#It's just vibes and some. Circumstantial evidence I guess

[hermitw]

I think kenjaku hit Rika with his car.

[demetriandelibinaryboyfriends]

Pride Month Character Sexuality Headcanon Moodboards 1. Yasmine - Lesbian 2. Demetri Alexopoulos - Gay 3. Moon - Bisexual 4. Eli "Hawk" Moskowitz - Bisexual

Next up is my favorite little gayboy in the whole world!!! Why am I so dead convinced he's a little gayboy and not a little biboy??? I'm so glad you asked!!!

Yes obviously he's in love with Eli, a boy, but I firmly believe Demetri has never once genuinely yearned for the touch of a woman akidjsilufhk

MF literally spends his first scene of the show limp-wristing. I am not kidding in the least.

Like even Eli is sus in the first pic akajsldibhodfku

"But that's circumstantial evidence, tumblr user demetriandelibinaryboyfriends!!!" you say. "He starts simping for Yasmine immediately after, so doesn't that cancel it out?"

Well, see, that's exactly what he wants you to think.

The reason he does this imo is actually kind of sad. Miguel comes to the table (Demetri's first potential new friend in like 10 years!!!) and immediately shows an interest in girls, establishing that he's probably a Regular Straight Guy. Miguel has seen Demetri talk in a slight gay lisp (he does!!! Don't @ me!!! Like maybe they were going for "nasally nerd voice" but it just sounds like the stereotypical gay guy voice???), have Some Kinda Fruity Vibe going with Eli, and limp-wrist all over the place, and Demetri knows this. He's also just met Miguel, and has every reason to believe this straight dude will ditch him immediately if he suspects Demetri's gay (high school kids really ARE that cruel sometimes), so...he tries to cover his ass and pretend to be straight so Miguel will stay :(

Speaking of Yasmine, though!!! Basically every time throughout the series that he shows an interest in her, it feels extremely performative. Like he's just saying what Miguel (or whoever else) would expect him to. And it's only ever about looks and social status in a way that suggests he sees Yasmine as a kind of placeholder/cover-up--"the conventionally attractive girl I act obsessed with so no one suspects I'm gay."

On that topic, the irt S1 Demetri, the fact that he picks a very unattainable girl to show blatant interest in is huge. Like what better cover than "pining" for a girl who you believe there is 0% chance you could ever actually date??? Indefinitely permanent beard without once having to fake a straight relationship!

I also think this is why Demetri is so gloriously unbothered when he botches hitting on Yasmine in 1x09. Like sure, he's socially inept, but he's not unintelligent; anyone with two brain cells could tell Yasmine wasn't interested (and he doesn't have the Eli-esque ego-driven delusion to think he's doing better with girls than he actually is). So why does he happily say "I think that went well!" when Yasmine walks away??? Because he's filled the Expected Straight Guy Quota beautifully by shooting his shot with a hot girl, and now that that failed he's off the hook!

Another funny thing is that he ONLY goes and hits on Yasmine after he's seen Eli making out with a random girl. I think it's both a mimicking kind of thing ("well, shit, if this is what Eli's doing I'd better do it too!" they're like cats I love them) and an "I guess if Eli's gonna start kissing girls and be unavailable now, I have nothing to lose so I might as well" kinda thing.

Generally speaking, S1 Demetri, um...sure does procrastinate getting romantically involved with girls. We're meant to believe it's solely a lack of confidence and his general defeatist nature, but like. Every chance he gets, he puts off making a move on girls. He straight up tells Miguel he's going to wait until he gets a well-paying, respectable job before asking any hot girls out. Homeboy literally putting off dating girls for like 5 decades. Not to mention the Halloween dance, where he tells Miguel to "slow his roll" asking girls to dance and says it "could've been worse" when they in fact don't end up dancing with any girls. Both rather flippantly and cheerfully, too! Like Demetri only ever seems to care about girls when Miguel is around, which goes back to my theory that he's worried Miguel would abandon him and Eli if he figured out Demetri was gay.

