. I can't wait for you to get to the Truly Horseshit portions of the plot (and I say this lovingly, I think you're in a great position to give us a real raw read on them without having to deal with the various Mega and Gigapauses) Also -- you keep pointing out a shitton of foreshadowing I didn't catch until my second readthrough. I can't wait for you to get to the bits where it applies and be like "son of a bitch", I think where I'm in the reading of your backlog and where you're in the reading of the comic you've passed at least one of those bits already :D @worldweary-walker asked: The liveblog is so cool. It's a lot of fun seeing you put things together, and the posts where you come up with three completely right conclusions and two wrong ones always amaze me. Impressive work!

Thank you so much! I know I say this a lot, but a lot of these sentiments are exactly why I like reading liveblogs myself. I'm just really glad I can do that for others.

I can totally understand why someone would just read Homestuck for the memes. I wouldn't have been nearly as analytical if I'd read it as a schoolgirl, and a lot of the 2010s fandom were even younger than that!

@divineerdrick asked: Now we have multiple explanations for what is wrong with the kid's session. Vriska has made herself responsible for Jack's rise to power, Karkat believes he gave Bilious Slick cancer, and Gamzee created the harlequin doll that would torment John and prompt Jack's rage-fueled act of rebellion. You've already suspected that Doc Scratch probably has multiple plans in play at once, and we can see that here. It seems he insured, through multiple causes, the kid's universe has always been doomed. Gamzee, as usual, seems to be the wild card. But he's acting out during a crisis of faith, a faith tied to Alternia's twisted social structure, which Scratch seems to have had a hand in. So despite how random Gamzee's actions appear to be, it's possible Scratch managed to seed even this seemingly unpredictable action.

I think Scratch probably did 90% of the work in making Gamzee go ballistic, from multiple directions at once. Looking back, it's shocking just how much of the comic was Scratch's doing.

'Caused' is a loaded phrase in Paradox Space, but what's happening is definitely what he planned.

Anonymous asked: It kind of seems like Rage as an aspect is evil, no? Do you think an aspect can carry an inherent moral weight? If not, what are the neutral meanings of aspects that seem to, and if so, how do you feel about it?

Personally, I doubt that any of the Aspects have a moral alignment - not even the scary-sounding ones. After all, you can Rage against tyranny, or bring Doom to a corrupt institution. Yeah, Gamzee is using Rage for evil, but his perception-shielding could just as easily be used to hide an innocent bystander from an aggressive Underling.

I think that more or less any ability can be used for both good or evil. The only real exception would be a power that's deliberately designed to be irreparably, comically evil. 'The ability to torture everyone for all eternity' would be one of those powers, but Homestuck's Aspect abilities would not.

@worldweary-walker asked: have you read Kill Six Billion Demons?

I have not! It's on my long and constantly growing list, which means I'll get to it between now and, uh, 2096.

Anonymous asked: re: the ancestors' story. WHAT IF WE ALL JUST CRIED like. the sheer transition from inane antics to the. that @corporalotherbear asked: There's a very popular fanmade version of the sufferer's final sermon and following vast expletive, voiced by a man that would go on to be the english voice actor of Izuku Midoriya. I can't add links to asks but if it's spoiler-friendly then your vetter can probably send you "The sufferer's last sermon"

Oh, I kind of love this interpretation. It really sells just how unwinnable the Sufferer's rebellion truly was.

@wolygan asked: I forgot how she is so happy when she is running away. This Girl is still able to believe that good is coming. Except Lord English won't let that happen, no matter what. @wickedsick asked:

That was possibly the fastest you have ever been proven wrong about something

That poor girl. She suffered just as much as the Signless did, but she'll only be known to Alternia as a monster - and unlike Troll Jesus, no one will ever mourn the Handmaid.

Anonymous asked: the sufferer cult is definitely independent of the juggalos! the use of the word sectarian to describe the war waged against the signless's beliefs is not a coincidence, imo. (we also see that highblood is most often used to specifically describe purplebloods). they're just two different religious organizations. given that the grand highblood was a juggalo man/subjuggulator and occupied significant power it seems to suggest that clown religion was a Big Thing among the purplebloods, which would not truck with the signless' cult being so small and secretive. there's one theory that part of the reason the neophyte was sent on mindfang's case was bc the GHB (given that mindfang mentions the neophyte was sent by subjuggulators specifically) knew she was a secret sufferite and wanted to get rid of her. mindfang does talk about how it seemed like they were giving up on her case entirely by sending just one neophyte (granted this is partially bc she underestimated her). it would track that while they definitely wanted to get rid of mindfang, they also were fine with the neophyte dying. this also follows with the fact that after mindfang gets out of that trial, she manages to persist without being caught right up until her death at the hands of the summoner. were they happy that the neophyte got killed, enough to stop putting much effort into mindfang's capture?

I think the Highbloods probably did set Redglare up. I speculated that it was possible when we first heard about her death, and that was before we knew she was a Signless cultist.

Also: lmao, do you remember when Hussie told us that the Juggalo Cult was 'obscure'? That's starting to feel like something that was quietly retconned offscreen.

@clueless-rarito asked: In case you like to know, "Dolorosa" is meant to evoke the spanish word "Doloroso" meaning painful but changing the O for an A turn it feminine.

Dolorosa; in other words, the woman in pain.

Fucking hell, she deserved so much better. It's amazing how much bleaker the Ancestors' lives were, compared to their descendants. Modern Alternia is bad enough as it is!

@lon-kasi asked: Fanwork recommendation: The same guy who did the EoA5 reanimation just did Intermission 2 as well. Like, less than six hours before I sent this ask. It's incredible.

Yessss! These are amazing.

My favorite parts are all the extra touches that weren't in the original animation, such as Rose beginning to realizing how badly she was tricked - or Jade, unused to her own powers, almost knocking John on his ass while she teleports him.

Anonymous asked: Now that you've seen what a Reckoning on Skaia looks like, you can see why Karkat was rushing Kanaya to get their frog done. Despite jumping the gun, skipping the lore elements and just killing their way to the end, the troll kids never had enough time. Especially since, now that I'm thinking about it, if it wasn't the Reckoning then it probably would have been Jack as the "time's up, now turn in your work" event. @marinerofthestars asked: With the revelation that Alternia was built to and ended up speedrunning an Sgrub/Sburb session to catastrophic effect (great job reading this far, btw), how long would you expect a “standard” session to take?

We've got two different asks here - one saying that normal sessions are meant to be shorter than Hivebent's, and the other saying they're meant to be longer.

I honestly don't know which I believe. It feels unrealistic for a Sburb session to take months, but Scratch really did seem to be saying that the trolls were extremely effective Players, implying most sessions take longer to beat. Maybe the reboot session will clue us in a little?

Anonymous asked: “How do you expect to out run me, When I Am Already Here.” Is such a hard line, and it’s completely missable in the alt text for the site banner. I know a lot of people missed it when these panels dropped. I remember HS being considered super unique because of how much the comic messes with formatting things like that.

I was super close to missing some of that scene, even though I'd already been warned about the alt text. There was just so much going on at the time, I almost didn't think to look at the banners.

@royalvorpal asked: "I thought words would be exchanged" How do you expect them to talk when they are in person?

pffffffffffffffffffft

Alright, that one fucking got me.

@bladekindeyewear asked: "But no, apparently not, because it took Karkat zero words and sixty seconds to completely shut Gamzee down. Now, don’t get me wrong, that’s incredibly impressive - but what did he actually do?" If you look back IN RETROSPECT at some of what Gamzee has been telling Karkat, it almost looks like pale flirting, like he was actually WANTING him to do this behind his threats. p3361: "FTC: i wonder if you can all be at with me in time and make me get my reconsider on?" Anonymous asked: You may not like it, but this is what peak moirallegience looks like.

Yeah, this really does make that exchange read as a little flirtatious.

Still, is this really how a moirallegiance is meant to work? Are moirails really expected to risk their lives to halt their prospective partner's rampage? This is starting to sound more dangerous than a kismesissitude!

@bladekindeyewear asked: I'm not sure how well it applies to the revised Homestuck website and it's probably impossible in the collection, but you could view any past/future page in any CSS format the site gave you with a keyword, like the black-on-green Doc Scratch format. So when Andrew did the "SNOP" to SBAHJ-mode, he was intentionally giving us a tool to view the ENTIRE SITE in SBAHJ mode.

There's a 'theme override' button, but I need to finish Homestuck to unlock it. I guess the comic's theme will change in more spoilery ways, later on.

Anonymous asked: Dolorosa/Mindfang is the true kicker of the “vriska keeps ending up in mirror relationships to her ancestor” belief, bc its the one where there is NO way vriska could know that shes in a mirror relationship. Eridan- orphaner dualscar and mindfangs romance was in the journal. Tavros- she knew about the summoner. But while there are hints to the dolorosas identity- sharp teeth, lower blood color, and a very vague if you stretch it hint about horn shape- no way vriska could have put those pieces together!!!

Man, it's still so fucked up that the Dolorosa went out like that. I still think it's at least remotely possible that she revived as a vampire, but I'm not gonna kid myself - her story is over. We're not gonna see her.

Anonymous asked: You've mentioned "ratfic" and something called "the Methods" before, is that something you've read?

If I could write an essay about Steven Moffat, I could write an entire thesis about Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality - but it'd be radioactively critical, and it feels mean-spirited to just post a rant about something unprompted.

If people want my thoughts in detail, I might stick them on the sideblog later - but for now, I'll just tell you that if it wasn't for that fic, XAE A-12 Musk would never have been born. Not a joke.

Anonymous asked: i love the complete about face on gamzee lol. "clearly the fact that he's gone nuts is something wrong with the timeline" gamzee is revealed to be responsible for lil cal "actually fuck this guy"

If we do ever recover the original Gamzee, it's going to really suck for him to face his friends. After everything he's done, will anyone ever really trust him again?

@elkian asked: Love the Exiles. So glad nothing bad happens to them, ever, (I assume the pause before the third s175 post is bc you, like me, took a break to cry over AR hesitating to kill his friend :,(

I was so bummed, guys. Carapacians don't have ghosts, I assume - so the Exiles, sans PM and maybe WV, are gone forever.

The Red Miles will probably have obliterated their corpses, so we can't even prototype most of them - but I'm holding out hope for Waywardsprite.

Anonymous asked: heh, you aren't alone in preferring god tier dave without his hood. i was around for when cascade dropped and wasnt able to watch it straight away due to the various troubles, but one of the first things i heard about it was people talking about how stupid they thought dave's hood looked.

I know, right? Like, yeah, it definitely says 'knight', but Dave's got great hair, and it feels like a shame to cover it.

@bladekindeyewear asked: "PCG: SHE WAS CONSTANTLY FIXING MY FUCKUPS. PCG: ROBOTS FROM THE FUTURE ALWAYS COMING BACK TO TELL ME HOW SOME HASTY SHIT I DID WITH FROG BREEDING OR WHATEVER WOULD MAKE IT BE IMPOSSIBLE TO WIN. PCG: MY OWN PERSONAL MISTAKES PROBABLY ACCOUNTED FOR MORE DOOMED ARADIABOTS THAN ANYTHING ELSE." Now that the Tumor's revealed for the precision device it was, it's also clear that Aradia, likely following the Horrorterrors' instructions, FORCED them to breed the frog JUST RIGHT to create the Sun.

Yeah, the existence of that precision device really fucking threw me. Whatever it did, the frog cancer probably was deliberately engineered to cause it - and I think it was engineered by Scratch, rather than the Horrorterrors. He was also talking to Aradia during the session, and this event was key to his plan.

Anonymous asked: (And one more ask from the person without a tumblr. -DJ) The thing is, Scratch could have just said "you must create the Green Sun, it is essential for the existence of the multiverse, not doing so will create a paradox". But either he chose to trick them, by only but saying "true words", just for fun…or there is some reason telling them about their true mission wouldn't work - RM

Either is possible, and it's pretty much impossible to say. That said, the Vast Glub is proof that he does just like messing with people, so I'm going with the former answer.

Anonymous asked: (forwarding another ask from the person without a Tumblr account -DJ) Do you think there are interesting parallels between Scratch and Tarquin from OOTS? - RM

Well, they are both meta-aware villains with extremely wide-reaching plans, and they're both pretty weird about women. Hopefully this means that Scratch's much cooler son will kick his ass in a later Act.

@bladekindeyewear asked: One tiny cute detail in Cascade I love is how when the Green Sun lights up in the distance for the trolls, Terezi tries to point at it, and Karkat gently takes her arm and re-points it in the right direction. XD

Shoulda brought the Smelloscope, Terezi!

Anonymous asked: The first time i read homestuck my shit bugged out and I literally just missed the entire scrapbook section and cascade. The SECOND time I read homestuck cascade gave me such a neuron firing high that only harrow the ninth has ever gotten close to

That's exactly how to describe it. Cascade blasted my neurons, in exactly the same way that part of Harrow the Ninth did.

@rwbypro asked: Ngl one of my favorite parts about homestuck is the fact that Doc Scratch Won, like he got Exactly what he wanted, and he played everyone like fiddles, one of my all time favorite villains in anything!

He did, the bastard! Scratch managed to pull it off without a hitch.

These are the exact kind of convoluted masterstrokes you want to see in a time-travel story, and I think English's machinations will only grow more intricate, going forward.

@sanctferum asked: The juggalo cult believes in a pair of mirthful messiahs rather than just the one, so if English is one of the messiahs, that's only half the equation. Presumably, the other messiah would be Scratch.

That works! I originally thought that the Messiahs were the two members of ICP, but let's be honest, they still could be. I absolutely would not put it past this comic to reveal that Lord English was Shaggy 2 Dope the whole time.

@sanctferum asked: So now that you've seen Lord English's true appearance: he's got a peg leg, and that peg leg is a golden cuestick, filling in the last missing piece of the Felt analogy - the one that moves the billiards around in the first place. For good measure, English's peg leg, single golden tooth and his garish coat give him a stereotypical pimp appearance, which is fitting given his treatment of his female servants so far (not to mention Scratch's own treatment of both the Handmaid and whichever female player he is manipulating at any given moment. He even explicitly uses the word grooming to describe raising Handmaid!). If there was ever a pimp for Dave to lock in his own crib while dropping it like it was hot, this would be him.

Ayy, you're right! I've been waiting for the Felt's cuestick since the Intermission days!

You're also right about the comic's villains. Scratch and English aren't just screwing over female Players - they've also been fucking with Mindfang, the Handmaid, the Condesce, and even Snowman. It's absolutely a pattern.

These guys aren't just cosmic villains, they're misogynist cosmic villains. Mundane evil and supernatural evil, all together in one convenient package of shit.

Anonymous asked: Now that we've gotten past this point in the comic- I just wanted to say I forgot Expatri8 was ever a name used to refer to Darkleer- mainly because all I ever see people refering to him as is Darkleer. And at first it kinda threw me for a loop when you called him that even though it's the only name you knew for him- Anyhows- You probably noted this at some point but only upper middle class to high blood colors seem to have name names, with some exceptions. Like, they're weird, but Mindfang, Redglare, and Dualscar are all fesable names. Meanwhile the lower bloods just have titles.

It is absolutely in character of Alternia not to allow lowbloods to have names.

Anonymous asked: Just read your liveblog over the last two days. I adore your analysis! I second that one person’s reccomendation of In Stars And Time. Also I reccomend the Blue Lips homestuck video, it’s lived in my head for ages. I’m 99% sure it’s safe to watch now? It’s about the events of murderstuck and I don’t THINK it references anything you don’t know. Anyhoot! I know you mentioned vriska being like Azula when you first started getting to know her. Now that you’re as far as you are, I’d like to argue… Vriska is more like Zuko, in a way? Like. The way she wants to wipe things clean, the way he wants to restore his honor. The way they both have a “parent” that leads them to how things are, and for a while they cling to that as “right” and how things should be… One time I saw a post that Vriska is girl Zuko and Eridan is boy Azula and all the comments were arguing that no, vriska is Azula, but lowkey that post changed my brain chemistry and idk why people were SO vehemently against changing the genders of the characters in the comparison

I think Vriska works well as girl Zuko. You're right - they both started off under the thumb of an abusive parent, and they both try to 'fix' their past mistakes without understanding the wider context behind why they made them. Now, does this mean Vriska will also be getting a kickass redemption arc, which turns her into one of the comic's most straightforwardly heroic characters? Possibly, but I ain't holding my breath.

It's a little harder for me to see the second comparison, though. Like her brother, Azula was made into what she is by her horrible father, whereas Eridan became what he is on his own, with some assistance from Alternian culture.

Perhaps there are layers here that I'm just not seeing. I haven't read the Avatar sequel comics yet, so they might do more with Azula's character that I don't know about.

@mrjocrafter asked: I was trying to think about what the characters' moon alignment means in terms of their characterization, thought "Prospit dreamers are relatively passive while Derse dreamers are relatively active", then realized that's only true for the humans, the Post-Scratch Trolls' 6 Prospit dreamers (excluding Sollux, as his 'official' alignment, according to the Extended Zodiac, is Derse) are the more active characters. Then I realized that on Earth darkness and dark-associated characters are edgy and countercultural, while on Alternia light and light-associated characters are countercultural instead! Goddamn this comic just keeps coming back for more themes Also, I know you've compared Taylor to Vriska in the past, but she really strikes me as more of a Terezi. Beyond the surface level stuff (like going blind and then relying on a supernatural sense), Taylor, like Terezi has a strong moral compass but will twist it into pretzels to do the most horrific shit and there's a 50/50 chance she even regrets it afterwards. Meanwhile, Amy, who I think makes a much better Vriska, does her atrocities either under manipulation (like Vriska) or just does it without thinking about it and feels bad about it later (hey, also like Vriska). Also, Taylor Hebert and Amelia Dallon are coincidentally both valid troll names.

Yup! Which means Kanaya is a troll goth, which is still amazing.

And... hmm, I'm not sure whether I'd call Dave active or passive. He certainly acts more on his own initiative than John, but he also spends a lot of time getting bossed around by Terezi. He's kind of in the middle, really.

I do think Terezi's reframing of her violence as 'justice' is very Taylor-coded - and Amy is absolutely a Vriska, if we're working off the 'female, controversial, and morally ambiguous' definition given by a previous asker. Plus, well...

...yeah. And let's not even talk about Ward. (Because I haven't read it.)

Really, all these characters are multifaceted, and you can draw many different parallels in many different directions. If I had the time, I could probably draw lines from each of the trolls to a different cape in the Wormverse - but for now, we must continue!

@morganwick asked: Bec's influence on Jack is so strong that not only is he reduced to following Jade around like a puppy, he kills CD for completing the mission he gave him and leaves Jade, one of the players he's supposed to be killing, on her quest bed, the nature of which he didn't seem to know about when it came to John. Bec = absolute king.

Bec is a king.

It really does seem like his influence over Jack is increasing as time passes. Is Davesprite going to get more birdlike, as well? Or is Bec just a special case because he's a First Guardian?

Anonymous asked: oh my god you really just cleaned the board with the last minute Dave+Rose quest slab guess??? Like. You were going on about other things and then you just casually mention "oh I guess this could happen too" like okay!!! Seer!!!!

Yeah, I'm pretty proud of that one. I was just thinking about how Aradia might help the Derse kids, once she'd met them at the Sun, and then it hit me: she's been in exactly the same situation, in exactly the same place, because of exactly the same sun!

Anonymous asked: dogtier IS in fact what the entire fandom calls her, if you came up with that yourself congrats on the authentic 2011 homestuck experience, move over carcinisation this is the new big thing in convergent evolution

I did, but come on. That pun makes itself.

Anonymous asked: Fun fact: the music used in [S] Begin Intermission 2, "English", is the same when reversed. It is an EXTREMELY excellent detail. And another example of Toby Fox being a brilliant composer. @sanctferum asked: English by Toby Fox is a really cool song in that its a musical palindrome, playing the same both forwards and backwards, as befits the titular entity. The whole Felt album it's from is based around creating songs with time gimmicks in them, so it serves as a very good semifinal track to almost close the album out. @emotionallyglued asked: You finally got to the part where our big bad man appears! Simple question to ask but I'm looking forward towards the answer: what do you think of Lord English's theme? Grandiose enough to fit a villain of his caliber or did you expect something more/else?

Oh, shit, that's cool!

I liked the song a lot. Sure, it's not as bombastic as the boss theme I went with myself, but it is much, much scarier. It was the perfect way to remind us that this wasn't really a victory - that English's plan went off without a hitch. Our heroes are still in terrible, terrible danger.

@morganwick asked: post/756751870755733504 Still think of Doc Scratch as "Big Cal"? @sanctferum asked: You've heard of Lil' Cal and Big Cal, now get ready for the deadliest and dastardliest villain of all: Biggest Cal. Anonymous asked: you've seen lil cal, now get ready for BIG CAL @lon-kasi asked: finally, Big Ca- well. actually. Scratch was Big Cal, wasn't he? so finally, Bigger Cal

This is the real reason Scratch wouldn't tell Rose his boss's name - because if she'd known her manipulator worked for Bigger Cal, she'd have been too god damn scared to go grimdark.

Anonymous asked: T1ck T0ck goes the God Tier Clock. Its chime signals the Br8k of Scratch's H34D. And with the arrival of Lord English, he lets loose two great, Vast honk HONKS. Anonymous asked: Did you notice something about the English sequence? First, we see Scratch's clock. t1ck, t0ck. Then, his head breaks. 8r8k H34DS. He releases the Vast Honk. honk HONK.

This motherfucker died to the very words that birthed him.

I guarantee you that this was deliberate on Scratch's part. He didn't need to foreshadow his plan so blatantly - but this horrible little troll knew that nobody would get the joke until it was too late.

bladekindeyewear asked: "S u c k e r s ." The bioorganic-looking Tumor opening up to reveal a precision device. Twice the mass of a universe. Doc Scratch fucking played EVERYONE SO HARD. We couldn't believe THEY CREATED THE GREEN SUN, so hard many of us watched without REALIZING IT. If you reread the talk Doc and Rose had from p3627 onward, the amount of TRANSPARENT DODGES AND WEASELING he did in that conversation to mislead Rose and the entire readership is so blatant and shameless, oh my fucking god!!! Anonymous asked: Not only did Scratch never said the tumor would destroy the green sun, he also specifically said they would travel to the green sun LOCATION, not to the green sun itself.

