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[nikodiangel]

I still think about the fact that according to Nora, the man Neil and Kevin watched the Butcher murder in the East tower when they were kids was an assassin who came to murder Riko. And Riko MADE Kevin and Neil watch to send them a message. Especially Neil (you're dad works for ME and I can make him kill you too).

Then at the end of TKM Neil watches with satisfaction as Riko is murdered by his own brother who Neil manipulated into killing him. In the same east tower.

Also Tetsuji who tried to force Neil to bow was forced to bow his own head while his protégé was killed beside him and his exy career and legacy forever diminished.

Neil didn't just beat these guys at Exy is what I'm saying. Then he goes back to his team with a big grin on his face

When Jean thinks this about Neil RIGHT before the game where this all goes down:

"The smile that curved Nathaniel’s mouth was slow and hungry and hateful. It twitched a bit as Nathaniel tried to force it away, but he finally had to use the side of his hand to smooth it off his face. The look he turned on Jean was almost serene, but Jean still saw the madness in his eyes.”

I mean the layers to this are so good, I'm obsessed with the Neil/Nathaniel dynamic that goes on inside Neil

[nikodiangel]

I think one big reason why we don't consider the stars as important as before (not even pop-astrology anymore cares about the stars or the sky on itself, just the signs deprived of context) is because of light pollution.

For most of human history the sky looked between 1-3, 4 at most. And then all of a sudden with electrification it was gone (I'm lucky if I get 6 in my small city). The first time I saw the Milky Way fully as a kid was a spiritual experience, I was almost scared on how BRIGHT it was, it felt like someone was looking back at me. You don't get that at all with modern light pollution.

When most people talk about stargazing nowadays they think about watching about a couple of bright dots. The stars are really, really not like that. The unpolluted night sky is a festival of fireworks. There is nothing like it.

[nikodiangel]

do you guys ever think about how maybe riko made the backliners SA jean bc he knew that jean liked men and wanted to “break him in” in both terms of breaking jean into the team but also into his sexuality and this is why jean never looked at other boys for too long and why kevin thinks being straight is easier?

[nikodiangel]

Kinda crazy how after Neil and Andrew kiss for the first time Neil literally thinks to himself that he doesn’t “look at Matt or Nicky differently” which implies that he 1. Thought kissing Andrew once had the potential to immediately turn him gay 2. That how he looked at Kevin wouldn’t be a good marker of this

Like it was literally just one sentence that I honestly don’t think I even caught my first read or two, but makes me pretty sure that Neil had the exact train of thought of “huh I guess I liked kissing Andrew. Does that make me gay? Lemme check” *looks at Nicky* “…hmm no” *looks at Matt* “….still no… ok so I’m definitely not gay for those two…”

[nikodiangel]

My Magnum (op)us

[nikodiangel]

Listen, you know why Andrew loves Neil? Why Neil Abram Josten was the one Andrew would allow into his inner space, to allow growing roots where Andrew keeps the remaining fragments of his heart?

Because hardly anyone respects Andrew's boundaries. Renee does. Bee does. Wymack does. Andrew respects his own boundaries to the point of enforcing them at knife point.

But Neil? Neil Abram Josten?

He views Andrew's boundaries as sacred.

Renee, Bee, and Wymack would view crossing Andrew's boundaries as disrespectful at best and a violation at worst. They earned his trust that way.

But NEIL???

Neil views crossing Andrew's boundaries as a fucking sin. As blasphemous. A devoted disciple would sooner spit in their God's face than Neil ever conceiving of crossing Andrew's boundaries.

Some people would look at you erecting brick walls covered in barbed wire and would start looking for a good crack to aim a sledgehammer. Some people would watch you lock a door and try knocking, just once, to see if you'll open it for them. And some people would watch you draw a line in the sand and never dream of stepping over it.

Neil parked his ass on the other side of Andrew's barbed wired multi-layered brick wall surrounding his concrete bunker and stayed there, running his mouth. And when Andrew revealed the hidden door, Neil smiled, stayed put, and kept talking.

Andrew didn't fall for Neil because Neil wouldn't come in.