Tbh I don't think Demetri's lack of initiative with girls is because he's a defeatist because...he seems indifferent (sometimes even chipper) about his lack of luck with women. But when it comes to Eli being bullied??? He is ACTIVELY bothered. Like he's clutching the back of a chair in a silent rage during the library scene. He looks heartbroken when the cafeteria kids start snickering about Eli's mom calling the school. He goes off at Johnny when he makes fun of Eli's lip! Clearly Demetri doesn't like being at the bottom of the school food chain, even though he's also a defeatist about getting bullied. But when it comes to girls??? Every time the loser trio fails with women, Miguel tends to take it 5000% harder than Demetri, who legit barely bats an eye!

I feel like I don't need to convince you of the Demetri-Eli subtext, because otherwise you wouldn't be on my page, but...it's worth mentioning that Demetri spends all of S2 being a sad little simp for Newly Evil Eli and completely forgetting Yasmine's existence while she's in France. Moon is the only one who acknowledges Yasmine's existence all season, but that gay subtext is a conversation for another day XD In any case, Demetri quickly 100% forgets the girl he was supposedly "so into" during S1. Wack! Speaking as an ex-high schooler, btw, you don't just forget your crush over the summer if you really liked them that much. You yearn and talk wistfully to your friends about what they might be up to XD

Also worth noting that as soon as Demetri does drop the Aggressively Straight facade and forms genuine relationships with women, platonic bonds with girls seem to come second-nature to him! He very easily befriends Moon and Sam, despite being scared to so much as interact with girls for years. But as soon as he does, connecting and being amicable with girls seems effortless as long as it isn't romantic. It brings to mind how gay men often have a lot of close female friends and tend to be more at ease around them because there's no concern of underlying sexual/romantic tension.

Tbh you could argue the only time Demetri's relationships with women suffer is when he Tries Too Hard To Be Straight. He has healthy and solid friendships with Sam and Moon, and he has never once tried to flirt with either. Among all the girls in the cast Demetri regularly interacts with, Yasmine is actually the one he has the most contentious relationship with. And why's that? I would argue it's because he feels obligated to hit on her whenever they're together, lest his hard-earned new friends suspect something is abnormal about him. Not Moon as much, but Sam and Miguel for sure--as far as he can tell, they are both 100% straight and it's very possible he's worried about them abandoning him for being a "weird freak" the same way Eli did. In any case, him hitting on Yas makes the atmosphere between them tense and uncomfortable, making his relationship with her feel more stilted than his more organic-feeling interactions with Moon and Sam.

Worth noting that he only really brings up Yasmine/waxes poetic about how "into Yasmine" he is around the people he MOST wants to think he's straight--Sam, Miguel, and Eli. Sam and Miguel are his best friends sans Eli, and Eli, well...of course he would constantly bring up his Girlfriend He Totally Likes So Much around the dude he absolutely does not want to suspect he's into!!! In S4 especially he just got Eli back, and shies away from anything that might open a rift between them again, especially a big fat gay crush he's been harboring since the jump!

The whole Demetri-Yasmine relationship is super shallow and performative--in my opinion, from both sides, but Demetri's side especially. He seems to see Yasmine as more of a concept than a person, calling her the "girl of his dreams" and saying he's "101% in love" while...not appearing to know anything of substance about her. He literally never alludes to knowing anything about her personality except that she's hot and mean. And sure, you could chock this up to him being a shallow, horny teenage boy, but...we know he's anything but shallow, given how he loves his childhood best friend so much and so deeply that he forgives him for all number of horrible things in 3 seconds flat because he is that certain that Eli means his apology and is a good person deep down. Given that he has absolutely undying loyalty to his other best friend Miguel Diaz, despite Miguel being (indirectly) part of the reason that he and Eli got estranged in the first place. Given that he also has so much undying loyalty to Sam LaRusso that he backed her up in a dangerous gang fight and got his arm broken for it. Demetri clearly sees and understands the nuance and complexity in people. So why does he talk about his own girlfriend as if she has none???