God damn it!

Scratch may have been stoic on the outside, but you mark my words: he was absolutely roaring with laughter on the inside.

@sunbluethinking asked: Regarding 'a dozen or two sweeps,' you do have to remember that it seems like one sweep is roughly equivalent to two human years? (See Terezi's and Dave's 'I'm six' conversation, or whatever it was.) So my impression is that a dozen sweeps would be equivalent to 24 years and two dozen sweeps would be equivalent to 48 years. Still really short, but not quite as absurdly short. (Which actually reminds me of the question of the problem of rate of maturation in fictional races with different lifespans. (Dungeon Meshi touches on this, but) in the case of Homestuck, I think it seems like the trolls mature to adulthood at about the same rate. It's just their adult lifespans that are different.) @bellcarved asked: If my math is correct, "a dozen or two sweeps" is a range of 26 to 52 years. Still not great, but 26 would be the low end of the life expectancy, while they tend to live around half as long as a human.

So either Aradia was about to die, or she wasn't - but either way, she was always going to die young.

We still don't know whether God Tier stops you aging, do we? I have to assume so, because death by old age isn't really Heroic or Just, but I'd feel a lot better if it was 100% confirmed.

Anonymous asked: And here we learn the story of Jesus and the second coming- @bellcarved asked: Now you know the truth: Karkat Vantas is the second coming of Troll Jegus Christ. Anonymous asked: I doubt I'm the first to say this but, the story of the Signless is undeniably based off the story of Jesus Christ. @skelekingfeddy asked: you do realise that the sufferer is Troll Jegus right. the irons/cancer symbol is the crucifix. his method of execution turned into the main symbol of a religion. the dolorosa is mary. karkat is the second coming. hes literally just Troll Jegus lmao @sanctferum asked: turns out, Terezi was right all along. troll jegus was real after all, and he was indeed the best jegus. shame on you for not believing, Dave

God damn it, Karkat. You hate yourself so much, even though you're literally the second coming of Christ.

And really does add weight to Terezi's claim that Alternia had the 'best' Jesus. Sure, says she's joking here, but... well, her Ancestor was a follower of the Signless, wasn't she? Could Terezi have inherited more of Redglare's legacy than we thought?

Anonymous asked: now that you know about the signless i recommend you take another read of karkat's long password on page 3972

...huh.

It almost makes it seem like Karkat's vaguely cognizant of the Sufferer's life, the same way the Sufferer was cognizant of his pre-Scratch incarnation. Funny, that.

@morganwick asked: "For a bisexual alien, his shipping is awfully straight, isn't it?" Well, consider that when he drew that he was trying to adhere to the human model of reproduction with its explicit requirement of one person of each sex, as best he could from his alien perspective. Note that in the same conversation he's struggling to understand the "human taboo of incest". @manorinthewoods asked: Karkat's humanshipping is straight because John told him he wasn't gay, and presumably, he extrapolated. ~LOSS (28/12/24) Anonymous asked: Karkat's very straight shipping chart is the way it is because John's Not A Homosexual:tm:

I totally forgot I came to the same conclusion, back in that legendary group chat.

Man, Rose x Kanaya is really going to throw Karkat for a loop. He'll probably think that John was just bullshitting him.

@skelekingfeddy asked: steven moffat is a valid troll name Anonymous asked: You've brought it up too much not to ask, what did Moffat do that pissed you off so badly?

Once more, I am very tempted to make this a full essay, but I'll save time by just pointing to Hbomberguy's famous Sherlock video, which I agree with, like, 80% of - particularly the Doctor Who segment that I've timestamped.

In a nutshell, Moffat was always really good at generating intrigue, and building hype for future events - but as a showrunner, he never really delivered on his promises, and was very fond of handwaving established canon to the side. Pet peeve of mine, as you can imagine.

@rwbypro asked: We warned you bro, we warned you about the most important character @skelekingfeddy asked: carcinoGeneticist may have engineered the cancer…but terminallyCapricious was the one who made it terminal. ;o) @capribornio asked: Honk, honk :0) Heyyyy you reached the part where Gamzee became my favorite enemy. Forget Vriska, Jack and Doc Scratch - Gamzee may have his buttons pushed by the good ol' Doc, but he managed to make things worse than even Vriska got to (and killed more main characters, too!). Anonymous asked:Congratulations on reaching this point. So, Gamzee chucklefucked the universe. Crazy, right? @bellcarved asked: Gamzee's "Bard of Rage" title is looking more accurate than ever, now. His own rage lead him to put the clowns in John's dreams, which ended up inspiring the rage that made Jack Noir go to the lengths he did. Bardic inspiration, if you will. …also, this makes Perfect Jack a collaborative effort between Vriska and Gamzee. @capribornio asked: I feel like you get Gamzee much better than most livebloggers (and a part of the fandom, too). Gamzee is an orchestrator, on a much bigger level than any could have predicted. The silly little troll dissappeared once he got off the slime, got his religion destroyed, and got Lil Cal.

I told you, guys! I told you Bards were overpowered!

Yeah, he's already getting pretty crafty, isn't he? Maybe, instead of manipulating Gamzee like he did the girls, Scratch has actually been coaching him. After all, his own manipulating days are over, so maybe he saw fit to train a successor...

Anonymous asked: if vriska was presented with a choice about the creation of bec noir, it would have had to be before the veil because the trolls only flee into the veil AFTER bec shows up and wrecks their reward- and that's their first introduction to him. any choice she could have made about bec/jack after that would result in a doomed timeline, because it would break the loop. that's why it has to be before the veil. @manorinthewoods asked: What I mean is that the Choice that would have prevented Bec Noir is something that would have made Vriska change who she was, in such a way that she wouldn't later make Bec. Vriska's Choice that made Bec can't have occurred in the Veil, because there wasn't a Denizen to give it, so whatever it was, it must have been something to do with character growth that she failed to do. ~LOSS (28/12/24)

Oh, right, that makes sense!

Yeah, poor Vriska simply wasn't self-aware enough to make such a Choice before the Veil. It's interesting what-if, though.

@flambeaufelid asked: ICP albums liveblog maybe??? (Do people liveblog music reactions? They should.) Anonymous asked: Since you mentioned the possibility of having to listen to ICP albums to understand Gamzee better, I figured I’d better let you know that while reading a bit about juggalos, ICP, and ICP’s music does help with understanding Gamzee better if you’re unfamiliar with them (though I wouldn’t say it’s crucial), I don’t recommend listening to their music unless you’re comfortable with graphic depictions of gore, murder, and other forms of violence. (Speaking from personal experience here; I tried listening to them because Gamzee’s my favorite character and quickly realized I didn’t enjoy that.) Anonymous asked: I would say listening to icp is not necessary… I tried myself and failed not even half way through one album so I admittedly could be wrong but… I think it was never intended to be THAT serious

I checked out Miracles, back when ICP was first brought up, but I haven't seen any of their other music. It's probably not actually necessary to listen to the band to understand Gamzee, but I might still do it for fun, since the graphic content wouldn't bother me much.

@skelekingfeddy asked: according to hussie the fifth wall is what divides two narrators/authors @sanctferum asked: According to Hussie's comments, if the fourth wall is the wall between the character and the author/their audience, then the fifth wall is specifically the wall dividing omniscient narrators from each other. or something like that

I, uh, guess that makes sense. Presumably Scratch would be our second 'author' in this scenario, even though he's not literally another author of Homestuck.

[alpaca-clouds]

Some things about the BEYOND PV

So, let's quickly (well, you know how "quick" I am in these) talk about Digimon Adventure BEYOND, aka the PV that they dropped at the Digimon Con yesterday. Before I talk about anything else, let's quickly address again what this is and what it isn't.

This is not a trailer. This is a PV meant to release and stand on its own. According to @ayukaze's translations of the website, this is basically based on some stuff that once upon a time was planned to tie into the final episode of 02 but in the end did not make it into the actual show. Though, obviously there is some fanservice in regards to the stuff that released since then going on with possible cameos of both Meiko and Rui.

But general, yeah, it is not really surprising that some of what we see does not line up with events from tri., Kizuna and The Beginning, because if what the site says is true, and right now there is no reason to doubt it, this is based on stuff that was written or at least pitched long before tri., Kizuna and The Beginning were written or even thought of.

Now, again, this is not a trailer for either a Trailer or OVA. Though, let's be fully honest: If fandom eats this up, chances are that Toei & Bandai might milk the Digimon Adventure cow a bit more and make this into a movie or OVA or something else. I mean, let's face it. Even with this just being a darn PV, they probably are going to make some merchandise of the designs of the adult kids in this video. lol

This being based on ideas thrown around in 2000 also explains why there are some call backs to some stuff that has been brought up in 02 and never mentioned again.

Before I am starting with overanalyzing this thing, let me quickly once more invite everyone to the Digimon Rewatch Discord Server. A general SFW Digimon Discord Server - mainly for a community rewatch, but you can also just join to discuss the show and games.

But let's go through some of the stuff we can see here, and what we can tell from it.

We start with the intro calling back to the epilogue of 02 with Takeru's novels and him writing. I did a translation of this writing of his yesterday. No guarantees of the correctness, my Japanese sucks ass. But I let a friend check it, so I guess it is not totally wrong.

“It's okay, you don't need to worry about it from now on [...] The Digimon next to you is [...] [...] is the Digimon behind me. [...] They look completely different, and [...] [...] me and you have partner Digimon. [...] I heard that you can't go back to your family [...] [...] and that you've been going through a tough time. But it's okay now. [...] I'll take you to a place where you can live safely. [...] [...] They'll be here soon. [...] They're really reliable people. [...] They've saved the world from danger many times before [...] I'm not much older than you, but [...] do you know the country of Japan? I'm from there. [...]

This is where the video cuts over to Kuwagamon flying away while a car is on the road.

With the Kuwagamon we hear some thanks to "Yuri", which will obviously is a reference to the Russian Chosen Child Yuri, whose partner is Kuwagamon.

If you look at the license plate of the car this also confirms that we are in Russia right now and this is happening in Russia. (And yes, the license plate is an easter egg: DM 2581B - Digimon 2025-8-1 Beyond. No, do not expect them to release anything related to this on August 1st. It is just because we have the year 2025 and August 1st is Odaiba Memorial.)

Referencing the translation by @ayukaze again, there was apparently this idea that with more and more Chosen Children appearing, some militaries would try to forcefully recruit those kids and their Digimon. And it makes sense in this regard that the dialogue above is Iori talking to the kid he and possibly Yuri and maybe the other Russian chosen have just rescued.

It is kinda ironic, if this idea had been around forever, given how rosy the actual epilogue let the entire "everyone has a Digimon partner" thing seem. Because, yeah, I absolutely do agree with this idea. The militaries trying to recruit those kids who might or might not end up with a nuclear missile shooting dinosaur makes a hella lot of sense. lol

The kid in question has a Kyaromon as their partner. The kid seems to be probably between like 10 and 13 years old - it is kinda hard to say in this artstyle. Just as the gender is not quite clear, though given they do not have eyelashes, I guess they might be a boy.

Kyaromon obviously would not have featured in the anime in 2000 or 2001 (when that last episode aired) given it was only introduced in 2005.

While they are driving, Taichi and Yamato talk. Apparently Yamato got himself an international driver's license, and also calls out Taichi for still not being good with English. Mind you, this is something I will still give 02 credit for back in the day: While with some of the kids the language issue did not come up (especially in America, where they just handwaved the issue with "Oh, Mimi taught everyone Japanese") they generally addressed the issue of cooperating with folks who speak another language. That was neat.

Taichi also mentions that he has recently learning some French from Yamato's grandpa. Which is a nice callback. Though if I am understanding the way Yamato speaks in his reply correctly, it sounds as if said grandpa has very recently passed away.

They then get attacked by a Digimon - Yatagaramon to be exact. Yatagaramon like Kyaromon was introduced in the Digimon Accel in 2005, so yeah, it also would not have been around back then. But I guess in general those enemy Digimon are quite exchangable. I guess if something like this would have featured in 02, it would have been Airdramon, which was kinda 02's go-to Digimon for "random flying Digimon to fight" lol

Something I found cute though, as Taichi pulls out a smartphone for Iori to open a portal to the Digital World, the phone has the Pinable Logo on it.

For context: Back when Adventure was written, it was really super hard in Japan to bring in actual brands into anime and manga. That was also why you would regularly see "WcDonalds" in anime, as they could not just use "McDonalds". So Koshiro has technically a MAC, but they could not use the Apple brand. So they turned it into a pineapple. Which is adorable and a nice callpack with the iPhone here.

Obviously I am going to argue that very likely this smartphone would not have featured either in a possible version in the last episode, given that they probably did not see the smartphone coming.

Though I really enjoyed this little thing, given that just days ago I had been talking to a friend on whether or not it would be possible to open the Digital Gate from a modern smartphone or not.

What follows is Iori and the Russian Chosen child disappearing into the Digital World, while Agumon and Gabumon evolve into Greymon and Garurumon. Not much to say here, other than that I really liked how they designed the evolution sequence here. It is neat. :D

From there we cut a bit more.

We have this scene with Takeru and Shuu who seem to be meeting in the real world somewhere. I base this on the fact that the Digital World in this trailer once more uses this kinda aquarell look that they had been using for it in the Adventure/02 series.

I am honestly kinda psyched to see Shuu here (as well as later on Shin and Daisuke's sister Jun), given that I always was a big fan of the siblings and families in the series.

As some of you might know: Back in the day there was one of the Drama CDs that also featured Shuu, Jun, as well as Miyako's sister Chizuru and Momoe meeting their partners. Which obviously then was fully ignored by tri., Kizuna and The Beginning. Yes, I get that I am probably one of like three people who cared about those characters, but man, I really would have loved to see their partners. xD

They are also turning around in this scene to a figure that might be Lui? Though given again that Lui definitely was not thought off back when 02 aired, this obviously would not have been a part of that episode.

It obviously could also be another character, given we only see the legs.

We have then some shots of Koshiro in a labcoat with "Izumi Labs" written on it clearly doing some research that also involves Kabuterimon firing an attack into some technical thingie.

The only thing I really can say here is that him having his own lab makes me wonder about the epilogue, where it seemed he was working for some international organization. Though I absolutely see Koshiro having his own research lab.

Still: no idea how this is connected to anything else we see going on.

We also see Jyou on Ikkakumon putting on his Doctor's coat, which makes me think he gets ready to take care of some other kid or maybe some Digimon. Notably this seems to be happening in the real world as well - as once more there is not this "aquarell" effect either.

And also notable: There is a rope around Ikkakumon's horn, meaning they seem to be transporting something across the water.

Again, given the lack of context - and knowing the context only exists probably in some notes that Kakudo has taken many, many years ago (clearly being more organized about his notes than Konaka, mind you, but that is a story for another day)... Ah, it is frustrating, eh?

We also see Mimi and Sora with Togemon and Birdramon - both clearly in the Digital World given here we see the aquarelly dots in the background.

I have seen a lot of posts since this was dropped yesterday noting how both look a whole lot more like their Adventure and 02 designs than they did in either tri., Kizuna or The Beginning. Which makes a whole lot of sense though if you think that this was originally based on something that might have featured in 02.

Though it also makes a whole lot of sense that it did ultimately not feature in 02, given that 02 was struggling for time and budget at times, and asking the animators and designers to design some "20-somethings designs" for the characters additionally to the epilogue designs for like one episode worth of content or something would probably have send someone over the edge.

There is however one thing I do note.

Mind you, I have currently a post scheduled for the Tuesday after next where I am ranting about that accursed epilogue. And part of the rant is also me going into the girls being reduced to their feminity.

Now, one of my big beefs with Kakudo has always been his tendency to defend the decisions for certain... traditionalist aspects both in regards to the epilogue and generally some of the writing in Adventure/02. And he will obviously again and again maintain that the epilogue had always planned and was always planned and is always considered and Kizuna and The Beginning totally did not contradict the epilogue whatsoever, which makes me just roll my eyes - because obviously it does.

Like, I do not doubt that certain aspects of the epilogue were being thrown around all along and it was talked about during the making of Adventure, but not for a minute I am going to buy that every single aspect of it was planned all along.

And one thing here that is noticable and has been called out by quite a few folks: Sora is a lot more tomboyish again, while basically everything since tri. worked very hard to make her more a girls' girl, given that is where she eventually ends up in the epilogue. Which makes me do a bit of a doubletake here.

Then we have this shot of Mimi and Togemon facing a cloud of black somethings (I mean this is Adventure-verse where "Black XYZ" was a very usual plot device to make Digimon go evil, so there is definitely that) in the Digital World. Though something I find a whole lot more interesting is the apparently falling tree-thingie in the background.

This made me instantly go "Yggdrasil". Which is ironic, because Yggdrasil was only added to the Digimon lore in 2003.

This might just be a freakishly large tree in the weird Digital World. But the association is still there.

And then we have a scene that possibly features Arachnemon in a hospital where seemingly both Shin and Jun are working by the looks of it. It is not quite clear if the nurse is Jun, but it definitely looks like her, I gotta say. Especially given that the red hair color was not particularly common in Digimon.

And again: I love Jun. She is annoying, but in a cute way. She is just this typical teenage girl, but in a way that I actually found quite amusing.

Then we have this shot of Sora and Birdramon again in the Digital World fighting seemingly again against "Black Somethings" - though here it is a bit easier to see that those things seem to be some sort of hexagons. Does this mean anything? Nope, for now it doesn't, but yeah, seems to be hexagons.

Also we see some large thingies behind the clouds, that also might be really big trees? I don't know. Just wanted to note that.

Then there is this scene of Taichi, Agumon, Yamato and Gabumon jumping into the light. Which... Uhm...

Okay, frankly, I have no clue what is going on there. But something clearly is going on.

First association obviously is kinda the Internet scene from Bokura no Wargame, as it featured the shadows being quite similar, but that is just a very typical design for very harsh shadows in animation, so... yeah, that might be nothing. *shrug*

Certainly mysterious. Which is great for a standalone PV that is not a trailer for anything... lol

Then there is this shot of some folks standing around in the Digital World. Those folks clearly are international children. We do see some familiar faces among them, too. Most notably Yuehon, Mina, a boy that might be Yuri, and a guy who at least has the same scarf as Steve. Not sure about the others. (Kinda sad we do not see Chicos or Catherine.)

Those Chosen stand in front of a hill or something on which we see then Daisuke and Ken in their adult designs. (No screenshots for them due to tumblr limiting the amount of pictures I can post.)

It is noticable that while V-mon and Wormmon are with Daisuke and Ken, the international Chosen... uhm... Young Adults are without their partners it seems.

Then we get this shot of Hikari and Miyako flying on Nefermon and Horusmon in the Digital World, which clearly is a callback to the 02 Opening - of which we have a couple of call backs happening in the next few seconds. lol

The two of them are dragging also some sort of line or something along, which we see more off in the next shot.

They seem to be opening up some sort of portal - though the weird thing about this shot most certainly is that there is like several Horusmon. Sure, like, there can be, but... This does seem weird, right?

I mean, we have seen the Digimon multiplying in the finale of 02 of course - and who knows what kind of portal they are opening... But yeah.

Given that we see a similar effect to this portal with Koshiro and Kabuterimon in the lab sequence before, I am somehow assuming this is related to Koshiro's research, but... Again, we do not have a whole lot of context for any of this.

And then we get the really weird stuff. We see Daisuke rising along in a clear callback to the opening of 02 again on Lighdramon. However, it is not just Lighdramon, but also Boarmon (Armadimon's evolution with the Digimebtal of Courage), Elephamon (Armadimon's evolution with the Digimebtal of Miracles out of all things), Goatmon (Tailmon and the Digimebtal of Hope), Lynxmon (Tailmon and the Digimebtal of Courage), and Bullmon (Wormmon and the Digimebtal of Hope).

Most notably: While in the coming two shots we see more Armor Digimon, these have only the common through line of "they are all named [animal]mon" lol This is a really weird collection.

Then we have Ken and Puchiemon (who was tradionally Wormmon and the Digimetal of Kindness) with some more Armor Digimon: Pipismon (Patamon and the Digimental of Love), Searchmon (Wormmon and the Digimetal of Knowledge), Harpiemon (Hawkmon and the Digimental of Light), Thunderbirmon (a really weird one because it was not part of the original Armor Digimon but released only when Frontier came out, so it is either Gottsumon or Impmon and the Digimental of Friendship), Flybeemon (Hawkmon and the Digimental of Knowledge), Pteranomon (Armadimon and the Digimental of Love) and Honeybeemon (V-mon and the Digimental of Knowledge).

(If you wanna hear something sad: I knew most of these without looking them up. Thank you brain, for holding onto this information for 25 years. I guarantee you, it was more important than French.)

And lastly we see Iori and Submarimon surrounded by even more Armor Digimon: Orcamon (Hawkmon and the Digimental of Reliability), Manbomon (Patamon and the Digimental of Light), Depthmon (V-mon and the Digimental of Reliability), Mantaraymon (Patamon and the Digimental of Reliability), Seahomon (Armadimon and the Digimental of Light), Tylomon (Tailmon and the Digimental of Reliability), and finally Archelomon (Wormmon and the Digimental of Reliability).

Why are there so many of the Armor Digimon?

I have no clue in hell. Especially as sometimes Armor evolutions of the same Digimon can be seen in these shots. Sure, most of these Armor Digimon can also be another Digimon either as an adult evolution, or an another one using the same Digimental... But it is still hella weird.

But then again, we never saw the Digimentals being used in anything that took place post the end of 02, so... Yeah, there is that, I guess.

We also have these shots of Hikari closing this door on Meiko before being attacked by a dark cloud that then gets dispearsed by Tailmon. Note that this clearly takes place in the Digital World once more, given that we see the splotches of aquarel in here.

Again: Whenever this was originally conceived Meiko clearly was not part of it. But yeah, whatever. xD

And we also have this shot of Takeru and Patamon going into what certainly looks like the Dark Ocean - another thing that we have not heard from since it was a concept fully underexplored by 02. Which certainly is a choice here.