He fell because Neil waited for Andrew to come out, waited for Andrew to extend his hand, and waited for Andrew to lead him inside by his own volition.

And that's why Neil was the one who earned Andrew's "Stay".

[nikodiangel]

I feel like the aftg fandom has just swung hard from one mischaracterization of Neil to another.

Yes, Neil is not an innocent little soft-boy like a lot of fans made him out to be pre-TSC, but he isn't some cold, calculated badass either.

He took out a hit on Grayson over Thai food. He doodles fox paws in his notebooks and hates vegetables. He insults FBI agents' parking jobs and he spent a bus ride staring over the back of his seat making heart eyes at his boyfriend. He manipulated the agents while eating takeout in the interrogation room. He canonically internally panics and overthinks the entire time he's attempting to manipulate anyone. He uses people's family trauma to manipulate them. He misses his mom.

Neil Abram Josten is a multifaceted character

[nikodiangel]

#carried

Rereading tsc and then aftg and truly STRUCK by the power of Neil. How much they all needed him. He pulled the Foxes together. He stood up to Riko. He connected Jean and Renee. He believed that Kevin was better. He refused to sign to the ravens. He negotiated with Ichirou Moriyama for Kevin and Jean. HE looked at Andrew and loved what he saw. The strength of that man's back....

[nikodiangel]

Come with me down this rabbit hole if you will. The moment we the readers find out about how much Andrew cares is the moment he says "I hate you". Because of this one "throw away" line in the first book "I don't care about exy enough to hate it".

I personally think this is the exact moment HE relieved he was in love with Neil. Because he realized he does care, he cares so much it hurts. And he hates that, he hates his feelings, he hates the fact that Neil makes him feel- makes him care.

And so he hates Neil, because he loves him, because he wants him. Because he cares for him.

[nikodiangel]

my favourite underrated moment in aftg is when they're all shopping for halloween costumes and neil finds like. a milk carton costume with a cutout for his face and the caption "have you seen me?" and he holds it up in front of him, only for andrew to go "oh that's perfect neil!" like lmao?? that's such an unhinged comment to make??? we as a fandom don't talk enough about how little of a filter andrew has when he does bother to speak. what a silly man i love him

[nikodiangel]

Hey man you okay?

NO. In Foxhole Court when Neil finished his first session with Betsy he goes out and talks to Aaron, he tells him he just spoke to Betsy about exy facts and Aaron tells him he just sat there in silence. AND NEILS REACTION IS "damn...I wish I thought of that. Thats good"

Please why isn't anyone talking about this.

[nikodiangel]

me, posting stuff for over 7 different fandoms at random all on the same blog:

[nikodiangel]

like every aftg stan, tsc destroyed me and i can't stop thinking about it but there's definitely one thing that makes me go feral and it's when riko is about to hurt Neil and Jean grabs the tv as if he can take Neil out of riko's reach and then begs for Andrew to run to save him... like???? The way neil-kevin-jean protect each other??? The way all of them suffered in a different way but somehow understand each other so well???

[nikodiangel]

in chapter 11 of the raven king (thanksgiving), neil says, ‘kevin was staring at andrew like he’d seen a ghost’. i’ve always kind of wondered what that meant, but now with the added perspective of tsc, and all the parallels between andrew & jean … maybe the ‘ghost’ kevin’s seeing here is jean’s. and the implications of that- jean says in tsc that ‘even kevin didn’t know the full story, only the jagged half-lie riko fed him’, so jean doesn’t think kevin knows the truth about the ‘rumors’. but what if he does? what if when kevin heard andrew say ‘don’t ask what’ and ‘you know better’, he finally realized: riko lied. and kevin should have known better than to believe him.

[nikodiangel]

Can we TALK about how for all of TSC Jean is telling himself Endure

Endure is a french word. It means exactly the same thing, it's used exactly like this. When someone complains about something being difficult or painful you can answer with just "Endure"

All of his inner monologue is translated to english, but this, this is a DIRECT QUOTE from his inner monologue, in french.

[nikodiangel]

Surprised that tumblr isn’t talking about the death of Frank Tyson. A policeman killed him after kneeling on his neck. It happened on april 18th, but the video of his arrest got released today.

[nikodiangel]