Something else to note is how in S5, Demetri reveals that he and Yasmine fight so frequently that her arm is literally weighed down with all the make-up bracelets he buys her. This is just supposed to be a Funny Bit, but...I can't help but notice that this is a stark contrast to S4, where they seemed to be all over each other every time we saw them together. Maybe because when they're alone together, the facade falls away and their "relationship" doesn't really have any leg to stand on? Also one has to wonder why anyone would stay in a relationship that dysfunctional. Makes a lot more sense looking at it from the perspective that Demetri feels like he needs a beard, and isn't sure he'd be able to find another girl willing to date him. Besides, as far as fake-girlfriends-to-make-people-think-you're-straight go...well, you're really not going to do much better than Yasmine.

Mentioned in many other posts, but I firmly believe that Yasmine is a closet lesbian and she and Demetri are a case of "gay and lesbian date in high school because they subconsciously detect the gayness in each other and mistake that sense of kinship for romantic attraction."

I also think it's very possible that a little ways into dating, one or both of them realized they were gay, and they made a mutual agreement to "stay together for appearances." Yasmine's social status plummeted after the end of S1, and it's possible she had homophobic family in the picture who would make publicly coming out impractical. And Demetri, while definitely more popular than he used to be, likely thought he could stand to lose all that if it got out he was gay.

Tbh maybe it was a mutual fake dating situation from the jump!!! Point is that this relationship is WAY too stilted and awkward for me to believe one or both of them ISN'T hamming it up a little. It just does not feel genuine or natural at all :/ Although they DO actually have a lot of platonic potential (especially taking the mlm/wlw solidarity aspect into account, or even just the trope of a popular alpha bitch having a sassy gay best friend aidpsiufhodly), which leads me to believe there's more going on than just Demetri using Yasmine as a beard. I do think he likes her and admires her a lot, just not romantically or sexually!

I've actually heard from my mlm friends that it's relatively common for gay guys to be drawn to powerful and outspoken women, and mistake that admiration for a romantic crush! This is probably what happened with Yasmine, if Demetri did believe he had genuine feelings for her and wasn't faking a crush to actively hide his sexuality. I'd also imagine this is where the "bitchy queen bee girly-girl with a gay best friend" stereotype comes from!

A big part of my gay Demetri/bi Eli belief comes from how different their relationships with women are. Demetri is more comfortable with women from the jump, befriending Aisha, Moon, and Sam fairly easily in a way that could indicate a lack of attraction (so, once again, less pressure and more freedom to be his authentic self). Eli, on the other hand, seems to have more trouble with girls in a way that leads me to believe he IS attracted to (and intimidated by) them to some extent. Although he does form a close friendship with Aisha, his other relationships with girls seem to consist of him awkwardly flirting with/trying to impress them, antagonizing them (e.g. Sam in S3), or not really interacting with them at all. In S2, Eli doesn't even seem at ease around his own girlfriend! He's quick to jump to snapping the MOMENT Demetri says something that might make him look bad, like he doesn't trust Moon to like anything other than his "coolness" (which, to be fair, she...doesn't really lmao). He does befriend Tory, but it's more of a casual "work friendship" and it's nowhere near the kind of easy, close-knit friendship Sam and Demetri have. Even Dem's relationship with Yasmine is amicable enough when he's not trying too hard to hit on her. Point being that Eli struggling with girls more than Demetri kinda gives me the impression Demetri doesn't get (romantically) nervous around girls much at all. Not to say someone like Tory wouldn't make him nervous about getting punched in the face or knifed in the gut XD But nervous about dating girls??? Nah. He's only nervous about keeping up the appearance of wanting to date girls!