Lastly we have a shot of Imperialdramon Dragon Mode flying over a dark forest towards a castle, that clearly is a callback to the Imperialdramon evolution sequence, where we see exactly the same thing happen. The castle looks a bit different, sure, but to be fair, the evolution sequence is a 3D thing that has aged horribly on the basis of being 3D created in the year of our lord 2000.

From this we basically zoom out into this shot of the goggles, where we see the goggles of Taichi/Daisuke, Takato, Takuya, Taiki and Taiki/Tagiru (in Hunters). Which probably does not really mean much other than being some symbolism that this is also something that lay beyond the ending of 02, I guess.

All in all, as I said: This is a standalone short film so to speak, not a trailer. However, let's face it, there was at least some thought to hope that folks would be begging to get the full story now in the hope to milk the DIgimon Adventure cow further dry.

And I mean, like many people I am kinda sick of everything being about Digimon Adventure and stuff - though I will also say, that I am actually kinda relieved we did not get a whole lot of post-canon DIgimon Tamers stuff. And be it just because I have my own very established headcanon for that.

Still, even being sick of Adventure getting more and more stuff... I kinda would watch a movie or OVA of this, I gotta say. Preferably an OVA, I think.

Especially as this has a lot of the stuff that I wanted to see in tri., Kizuna and The Beginning and never did: More of the international kids, Shuu, Shin and Jun (possibly also Momoe and Chizuru), and some more evolutions than just again and again Omegamon and Imperialdramon.

So yeah, if they should decide to turn this into something real... I would probably not hate it.

[stellastra-scribbles]

Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura doodle dump

various scribbles or scrapped WIPs from the past few months of some Arcanum NPCs~

September 2024 - Scrapped M'in Gorad scribbles, based on her in-game sprite and one of the female elven portrait options (since she doesn't have an in-game portrait).

While Raven's hair is described as "dark crimson, almost black," I like to think M'in Gorad's hair is a dark green, almost black hue.

October 2024 - Scrapped/unfinished Torian Kel sketch from my endgame team headshots. I restarted this dude's portrait like three times because golly it's so hard to capture his likeness in my style.

?? November 2024 - scrapped armor concept for Torian Kel, inspired by a blend of in-game armor, 17th-century Dutch infantry armor, and 19th-century Zouave infantry uniforms.

November 15, 2024 - My take on Hieronymous Maxim, the Master of Repair and (in his words) the "inventor of the mechanized gun and the recently absconded aeroplane." You know, the same planes that shot down the IFS Zephyr in the game's intro.

I took reference for the clothes from an 1882 fashion plate. For Hieronymous Maxim's face, I referenced his namesake, Sir Hiram Stevens Maxim, creator of the first automatic machine gun who also experimented with heavier-than-air flying machines.

I'm thinking of making similar portraits for the other Master Trainers.

December 20, 2024 - island hermit Nafroodinski

February 17, 2025 - My interpretation of a younger (Age of Legends-era) and a present-day (1885) K'an Hua. I imagine he had a Gollum-like transformation in the 2000ish years between to become what the game describes as "[... a hunched, robed figure...you are taken aback by his hideous appearance. An air of dank, foul evil emanates from him, warping his elven features.]" (although he ended up looking like Brad Dourif's portrayal of Grima Wormtongue lmao)

Early April 2025 - Headshots of Jayna Stiles and Garfield Thelonius Remington III, much like this previous batch of follower portraits I did~

[discokicks]

FOX IN THE BOX — ROY KENT.

PART TWO of ACES AT THE WATER’S EDGE.

(series masterlist!) (AO3!) (series playlist!)

pairing: roy kent x fem!reader (no use of y/n!)

summary: back in 2012, you and roy meet for the first time. in 2023, you sign a one-year contract with richmond and have to work with roy for the first time. both go about as well as you’d expect.

word count & rating: 9.6k, R (roy kent says fuck and does fuck!)

chapter warnings: swearing, light sexual innuendos and light references to sex, mentions of alcohol and partying (the olympians get DOWN in olympic village) minor allusions to what happened to reader at west ham, major football talk, roy kent is rich, original character intros and plot (author really likes a plot, woo boy), angst, and of course, fluff.

author’s note: ok wow, thank you for all the love on the first chapter! wildly unexpected but much appreciated. this one’s got a bit more to it— jumping timelines, original characters, lotta soccer/football talk, reader and roy don’t know how to act (in more ways than one). also did crazy research into the 2012 olympics for this, so no one tell me my timeline’s off or i’ll cry. also also, is roy's sister named molly or is that just evidence that i've read too many fics? whatever it is, her name's molly! thank you again for the love and i hope you all enjoy! love you all tons! -mags

LONDON OLYMPICS. (LATE JULY, 2012)

You meet Roy Kent for the first time at midnight, in a rookie’s dorm room in the Olympic Village.

It’s a seemingly unlikely place for a football phenom like him to be. You’d expected all of those guys to choose to be elsewhere, exploiting their home-country advantage to hang out in their posh flats. But there they were, carrying out their team bonding efforts to prepare for their game tomorrow. 

Knowing what you know about Roy now, it’s fitting for him to have been there. But in this moment, you’re shocked to see the likes of him in Olympic Village. 

It’s a place that’s convinced you that your college career was only good for preparing you for it. And you’re not even talking about the sports aspect of it. You’re talking about the shit-show, chaos-menu of athletes from around the world, acting as though it’s the first week of freshman year.

Despite the fact that alcohol, drugs, and any other traditional party favors are completely off-limits on-premises, it doesn’t seem to deter your fellow Olympians from running the dorms like it’s a frat party. You’re half-convinced you’re going to get a classic ‘who do you know here’ from the trust-fund-looking Australian swimmer you pass getting into your building, but he just sends a heartbreaking smile at you and your teammate as you walk in.

Your team’s fresh off the bus from Glasgow, having just beat France at Hampden Park. It was a hell of a way to open, despite the Opening Ceremony not taking place for another two days. As a younger player who’d proven herself in last year’s World Cup, you were the starting striker in your first Olympic game ever, scoring the second goal of the match and assisting the fourth. The adrenaline of it all hadn’t quite worn off yet. 

It’s clear that your teammate’s feeling the same way. Melanie Rivera, your left winger and for all intents and purposes, best friend, is straight-up vibrating. You’d met during World Cup training, where you two had instantly clicked and she’d taken you under her wing to show you the ropes and what it meant to play at this level. Despite this being her second Olympics, the feeling of a win never goes away. Or at least, that’s what she tells you.

The two of you are practically bouncing off the walls as you arrive on your floor, giggling to yourselves about different things that had happened during the game. Your fluent-in-French full-back telling off a French forward when she got too close to your goalie. The mid-game mishap where some French girl’s cleat went flying. The ‘bullshit’ yellow card Mel had received right before the half (Mel knew it was a fair call, she’d totally pushed that girl). 

“She was asking for it, though,” Mel insists, collapsing onto your bed as you enter your shared room. “Pulling on my shirt the whole game. I have two rules. Two. Don’t—”

You roll your eyes, having heard these rules a million times. “—touch my goalie, and don’t—”

“—touch my fucking kit,” she finishes, throwing her hands up exasperatedly. Her eyes shut with a huff.  “They’re pretty simple. Don’t know why people can’t follow them.”

“Yeah, it’s a travesty,” you reply dryly. Your lip curls into a grimace as you look at her. “You wanna know what my rules are?”

One of Mel’s eyes opens with a knowing smile. “Don’t be sweaty on your bed?”

“Oh, so we do remember,” you say, falsely cheery. The faux smile falls from your face. “Get off. Or at least shower. I want to go to bed and I don’t want to like, smell you.”

Mel rolls off your bed with a dramatic sigh. “Fine,” she relents. “But you can’t go to bed.”

Your expression remains unamused. “And why not?”

“Because the British men’s team is hanging out upstairs,” she states as if the answer’s obvious.

“Right. Of course,” you reply. “So, we’re crashing their team bonding?”

“No,” she says, pointing at you. “Their women’s team crashed. And then Jack texted me to tell us to come up.”

You narrow your eyes at her. “Uh-huh. Is Paige there?”

Mel shrugs, avoiding your gaze. “Maybe.”

“Oh, great,” you say sarcastically. “So, you’re forcing me to stay awake so I can wingman you?”

Mel flops on your bed once more. “Please,” she cries. “Dude, I like her so fucking much. We’ve been texting since the Cup and I don’t know, this year I think I’ve got a chance.”

“Why can’t Jack wingman you? He’s clearly down to set you two up,” you say, sounding a bit whiny. “Also, why are they hanging out here? I thought they’d rent a place or stay at their own houses.”

“They make the rookies stay in the Village their first years. It's for the experience, or whatever,” she answers. That’s brushed to the side quickly. “Also, Jack is a fucking awful wingman. The only type of scoring he’s good at is on the field.” She looks at you expectantly. “And I can’t go up there alone. I’ll look like a loser.”

You gape at her. “You are twenty-seven years old.”

“And I’ll look like a twenty-seven-year-old friendless loser!” When she sees the expression you’re wearing, she tilts on her side. “Say yes or I’ll roll around in your bed.”

You cover your face with your hands, an exhausted laugh echoing into your palms. This clearly is a losing battle, and you decide you’re going to be a good friend tonight. “Fine,” you groan, hearing your bed squeak as she launches herself off of it with a cheer. “An hour. That’s it. And then I’m going to bed and never talking to you again.”

“I can live with that,” she yells, bounding for the shower in your room. “I’ll text Jack that we’ll be up in thirty!”

“You owe me so big!” you reply.

You can hear Mel’s grin when she says, “I love you, too!”

Thirty minutes later, you’re freshly showered and up three floors, standing outside of the rookie’s dorm room. You can hear just how loud it is from outside and you suddenly really feel like you’re back in college again. 

It takes Mel a solid three minutes to work up the courage to knock on the door, something that you’re sure would have taken longer if you hadn’t reached out and done it yourself. She scowls at you, but the door opens before she can cuss you out.

Jack Wilson, Tottingham sweeper and three-time Olympian, answers the door with a wide smile. You’d met him a handful of times due to his friendship with Mel and he was just as lovely as everyone had said. There was a charming sort of awkwardness about him despite his status as a professional footballer, but it made him all the more endearing to you. 

“Glad you finally decided to show,” he said to you two, opening the door wider for you to enter. “Congrats on the win.”

“Thanks,” Mel said, eyes already scanning the small dorm living room for Paige. “What’s up with the team bonding in the dorms?”

You’re also looking around the room, sending smiles to the handful of girls you recognize. “Game tomorrow. Coach wanted us to do dinner as a team, so we ate in that big hall. And we--” he says, pointing to two guys on the couch, “--wanted to see the Village this year. So here we are.”

Your eyes follow his finger to the men, one of which isn’t familiar. The other, you immediately identify as Roy Kent. And his eyes are on you.

He’s easily recognizable, curly hair a bit more tame and managed than the iconic, half-assed mullet he’d had when he first signed with Chelsea. That ever-present scowl only lifts a little when he sees that you and Mel have arrived, but you honestly can’t see much change in his expression due to his drawn brows.

While you’d relied on Mel for the majority of your connections to this new world of football, she’d never really seemed to hang out with the likes of Roy. From what you’d gathered, despite his rather high status, he was a bit of a recluse. Yes, he went out constantly, and yes (if the tabloids were right), he’d certainly dated around, nobody really seemed to know much about him. 

When he’d come up in a team game of ‘Fuck, Marry, Kill’ with famous footballers, Mel had told the group that he was a guy of few words, and of the words he did say, ‘fuck’ seemed to be his favorite. Your friend and teammate Katie O’Connor was ready with a terrible impression of him when she answered with ‘fuck,’ especially after Mel also confirmed that the Gina Gershon news was true. 

You try to ignore this as you go over to introduce yourself to them, despite the fact it’s currently setting up camp in your brain. “Nice to meet you guys,” you say to Roy and the other boy on the couch. Jack takes a spot next to you on the floor as you take an empty chair next to the couch. Paige waves at you from her spot when you sit.

Roy nods at you in acknowledgment. “Good showing out there.”

Jack points at you. “Bloody insane goal you had,” he says. “I think I’d break my back if I tried to do a scorpion kick like that. It was fucking class.”

You grin. “Well, lucky for Tottenham, they keep you on the other side,” you say, then quietly add, “Not that it would make a difference.”

You see Roy’s lips twitch up from the corner of your eye, and you bite back a laugh as Jack physically deflates before you. Mel’s heard your comment and runs over to sit on the arm of your chair, which is conveniently close to Paige. “Ooh, is it shit on Tottenham time? Because I haven’t seen your ass in months, so I got a whole list, man.”

As the two of them begin to argue in the way they do, you sit at watch them with a smile. They’d had this type of relationship since you’d met them back at the Cup, when Jack had flown into Germany to see your final games. Despite the loss, those were a wild couple of weeks.

The moment your brain starts to recount them, you can feel a pair of eyes on you. It snaps you out of your haze completely. Especially when you realize that it’s Roy Kent who’s staring at you once more.

You blink at him, slightly confused by the attention. “Hi?”

He nods at you again. He seems to take a moment to evaluate you, and then, “You overthink.”

“W-What?” you ask. The word comes out clunky and confused.

Roy motions to the TV that’s on across the room, one that’s showing highlights from your game. “Out there,” he says. “You overthink.”

The two of you stare at each other for a moment. You, feeling unbelievably out of sorts and unsure of what brought this on, Roy, secure and casual, like he just stated the weather. 

Before you can question him, he nods at you for a final time, then stands up. “I’m going home,” he tells the group. “You lot better be fucking ready for the game tomorrow.”

Roy’s out of the room before anyone can say a proper goodbye to him, but no one bats an eye. No questions follow. 

Except you, of course. You’ve got a fucking million.

You overthink on the field? Where the fuck had he gotten that from? How had he seen it? While there were some times, yeah, you got a bit in your head, you’d never considered yourself an overthinker. And even if you were, the overthinking produced results, right? You liked to think you were just three steps ahead of everyone else out there. Not an overthinker.

But what made him say that? What had he seen? Was it your hesitation outside the box in the first fifteen that resulted in you losing the ball? Was it the switch you’d made to get to the goal when your right winger had it on the side? Was there a look on your face when you’d taken that free kick in the second half? You were pretty in your head then, but hey, it led to Mel scoring.

Overthinking. Pfft. He didn’t know what he was talking about. 

But then again, what the fuck was he talking about?

The thought of this unknown bomb dropped on you without any sort of answers quickly and completely took over your mind. Criticism about your playing had never bothered you (you were a twenty-five-year-old female soccer player, and you’d had more horrendous coaches than you could count), but this? This was something that literally made you itch. And you weren’t going to be able to scratch it until you knew what the hell he meant.

Before you knew what you were doing, you found yourself practically chasing Roy out of the room, whipping your head around to figure out which way he’d gone. Lucky for you, the dorm’s slow lifts were on your side. 

Roy stood by the elevator, checking something on his phone as he waited. He clearly doesn’t hear you coming because he nearly drops it when you ask, “What do you mean I overthink?”

“What the fuck?” And now he’s staring at you like you’re the crazy one.

“I should be asking you that!” you say, then motion back to the direction of the dorm. “You tell me I overthink, stare at me with no follow-up, then leave? Who does that?” You’re way too animated for past midnight, but you don’t care. “Because even if I was an overthinker, which I’m not, that sort of stuff is probably the worst thing you can do. Not leaving on a note like that is like, rule number one.”

Roy’s brows shoot up. “I wasn’t aware there were rules.”

“Yeah, well, there are,” you reply, crossing your arms over your chest. When he continues to just stare at you, you make a face that you hope will cue him to go on. “So, go ahead. Please explain yourself.”

“Explain the overthinking thing?” he asks. “I thought it was pretty fucking simple.”

You roll your eyes. “No, what made you say that? Was it a play I had? Was it something I did? What did you see? I’m just curious as to—”

“You came up the field toward the end of the game,” he says, effectively cutting you off. “And you made a pass to Rivera that led to another pass, then a goal.”

You nod at him, not seeing his point at all. “Yeah? So? It was a great goal by Katie.”

Roy’s expression turns slightly frustrated, as if he’s annoyed that you don’t immediately catch on. “It was a great goal. But the fucking second you saw Rivera next to you, you started thinking ahead,” he tells you. “So far ahead that you didn’t notice how slow and fucking awful your mark was and that you could have had a better goal if you’d stopped thinking.”

There are approximately fifteen seconds of dead air between you two as you attempt to take in what he just said to you. “So, let me get this straight,” you begin. “You’re saying I’m bad because I think too much about teamwork?”

For a moment, you think Roy’s going to slam his head into the elevator door. Instead, he just turns to the buttons and presses them once more. “Fuck’s sake, could these be any fucking slower?”

You’re too far gone at this point to even be offended. “Uh, it doesn’t matter. You started this. You’re not going anywhere until we finish it. Why does me not being a selfish dick make me bad?”

“I didn’t say you were bad. You’re not. Clearly,” he responds. You note a bit of the classic ‘Roy Kent’ anger laced within his words and it makes you snap your mouth shut. “I’m just saying. You’re at your best when you’re not so fucking nice and when you don’t fucking think.”

Unconsciously, your arms cross over your chest. “I’ve got twenty-two years of playing time and about ten coaches that would disagree with that.” 

Once more, you see the corner of his mouth slide upward as he glances at you. “If that’s the case, then your coaches were all idiots. They weren’t smart enough to let you loose.”

An unexpected warmth rises to your cheeks. But instead of acknowledging it, you ask, “What, like you’d be a better one?” Before he can respond to that, you’re talking again. “And even if all of that were true, I wouldn’t know how to do that.”

Roy’s brow creases. “Do what?”

“Not… think ahead,” you say. “Or not think at all. That being three steps ahead thing is kind of, well, my thing.” You offer a shrug. “The generous, teamwork thing too. I like that. It’s what makes me good.”

Roy continues to look at you, but says nothing. For a moment, all is quiet as he just… stares, almost as if he can see through you. Like he’s privy to something you’re not, or he’s had some sort of revelation about you. You’re not sure anyone’s ever looked at your this hard. It’s a bit unnerving and you have to fight to not avert your eyes.

Before you can begin to further overthink that (god fucking damn it), he’s holding his phone out to you. You stare down at it blankly. 

“You’re showing me your phone,” you state, but it’s almost a question.

Roy rolls his eyes. “Put in your fucking number,” he says.

Your lips purse as you hesitate, but you find yourself reaching out for it. “Is this how you typically do it?” you ask, typing your name into his contacts. “You neg a girl for five minutes straight and then ask her for her number?”

Roy rolls his eyes again, but there’s humor amongst the annoyance this time. “I’m going to text you a time and an address,” he tells you. You hand him his phone back. “Be there on Friday after the Opening Ceremony.”

The elevator had finally arrived in the middle of his sentence and you eye him wearily as he steps in. “Just… show up to this address?” you ask. “Do I get context? Like, what to expect? What am I dressing for?”

“Overthinking,” he reminds you as he presses the button for the lobby. “Just fucking be there.”

Before you can object further or tell him that you were not in fact overthinking, you were just a woman in a foreign city concerned for your safety, he leans forward to stop the doors from closing. He’s got one hand up and has a small smirk on his face.

“And just so we’re crystal fucking clear,” he says. “If I were trying to chat you up, you’d fucking know it.”

Your eyes immediately fix into a glare and the doors close before you can say anything in response. “Asshole,” you mutter to yourself, but you’re already flipping your phone over to see if he’s texted you.

(You won’t know this until much, much later, but Roy Kent let out a loud and regretful ‘fuck!’ as soon as he was five floors down, absolutely cringing at the idea that he used a line like that on someone like you. It plagued him for three years straight.)

PRESENT DAY. (EARLY AUGUST, 2023)

On a day when Roy not only had the strangest interaction of his life with Jamie Tartt in the Boot Room, but he also found out that Trent fucking Crimm would be lingering around all season, he was sure that he was done with surprises at Nelson Road.

That quickly proved to be false, as he soon found that Ted was rounding the team up in the media room for some sort of meeting.

Roy saw Beard as he was leaving the Coaches’ Office and sent a questioning look his way. “Did I miss film on the agenda?”

Beard shook his head. “Nope. Impromptu. We just heard back.”

“Heard back?” Roy asked, watching Beard go to leave the room. “The fuck are you on about?”

Beard smiled at him in the doorway. “We got her,” he said and left with a skip in his step that Roy wasn’t sure he’d ever seen before.

They’d gotten her? Got who? 

Then it hit Roy. Oh. You. They’d gotten you.

You’d said yes. You were joining Richmond. He’d helped convince you. Despite everything, despite all that had happened and everything you two had done, you’d said yes. You were willing to work with him. You were now going to be back in his life for worse or for better. And not just back in his life, but a fucking constant in it.

Then that hit Roy. The reality of it all fucking bodyslams him and it makes his heart race. After eight years of cold-turkey no-contact, he was going to be seeing you every day. After everything he’d done. After everything you had done.

Roy realized then that he didn’t exactly consider this feeling. That he was so blindsided by Rebecca’s request and by seeing you that he didn’t even think about this. It had been hard enough to work up the nerve to confront and speak to you once. Would it feel like that all season? Had you considered this?

But then, he remembered you and how you think about every fucking angle of every situation. You definitely had thought about this. And if you were willing to push the discomfort, the awkwardness, the whatever in order to have this job, he supposed he had to be too.

Roy swore under his breath, turning away from his desk to get his head back on straight. The team was waiting for him. He could mope about this in the comfort of his own home later.

He arrived in the room just as the rest of the team was getting in. The boys were buzzing. Between the news of a potential Zava acquisition and the Trent Crimm book development, as well as whatever this was, they couldn’t seem to stop talking. Roy didn’t blame them. It was a lot for one day. 

(It’d been a lot for him too. With everyone now knowing about his break-up with Keeley, to fucking Trent Crimm, to you, he was surprised he hadn’t gone outside to scream yet. But he presumed that was coming.)

“Alright fellas, listen up,” Ted said from the front of the room, holding his hand up to get everyone’s attention. The team quieted down after a moment. “I know there’s been a lot of talk going around this week. And I know y’all are excited. But I’ve got some more news.”

“I don’t know if I can take any more,” Dani said, sending a wave of agreement through the group. “It’s hurting my head.”