Just LOOK at what this mf wears!!! Like he LITERALLY has the mlm flag on a hoodie!!! With fucken purple-ass skinny jeans, the fucken bottom stripe of the mlm flag and also the gayest color alive!!! Like all throughout the show this mf's color motifs are CONSISTENTLY blue and green. The blue we could say comes with the Miyagi Do color motifs, but what of the green??? Why he wearing so much green, though??? To match Eli??? His BOYFRIEND???

Yes, it COULD be a reach, but like. It's SO CONSISTENT throughout the show!!! So much blue!!! So much green!!! And when he's NOT wearing those colors, whatever colors he's wearing usually match with Eli's outfit!

Sorry but color-coordinating your outfit with your bestie shows the fashion sense and awareness of a gay man. Demetri Alexopoulos...

As always, pic credits available upon request!

[favesblog]

so like. my thoughts on the try guys are... they're just guys. i was subscribed to them for years bc i liked their content. i unsubbed maybe 2 years ago (maybe less) bc their vibes started to get weird to me. they started mentioning mr. beast and some other nonsense that pissed me off, so i was like "whatever" and only watched their videos if it seemed like they were doing something interesting to me.

today, ned put out an announcement that he had a "consensual" (and extramarital) affair with a "coworker." that's not entirely accurate; as the founder/ceo/whatever you call it, that was his employee. not merely a coworker. the distinction is important, i think, because it puts into perspective the power imbalance at play.

everyone kind of assumes they know who the employee was based on circumstantial evidence. i really don't care who in particular it was, because it shouldn't have happened regardless. ned held all of the cards. he played his hand, and he lost the bet. his friends called his bluff and they ousted him. they put out a statement saying they "no longer see a path forward with ned."

and honestly? good for them. people keep saying how shady it was for them to edit ned out of videos before releasing their statement, but you know what? that's their choice. it's their company, they can do whatever they want. they don't even owe us an explanation. i think what they did is appropriate. these are real people with real relationships. and i'm glad they're holding ned accountable for his actions.

and of course i'm sad for Ariel and her kids, because that is tragic. ned said he wants to "focus on his marriage" in his announcement, and i'm not going to pretend like i know what the outcome of that will be. i know he's catholic, and i was raised by roman catholic parents who stayed married for years after horrific abuse had poisoned their marriage because the church forbade them to divorce. but Ariel and her children deserve to be safe and loved. i'll leave it at that. the specifics are none of my business.

and, of course, the fans feel betrayed because for years ned was "the wife guy," and the self-proclaimed "legend of love." what a joke, right? well, again, he's just a guy. and sometimes, guys are shit. the world will not stop turning. he was never infallible. no one is. stuff happens.

so, am i pissed about this? no. heartbroken? not really. it's just another day that another rich white man gets outed for using his power to do a terrible thing. it's old news. frankly, i have more important things to worry about.

why am i writing this, then? well, i just wanted to sort my own thoughts out on my own blog. i guess it's the end of an era, with Eugene going off to do his own thing most of the time now, too. i guess it's kinda sad, since i've been watching them since their buzzfeed days.

final thought: i think they should replace ned with Kwesi. i really like him.

[seancamerons]

i was telling my bf earlier in the parking lot of his library, about the times i used to rent the VHS' for degrassi high from my local library in the 2000s. there were about 20, with 2 eps 30 min. each, idk if they still have that sort of thing. who would bother renting vhs' now?

+more under read more

the first eps i saw was about kathleen mead. i didn't watch dh in order. i watched next gen before i watched the degrassi high/degrassi junior high content.

one was about finding random drugs in a tampon vending machine in the ladies' room and bringing them to her sleepover/birthday party where there was a sleepover kind of party.

so once i guess her mom went to sleep, everyone got 'mega high' except caitlin (bc at that point in the series perhaps she's this goodie 2 shoes/she is an epelpetic idk if that makes things worse smoking weed or didn't seem like her vibe, which isn't an issue but i can see caitlin being 420 friendly circumstantially or there was a vibe/implied heavily she experimented with that at least in college or something!) and her i think kathleen's best friend like longtime bestie insensitively like no fcks given, told the girls all kathleens secrets.

she was an emotional high person, these girls shouldn't smoke tbh they got too much baggage ESPECIALLY KATHLEEN and evidently melanie too, and some of her skeletons were pretty damning but i assumed everyone knew about the boyfriend/the drunk mom so idk. meanwhile like poor diana didn't feel a thing! melanie wouldn't shut tf up, and it was lowkey sad for some reason bc the next episode was about her getting the snot beat out of her by a mean older creepy violent angry rude jerkass boyfriend ironically like,

why is this the first thing to come to mind when it comes to libraries?

i did remember that in the episodes, caitlin despite all the mean shit kathleen had said over the years about her, or snide and sneaky things she'd done to her over the time they were in school, actually comforted her.

caitlin was a saint bc i wouldn't ever comfort my bullies after that, i think kathleen tried to kind of weasel rick from caitlin bc she was jealous. early kathleen like jr high version ugh what a cringey and annoying, bitchy girl, like awful and annoying as all get out, in hs she had like deeply sad sad plots by comparison not to mention took a few levels in badassery but still, like caitlin of all people really?

also worth noting finding two wrapped joints in a bathroom tampon vending machine in like 1989, is just listed under things that would NEVER happen in any country or planet on earth, the likely hood is almost impossible. that shits expensive and they're all getting that stuff for free?

it's the same thing as, who would waste quality drugs on a trick-or-treater/child? simply just doesn't happen, fear mongering is the reason we all have to begrudgingly attend trunk or treats with our adult friends who are parents or hear about it from friends who have kids. like i needed another reason to just generally not want kids tbh, i'd be goddamned if random drugs came out of a tampon or pad dispenser like that, i'd be like 'okay.' i'd probably smoke it because, that's a goddamn miracle and it would probably never happen again, the equivalent to finding a four leaf clover without looking as if its a needle in a haystack on the grass.

knowing degrassi, it was probably intended for other people, like seriously it wasn't intended for kathleen and her friends, it was like a girl sharing the wealth with a friend, and it somehow fell in the wrong hands tbh. for all we know it could've been oregano. for all we know it was just like a placebo and like melanie snitched and turned on kathleen because she was sick and tired of her shit because they were amateurs and didn't inhale or something. that whole crew no offense were like 'desperate wannabes' or misfits like the ones on mean girls with the wide-flow and the heavy-set vag/army pants and flip-flops and stuff like that.

PS if you're wondering those episodes i think were called: nobodys perfect & the all-nighter

[silver-grasp]

As I near the end of my Nirvana in Fire rewatch, have some unorganized thoughts

Consort Jing is slowly poisoning the emperor in the last few episodes. I have no evidence for this beyond the circumstantial but I just get the Vibe

Relatedly, when the emperor wanted to poison Mei Changsu, I’m betting you Gao Zhan either didn’t put in poison or straight up poisoned the emperor’s cup. I know he normally plays it so safe but he went out of his way to try to send a warning beforehand, there’s no way he would later be like oh well guess I’ll kill him. Also he totally knows MCS’s identity at this point.

I will never fucking get over Jingyan telling Princess Liyang that she can treat him and MCS as one person. She even repeats it after him like “one person? are you fucking married to him what did I miss”

Mei Changsu Communicate With Your Loved Ones Challenge

Speaking of which, I hate episodes 44-49 so so much they literally might as well be subtitled Everyone Gaslights Jingyan. Just tell him! Fucking hell!

It’s honestly so funny that Nihuang doesn’t seem especially jealous of Gong Yu until MCS tries to appease her by saying Gong Yu is just guarding him... then she’s like fuck off, protecting you is my job! How Dare She!

Lin Chen and Mei Changsu really are chaotic bros platonically coparenting Fei Liu, huh?

[keatsblue]

Snippet from ch. 11 of Foresight is Better Than Hindsight, But Insight is Better Than Either One - my attempt at writing Dabihawks. I’m just warning you now -- the urge to murder me will be strong.