Ted chuckled. “I know. Mine too. And we’re the ones who have to manage all this,” he said, motioning to Beard and Roy who stood against the wall. “But this is good news.”

Good news? That was something the team could manage.

“So, how many of you are familiar with the Women’s World Cup that happened back in 2015?” he asked, eyes scanning the crowd.

A murmur went through the team. “America won?” Colin offered. “Crazy final game that was.”

Isaac pointed at Roy. “You did some shit for Sky Sports for this Cup, right?”

As the boys began to recall this, Jaan Mas said, “Why they gave you another pundit job after that completely blows my mind.”

“Yes, Roy did do some TV work over here,” Ted answered after the laughter died down. “And yes, America won. But does anyone remember what this Cup started to be called?”

It seemed as though no one had an answer. That is, until Beard cleared his throat said, “The Summer of Fourteen, baby!”

Ted snapped at his best friend. “That’s exactly right, Coach. And despite it being the 2015 Cup, they called it that because of this woman right here.”

Ted had brought up what is perhaps the most iconic photo of you to date. It’s one of the first things to come up if you were to Google yourself, a picture that’s haunted you for the last eight years. It’s from the 2015 quarter-final. You’re mid-penalty kick against China, scowl on your face as your foot collides with the ball, blood dripping down your face from the broken nose you’d received moments before. 

(It’s certainly not the most elegant or flattering picture of you that exists, especially when your fellow teammates’ search results yielded photos of them at the ESPYs, but you still think you’ve never looked like more of a badass.)

Ted said your name smoothly as he pointed to you on the screen, annunciating all syllables. “Wildly prolific USA Women's athlete despite her rather short time in the league. And while she was always good, y’know, starting striker since she began and all that—” He chuckled, turning to look at his other coaches, who had knowing smiles on their faces. “—I don’t know. There was something in the water in 2015. Because she just became…”

Ted trailed off, looking for the word. This time, Roy found it before Beard. “A nightmare,” he said, with a suppressed yet fond sort of smile. “She was a fucking nightmare out there.”

“In a good way, of course,” Ted cleared up, earning a nod from Roy. “But, yeah. A nightmare. Wonderful teammate and fantastic playmaker, but man…” Ted trailed off with a low whistle. “We were all glad she played for our neck of the woods.”

Jamie’s hand went up. “Didn’t she just get like, hired and fired by West Ham?”

“Wonderful segue there, Jamie,” Ted said. “Because yes, that is true. She was with West Ham for a couple months. First female coach in the league. Pretty impressive stuff, and it was a pretty big deal. And then something went wrong, and they let her go.” The team made a noise of acknowledgment, all of them having seen it in the news. “And I don’t know what happened, and we probably won’t know what happened, but we knew she was too good to leave the league. Lucky for us, we need a new coach. And she needs a new job.”

There was a wide smile on his face when Sam asked, “So she will be joining Richmond?” 

“That she is, Sam,” Ted replied, earning yet another eruption of chatter amongst the group. “She’ll be joining us on Monday. And while I know you fellas will do everything you can to make her feel welcome and will show her the same level of respect that you show us up here—” Ted pointed to his coaches once more, glancing down at the computer in front of him. “—I’m going to show you why she deserves it more than us.”

A YouTube video of your highlights appeared on the big screen, going full-screen as the quick ad ended. Ted stepped back from the computer, sitting down on the stool behind him to watch along with the rest. 

Your famous 2012-France-Scorpion-Kick goal just so happens to be the first thing up and Roy’s heart nearly stops. It’d been years since he’d seen this clip and he was immediately transported back to the night you two met. A ghost of a smile unconsciously made its way up his face as he watched your body contort to flip around, and the ball soar into the net. It was a goal of pure and utter instinct. You hadn’t thought about it. You just ran in there like a maniac and knew what to do. That one gets an immediate reaction from the team.

The next one is a play you’d set up in the Quarter-Final New Zealand game, with a bunch of quick passing in the box to confuse and rattle the defense. Melanie Rivera had sent you a world-class assist for an even better goal, one that earns you the title of ‘Fox in the Box’ from the past commentator on screen. The next, an impressive goal scored after an injury you’d had in the Semi-Finals against Canada. Then, and perhaps most famously, your assist to Katie O’Connor from midfield to win the Gold. 

And they hadn’t even gotten to the World Cup yet.

The World Cup footage made up the other three-fourths of the video. It was a completely different side of you, one that had thrown caution to the wind, one that had a huge fucking chip on her shoulder, one that was just… insane. In all the best ways and meanings.

Roy’s shock of the day, though, comes after a highlight of you completely blowing past three Colombian defenders. You’d broken the fourth’s ankles with your footwork in the box for a quick goal. Footwork of yours that had been massively improved, Roy noted. And he would know, he’s the one who did it.

Arlo White’s voice filled up the room. “And yet another breakaway goal from USA’s Mean Fourteen!” The clip said. “It’s just remarkable to watch her work this year, don’t you think, Roy?”

Roy felt all eyes on him when he heard his own voice on the speakers. “I don’t know what USA would do without her,” 2015 Roy Kent said. “I’d hate to have her against me.”

It was strange for Roy to hear his own voice mock him like that. And as the team began to cheer for him, he felt a pit form in his stomach. They didn’t even know.

The highlight reel continued for another couple of minutes, and it seemed with each play, the boys became more excited about the prospect of being coached by someone like you. Beard and Ted were evidently just as ecstatic about the development, and Roy knew he had to get on board. Warp his feelings and nerves and whatever else into something resembling his team’s attitude.

After all, he was the reason you were joining.

The lights came up as soon as the video ended, snapping Roy back to reality. Ted smiled at the team. “Alright, fellas. Now, let’s get to work on the welcome party.”

The boys hooped and hollered, each of them getting up to join in whatever Ted had planned. Beard looked over at Roy as the rest filed out. 

“You think we’re ready for her?” he asked.

Roy hated the weird fucking sixth sense Beard had when it came to… well, everything. He made Roy feel like he was completely transparent. “We’re ready for her,” he replied.

Though, he wasn’t sure if he was assuring Beard or himself.

PRESENT DAY. (EARLY AUGUST, 2023.)

You sign a one-year coaching contract with AFC Richmond that Monday in Rebecca Walton’s office.

The news broke that you’d been picked up by Richmond on Friday, something that had completely come alive in the press world. Your face was plastered over all of the papers yet again, newscasters seemed to mention your name every time you turned on your TV, and social media was set on fire. Everyone had something to say about this move and the majority of it wasn’t too positive.

You tried to keep your nose out of it, knowing just how much you did not need to see people talking about you like that. The majority of the negativity was from West Ham fans, wishing Richmond ‘luck’ with the likes of you, others wishing you good riddance. 

If they knew how happy you were to be out of there, you’re not so sure they’d be as excited to let you go.

Though signings on every level in this league were typically more public affairs, ones with major press conferences and coverage, you’d requested this to be quieter. Just a few statements from the people who mattered and a pen and paper. You’d been in the media a bit too much for your liking over these past couple of months, and if you could get some exclusivity, you’d take it. 

Rebecca, thankfully, was more than happy to comply. You’d been in contact with her practically non-stop since you’d called her, and she’d been nothing but lovely to you. Each interaction with her made you feel better about this job, despite the cloud of anxiety that still hung over you.

You’re sitting in a chair opposite Rebecca’s desk when a message from Mel comes through. i always liked richmond better than west ham anyway, she says. paige and i bought shirts and will be at every game. 

A photo comes through shortly after of her three-year-old toddler, decked out in a Jamie Tartt jersey. oliver’s already got his!

You can’t help the smile that spreads across your face, fingers tapping against your screen with a quick response. adorable. give him and paige a hug for me. and i’ll be freaking out so bad at every game that i’m gonna need you there anyway, so i’m holding you to that.

you’ll be incredible. knock ‘em dead, kid.

Rebecca re-enters her office before you can respond with a thank you. She’s got Coach Ted Lasso in tow, who could not be grinning brighter at you. The second you see him, you think about everything Nate had told you during your short time at West Ham, and something within you just can’t believe it. The energy of Richmond had been different as soon as you walked through the door. The good kind of different. And their manager appeared to not be an exception.

Ted greets you immediately with an outstretched hand. “It’s so nice to finally meet you,” he says after your introduction. “I gotta tell you, we’re all mighty excited that you’re here.”

“I think I might be more excited,” you reply, and it’s an honest answer. Or at least, you’d been able to shift your nerves about the job into excitement. You’d only anxiety-thrown up once today. You figured that was an accomplishment. “Seriously. Thank you both again for the opportunity.”

“We’re just grateful you said yes,” Rebecca says. You can tell she means it. “The team’s been buzzing all week.”

The nerves return at the mention of the team, but you mentally scream at yourself to get over it. “Well, I’m just excited to get started.”

“Speaking of getting started, we should probably head downstairs,” Ted says to Rebecca. “I wanna show our new coach around a bit before practice gets going.”

“Of course, don’t let me keep you,” Rebecca responds. “I’ve got a couple more things for you to sign before you leave today, so just make sure to stop by. If you have any questions, my door’s always open, or you can ask Leslie, who you met earlier, who’s always wandering around somewhere.” Her smile gets warmer as she puts a hand on your shoulder. “And we really are pleased to have you joining us.”

You wonder for a moment how a woman like her could have ever been married to an asshole like Rupert, but you suppose that’s a story for another day. “Thank you,” you say again, a bit of that anxiety washing away. “I’m happy to be here.”

Ted leads you out of the office, his tour starting from the minute you exit. He offers a bit of insight into himself and his time at Richmond, his past two years working with Rebecca, then launches into what he knows about the history of the place (and you don’t have the heart to tell him that Rebecca had already done that when you’d arrived). 

The facility is gorgeous, but it feels a bit more lived-in and welcoming than what you remember about West Ham. Everything there was so manicured and monochromatic and sterile. Nothing about it felt like a place you’d want to work.

Richmond is the opposite. It’s bright and colorful and you can hear people laughing as soon as you step down into the lower level. While your nervousness about the team still lingers, you can feel it easing. You’ll see how long that lasts.

You’re stepping into the Coaches’ Office before you even realize it, mind too occupied with taking in your new surroundings and trying to keep up with Ted’s story. You resent the overwhelming amount of relief you feel when you realize there are only two men in the office, and neither of them are Roy. 

One is sitting with his feet crossed up on his desk and a book in his face. The other is writing on a notepad at a separate desk. You’re surprised by the speed at which both of them jump up to greet you as you and Ted enter.

“Alright, Coach, this is Coach Beard,” Ted says, and you meet Beard’s hand for a shake. “He’s one of the guys you’ll be working with this season.”

“Nice to meet you,” Beard says, nodding your way.

“You too,” you reply. Your eyes are drawn to the book he placed down on his desk and you allow yourself to grin. “I love Merlin Sheldrake.” When his brows shoot up in surprise, you shrug. “I’ve got a lot of time in the off-season.”

Beard’s eyes light up. “We’ll get along just fine.”

Your grin grows and you hear Ted’s voice from behind you. “Is that that mushroom book?” he asks. “I don’t think Beard’s ever found someone who reads that stuff too. I guess we’ve now got two Fun-guys in the group.”

You glance over at Beard. “Now it's a Fung-us.”

Out of the corner of your eye, you see Ted’s hand come up to his mouth as he looks over at his best friend. For whatever reason, it’s clear that the two of them are trying to contain their excitement. Before you can question it, Ted places a hand on your shoulder. “Oh, you’ll fit right in here, Ace.”

The nickname catches you off guard. It’s something that you haven’t heard since your playing days, something that the commentators and pundits loved to call you. It was always a compliment when they said it, but something about the way that your new manager says it makes it sound more like a title than a name. Like that’s what you are. 

It immediately makes you feel welcome and you can feel yourself warm into their excitement.

The other man in the room, who’s been watching this interaction in amusement, steps forward to hold out his hand to you as well. “Trent Crimm.”

Now, it’s your turn to raise your brows. “You’re the writer who keeps calling me?”

A smile that could also be a cringe appears on his face. “Guilty,” he answers. “Just trying to cover all the bases for the book.”

“I get it,” you tell him. “If you still want a quote, I’d be happy to give you one. But I can’t guarantee it’s going to be clean.”

Trent chuckles. “I’ll take what I can get at this point.”

There’s a moment where you almost question what he means by that, but you brush it off. Especially now that Ted’s started talking again. “Roy's running a little late, but I’ve heard y’all already know each other, so we’re not technically missing an introduction.”

That makes you pause. You’d figured that when Roy had appeared on your doorstep he’d told at least Rebecca about your past, and that the probability he’d told the staff was high too. But exactly how much had he told them? Did they know the basics or did they know everything?

You then realize it’s Roy you’re talking about. There was no way in hell he’d told them anything more than what Ted said. That you knew each other. Maybe that things hadn’t ended smoothly. But that was it.

That, at least, gives you a bit more confidence. Ted turns to you and leads you back into the small, adjoining room you’d walked through, pointing at an almost empty desk. “That’s yours,” he tells you. “Feel free to dress it up with whatever you want, and get yourself unpacked. We’re starting practice in about fifteen minutes and Coach Beard and I gotta set some things up, but I’d like to introduce you to the fellas before you start shadowing. That all sound good?”

You grip the strap of your backpack and nod at him with a smile. “Works for me, Coach.”

Ted grins, patting you on the arm. “Glad to hear it.”

And with that, he returns to his desk, making sure to leave the door open as he leaves.

You plop your backpack on your desk and begin to empty out your things. You grab your laptop first and place it on your desk, followed by a couple of knick-knacks and photos you brought along, ones that never felt at home at your desk at West Ham. There’s a rational piece of you that knows you should stop comparing the two places, but the pettier, more aggressive side of you tells it to fuck off.

(You like to listen to that one when you can these days.)

You’re holding a photo of a baby Oliver dressed in a Women’s USA onesie when you hear someone else walk into the room. You glance over your shoulder and immediately regret it.

Roy Kent is standing in the doorway, staring at you like he completely forgot your signing day was today.

Of course, Roy hadn’t. He’d been pacing around his flat all morning because of it. It was actually why he was late to work. But he hadn’t expected to see you as soon as he walked in. In his office. Now, your office too, he supposed.

The two of you just stared at each other for a moment, much like you did when you saw each other again for the first time last week. However, it appears that you’re both acutely aware of the three sets of eyes that are on you two from the other room.

Like you’re snapping into a scene in a play, Roy’s expression rids itself of all surprise. “Coach,” he says stiffly, nodding at you.

Coach. You suddenly remember your previous conversation. It’ll be professional. Civil. I won’t let there be any issues. 

Well, if he won’t let there be any issues, you’re sure as hell not going to give him the satisfaction of causing any.

So, instead, you return his nod. “Coach,” you greet him. As he puts his things on the desk opposite yours, your heart falls into your stomach, “A-Are we…”

“Sharing an office?” he finishes for you. You nod weakly. “Yeah.”

“Oh,” you say, then awkwardly add, “Fun.”

“I’m over the fucking moon,” he deadpans.

You bite your tongue, trying not to retort too quickly to a comment like that. You look away from him and to the keys in his hand and you prepare for the small talk you’re about to force yourself to engage in. “Tough ride in?”

It seems to take him a moment to process the question. The awkwardness of it all lingers. “Something like that,” he answers. However, his gaze is stuck on the picture in your hand. “What the fuck is that?”

Your brows furrow and you glance down. So much for small talk. “This?” You hold up the photo. “Oh, this is, uh, Oliver. Mel and Paige’s son.”

“Fuck off,” Roy says in a way that’s almost inquisitive, though the relief in his voice is palpable. You try to ignore that. “I didn’t know they had a kid.”

You huff a laugh despite yourself, and a bit of weight falls from your shoulders. “You clearly don’t follow Mel on anything,” you reply, then pause. “Oh, wait. I forgot. You don’t do social media.”

“It’s a waste of fucking time,” he says, reaching out to look at the photo. When you hand it to him, he mutters, “I think Rivera would have me blocked if I did, though.”

“Yeah, you’re not wrong,” you say honestly. You take the picture back from him and place it on your desk. Your next question comes out casual, and you can’t help but be proud of how nicely this is all flowing. “Speaking of kids, how’s Phoebe doing? And how’s Molly?”

You’re not expecting the hint of shock on Roy’s face when you turn back to him. It’s as if he can’t believe you’re asking about his sister, or that you remembered the name of his niece that you met when she was no more than six months old. You want to slap him upside the head for looking at you like that because, of course, you fucking remember that, but a knock on the door from the other room interrupts your conversation.

Trent’s standing hesitantly in the doorway, notepad in hand. “Sorry to interrupt,” he says, and he appears to be avoiding eye contact with Roy. “But if you were serious about talking, would you be free to do it tomorrow?”

You offer him a warm smile, hoping that’ll contrast Roy’s crossed arms and hard stare directed at him. “Sure thing.”

“No,” Roy immediately says. “You’re not fucking talking to him.”

Confusion takes over. “Why not?” you ask.

“Because no one’s fucking talking to him,” is Roy’s answer, firm, with no room for argument. His eyes never leave Trent. “And don’t try to fucking weasel your way into this team through someone who doesn’t fucking know any better, Crimm. You’re fucking better than that.”

You’re gaping at Roy as Trent nods at you kindly and retreats into the locker room. When you look back into the office to see if you can get some clarity from one of your other new colleagues, you notice that they’re both missing. Ted did say they had to set some things up.

You suppose that just gives you the ability to talk freely to Roy now.

“I’m sorry,” you say, whipping back to Roy who’s already facing his desk. “Has he not been given the O-K to write a book about this team?”

Roy grunts. “He has. But it doesn’t mean we’re fucking talking to him.”

“Well, doesn’t that, like, defeat the purpose of him writing a book?”

“You’re catching on.”

You lean back against your desk, folding your arms to take on Roy’s previous stance. “Oh, I see,” you say in understanding. “This is a Kent Rule.”

He doesn’t have to be facing you for you to know he rolled his eyes. “No, it’s not.”

“Oh, it’s totally a Kent Rule.” You stare at his back as he shifts his shoulders in discomfort. “You hate him, so you’re forcing the team to hate him. Enemy mine is enemy yours? That’s Kent Rule number three, if I’m remembering correctly.”

“It’s a team rule,” he states. “I’m just enforcing it.”

“Right,” you agree, though your voice says differently. “Each person here hates him so much that they allowed him to write a book here.”

Roy shakes his head with a scoff. “Fuck’s sake, I forgot how fucking irritating you were.”

“I’m not being irritating. You’re being evasive.” You only get another grunt in response. Fed up, your frustration at his lack of an explanation starts to seep into your tone. “So, what? I’m just supposed to ice that nice guy out because you say so?”

When Roy finally looks at you, he’s scowling. “He’s not fucking nice,” he says. “And you don’t know anything.”

“I don’t know anything because you won’t tell me,” you argue. 

“My word’s not good enough?”

You glare at him. “Your word hasn’t been good enough in eight fucking years.”

Roy shakes his head, almost in disbelief. “Definitely not telling you now.”

“Okay, enough,” you say, scanning the room and the hall to make sure no one’s watching the two of you. You put a hand up before he can retaliate with anything. “Look, if this is gonna work, you have to tell me things, okay? And we can’t argue here. Not here.” You motion to the office around you. “I can’t work with that shit. Alright?”

For a moment, it’s like you can look into Roy’s mind. You watch him appear to recount last week’s talk, just as you did minutes ago. Professional. Civil. No issues.

“Fine,” he finally sighs, knowing you’re right. 

“Fine,” you reply. You take a breath. “So, if he sucks and you don’t want me to talk to him, you need to tell me why. You can’t just order me around like I’m one of the guys, especially not in front of people. I’m your equal here, Roy. Whether you like it or not.”

Roy shakes his head. “You’ve always been my equal,” he says, though it’s a bit softer. “You fucking know that.”

His words leave a lump in your throat that you’re not anticipating. “Well, you’re not acting like it.”

His head tilts back, eyes falling shut. His shoulders tense up. Heavy sigh. Dear God, he really doesn’t want to tell you, huh?

And then it hits you. Oh, fuck does it hit you. He doesn’t want to tell you. 

And you get why.

Roy’s talking as soon as you open your mouth to apologize for pushing him. “The others don’t know either. I’ll tell you when I tell them,” he offers. “That’s the fucking best you’re getting from me.”

Your tongue feels heavy in your mouth, so you offer a nod. “Fine,” you say softly.

The nod is returned. “Fine.”

The conversation feels finished, but there’s still one more thing you want to say. “And can we agree right here that we’re not going to argue in front of anyone? Just like you said?” you ask. “Like, if you want to pick a fight, just like, pull me into the Boot Room or something. This shit can’t affect the way we do our jobs.”

Humor slants Roy’s expression. “Boot Room fights?”

You roll your eyes. “You know what I mean. Not in front of the team.”

“Yeah, I got it,” he says with a nod. “Fine.”

“Fine.”

From the outside of the office, you can hear the team start to file into the locker room from their gym facility, laughing just the same as when you heard them earlier. The alone sound makes you tense up. Roy narrows his eyes at you. 

“Speaking of,” he says cautiously. “I think it might be time for your introduction. Hope you like primary school-level art done by grown fucking men.”

That takes you out of your headspace immediately. “I’m sorry, what?”

LONDON OLYMPICS. (LATE JULY, 2012.)

Mabley Green. Friday. 23:30.

Wear some training gear.

I can send a car for you so you know you’re not being murdered.

You’d read the three messages you’d received two days ago from Roy Kent about a million times. While you’d replied to him that his sending a car felt very mafia boss and definitely doesn’t eliminate the murder possibility, you’d still gathered up the courage to dress up in your nicest sweats, escape from the Village after the Opening Ceremony festivities, and meet his driver on the outskirts.

(Of course, you said yes to the driver. Roy Kent was fucking loaded and if he were going to be strange and summon you places, you were going to take his free transportation.)

You’d confirmed your whereabouts and situation approximately thirty-five thousand times to Mel, who had nothing but questions for you. 

“Roy Kent. Like Chelsea’s finest, here, there, every fucking where Roy Kent?” That’s the one.

“Is sending a car for you to go to where?” I don’t know, it looks like a soccer field. 

“To do what?” Battle Pokemon. I don’t fucking know, Mel. I think he wants to train me.

“Train you or train you?” Why are you saying it like that?

“Because this has to be a weird hook-up thing that famous footballers do, right?” He made it very clear he had no interest. Also, pause. What about me says I’d fuck on a pitch?

“He could bring an air mattress.” Oh my God, I’m leaving.

But as you arrived to this completely empty field, with nobody but your overly friendly driver, Roger to back you up, you couldn’t help but feel a little nervous. This was weird, wasn’t it? You were meeting up with this guy you barely knew at an abandoned location just because he told you that you were an overthinker? Your mother would be absolutely horrified if she knew. You’d broken just about every Stranger Danger rule she’d set.

However, the second that you stepped out of the car to see Roy illuminated by the field lights, standing with his hood up and a bag of footballs thrown over his shoulder, you knew this was legit. And the anxiety washed away. But a few of the nerves stayed.

“Glad you showed,” he greets, turning to walk to the field as you fell into step with him.

You look over at him expectantly. “So, you are coaching me.”

“No, I’m fucking not,” he says. “I just want to get you out of your head.”

You nod in faux agreement. “Right. Because that’s not coaching.”

Roy rolls his eyes. “No, it’s not. It’s called being a nice fucking person.” 

“Right,” you say again. “Because Roy Kent is known best for his kindness.”

He turns to you. Something sparks in you when you notice that he appears to be humored by all of this. “You should be thanking me.”

“Of course. I’m sorry,” you apologize, sending him a wide smile as you two make it to the field. “Thank you, Coach.” Roy rolls his eyes again and you chuckle softly. “I’ll thank you when I know for a fact you’re not gonna murder me.”

He watches as you plop yourself down on the pitch to stretch a bit. “If I was going to kill you, I wouldn’t have brought a fucking witness.”

“I don’t know,” you shrug. “Roger could be your Ryan Gosling.”

Roy actually laughs at that one. It’s a sound that you’d never expected to hear, but you’d be lying if you said you didn’t want to hear it again. “I wouldn’t trust him to do that kind of driving. Chatty prick can barely get around London.”

“Hey,” you chide. “He was very nice.”

“He’s fucking incredible. Been with him since my Sunderland days. Still a chatty prick.”

You can’t help but smile at the fondness that’s crept into his voice, but you say nothing about it. You bring your knee to your chest in a stretch and look up at him. “So, what’s the plan here, Coach?”

“Not your coach.”

“Right, sorry. What’s the plan here, Zodiac?”

Roy shakes his head, fighting to keep his lips even. “I want to make a deal with you.”

“A deal?” you ask. “What kind of deal?”

“I’ll train with you until your team's out,” he says. “Whenever our match schedules align, we can figure out a time to do shit until you need to go home.”

Your smile turns cocky. “And if we win?”

He practically snorts. “You’re not going to win.”

“But if we do?”

“Then we’ll train until then,” he replies. “And I’ll give you whatever you fucking want.”

You’re not sure what that entails, but anything you want from Roy fucking Kent? It’s an offer that may be too good to pass up. But still, one question lingers. “In exchange for what?”

“What?” he asks.

You stand, lifting one of your feet from the ground so that you can pull it up behind you in another stretch. “A deal works two ways. Exchanging goods or services and all that,” you tell him. “What’s in it for you?”

Roy shrugs. “I need to train too,” he answers. It's a bit simple, a bit evasive. “That’s what’s in it for me.”

“Oh, c’mon,” you say, “you can’t be serious. You want to train with me just to train?”

“What’s wrong with that?” he asked, crossing his arms.

“Nothing,” you respond, slowly realizing he’s serious. “I guess I just kind of assumed when I heard ‘deal’ that you’d want something in return.”

“Well, that’s all I fucking want,” he tells you. “If I think of anything else you can do for me, I’ll let you know.” 

A mix between a scoff and a laugh escapes you. “I’ll be anxiously anticipating your demands.”

He’s turned to his bag of footballs and crouches to grab one, glancing up at you as he rises. “So?” he asks. “Do we have a fucking deal, or what?”

Your foot goes down as you look at him, evaluating him and his offer. You shift your gaze to the field, to the big lights around you, then to the night sky that tells you it’s almost the next day. 

You have a game in Glasgow again tomorrow against Colombia. You’re out past curfew and know your team would both kill you and congratulate you if they knew where you were. You have to be on a bus in less than eight hours. 

But here’s Roy Kent, standing with you on an abandoned pitch in London, offering to train with you. And what kind of idiot passes that up?

“Deal,” you agree, taking the ball from his hand. “Now, where do we start?”

(mini!) TAGLIST: @tegan8314, @csigeoblue, @confessionsofatotaldramaslut

[yuyuswrld]

O Captain, My Captain || 1

series intro here, or read chapter 2

characters: reiner x reader (this chapter), various aot boys x reader.

notes: this is an 18+ series, please don’t interact if you’re a minor! reader is referred to with she/they pronouns.

content warnings: explicit smut, fingering, reiner eating pussy like a god!!, alcohol consumption, degradation, mild slut shaming (?), mentions of marijuana at the end

“Has he always been a bitch?” You question Marco, inhaling bites of your ramen. He shrugs, “We’ve both been on the team since freshman year and I’ve never had a problem with him. Maybe you’re the problem?” He meets with dead silence as you stare up at him from your bowl.

“Funny, Bott. I’m just not looking forward to spending so much time with him, if he behaves like that, anyway.” Exasperation visible, you slump in your chair to think. “It’s not like he’s on the sidelines. He’s the damn captain, which means I have to talk to him a lot.”

Marco shrugs. “You’re being dramatic. He’s a pain sometimes, but he’s not that bad. Just try to be nice to him, please. Eren won’t get any nicer if you’re mean. Plus,” He stops to take a bite of his food, “we don’t have the time for fighting. We’re expected to go to nationals this year, and that’s not happening if you two scare each other off.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever you say, Bott. I’ll see you at practice later.” Uncrossing your arms and brushing off your legs as you get up from your seat. Okay, sure, Eren has yet to be anything except slightly dismissive and maybe just a little shit. He hasn’t actually done anything to you. You toss your bag over your shoulder before thanking Marco for the meal and dismissing yourself.

As the time for practice draws closer, you collect your thoughts as you stand outside the cold metal doors of the university’s second largest gym. Sure, you went to a school notorious for its D-1 volleyball, but the gym’s size was excessive. The high rise bleachers felt as if they would swallow you alive and the walls would collapse in. They had before. You remember the bile pool in your throat as the sports cameras flashes ate at your failure and spat you back out. Like a gazelle running from its predator, your body craves to run away from the glorified arena ahead of you.

“The fuck are you standing in the doorway for? Are you going in, or what?” Is it wrong to want to choose violence? Couldn’t he just say excuse me or ask if something’s wrong like a normal person?

Ugh, you should choose peace and not mess up a good opportunity. Just think about the money and all the nice things you can buy.

“I’m obviously just trying to get in your way.” You push the door open and walk into the gymnasium, not bothering with holding it open for Eren. In fact– hopefully it hits him! 

You hear the door fly open again behind you and a bag hits the ground with a loud thud. Eyes landing on the congregation of men in jerseys surrounding a smaller man, you beeline over to them. As you near, the smaller man, who you assume to be Coach Levi, locks his gaze with you. Is he… angry? Concerned? It’s impossible to determine what he’s thinking as he continues to stare.

“You’re not pregnant, are you?”

Your jaw drops. You’ve met more people in your life than you can count and never did a single person start a conversation in such a way.

“Not as far as I’m aware of…?”

“Okay, if you do what Hanna did, I will rip that baby out of your-”

A blond kid speaks up, “Um, Coach, you probably shouldn’t be threatening them on the first day. I just don’t think it’s a good idea to do that when we really need someone to organize our itinerary and keep practice stats. We’re nothing if we don’t have those numbers.”

“Fine, Arlelt. You and Braun stay here, explain how game statistics work and start having her do one-on-ones after. Performance evaluations for all of you.” You watch as Coach Levi’s eyes hover over Eren, who looks less than pleased. You’re not sure what’s going on there, but also can’t bring yourself to care. “Rest of you can go practice.”

As you glance over at the two boys who stayed, it throws you off that you’ve seen both of them before. The little blond one, you’re pretty sure his name is Armin. You’ve seen him walking around with Eren before, but he always looked so out of place in how gentle he is. You’re pretty sure you watched him bump into a trash can and apologize.

The other, however, you don’t think you’ve ever seen a man with such a commanding presence. He’s well-built. You’re pretty sure even a Greek god couldn’t hold up in comparison. You scoff internally, ‘it’s always the fucking volleyball players.’ But there’s something that lingers on your tongue, a conversation revolving around him. Then it hits you, Petra’s gossipped about him before!

“There are some really cute guys on our volleyball team. Did you know that?”

“Not this again, Petra. We’re supposed to be doing our biology homework.”

“Bitch, please. Let me speak. Anyway, there’s this guy on the team, his name is Reiner and oh my god- that is one fine ass man. He’s built like a tank engine. Not only that,” she says, a little giggle follows. “I’ve only heard this from two girls. He says he doesn’t like to hook up a lot, but his head game is insane. Like cum in a minute insane.” 

You stare, “I’m pretty sure that’s impossible, Petra.”

“I don’t know! Hook up with him yourself and you can give me all the juicy details afterwards.” You can only sigh in response, disturbed by your best friend’s inability to study.

But, here he was in the flesh, all 6’2 farmers tan of him. You couldn’t possibly do something so scandalous on your first day, could you? You shake the thought out of your mind as Armin talks.

“Volleyball stats are relatively easy to get the hang of. You just need to watch pretty closely. Even if you do miss something, we record them and you’ll go back through with Eren to make sure everything is recorded properly. Then, you’ll want to convert the numbers of each hit, serve, and pass into percentages compared to how many times it occurred per set.”

Reiner laughs, just a small one, but lord it’s like music to your ears. “Armin, you’re dumping too much info on them at once. It’d probably just be best to just show them the ropes visually and they can go from there. C’mon, let’s have coach set up the camera and record the three-on-three’s that they’re doing now.  We’ll watch the game, I’ll have you watch me record it, and then we’ll go back over it while watching the tape later.”

You nod, feeling just a hint of warmth across your face. Is this even possible, to have a school-girl crush in university? Those days were supposed to be behind you, but you can’t help but have the smallest bit of a smile as you follow him and Armin to speak with Coach Levi.

As you watch Reiner and Armin record the stats, your mind spins with utter confusion. You’re beyond lost, unsure how they’re even keeping up with the sheer amount of movement the players are doing. Dig? Write it down. Set? Write it down. You want to groan, or maybe even just go get dinner as you feel your stomach rumble.

As practice wraps up, your stomach rumbles in pain once again as it craves its next coddling. Reiner glances over from where you two stand, finishing up showing Coach Levi the statistics and getting a dismissive, “make sure it’s right,” instead of an appreciative response. He smiles at you, looking down.

“Gettin’ hungry?” He asks.

“Beyond hungry,” you say, shoulders dropping in defeat. “I’m being tortured. I haven’t eaten since noon. It’s 7 now! It’s criminal that you guys would starve me for so long.” You tease Reiner. He only responds by glancing at the gym door where most of the boys say their goodbyes before tapping out for the night.

“Y’know, I’ve heard I make a mean rice bowl.” 

It didn’t take much convincing for you to follow him back to his dorm room as practice winds down. Upon sitting across from each other at his make-shift dinner table, you learn Reiner is one of the middle blockers, coming at no surprise to you when taking in consideration to his stature. Although, you also learn he was from the countryside and this scholarship was his way out.

“Y’know, I always kinda dreamt of moving to the big city and being able to do what I love. But it’s crazy, man, I still can’t believe I’m here sometimes playing for the top university on the island.” 

Hearing the passion in his voice, you question if it’s right for you to intrude as a manager. Is it okay for you to be in charge of the livelihood of the men who’ve come so far and done so much for their passion? The men who could very well play on Paradis’ Olympic Team in the future? The concern is quickly shoved into your mental locker to be returned to as Reiner asks about watching a movie over some post-dinner snacks and beer. A much needed chance to relax after endless studying, you agree chipperly and move over to his plush couch.

As you two get halfway through Inglourious Basterds, you feel his arm wrap around you and his head turn in your direction. The alcohol running through your system has you heating up just from the skin contact. You blush as Petra’s words return to the forefront of your mind. You turn your head to face him, eyes interlocking with each other. His eyes signal a look of need, not want. You’re not sure if anyone’s ever looked at you like that before. Like a hunter who’ll starve without the meat of the deer he’s trailing.

“You’re so fucking hot” He mutters, you’re surprised a man of his stature can be so quiet. “I don’t think I’ll last with you as our manager.” Reiner closes the gap between the two of you. There’s a slight metallic tinge on his lips, but it’s addicting in the worst of ways and only deepens the experience. You two continue, allowing yourselves to sink into the couch, your body hitting the arm rest. His kiss moves from your lips to your neck, hands beginning to roam until they find purchase underneath your shirt. First, he plays with your bra before making his way under. Reiner moves his lips from your neck gently, almost like he’s scared of making a mistake. He helps you pull your shirt over your head and follows by removing your bra, his delicate touch unhooking the backing.

“You don’t have to be gentle,” you coo to him, lust-filled gazes connecting. “Please, I like it a bit rough, I swear.” He groans into the valley of your breasts.

“Don’t say that shit, I might break you.”

You can only laugh at his words, unfazed by the prospect, if not even more turned on by it. 

“Holy shit, please do,”

“In that case,” He says, voice lower as if weighing his options internally. “Don’t blame me if you limp to practice tomorrow.” Reiner helps you remove your pants before his fingers begin to dance over your body again. The touches are soft as they ghost the outline of your skin, your heart beating as you wait for him to soothe the ache between your legs. You attempt to rub them together for a semblance of friction but his arms find their way to keep them split. His gaze shifts up to you, eyes narrow as if disapproving of your behavior. Reiner’s face then begins to move lower, tongue licking a stripe up the inside of your thigh as his fingers begin to dance over your clit. He moves his face over to meet his fingers, tongue flattening against your clit, which draws a moan of approval from you. It seems evident that it spurs him on further as he begins to speed up his tongue, then switching to sucking your bud and having his fingers delve lower to your hole. Reiner holds eye contact with you as he begins to press one of his monstrous fingers inside of you. 

You can only make a noise of approval as he pushes it further in, approving of how well even one of them feels inside. It heightens your pleasure as he thrusts it forward, keeping his tongue dancing and sucking against your clit in a flurry of movements that have you questioning if Reiner is really a man and not a god in disguise. As he pushes a second large finger in, you cry out much louder than you should be in the dorms. You bite down on your lip to withhold any further noises, but Reiner puts a complete pause on what he’s doing.

“Keep moaning, baby. Let them hear how well you’re getting finger-fucked right now. This is what Armin wanted to be doing to you right now, did you know that?” He lets out a deep laugh, lips and face glistening in the dim lighting of his tv. “Bet you’d like that, though, huh?” His fingers move again and you gasp. “Yeah, you’d fucking love it if I bent you over and fingered you from behind to show off the entire team what a good little pocket pussy you are.”

That’s what tipped you over the edge. In fact, it’s probably disrespectful to feminism that you allow yourself to be finger-fucked while getting off to the disgusting words spewing out of the blond’s mouth. But social constructs be damned if this man didn’t stick his dick in you soon. You clench around his fingers as they continue to move, despite your cum gushing over his fingers.

“You’re fuckin’ nasty. But you’re still not ready for me.”

His face returns to its original spot, blowing hot air on it first as you wriggle at the stimulation. Reiner only adds another finger in response, allowing the three large digits to stretch you out before moving them once again. It feels as if you’re melting around his fingers as your back arches to the stretch. Despite slight discomfort, it’s overwhelmingly pleasurable to feel the expertise in his ways.

It’s not long after he adds another finger that you feel the coil in your stomach once again. As his tongue laps at your clit with a technique unknown to you, you’re about to unravel against his touch once again.

“‘M gonna cum,” you pant out desperately.

“Do it, cum on my fuckin’ tongue.” He replies approvingly, allowing you to take the time you need to ride out the rush to your body. For a second, you feel as if you’re floating in the way your back arches off the couch and your head spins in pure ecstasy. You glance over at Reiner, eyes fixated, as he removes his pants and reveals the thing you’ve been so curious to see. It matches his stature in almost every way, which makes you cringe at the thought of him fitting it in.

“You said you like it rough?” It’s a trap, that much you’re sure of. You glance back down to examine how large he is before you reconfirm, but before you know it, the condom has slipped on and he’s making his way back to you. He asserts his way on top, arms on either side of your head as he leans in to give you a quick kiss. It catches you a bit off guard, the earlier metallic taste has changed into the taste of your own cum and there’s a slight wince as you taste it. You can’t tell if this man is slightly depraved or hot as hell.

“I asked you a question. It’s not nice to ignore me.” 

A loud smack to your clit resounds as you let out a sharp, pleasure-filled gasp. 

“Yes, please,” you whine. It’s slightly pathetic, how you’re behaving for this man, but god be damned if anything were to impede your moment. 

He only grunts in response, lining himself up with your entrance. As he sinks in, you bite your lip to fight the stretch. You attempt to lie back and relax in his touch to allow him in, but he’s just so large. Reiner bottoms out, tip just ghosting against your cervix. He only grants you a few moments to adjust to his size before he’s pounding into you, your cries of pleasure nothing but music to his ears. The tip kissing your cervix is making your brain fuzz beyond anything you’ve felt before, and your walls hug him in intoxicating ways. Reiner grips both of your legs, bringing them onto his shoulders to push in further which earns you a grunt of approval from the larger man. 

He fucks you like he hates you. Every so often, his head falls back, and he lets out grunts of pleasure. His body moves like an artist painting their long-lost lover from only a distant memory, hips ferocious in their assault of your cunt. Reiner flips you over onto your hands and knees after an indiscernible amount of time, your sweat-covered body cringing at the chilly breeze it causes. His pace is still unrelenting from the back, cock feeling as if it’s touching every inch it can inside of you.

“Holy shit,” He cries out. “I’m gonna cum. I wish I could cum inside this pretty little pussy of yours.”

Without another word, except for your moan of approval, Reiner finishes and delicately slides out of you, removing the condom and disposing of it. He arrives back a couple minutes later, towel in one hand and a glass of water in the other.

“So, round two?”

“I’m pretty sure you started my period just now.”

[delaythings]

𓆩✧𓆪 sooo… my mha dr Exists

basically, as i mentioned on an earlier poll, this dr is yearning to escape my brain, hence this kinda-intro with minimal formatting, maximal rambling, and, shockingly, proper capitalization and punctuation. and, as such, without further ado, introducing my mha drself...

DELANEY ARTEMIS QIN-RUSSO

𓆩✧𓆪 The youngest child of the U.S.'s Number 7 Pro Hero, Resonance Hero: Seraph (a.k.a. Kya Valerie Qin-Russo) and the current head (a.k.a. Sylus Alistair Qin-Russo) of one of the world's most influential hero tech/support business conglomerates, known as Onychinus. Naturally, with two older twin brothers (a.k.a. Luke Cassian Qin-Russo and Kieran Atlas Qin-Russo) who are 3rd years in the support course of UA High School, it's no wonder that she would end up going to the same school, after getting into the hero course’s Class 1-A on recommendations.

𓆩✧𓆪 Delaney’s Quirk is a dual Emitter/Mutant type known as Draconic Energy. The "energy" part of her quirk refers to her abilities of energy manipulation, a part passed down to her from her father’s Energy Manipulation quirk. Her energy typically manifests as black mist with streaks of blue when it’s used to make constructs, and she is able to manipulate most forms of energy (kinetic, potential, thermal, light, sound, etc., but she she mainly forms constructs). Meanwhile, her dragon-like traits are actually the result of an unexpected quirk mutation, leading to her having horns, dragon wings, talons, a tail, adapted eyes (slitted pupils with nictitating membranes), and even dragon-like instincts, such as nesting, hoarding (her particular items of choice being crystals, fantasy/romance books, blankets/any other kind of cozy item, and surprisingly, pretty decorative daggers), and protective instincts. For a little bit of flair, her left eye glows a bright, electric blue when she's using her energy manipulation, and it grows more radiant when she's doing more complex work. She is able to use her energy manipulation to retract all of her dragon traits except for her eyes, though it does take a tiny drain and her traits will reform once she falls asleep or goes unconscious. Also, her dragon limbs are actual body parts, so they can make her sore when they're used, especially her wings. Other drawbacks of her quirk include fatigue and headaches that come from using her energy manipulation and get worse with more use, until they develop into full-blown migraines and, at the worst, sleep comas that come from her quirk forcibly shutting down her body to recover lost energy, hence why she keeps caffeine pills and painkillers in her hero costume.

𓆩✧𓆪 Speaking of heroism, her hero name is Dragoness Hero: Scylla, named after a six-headed Greek sea monster occasionally depicted with a dragon-like appearance, with it being an allusion to her quirk's awakened state, Apex Predator (something that I will get into in a later post).

𓆩✧𓆪 Her hobbies and interests include things such as reading, playing video games, flying (especially during thunderstorms), dancing (she was an extremely good competitive dancer back in the U.S. before moving to Japan), martial arts (trained in Brazilian jiu-jitsu, boxing, and weapons), electric guitar, long spa-like baths (her wings are gigantic and being in water helps to take away the weight; plus she can’t feel things as much when her talons are out, so she retracts them cause she likes feeling and smelling bath products), geology (has her entire gemstone hoard memorized to exact cuts, colors, place of origin, and she WILL KNOW if it is touched), and the occasionally tinkering, because in a household filled with two chaotic engineer brothers, she has to know how to undo their chaos, especially when it comes to her mechanical owl.

𓆩✧𓆪 It is sort of an unofficial "tradition" within the Qin-Russo family, mainly started by Sylus, for each person to have a mechanical bird as a companion, modeled similarly to his own mechanical crow (with red eyes), Mephisto. Kya's bird is a barn owl with golden eyes named Ra and was a wedding gift. Meanwhile, Luke's falcon (red eyes) named Ares, Kieran's raven (also red eyes) named Nyx, and, of course, Delaney's mechanical great gray owl with blue eyes, named Athena. Athena is Delaney's companion (even leading to her sneaking her owl into the Class 1-A dorms when they moved in), and Delaney is very protective of her owl. As mentioned above, this can become a problem with her brothers, and exchanges similar to the following are very often heard in the Qin-Russo household.

“LUKE, I SWEAR TO ALL THINGS GOOD AND HOLY THAT IF YOU MODIFIED ATHENA THE TINIEST BIT I WILL TURN YOU INTO A THROW RUG.”

“YOU’LL HAVE TO CATCH ME FIRST, SIS!!”

“I HAVE FUCKING WINGS, YOU DIPSHIT! YOU CAN’T OUTRUN ME?!”

“Both of you, cut it out.” -Kieran, as Delaney tackles Luke post-jumping off of a stair railing.

𓆩✧𓆪 Switching topics here (and I'm gonna swap to first person cause yes), while I am going to around the first day of UA, I already know who my main friends are going to be. Said friends are Bakugo, Mina, Kirishima, Kaminari, Sero, and Jirou, and I am so, so unbelievably excited to meet and befriend them. And, of course, when it comes to my s/o, it will be none other than the aforementioned blonde, bombs-for-brains menace, ahem ahem Katsuki Bakugo. Basically, our dynamic progression is probably gonna be rivals to kinda friendly rivals to friends to best friends to mutual pining but in denial to finally dating around the end of second year. Most of the posts related to Katsuki on my blog will be tagged with “detonations and dragons 💥🐉” which is the ship name I came up with (play on Dungeons and Dragons).

𓆩✧𓆪 With all of the above being said, I think that’s probably enough for one post, so I’m gonna cut it off here. Thank you so much for reading all of this, and please feel free to ask me any questions on all of this :))) byeeee!!! (also, my playlist for this dr that's a mix of m y vibes and things I'd listen to in this dr is linked below!!)

[disneytva]

Hulu's Animayhem Returns to SDCC With a Factory of 20th Television Animation

Disney is once again bringing the Hulu Animayhem to San Diego Comic-Con. Last year, the streaming service created a hub for all of its adult animated favorites, from Futurama to Solar Opposites, the Bob's Burgers, and The Simpsons.

This year's activation is designed like a factory with all the characters of your favorite animated shows working to crank out some of the best series the medium has to offer. Mock-ups show a floor filled with references to Animayhem's flagship programs, with Bob Belcher, Homer and Bart Simpson, Fry and Bender, Hit-Monkey and Bryce, and more flying through the gears and conveyer belts that make it all work. Deeper inside the factory is where the real magic lies, however, with a selection of immersive activities based on the shows and exclusive collectible memorabilia that can only be found at the yearly convention

Key among the factory's many moving parts is a replica of Futurama's Slurm Factory. The highly addictive soft drink, which may or may not be made from the slime excreted from the butt of an alien slug queen, is Fry's favorite drink in the year 3000 and the episode "Fry and the Slurm Factory" gives him and the Planet Express crew a once-in-a-lifetime chance to see how it's made. Animayhem's replica recreates the factory as it appeared in the beloved episode, from the Willy Wonka-inspired music to the borderline copyright-infringing Grunka Lunkas and, of course, the Slurm Queen herself for some unique photo opportunities.

Past that is the Cutawayland Storage, a special 25th-anniversary celebration of Family Guy full of all the best cutaway gags from the Seth MacFarlane show's long history. Fans can pick up 2D objects that correspond with specific jokes and take them to viewing stations to see the cutaway play out on the spot. Add in some cutouts of the Griffin family in their signature yellow tuxedos from the show's iconic intro sequence, and the station has no shortage of photo opportunities to commemorate such a major milestone.

Slurm isn’t the only treat fans can see the making of. Another area replicates The Simpsons LardLad Donut Factory where Homer Simpson's favorite pink-sprinkled sweets are made. As part of a partnership with the SoCal staple Randy’s Donuts, attendees can pick up ready-made donuts with suspiciously green icing that may be toxic waste from Mr. Burns's power plant.

From there, the factory opens up with a bevy of interactable activities including a chance to sing along to the end credits songs of Bob's Burgers and get a shareable video from Bob's Record-O-Matic, take a Solar Opposites-themed Goobler stress test and get a corresponding Goobler stress ball based on the results, and search for the Bonsai Master's Sword in a Hit-Monkey-themed katana factory to win an SDCC-exclusive set of pins.

American Dad fans can also come to the rescue of the show's disguise-loving extraterrestrial star, Roger. His cries for help will ring throughout the activation as he's stuck in a CIA lab and being dissected. Following Stan and Francine's example from "The Scarlett Getter," participants will have to quickly reassemble the alien in an Operation-like game, a task easier said than done with his strange organs scattered all over the place. Whether that operation is successful or not, a photo opportunity with Roger's golden turd will be available thereafter

For anyone who needs a quick rest after all the adult animation activity, the Animayhem Factory is stocked with a break room courtesy of three of 20th Television Animation - The Great North. A fridge in the room can be opened for some refreshing cold air during the red-hot summer while also providing a view of the Tobin family's idyllic Alaskan cabin.

Hulu's Animayhem activation opens on July 25 from 11:30 a.m. through 7 p.m., July 26-27 from 9:30 a.m. through 7 p.m. daily, and July 28 from 9:30 a.m. through 5 p.m. Stay tuned here at Collider for all of our coverage of SDCC throughout the weekend. Get an exclusive look at the Animayhem factory in the gallery above.

[stepswowdsen]

【Magi】 JuAli AU: Judar decides to play the "dodge ice shards" game with Alibaba 🖤❤️💛🐈‍⬛☀️

Intro Rambles

I drafted some JuAli AU dialogue scripts 🐈‍⬛☀️🖤❤️💛

I thought about a JuAli scenario where Judar occasionally comes to Alibaba to see him during one of their trysts, and plays games where Judar flings ice shards at him while flying in the air and chasing after him. ❄️🔥

Judar plays all sorts of games with him like, "Dodge ice shards!!!" just to entertain himself because he wants someone to play with.

At the very least, Alibaba figures this would be good sparring practice for him.

In my JuAli AU, while they’re still Enemies, Judar has a mindset towards Alibaba that's something like, "I seriously can't stand your type. I want to destroy you."

JuAli in the Enemies to Lovers phase is so fun to think about. I love thinking about their initial hostility and sexual tension 😌🖤❤️💛

I thought it'd be hot to portray JuAli's initial hostility and Judar's initial curiosity in him while he's still violently tsun 🤭❤️

My dialogue scripts are under the cut as usual 💫

Dialogue Scripts

Rambles

Anyways, here’s my JuAli dialogue scripts ✨

I just got the chance to make some colour edits for my HC version of Alibaba with tan skin.

I was gonna post them yesterday, but I decided to edit them right now.

I wanted to write them bonding and getting to know each other better <3 I just got the chance to write the rest of my rambles. 👍

Personal Notes

I was thinking about translating some of my future JuAli comic ideas over to JP so that EA/JP Magi fans can still read it ❤️

I chose this line:

Judar: That’s right……. Excite me more!

ジュダル：そうだ……俺をもっと、もっと、興奮させてやるよ！

(Judaru: Souda…… Ore wo motto, motto, koufun sasete yaru yo!)

As stated above, I chose the verb 興奮 (koufun, "excitement; stimulation; agitation; arousal") so the line could be read as Excite me!" or "Make me more excited/aroused!" And I wanted to include both meanings.

I also drafted this alt version:

Judar: Excite me more!

ジュダル：俺をもっとドキドキさせてやるよ！

(Judaru: Ore wo motto doki doki sasete yaru yo!)

This line could be read as "Excite me more!" or "Make my heart pound with excitement!"

Inspiration

I imagined that Judar goes like “…” and “That expression…” when Alibaba rises up to the challenge.

It’s a deliberate reference to Ch. 48 (when Alibaba breaks through Judar’s barrier (Borg) and slashes him in the cheek) and Ch. 71 (when Alibaba and Morgiana fight Judar)

Alibaba slashes Judar in the cheek

Magi: Vol. 5 - Ch. 48 (Balbadd Arc)

Alibaba and Morgiana fight Judar

Magi: Vol. 8 - Ch. 70 (Balbadd Arc)

Magi: Vol. 8 - Ch. 71 (Balbadd Arc)

I'm gonna use Viz's HD scans for this since I want to show Ohtaka's art in HD.

As said before, I think that Judar's initial curiosity in Alibaba comes from him being drawn to Alibaba, someone who's the exact opposite of him in personality, mindsets/beliefs and goals/ideals, etc. 💞

I imagine that Judar would occasionally visit Alibaba and play these kinds of games with him. Judar thinks it’s fun, but it’s not so fun for Alibaba (at first)

I think that Alibaba does eventually grow accustomed to Judar’s antics and grows to find these kinds of games fun, since it’s pretty much like sparring? Just more tense, due to how dangerous but mischievously playful Judar is.

He eventually gets used to Judar seeking weird forms of entertainment from being an asshole. LOL. 😂

Hakuryuu vs. Alibaba

Magi: Vol. 26 - Ch. 254 (Kou Empire Arc)

Judar confronts Alibaba on the Dark Continent

Magi: Vol. 27 - Ch. 266 (Kou Empire Arc)

The line where Judar says that he can't stand Alibaba's hypocrisy is referenced from Judar and Hakuryuu’s dialogue in the Kou Empire arc.

Especially since Judar and Hakuryuu perceive Alibaba's unwillingness/hesitance to use any means to take back his country (Balbadd) as naivety and weakness.

Since Judar and Hakuryuu (and others, in-narrative) fundamentally misunderstood Alibaba’s goals, they voice similar sentiments on (what they perceive as) Alibaba's hesitance/inaction with Balbadd as naivety and moral hypocrisy, etc.

(Gonna use the Magi: EN Fan-TL by Sense Scans for this, since I wanna show the dialogue)

JuAli Core Memes

This is so JuAli core LMFAO 😭 😂

Kinda reminds me of that one meme (except these two are obviously not related)

Local hissy cat (Judar) bats his paw at the golden retriever puppy (Alibaba) 🐈‍⬛ 🐕

Misc Rambles

Queued a JuAli dialogue script to post tonight ^^

I started writing down some ideas once I came back home.

It started out as just a couple lines, but then I got carried away.

I wanted to add to my rambles since I always prefer to post my art and writing ideas (dialogue scripts) with commentary on my thoughts and ideas.

Gonna make a reminder to myself to write my posts on Notion first then transfer them here

Cuz there's been a bunch of times where Tumblr logged me out while writing a post (thankfully I copy pasted everything first)

My internet has been ASS recently like it just randomly disconnects so often. So it took a while for this post to get uploaded

Previous Rambles

Copy pasting my previous rambles from this post

I think conflict and tension are the spice of life in writing, so I love it in my ships as well. That's why I amp up their initial hostility. 👍🙏

But I imagine they'll slowly progress into a more domestic relationship as they get closer 🤭 :)

Especially when post-Kou Empire, Judar seems more committed to giving Alibaba empty threats than actual violence LOL.

Judar recognizes the qualities that others to him (Alibaba), but just can't understand it at first.

But, as my friend Jaqui said, deep down, it only shows that deep down, he's eager to know and wants to understand. 💗

JuAli's potential development for understanding each other and connection, and how they're the true opposites in Magi irt their personalities and goals/ideals, really makes them the perfect couple to me. 💞💘

I think that their personalities balance each other out perfectly. ❤️🖤💛

He truly doesn't hate him. Alibaba is someone who's the complete opposite of him in personality and goals/motivations/ideals, so he especially clashes with him irt their worldviews.

As Jaqui said, in the Kou Empire arc, Judar and Hakuryuu perceive Alibaba's unwillingness/hesitance to use any means to take back his country (Balbadd) as naivety and weakness, but both people in the fandom, and narrative (in-universe), misunderstood Alibaba's goals.

Their idealism clash is what makes Alibaba's relationships with them so interesting to me :) 💞

And I agree with Jaqui. Like they expected Alibaba to take back his country, but that was never what he wanted. They think he abandoned Balbadd.

Meanwhile Alibaba just wanted to protect Balbadd without ruling it, and wanted it to be independent without a king.

Alibaba is so straightforward and easy to understand, but Judar just can't figure him out or understand him at all, and that infuriates him.

Alibaba seems like someone who's almost of a completely different world to him.

But he (Judar) just isn't ready to confront that.

[embyrinitalics]

Hail, whump queen! Do you have any thoughts or head canons about the end of TotK?

Ah! You're too kind. 😌 Though I usually feel more like a whump jester than a whump queen. 😅

Mmkay, so. I have Complicated Feelings toward TotK. I had fun while playing it, but trying to reconcile it as a sequel to BotW left me with a bad aftertaste (WHERE IS KASS), and as a result I haven't spent a lot of time thinking about the story or the ending or what came afterwards.

But what I HAVE spent a lot of time thinking about is How The Heck Does TotK Make Any Sense, and I have a timey-wimey cockamamie theory at which you are all sure to HOOT.

You know how there was always a sky full of floating islands and this mind-bogglingly huge underworld above and below Hyrule for thousands of years and everyone just never noticed. That really bugged me from day one. And whenever it gets brought up people are always just like "Oh yeah, it was the Upheaval."

What is that even supposed to mean? Ganondorf lifted the castle into the air and now the sky is filled with islands and we have giant chasms leading to an underworld? How is "it was the Upheaval" an explanation of anything?

But then I was thinking about how the game begins with time travel, and how Zelda has always been fast and loose with their time travel rules, and how maybe "the Upheaval" is just what people call it because it's all they can see to blame it on, but what they're really referring to is "the moment Zelda went back in time."

There's a couple different time travel options, right? You have alternate timelines, like Ocarina of Time, where you create multiple branches when you go back and forth in time and change things. You have the Back to the Future type, where there's only one timeline, but only the time-traveler notices things have changed. You have Dr. Who, which has no rules whatsoever except for when it does.

Tears of the Kingdom presents itself as more of a predestination paradox type time travel, which is more Star Trek-y. Ganondorf recognizes Link and Zelda beneath the castle before she ever goes back in time and there is a mural of her turning into the Light Dragon in the catacombs, implying that she has already done what she's about to do. If that's so, then she and Mineru have also sent the islands into the sky in preparation for Link's future, and basically everything that he discovers after his awakening has been there all along, unbeknownst to everyone.

OR HAS IT?!?

I think the game isn't a predestination paradox at all. I think, prior to their jaunt beneath the castle, there are no islands in the sky, nor Dragon fly-through routes through Hyrule's underbelly, nor any of the new, inexplicable things that crop up between BotW and TotK.

I think that when Zelda traveled back in time, she altered history. During the events of BotW there were no sky islands and no Light Dragon and no geoglyphs. But unlike in Back to the Future, when Zelda alters history everyone is aware that things have changed. They just don't know why. They blame the "sudden appearance" of sky islands and a Light Dragon and geoglyphs and everything else on the strange event they could all see happen at Hyrule Castle: the Upheaval.

Now maybe I'm just a dumb-dumb and this was what we were supposed to think all along? But I didn't get that during my play-through. O_o

BUT WAIT, you may be thinking. If that's the case, how did Ganondorf recognize Link and Zelda beneath the castle in the intro, and how was there already a mural of her turning into the Light Dragon down there? And I'll give ya another one! How do we see the Light Dragon flying around the Great Sky Island when Link still has the decayed Master Sword in his possession?!

SO THIS IS THE HOOTABLE PART.

Things don't change when Zelda goes back in time. Things change when Zelda picks up the Secret Stone.

The stone itself is a magical magic-amplifying device, and rather than the instant Zelda warps backwards being the time-altering event, I think that it was the moment she touched (and "activated," if you will) the stone and it's timey-wimey powers that the timeline began altering.

At that point she is existing in a midst of a magically-created spacetime paradox bubble, wherein time no longer functions linearly for her. She exists as the princess beneath the castle, as the time traveler in the past, and as the dragon in the sky simultaneously. All of the events that are currently happening (from our perspective), have happened (in Hyrule's past), and will happen (in Link's future), are all swirling and altering the timeline at once. This is why Ganondorf already knows her name, and why she exists as the Light Dragon in the sky despite Link not having sent back the Master Sword yet.

BUT WAIT, you may exclaim. WHAT ABOUT THE MURAL.

Ok so. This is a cop out, but listen. We don't ACTUALLY see the contents of the mural. It's covered up until later. So. It might not have been an image of the Light Dragon at all. PERHAPS.

...

Look. I know this whole theory is riddled with holes and I don't think this is what the developers intended at all and I'm not even sure I really believe it myself. But if I had to write a fic and I needed the events I see in the game to make sense, this might be a route I would take. Just so my brain would stop hurting.

So! That's totally not what you asked but there you have it. 😂

Thanks for writing in!

[imperatorcaesaraugustus]

you know what time it is! it's the long-awaited (?) return of Thought D: Thoughts on Hot D, where i tell everyone what's going through my head immediately after watching House of the Dragon.

season 2, episode 1

love the new intro. much better than the season 1 intro

there's no Daeron (Viserys and Allicent's third son in the books, who was being fostered by his great uncle in Oldtown). this is a massive disappointment for me, and i have little hopes of it being rectified

it would have been nice to see more of Cregan Stark and anything at all of Jayne Arryn. really expected Jace to spend more time in the north than that. still, liked what i saw. love that they mentioned how the dragons refused to cross the wall

good to know that criston cole is still... performing his duties

Alyn of Hull!

was that Hugh Hammer in the throne room? what the hell is he doing in King's Landing?

it seems incredibly risky for Rhaenyra to be flying unaccompanied in the stormlands after they've declared for Aegon

Larys' motives are a complete mystery to me right now, which is very book-accurate

those balls in the small council room have been nothing but a liability. no wonder they're not there by the time Game of Thrones happens

i was not expecting to see Mysaria or her Accent this episode, but i'm glad we did because i like Mysaria and her Accent

more of the runtime was Blood and Cheese than i was expecting

(for those unfamiliar with Fire and Blood - which, to be clear, is entirely reasonable - the killing of Jahaerys in the books is done by a butcher and a rat catcher. their names are unknown, so the book refers to them as Blood and Cheese. no names were given in the show, so i will also refer to them as such)

changing the intended target to Aemond (it was always supposed to be one of Aegon's sons in the book) is interesting. it makes Daemon a less detestable character (which was certainly unintentional, given what i've heard about the showrunner's opinions on Daemon), but gives a weird amount of agency to Blood and Cheese

"they have different rat catchers for upstairs" what is this? why is this? what are you on about?

surely they did not have to walk directly across the throne room. surely there was another route

this assassination is such a clusterfuck

i didn't realize until now that Aegon doesn't have a younger son in the show like he does in the book

in the book, Helena is forced to choose which of her sons - Jahaerys or Maegor(?) - gets killed. she chooses Maegor, so they kill Jahaerys. changing that so instead they can't differentiate Jahaerys and Jahaera definitely makes them less cartoonishly evil and more weirdly hapless

actually this whole Blood and Cheese thing is weirdly hapless from start to end

can't believe she just walks in on criston fucking Allicent. surely they would have taken any amount of precaution to prevent people from doing that

so, when Allicent is in the sept, she says three names as she lights the candles: Alerie Florent, Viserys Targaryen, Lucerys Velaryon. now, i am more likely than most people to recognize an obscure Ice and Fire name drop, but i do not know who the fuck Alerie Florent is. based on the fact that she is a) apparently dead, b) presumably important to Allicent, and c) from a major house of the Reach, i assume she's Allicent's mother, but i don't recall that name ever having been given before now

anyway, i'm still enjoying the show and can't wait for next week

[pumpkinpartynoelle]

Deltarune Angel Theory! Who it is, what changes in the weird route, why we do it, + more!

Variable Angel Theory Part 1:

Hi! Noelle Holiday here!

It's my first time posting anything like this so I'm not totally sure how it works, but here's my best shot. Spoilers for everything currently released in Undertale and Deltarune, and hopefully, spoilers for parts of Deltarune that haven't been released yet too!

A quick multi-paragraph intro with like 15 disclaimers:

Okay so I've been binging theorycrafting videos and Deltarune and Undertale playthroughs over and over for the past month and I think I've just cracked the code and seen into the matrix.

So, this started when I noticed that Spamton calls me Angel, which is weirdly specific, right? But then I noticed one of the Addisons also calls me Angel, and both of them only do it in the weird route. So that got me wondering why, of course! And I think I've connected enough dots that I might be able to predict not only who the angel is, but how the weird route changes things, exactly why we do it, what will happen in chapter 3's weird route, and even some mostly-unrelated stuff involving characters like Seam.

I'm more confident in this than almost any other major Deltarune theory I've heard, despite how little we know about the angel. I wouldn't be sharing it, and wouldn't have put this much time into a full writeup, if I didn't believe in it. And, given how limited our information is, don't expect rock solid, undeniable evidence for each point I cover. I'm working with what I've got. This is a theory about stuff we're probably years away from seeing to fruition, so I have to make a lot of predictions.

A lot of this uses @jarujaruj's theorycrafting method, which involves considering the story from a writer's perspective rather than relying on pure hard logic, but we're also going to be going over most of the info surrounding the angel in both Deltarune and Undertale, both stated and implied. So, if you're familiar with Jaru's theories and find them hard to believe, you might not get much out of this one either. I won't go over those theories in much detail in this post, as it's already long enough, and while I'll reference Jaru's theories a few times, even if they're wrong I don't think it would invalidate much of this theory. You also don't need to know them to understand most of what I'll be discussing, however, a few details make more sense with them in mind.

I'm looking for thematic parallels and interesting story implications just as much as the hard facts, but since we have so few hard facts to work with, you'll see more of the former I think. This will take a while, so stick with me if you care about the evidence.

Here's my theory:

The angel changes depending on which route you play, and when you play the weird route, Noelle is the angel.

Not only that, but you end up turning me into the angel yourself, at least in the weird route, but maybe in other routes too. And, borrowing from Jaru, every route (except maybe one) ends in the angel deciding to reset back to the start of the game. Look into his stuff for why I think that part is the case, but it's not quite as relevant to my theory as much of the info I'll be showcasing here. I'll still be discussing it though, as I think it explains a lot of what happens in the weird route. Much like Undertale's merciless route, it makes more sense after a reset.

I'll be going over all the evidence I can think of in this post, and giving my thoughts on who the angel is likely to be in each route, and why I think it varies.

Direct "angel" mentions in Deltarune:

Spamton and Addison call me angel in the weird route

I say I would hypothetically grow angel wings and fly out of the ferris wheel when I'm riding it with Susie

Alphys calls her cat that she may or may not have a "perfect angel"

The ANGEL'S HEAVEN

Discussion of the angel doll in Rudy's hospital room. The doll was made by Dess and I.

Alvin talks about the angel a few times

There's a clear pattern here of angels being associated with me. Not exclusively, but far more than any other character, other than maybe Alvin, but he's a priest of the angel so I'm not sure that counts for as much. Let's go over each one to see what they can tell us.

"Angel" is used here just like a nickname, there's not much clear context beyond that for its use. Spamton says it when you've cleared out all the weird route encounters and talk to him at his dumpster.

Here's that full conversation:

* [Angel], [Angel]

* ARE YOU LOOKING FOR THE [Ring] of [Thorns]?

* THEN [[Why]] GO TO A DUMPSTER!!!

* THat'll be 1997 KROMER.

* HERE'S YOUR [Ring]! CAREFUL, IT MIGHT [Sting] * EAHEAHEAH

* (You got the ThornRing.)

Addison, specifically the pink Addison, though I'm not sure it matters all that much which one it is, calls me "angel" in a similar way, as a nickname with no clear meaning behind it.

Here's that conversation:

Addison: * If you're something else, maybe a Dating Shoes isn't right...?

Addison: * Maybe I could interest you in a FreezeRing?

Noelle: * Huh...? A ring...?

Noelle: * Faha, sorry, I don't think WE need something like that!

Addison: * C'mon, angel! You can't get stronger without good equipment!

Noelle: * Stronger...? R-right, I guess that's how it works here...

Following this, of course, Kris (or the voice associated with them) has me get the ring despite not being able to afford it, presumably by attacking the Addison with iceshock.

So, clearly there's a pattern to this, right? I could see *one* person calling me angel being a coincidence, but the fact that it's two different people, and both only on the weird route, feels too intentional to ignore, but there's not much meaning you can derive from the way it's used here other than establishing a strong connection between me and the angel, and specifically on the weird route. Additionally, the fact that it's associated with acquiring rings both times could mean something, maybe involving the romantic implication of the rings? It's something to keep in mind!

This isn't enough to say I *am* the angel though, even if that might be a possible implication. We can only be confident that there's a connection, so let's keep going.

2. This one is interesting, being an association I have with angels that isn't on the weird route, one that may not mean much on its own but combined with the other two we just went over is clearly important. I've included a bit more context than is probably needed, because I think it's relevant later.

Here's the conversation:

Susie: * So, uh... Ferris wheels, huh.

Susie: * Kinda makes you wonder what car they were built for.

Noelle: * (It's... it's different than riding one with Kris...)

Susie: * ... the hell's wrong, you scared of heights?

Noelle: * No! No, I... I love heights! Haha!

Susie: * You're, uh, shaking.

Noelle: * Well, um, maybe, I'm a little scared, but... I...

Noelle: * To be honest, I... I actually like... scary things.

Susie: * ... what do you mean?

Noelle: * When we were little, me and my sister would stay up...

Noelle: * And go past our bedtime watching horror movies.

Noelle: * At first I cried, but now... it's like... watching them...

Noelle: * Makes me feel... comforted...?

Susie: * Comforted? I guess I do like slime and blood...

Noelle: * It's scary, but I can just turn it off, right?

Noelle: * Now it's mostly... people, that are scary. Haha.

Susie: * You can just say you mean me.

Noelle: * Haha... umm... well... I guess y-you too, but...

Noelle: * But that's... what's... NICE about you, y'know?

Susie: * Nice!? The hell does that mean???

Noelle: * You're the... good kind of scary.

Noelle: * You aren't afraid to... break the rules, y'know?

Noelle: * ... I wish I could do crazy stuff like you.

Susie: * So, um...

Susie: * If YOU could do something crazy right now,

Susie: * What would you do?

Noelle: * U-umm... Well, I... I...

Noelle: * I'd... I'd jump out the window!

Noelle: * It's a dream, right?

Noelle: * I'd grow big angel wings,

Noelle: * And fly as far as I can, gazing back at it all...

Noelle: * The skyline shining like Holiday lights.

Susie: * ... that's kinda... beautiful?

Susie: * Wait, you wouldn't seriously jump out, would you!?

Noelle: * Hahaha!! No promises!

I actually noticed this one pretty late into crafting this theory, it almost felt like a smoking gun at the time, but obviously given what we've discussed so far this isn't enough on its own. It *is* a third instance of my being associated with the angel, undeniably a pattern at this point.

Growing big angel wings could be like not just being the angel, but becoming the angel. Flying above everything and looking down at all of it sounds like what the angel's role may be, to watch over and protect people, as Alvin will hint later. This solidifies the angel association even more and implies that I might become it at some point, but that implication is still a bit weak for now, so let's move on.

3. Alphys's saucer of milk. I was inclined to think this one doesn't mean much, but for the sake of being thorough, let's give it a good once over.

* Oh, this saucer of milk?

* I-It's for my kitty, MewMew! She's a perfect angel!

* ... uh? What does she look like...?

* W... well, I've never actually s-seen her, b-but...

* Ever since I started putting out milk, it's been disappearing.

* S... So I'd like to think that there's a cat.

* M... My cat.

There's enough mystery here that it could potentially mean something significant, but then we get the reveal to that mystery in the next chapter.

* Hey Kris, this free milk? It's amazing.

* It just magically refreshes itself over night.

So presumably, it's just Susie, and may just be a joke. However, this does give Susie a minor association with being an angel as well! Given how serious of a topic the angel is, I'm inclined to think this, while definitely a joke, isn't *just* a joke. We'll come back to it later, because it might be important.

4. The ANGEL'S HEAVEN is a pretty unclear concept. Whatever it is, Ralsei seems to think the heroes will banish it, or at least try to. It seems to be associated with the Roaring, but that's also an unclear concept. I'm inclined to believe Jaru's theory on this, that the Angel's Heaven is the reset at the end of the game, and the Roaring is the release of magic back into the light world, but it could mean something else. However, I don't think we have enough information about it to draw any significant conclusions about who the angel might be from whatever the Angel's Heaven is, unless it's a reset, the potential of which I'll be giving my thoughts on later. It's something to keep in mind either way, because whatever the Angel's Heaven is, it's obviously very important. Moving on!

5. Here's where we start getting into some bigger evidence for the specifics of my theory: the angel doll in Rudy's hospital room.

* (It's an angel doll.) * (Its lack of facial features is unsettling.)

* That angel? * Noelle n' Dess made it in youth group.

* It's kind of like a good luck charm to me now.

* Oh, right, you and Azzy tried to make one too...

* But you wasted the whole time making huge wings for it!

And, with Susie:

* (It's an angel doll.) * (Its lack of facial features is unsettling.)

Susie: * ... so why do you collect creepy dolls?

Rudy: * Hey, Noelle and her sister made that. Respect it!

Susie: * (Noelle's sister...)

So, weirdly, chapter 2's dialogue doesn't really reveal much, at least not much that you can't infer from other information. It tells us that Susie probably cares somewhat about whatever happened to Dess, but that's it.

Chapter 1's dialogue though, WOW there's a lot here, way more than you'd expect from such a short conversation. Let's break it down line by line, since I think we need to. I'll be drawing heavily on the thematics of this since we have so little hard evidence on the topic, and if this means anything at all, which it probably does, it's likely some non-literal foreshadowing.

* (It's an angel doll.) * (Its lack of facial features is unsettling.)

The fact that it's a doll could be referencing the puppet motif, the idea that somehow even the angel is beholden to fate, even its choices don't matter.

The lack of a face could mean that the angel's identity is unclear, could change, or is unimportant. I think all 3 are true. It's unclear because we don't know who it is, it could change because I think the route you take changes who the angel is, and it's unimportant because I think that, no matter who the angel is, they'll probably end the game by resetting back to chapter 1.

* That angel? * Noelle n' Dess made it in youth group.

The doll having been explicitly created by specific people could mean that the angel is created too, like an arts and crafts project. You might build up the angel over the course of the story. Plus, it's another association I have with the angel. This also associates Dess with the angel, but since she's already my sister, that might not mean anything new.

You could maybe argue the same for Susie's association, that she's my love interest, but the connection there is less solid, and Susie is an established main character, so I think there's merit to considering her association to the angel more separately. Don't count this as a full dismissal of Dess's connection though. I'd like to look into it, but we know so little about Dess that it's hard to really say much for it.

* It's kind of like a good luck charm to me now.

This line probably means the least. It could be a reference to the angel's role potential role as a protector, though. There's a decent chance Rudy will die by the end of the game. If he does die, and I become the angel, my resetting at the end of the game to bring him back, and undoing all of the damage done by the weird route, could be considered protecting him, like a good luck charm. However, that's a lot of ifs, too much speculation to be sure just yet.

* Oh, right, you and Azzy tried to make one too...

Kris and Asriel trying to make an angel is another point in favour of the angel being "made". Kris is our way of interacting with the world after all, so it makes sense that if the angel varies depending on the route, it would be Kris that makes them.

As a bonus, if Jaru's theory on the nature of Asriel (and Ralsei) is correct, and I strongly believe it is, this makes even more sense, for reasons I'm sure are clear if you're familiar with it.

* But you wasted the whole time making huge wings for it!

Wings, thematically, are heavily associated with freedom, not just in Deltarune but throughout media in general. Freedom is something we know Kris desperately wants from many sources, most clearly their interactions with the soul and with Spamton. Given the terrible fate this world seems to have in store, it's something everyone might want. This could mean that, if you focus solely on your freedom, you'll run out of time to make the angel, you won't make one that's complete enough to give you what you want, or, more vaguely, you won't achieve what you're after.

6. Father Alvin's dialogue is kind of a lot to go through, just because he's a priest of the angel, and as such, anything he says could potentially relate. However, most of it doesn't seem as relevant as you might expect, and, to be honest, I remembered him having more to say. Either way , there's still some interesting stuff here.

In chapter 1, if you select "Nothing" after he asks you if anything is weighing on your mind, Alvin says this:

* I understand. * I hope in time you may find the words you seek.

* Let the Angel's power light your way.

This associates the angel with "power". It's a very vague word, but it's used consistently at save points, implying the angel has a connection to saving and loading (and thus, potentially, resets). Of course, it's also used in the weird route. The whole purpose of the weird route, seemingly, is to gain power, and specifically for Noelle (me) to gain power. As I'm already the most strongly associated with the angel, this farther strengthens the connection. Kris is also connected to power, of course, but as I believe your actions determine who the angel is, and Kris is who the player acts through to affect the world, that connection is already accounted for in my theory.

While it could probably be assumed, this also tells us that the angel is likely a very powerful entity. If anyone's choices matter, it's theirs, but I'm not convinced even they can break the theme of the game. We'll explore the most powerful entities known in Undertale and Deltarune later, to see if we can draw any parallels.

Next, chapter 2.

Selecting "Gerson" as a conversation topic yields this:

* It's been a few years since my father passed on...

* Fans of his famous book series, Lord of the Hammer...

* We still received condolences from them until just recently.

* A brave man, brilliant, and sharp.

* Kris, it is a shame you were not able to have him as a teacher.

* And, difficult for Ms. Alphys, as his replacement.

* Let us pray that the Angel will smile upon her.

Selecting "Hammer" gives this response:

* As per the ritual, a hammer is buried in the earth here.

* To symbolize his existence.

* To connect his spirit to the divine.

* Originally a smith by trade, he began writing history...

* And made a turn into telling stories,

* As a means to entertain his children.

* That such a story, created for such a simple purpose,

* Could blossom into such a large, wonderful, world-changing thing...

* That is the majesty of words, Kris.

* My father was blessed to have such a talent for writing.

There's probably not too much to get out of this. The angel is associated, seemingly, with watching over people, and protecting or guiding them, and may be associated with Alphys. Specifically though, the angel is implied as distinct from Alphys, so this connection does nothing to support Alphys potentially *being* the angel, just having some connection. As a student in her class, this of course supports my own connection, but it also could support anyone else in the class.

This also seems to support the ritual of placing monster dust on an important item so that the monster's essence may live on, being connected in some way to the angel, or "the divine". This implies a connection with everyone in the graveyard, and anyone still living who may be associated with this ritual.

Again, those who know of Jaru's Asriel/Ralsei theory will understand why I think this may be supportive of Ralsei being connected to the angel, and by extension, maybe Asriel or even Kris. Outside of that speculation though, I see nothing else from this. The undead have yet to clearly establish themselves as much of a presence in Deltarune, as opposed to Undertale.

Alvin's other dialogue discusses sin, but I can't find anything particularly noteworthy in it, other than sin being associated with a couple lines in Sans's boss fight in Undertale, and by extension the merciless route as a whole. I might come back to this later, but right now, it doesn't tell us much.

Direct "angel" mentions in Undertale:

You might be wondering why I'm bothering with Undertale's angel mentions when we're talking about Deltarune. While they're different games, they're parallel stories, so unless a contradiction is shown or implied between the rules and themes of Undertale and Deltarune, I think it's safe to consider Undertale's lore as part of this discussion, and I feel it would be incomplete if I didn't look into it. Plus, Undertale literally has the Delta Rune in it, and a lot of this information is directly related to Gerson's lore on that.

Here are all of the "angel" mentions:

Gerson talks about the angel when discussing the meaning of the Delta Rune

An old inscription on a wall mentions the angel

The Riverman (or is it the Riverwoman?) mentions the angel

First up, Gerson!

While we go over this, we'll have to figure out what we can carry over from Undertale's Delta Rune into Deltarune's Delta Rune, since some of the details apply too specifically to Undertale to transfer easily. However, we can't 100% dismiss ANYTHING said here as unrelated without some serious consideration, as we're discussing the Delta Rune itself. So you can consider this sort of a Deltarune Undertale Delta Rune interlude.

That emblem:

* Eh? * You don't know what that is?

* What are they teaching you kids in school nowadays...? * Wa ha ha!

* That's the Delta Rune, the emblem of our kingdom. * The Kingdom...

* ... of Monsters.

* Wahaha! * Great name, huh? * It's as I always say...

* Ol' King Fluffybuns can't name for beans!

There are several reasons why I don't think Deltarune has a "Kingdom of Monsters". Here are just a few:

No one mentions it

There's a human in Hometown

There's enough intermingling for there to be a book on how to care for humans in the librarby

There's enough intermingling for there to be "monsters 4 humans" dating ads (Kris clicking on Poppup)

Granted, there are probably still tensions between Humans and Monsters, but whatever they are, I don't think it's enough to cause a complete schism like in Undertale.

So, how much lore can we retain? The "Kingdom of Monsters" is probably out. Does Deltarune have an equivalent? Sort of. The "Kingdom of Darkness" is Deltarune's closest counterpart, being trapped in a different plane you fall down into, for example.

However, the Delta Rune seems completely absent from the dark worlds, bar one location: Castle Town. This is also the only place directly called a "Kingdom of Darkness", by Ralsei. As Ralsei was its only inhabitant, and the Delta Runes were already all over Castle Town when we first got there, this associates Ralsei with the Delta Rune, and by extension, the angel.

This is a little strange, since the Delta Rune is otherwise exclusively a light world thing (barring one example we'll discuss in a moment), implying Ralsei has some connection to the light world. Seeing as he looks almost exactly like Asriel, and his name is an anagram, he at the very least has some connection to a specific lightner, so this isn't out of the question, especially given how religious Asriel is.

However, the Delta Rune, seemingly, can't be the emblem of the "Kingdom of Darkness", at least not primarily, given how often it's used by lightners who have, presumably, never heard of dark worlds. However, the "Kingdom of Darkness" may only be associated with Ralsei's Castle Town, rather than all dark worlds, which would explain the Delta Rune's presence there exclusively. This could tell us that Ralsei knows more about the light world than most, something that seems to be true given the specific directions he gives us to the unused classroom at the start of chapter 2, as well as all the strange lore he seems to know.

The weirdest placement of the Delta Rune, the one that seems to break this pattern, is in Seam's seap. It's prominent in the top left of Seam's shop's background. This, combined with the fact that the music that plays is named "Lantern" for no clear reason, gives Seam a weirdly strong connection to light/the angel, at least compared to any other darkner besides Ralsei.

Could Seam be considered a light in the dark because of a potential relationship with a lightner? As a worn down old plush, Seam was probably very beloved. Or, could that light in the dark theming mean that Seam absorbed a lightner's soul at some point? Spamton implies that's a possibility, as he tries to do it with Kris. Whatever the case, it places Seam in a weird spot. We'll consider Seam more later, there's a lot I want to talk about, some parts much more speculative than others, but there might be enough information to take a decent guess at his origins.

Emblem's meaning:

* That emblem actually predates written history. * The original meaning has been lost to time...

* All we know is that the triangles symbolize us monsters below, and the winged circle above symbolizes...

* Somethin' else.

* Most people say it's the 'angel,' from the prophecy...

Ironically enough, despite Gerson knowing they symbolize monsters in Undertale, I'm actually less sure about what the triangles mean in Deltarune than I am for the winged circle. It may still mean just monsters, but that doesn't feel quite right. The implication seems to be that the angel is more powerful than everyone, including Kris, and the disparity of power between monsters and humans doesn't seem to be a thing anymore. Monsters and humans seem to be on a more level playing field in Deltarune than they were in Undertale, seemingly having physical bodies as well, since they can wield determination.

So, I posit that, in Deltarune, the two upward-pointing triangles symbolize humans and monsters, and the downward-pointing triangle symbolizes darkners. It's still just a guess though, we may not know for sure until we get a more direct discussion of the Deltarune Delta Rune in Deltarune.

The prophecy:

* Oh yeah... * The prophecy.

* Legend has it, an 'angel' who has seen the surface will descend from above and bring us freedom.

* Lately, the people have been taking a bleaker outlook...

* Callin' that winged circle the 'Angel of Death.'

* A harbinger of destruction, waitin' to 'free' us from this mortal realm...

* In my opinion, when I see that little circle...

* I jus' think it looks neat! * Wahaha!

As for the circle, that still seems to symbolize the angel, so let's look at what it meant in Undertale. The angel is someone who's seen the surface, and has the power to free monsterkind, some way or another. This could apply to many people. Frisk, Chara, Asriel/Flowey, maybe even the player if you want to consider them enough a part of the world to have a prophecy about them. Freedom, of course, remains relevant, and may be much more relevant in Deltarune than it was in Undertale.

So, the angel is someone with an ambiguous identity, who, through murder or mercy, holds control over the freedom of those below it, perhaps as a protector, perhaps as a destroyer.

This, I think, is another point in favour of the angel in Deltarune potentially changing depending on how you play it. Even in Undertale, their identity was markedly ambiguous, and with how little information we have on the angel, the fact that attention seems to be brought to that ambiguity in both Undertale and Deltarune probably means something.

You could even argue that the angel changes depending on your route in Undertale, too. Frisk is the most prominent in the neutral route, freeing themself in a variety of ways. As they're the apparent player character (though I posit we actually play as Chara possessing Frisk, hence why we name them), they have the most versatility, but it also makes it hard to say there's any particular way Frisk "freed" everyone. Asriel explicitly frees everyone in the pacifist route, and Chara has a greater presence in the merciless route, freeing everyone from mortality. This isn't to argue that Chara is the cause of the merciless route, just that they have a greatly increased presence there. You could consider it "their route", to an extent.

It's not perfect, but it works far better than I'd expect from a pure coincidence, and you could absolutely make the argument that Frisk frees people in some way in the neutral route, or that the neutral route just doesn't count for as much, since it feels less complete and final than either of the other two routes (neutral has been called essentially "boneless pacifist"). You could also argue Frisk and Asriel share the pacifist route, as it's where everyone learns Frisk's name and they first clearly establish themself as distinct from just a nameless vessel for the player and/or Chara.

Either way, the ambiguity of the angel, and it changing based on route, is pretty clearly baked in to Undertale, and given that they're parallel stories that are likely to share a lot of themes (and already do in a multitude of ways), it factors nicely into a potential variation in the angel's identity in Deltarune as well.

What's "the surface" equivalent in Deltarune then? The light world? If so, all serious candidates so far, except for perhaps Ralsei, have seen the light world. Even for Ralsei, it's possible he's seen it, given that he knows the school's layout, and the game seemingly goes out of its way to never explicitly call him a darkner in the narration, menus, or Ralsei's own dialogue, but instead refers to him as a more ambiguous "dark world being", leaving the metaphorical door cracked open just enough for him to potentially be able to traverse the light world. Even if he is a normal darkner, it could still be argued that, as objects in the light world, every darkner has seen it, so this may not tell us much at all.

* However... * There is a prophecy.

* The Angel... * The One Who Has Seen The Surface...

* They will return. * And the underground will go empty.

The waterfall sign doesn't actually seem to tell us any new information. You could maybe see the specificity of the wording implying that the prophecy only applies to Undertale, as it specifically mentions the underground going empty, which seems to apply more to Undertale than it could to Deltarune.

However, even looking at this with more scrutiny, it's possible the angel's heaven, whatever it is, will destroy all dark worlds, or, by the time it happens, the roaring has already begun, all darkners have turned to stone, and the dark world, Deltarune's closest underground equivalent, has gone empty that way. In fact, I think the roaring being first is the implied, or even stated, order of events. There are plenty of ways to spin this that don't feel too farfetched.

* Tra la la. * The angel is coming... * Tra la la.

This tells us basically nothing. Thanks, Riverperson.

Stuff that's not direct "angel" mentions:

This section is going to go over some miscellaneous stuff. I'm not going to cover everything, because I realistically can't, but I'll cover everything that seems the most relevant to my theory.

I won't be discussing the design of the church, because, despite its obvious relevance to the angel, there's not much info I can get out of it besides the resemblance to Christianity. I tried.

First up, the character with the most angel connections, me!

Noelle, And The Purpose Of The Weird Routes:

So, right away we've got a lot of angel indicators in the character design, most clearly the dark world one. There's themes of christmas angels, snow angels, and when Queen's giant mech thing holds me at the end of Chapter 2, I'm strung up not only like a puppet, but like one of those angels you put on nativity sets.

Even my face is unseen, just like the doll, and I don't show it until I'm released from the hand and out of that angel-esque pose.

At this point, there are so many hints that I'm the angel, it feels almost too obvious! Which is why, on top of being called angel explicitly only in the weird route, I think I'm not the angel in a first playthrough. If I were the angel, and the angel's heaven is something we're trying to stop, why would we intentionally make the angel *more powerful* on a first playthrough? We wouldn't, of course!

But on a second playthrough, intentionally making me more powerful in the weird route to replace the previous route's angel makes perfect sense, and I'm the ideal candidate with all of my angel connections anyway. We're doing exactly what Queen did, albeit more harshly, and creating the angel rather than the knight. If the angel doesn't do what we want, we will simply make a new one. It's a reason for the weird route that isn't pure sadism. I don't think we'll have a repeat of Undertale's merciless route, where you do it just to see what happens. It's already been done, and the steps you take for the weird route are much more methodical and precise. This time, there's a purpose.

Plus, on a second playthrough, you'd know I have some hidden power, at least from Queen, but probably from other sources by then too. After all, the part where Queen mentions my power is immediately after the weird route section, you can't see it if you do the weird route to completion on your first playthrough, so anyone playing normally wouldn't know to make me more powerful, they have no reason to. It has to be a second playthrough, minimum, to make sense, just like the merciless route in Undertale.

So, if I'm not there for chapter 3, and it seems like I won't be, what might its weird route hold in store? How could it farther this goal? I believe the next step is to isolate me from my support network, anyone I might go to for help. That's why we killed Berdly in the first place. If I find out that Berdly actually died, the first people I go to would be the police. As such, I think we'll manipulate Toriel into killing Undyne, who is likely nearby watching over the house, as otherwise I doubt Toriel would be able to sleep soundly.

I bet we'll do it by getting Kris's health low and forcing Toriel to "protect" us with force. This is also supported by my mention of Fireshock in the hospital, as we know Toriel uses fire magic in Undertale, so she'll likely have it in the dark world, and it could serve as an equivalent to my Iceshock. We also know from Undertale that Undyne is specifically weak to heat. Over the course of the weird routes, we'll gradually eliminate anyone I could rely on except for Kris (or whoever is possessing them), letting them manipulate and mold me freely.

The fact that the angel themes are only so obvious with my dark world character design may also be meaningful. Only a certain, darker version of me is the angel. The normal me is just me. It's also interesting how much Chapter 2 seems to be trying to push me as a main character, despite my not being a normal part of the team.

As a bonus, though perhaps this is a bit of a stretch, I'm also wearing a white sheet almost like a ghost, possibly foreshadowing the death and destruction that comes with my being the angel? But that could just be coincidence given the clear angel theming the outfit already has. The pose may also invoke the idea of crucifixion. Knowing Toby's penchant for foreshadowing and double meanings, and how much the angel religion seems to share with Christianity, maybe it's intentional? Speaking of which...

Angels, Demons, and Power:

Lore on demons is incredibly sparse, far more than even something as enigmatic as the angel. Chara calls themself one. Kris has probably tried to summon one with Catti. That's it, as far as explicit mentions of the term in any even remotely serious context. However, despite this, I think it may be able to tell us a few things.

In some sects of Christianity, demons are fallen angels. I've been wondering, are demons and angels similar in Undertale/Deltarune? Or even the same thing? Maybe! Perhaps this is a bit, to borrow a term, dubious, but I think there's a case to be made for them being more similar than you might expect.

Chara matches everything we know about the angel in Undertale, and Chara also calls themself a demon. We know that the angel religion in Deltarune bears similarities to Christianity that feel more than coincidental, so angels and demons being one and the same wouldn't contradict that inspiration. What really makes me think this is important though, comes back to Power.

There are 2 beings in Undertale with power far beyond anything else: Chara, and briefly, Flowey. Flowey comes into power through his own actions, and while he couldn't have done it without our help in either route, to say we "made" Flowey into an all-powerful being is perhaps a stretch. Or, perhaps it's not. It depends on your perspective.

To say we made Chara into an all-powerful being however, not only is that perfectly reasonable, but it even seems to be the intended reading! Here's what they say:

Greetings. I am Chara. Thank you. Your power awakened me from death. My "human soul." My "determination." They were not mine, but YOURS. At first, I was so confused. Our plan had failed, hadn't it? Why was I brought back to life? You. With your guidance. I realized the purpose of my reincarnation. Power. Together, we eradicated the enemy and became strong. HP. ATK. DEF. GOLD. EXP. LV. Every time a number increases, that feeling... That's me. Now. Now, we have reached the absolute. There is nothing left for us here. Let us erase this pointless world, and move on to the next.

That's kind of explicit, isn't it? The blame lies with us. We made Chara into what they are, and we do it through mercilessly attaining Power above all else. Chara doesn't even meet the qualifications to be the angel until we make them into a demon. Even though we're making a demon in the merciless route, we're also making an angel. This all sounds pretty familiar to me!

It even ends the same way as I think Deltarune will. Chara takes control, and resets. Or, erases the world and then eventually resets.

You could also say, then, that "god" is an equivalent term to demon and angel, as that's what Flowey/Asriel calls himself in the pacifist final battle, and the angel seems to take the place of God in the angel religion. So, we're making a demon, we're making an angel, we're making a god, we're making frozen chicken, all in an attempt to drink some of that sweet sweet freedom sauce. Plus, what RPG inspired by the classics wouldn't end with confronting a god? All three routes of Undertale did it!

As for the less serious instances of "demon", I don't think Temmie's demon comic or Alphys's mention of demons ruining the later seasons of the Symptons really mean anything relevant. It's possible that the Alphys one has some meaning, so I guess let's give that a brief look:

* But make sure you don't watch past the second season

* Since they just rebooted it as Symptons Turbo

* They all started driving their own motor-vehicles

* And fighting giant giga-demons and stuff

* The main problem about that is that it kind of

* Lost the focus on family that it had earlier

* When their vehicles were shaped like animals

* And they were friends with the animal vehicles too

So, there's a chance that "when their vehicles were shaped like animals" refers to the rollercoaster cars in the second chapter, matching the second season. But the only potential "giga-demons" we might fight are the titans in the roaring, and those don't really give the impression of being things you can fight so much as forces of nature, mountains brought to life by the magic of a dark fountain, and presumably having so much magic in them that their emotions run wild and they wreak havoc (there's a lot tying magic to emotions in both Undertale and Deltarune, look into it if you're interested!). Unless the roaring happens way earlier than makes sense given the current pacing of the story, or we start fighting some giant demonic entity in chapter 3 with some kind of motor vehicle, this probably doesn't mean anything important.

If the Temmie one has any meaning, I can't for the life of me figure out where to even begin in deciphering it.

A Brief Extended Intermission To Talk About Seam:

It's time to talk about that one outlier Delta Rune again. What association does Seam have with light?

One of the possibilities I touched on before is the answer I've come to. Seam is likely the most powerful darkner we've met because Seam's so beloved by lightners.

Seam used to be owned by Catti, and possibly her family as well, passed down from person to person. That explains why Seam's a purple cat, the somewhat gothic aesthetic, why Seam's so worn down yet has been patched up multiple times, why Seam seems so old, and why Seam was the court wizard. Catti is the only lightner to mention magic as a real thing, outside of dark world contexts, and we know she involves herself in it frequently. Seam is like if she had a family member that was "more goth", as she says she wants.

So, how did Seam get to the school? How does Seam have a history with Jevil?

Catti's family is the perfect one to misplace Seam. They probably donated a bunch of items to the school, like a deck of cards, which is why Seam's known Jevil for a while. We know things get donated, because some of Kris's old books are there. I bet dad cat donated them, he's forgetful enough to accidentally miss Seam being in the box of stuff to donate, and their house is messy enough that they might not realize Seam isn't home anymore. That might also be why there are cardboard stands at the bake sale, they could be repurposed from the cardboard box used to bring Seam there.

This, I think, explains a lot of Seam's light in the dark theming. However, I don't think it's quite enough to fully justify Seam having a Delta Rune just from having a strong connection to a lightner. If angels and demons are the same thing, that could help, as we know Catti has an interest in demonology, and has looked into how to summon a demon with Kris. Seam, then, would absolutely be able to have an association with demons, and thus, angels.

I'm not fully confident that this is the only reason for Seam's Delta Rune, but it's the best idea I've got. Either way, while Seam is obviously important, I don't think Seam has enough of a presence to be a very realistic candidate for the angel on a non-weird route. Which brings us, finally, to...

The End:

Much like "kill or be killed", I think "your choices don't matter" is a theme that applies to the whole world, not just to Kris. The difference is, in Undertale, Flowey was proven wrong. In Deltarune, everything seems to be set out to prove its theme right. The secret bosses and Seam, those characters with the most knowledge of the world and its lore, seem to agree that the world's fate is sealed.

Even Ralsei, who also has a lot of lore knowledge he seemingly shouldn't, might agree with this. His approach, however, is not to lose hope, but to try to make sure his adventure with Kris and Susie is the most fun it can be. That's why he doesn't want you to think too hard about Spamton NEO. That's why he almost never asserts his will over Kris or Susie, and lets them make all the choices. When the destination is set in stone, it's best to just enjoy the journey, and he wants to make that happen for Kris and Susie. He doesn't want you to worry about a fate you can't change, so he never brings it up, and he tries to make sure you don't think about it. He only puts his foot down to stop the roaring, something that would cut that journey short, and perhaps he holds out a bit of hope that there might be some way to change fate.

I think the true message of the story isn't really "your choices don't matter", but "in a world where your choices can't affect anything on a grander scale, how will you live your life?". Jevil decides to focus purely on having fun, consequences be damned. Seam loses hope, but finds comfort in those that share his knowledge of the inevitable. Spamton tries desperately to escape his fate, but at the end of the pacifist version of his NEO fight, he finds new purpose in his existence, to live for the sake of himself and his new friends. Even when he fails to be freed, he still gives himself to his friend Kris, holding out hope that, maybe, they can break their own strings, even if he couldn't.

All we have left is figuring out how viable our candidates are for being the angel of a non-weird route. I've touched, already, on why I don't think I'll be the angel in that route (or routes, maybe), so we'll move on to who I think is the most likely:

Susie:

If I had to guess, I'd say Susie is the most likely by far of the candidates we know of to be the angel in a non-weird route.

But why? Isn't she always making her own choices? Doesn't she have the most meaningful impact on the world of any character we know of, besides the one we control? Yes, she does. And that's exactly why I think she'll become the most powerful being in the world, able to do just about anything. As the person who's choices have always mattered the most, what an irony it would be to, in the most important moment, with all this Power, have her choices not matter.

But, aside from the impact, why else do I think this? Well, first, she's the only other character who's ever been explicitly referred to as "angel". Susie is also the most powerful attacker, and will often refuse to equip items that lower her power. Power is practically baked into Susie as a concept, including power over choices. But in this world, your choices don't matter. Your fate is already sealed.

The roaring happens before the end of the world, before the angel's heaven. When Susie gains this power, the roaring will have already started. Lightners will die, darkners will turn to stone, including Lancer. Her hand will be forced. All this power, and she has no option but to reset.

But what even is Power?

I think the heart on Susie's belt may be a clue, not only to what Power is, but to Susie's eventual acquisition of it. Power is vague, but its function in Deltarune seems to at least match Determination. I think power is short for "soul power". Soul power is a very vague concept, but Determination falls under its purview, and thus the ability to save, load, and reset.

It's unclear exactly what sort of Power you gain by becoming LV 20 in Undertale, but the results seem to be much the same: control over the timeline, and perhaps even the power to attack reality itself. So, did Chara potentially retrieve the 6 human souls when we weren't looking? It doesn't seem like it, they were multiple rooms away, under the floor, and we cut immediately to the conversation with Chara after killing Asgore and Flowey, while still in the throne room.

Plus, Chara is a human, and while perhaps they're not one anymore by the end of the merciless route, or perhaps being a spirit means they're not human anymore, it would still feel a bit odd for them to have absorbed the 6 human souls, especially without us even seeing it. We see Flowey do it, why wouldn't we see Chara do it?

As such, I have to assume there are ways to attain this reality warping Power without needing human souls, which means we don't have to account for our candidate killing multiple humans to gain this Power. Or monsters as the case may be, if our candidate is Kris or some other human, as monsters can wield Determination too in Deltarune, though I don't know if that translates to other aspects of soul power.

Of course, LV is still tied to killing, and while Susie so far seems to be the most violent of our candidates, killing people to gain Power seems pretty far out of character for her, especially by Chapter 2. But Deltarune has a second system of LV used in the dark world that isn't tied to killing. You level up at the start of Chapter 2, whether you used violence or not. Maybe that holds the key?

Another piece of evidence, and a bit of a strange one, is the theme of romance with Kris. Both times someone calls me angel, it's when I'm getting a ring, and the romance themes of that are intentionally played up a bit. Kris may have a crush on Susie, that seems to be implied a few times, but most clearly by them liking Susie tea so much, by clicking on a Poppup ad for "monsters for humans in your area", and by them clearly preferring Susie when asked who they'd take to the fair at the end of chapter 2.

As I'm known to like scary things, and I mention Kris's name first when visiting the hospital after the weird route, it's possible I'll develop an unhealthy crush on Kris in the weird route, maybe even replacing my crush on Susie. Spamton even calls me Kris's "side chick" in this route, not only supporting the romance connection between Kris and I on that route, but that Kris has a different love interest as well, a "main" one, rather than a "side" one. As such, who Kris ends up in a romance with may also relate to who becomes the angel.

I can't be sure that Susie will be the angel, and while I think she is far more likely a candidate than anyone else we know of, our evidence is still limited. I'll be thorough and examine the other options as well.

Ralsei:

Ralsei is clearly based on Asriel (or maybe the other way around, as the idea for Deltarune came first), and we know that Flowey, a mysterious being with the essence of Asriel, met all the requirements to be the angel in Undertale. There are many clear parallels between Ralsei and Flowey that are easy to find if you're interested, so many that I don't see how it could possibly be a coincidence. So, if we know someone very similar to Ralsei in a lot of ways was the angel in Undertale, why do I think Ralsei won't be the angel in Deltarune?

Well, first, it feels too easy, and too much of a rehash. Deltarune is a remixed version of Undertale to some extent, right? So it would be odd for someone so much like Asriel to be the angel all over again. We also don't even know that darkners have souls in the first place, and while Ralsei is clearly no normal darkner, it still doesn't help his odds at all.

Ralsei is also never referred to as "angel", while Susie is, despite Ralsei clearly being more fitting to be called "angel" than Susie. He also, of course, knows of the angel's heaven and seeks to stop it, along with a lot of other lore knowledge, including how some future events are supposed to go. If he were the angel, he'd probably know it, and of course, knowing the lore doesn't mean he's the angel, as Jevil, Seam, and Spamton know it too.

So, aside from Ralsei having a clear association with Delta Runes, there's really not much evidence of Ralsei having a strong enough angel connection. There's the fact he has heal prayer, which may be associated with the angel. I also have heal prayer, and I think I'll be the angel. However, I think Toriel will also have heal prayer, as she's the only one to explicitly use healing magic in Undertale. I think you can have heal prayer with any sort of healing/angel association, it doesn't have to be a strong one.

The game does seem to place an odd emphasis on Ralsei being in romantic situations with Kris, like the swan boat ride, but Kris doesn't reciprocate. If romance with Kris is actually connected to who the angel is, it may work for Ralsei as well, giving him a bit more of a connection.

Ralsei is absolutely a possible candidate, I won't dismiss him. He has a few things in his favour, more than anyone but Susie. I just feel like it makes far more sense, especially from a storytelling perspective, to give Susie the role of the angel, unless there's more than one non-weird route so you can do both.

Kris:

Kris has fewer angel connections compared to either of the previous options. We know they've looked into demon-summoning, so if demons and angels are the same thing, that's a connection. They also resemble Chara, much like Ralsei resembles Flowey/Asriel, and while those connections exist and are numerous, they're not as strong as Ralsei's connections with Flowey/Asriel. Kris also has some Frisk connections, and Frisk may also meet the requirements to be an angel in Undertale. So, there's at least something here.

If the power of the angel is achieved through souls, Kris would probably need monster souls, but we don't actually know that monster souls are strong enough to grant that sort of power. They can wield determination, sure, but determination doesn't seem to be the only aspect of soul power, just part of it. After all, Kris is the only one who can seal the fountains, and they do it with their soul. Kris's soul may be unique, and I think it is, Jaru's Asriel/Ralsei theory can tell you how and why, but they don't demonstrate significantly higher power than anyone else on the team, just their own style.

Kris, unlike Susie, has not been called "angel". Kris's house has Delta Runes on it, but that's probably Toriel's design choice, not theirs. Kris is certainly mysterious, and has some unique abilities, but them being the angel feels too off. It feels like it would run counter to "your choices don't matter" if the character we control is the one to have all this Power. And if the normal route ends with them being so powerful, and we get to control it, it doesn't make sense why Seam, Jevil, and Spamton are all so convinced that the world's fate is sealed. Maybe, like Chara, they take control from us? But that, again, feels like too much of a rehash, and to do it, they've always demonstrated needing to remove their soul, seeming to be greatly weakened in the process.

It's not impossible! Certainly not! But there's just not enough evidence for me to think Kris has a strong case.

Anyone Else:

Berdly doesn't seem like an important enough character. If you kill him in a weird route and then abort it, if he's the angel in a normal route, what happens at the end? His personality also doesn't fit well for such a serious role, and we've already defeated him. It doesn't make sense from a writing perspective.

Toriel already had a major role in Undertale, I don't think she'd get one of the most important roles in Deltarune as well. It also would strike me as odd just by the vibe of it. She'll become important in chapter 3, I'm sure, but that feels like it's a little late to start getting to know the character that will become the angel.

Catti is even worse in this regard. She'll probably have a major role in chapter 4 at the earliest, and that just feels way too late to introduce your angel. The same, of course, goes for Jockington, but he also has the Berdly problem of not being suited for such a serious role.

Alvin has clear angel connections, but he doesn't even have a dialogue portrait. He doesn't seem important enough, and I think he's probably more tied up with knight business.

Lancer has nothing going for him. Absolutely nothing. He also, again, has the problem of not being suited for such a serious and dramatic role as the angel, and as a normal darkner, he should turn to stone before the angel's heaven even happens. This also rules out King and Queen.

Asriel might be an option, but again, him being the angel feels too much like a rehash, even more than Ralsei, and if we don't learn about him for a while, it'd feel kind of cheap, especially to pull the exact same stunt again as Undertale's pacifist ending.

That's about it!

Thanks for sticking with me on this, and suffering through all my ramblings about the variable angel theory, even the parts that only sort of related. Or, if you just skipped to the end, how dare you! But here's the TL;DR for you anyway:

The angel changes depending on the route. In the weird route, it's Noelle. In the normal route, it's probably Susie, but might be Ralsei, and probably ends with a reset to undo the roaring. The weird routes are about manipulating Noelle into replacing the normal angel by the end of the game, and removing Noelle's support network so she has no one but Kris to turn to. First Berdly, and in chapter 3, Undyne, so Noelle can't go the police if she finds out that what happened to Berdly was real. Seam used to be owned by Catti, before probably being accidentally donated to the school along with other toys, including playing cards, which is why he has a history with Jevil. "Power" probably refers to soul power, of which Determination is a part, and angels and demons may be the same thing.

Part 2 (it's twice as long)

[sigmadaily]

Welcome to the home of ultra high quality reference screenshots for Sigma aka Dr. Siebren de Kuiper from Overwatch.

I'm the Sigmatographer.

☼ CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL TAG LIST FOR NAVIGATION

All the categorization you can imagine.

☼ CLICK HERE FOR THE HIGH RESOLUTION DISCLAIMER

I have even higher resolution available for most of these, if you want.

☼ HOW DO I FILTER YOU OUT FROM THE SIGMA TAG???

Glad you asked!

Settings > Account Settings > Content You See > Filtered Tags > add #siebren de kuiper screenshots - This will cut down my posts to a little grey box you can un-filter at any time without blocking me!

☼ CAN I USE/MODIFY THESE SHOTS FOR...

I welcome crops/edits/touchups whatever you want to do for the screenshots, please credit the blog. If you use these for artistic reference, please let me know because I want to see your art. Let me feast my eyes on him. More. More.

•••••

More info about the blog in general below the cut, for the curious.

== WHY?? WHY IS THIS BLOG ==

because i have, ahem, a hobby.

Anyway, I figured that artists who want to draw Sigma should benefit from this uh. habit? of mine, of course.

== ...HOW?? ==

Settings > Video > Graphics Quality > Screenshot Quality > 5X Resolution

This applies a rendering multiplier on the in-game screenshot feature that activates when you hit your [print screen] button on your keyboard, temporarily straining your graphics card for a little more processing power to produce a screenshot at, in this case, 5x the resolution of the window you're playing in. These screenshots are rendered this way during recent highlights [including intros] [not including saved highlights], the hero gallery, and replays.

Almost all of my non-gallery and non-highlight screenshots are taken during replays using the 3rd person camera, replay speed at 0.1x to really control capturing the coolest moments, player outline at 0%, and covering about 5min of gameplay over the course of 3hrs on average, constantly pausing and flying around Sigma to capture his various skins + weapon customizations in various lightings, maps, settings, effects, poses, abilities, and angles.

For skins that I do not own, I am merely capturing opportune moments when I happen to play a game when a Sigma with a skin I do not own is playing, and pinning/importing that replay for screenshotting. It's mere happenstance to catch those moments, for the most part.

Skins I've screenshotted without actually owning them:

Maestro [when will my husband return from war (lootboxes)]

Beholder

Carbon Fiber [and then they re-released him so i have him now!]

Draik [which I then bought on re-release]

(As far as the Drowned Warrior skin is concerned, I hate it on principle for the fact that they released such a garbage and lazy recoloring for $60. I will not screenshot this insult.)