TW: mentions of past child abuse

***

“Yeah, okay, but what if he’s not?” The Rabbit Hero nestled further under his wing, almost buried within the feathers. “What if you don’t unlock some tragic backstory? What if he’s just some guy who sets people on fire for fun?”

Hawks raised a brow. “I seriously don’t get that vibe,” he said, tone careful and even. “We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it, I guess.”

Rumi reached out and poked him solidly in the ribs, which let him know exactly what she thought of that explanation. “Ow! Asshole—”

“Fuckwit.”

He choked on a laugh, had to cough for a bit just to be able to speak. “You know how I am, Carrots. Once I want something, I’ve got no self-control—I’ve gotta go get it.”

“Oh, I believe it,” she smirked, and he did not like that sly look in her eye, not one bit. “Speaking of you having no self-control, how’s the boyf—”

Hawks clapped a hand over her mouth, glaring daggers. His answer came as a hiss between his teeth. “Fucking fine and sexy as hell, you jerk. You shoulda seen him almost light Shigaraki on fire earlier, it was damn spectacular.”

Both Rumi’s eyebrows shot up, even as she grabbed his wrist to push his hand away from her face. “Okay, I take it back. Maybe he’s not so bad.”

“Ha! Told you so.”

“That doesn’t mean I think he’s good for you, yet. I wouldn’t trust that half-baked bastard as far as I could throw him.”

Hawks pretended to consider this. “Hmm, he’s kinda skinny, you could throw him pretty far—”

He laughed as she shoved his shoulder in retaliation, damn near pushing him over. Some things never changed, like the red of his wings or the blue of the sky. Like Rumi’s reactions to his jibes.

Still, at the mention of Dabi, his brow furrowed. He was the reason they were here, in the first place, and yet Hawks had left him at home. Begged off on hero work, which wasn’t necessarily a lie, but just close enough to make Hawks uncomfortable.

He didn’t like keeping things from Dabs, anymore. Still, he couldn’t envision any scenario in which the villain would be accepting of what they were doing.

Even Hawks wasn’t completely certain what was driving him to these lengths. He had the perfect man waiting for him at home, they’d hashed out all that double agent business. Sure, perhaps there was some grey area—namely, how the fuck he was going to fit in with the League of Villains considering his ties to the Commission and the fact that he didn’t want to actually join them—but he found himself pretty content to let Dabi take the lead on that front, too.

They’d figure something out.

No, he just had this vague feeling, that something wasn’t right. And a lot of circumstantial evidence to back up that feeling.

He glanced at his watch. It was time. “Come on, Carrots. Too late to back out, now.”

“Whatever, bird.” She blew out a sigh, breath fogging up his goggles. “Let’s get this over with.”

It was a simple thing for both heroes to melt into the night, to make their way on silent feet (or wings, if applicable) across the street from their vantage point to stalk the perimeter of the building. Heroes were so often lauded for their high-profile rescues or flashy quirks, one could easily forget their true talents.

Combat. Reconnaissance. Recognizing a situation and adapting to it, controlling it, manipulating all possible outcomes.

They would not be seen. They would not be heard.

They skipped past the two guards near the entrance, waited a beat for the security cameras to pan (28… 29… 30 seconds, let’s go, Carrots), then made their move.

Hawks knew for a fact that there was a good window on the back side, one that never shut completely. He always heard the lady at the front desk complain about it whenever the Commission forced him to come in to physically deliver reports—which was the case for anything high-clearance level, or if they just wanted to inflict punishment. Now, he jammed a primary under the sill of said window, wrenching it open wide enough for his friend to crawl through. The Winged Hero followed shortly after.

The difficult part was yet to come.

Read more here

[excusemewhileiplaykh]

Out of curiosity, what makes you think the real scala was not surrounded by water?

Edit: So It was brought to my attention that I made a major oversight and just blatantly forgot how in the opening scene of KH3, the camera pans into the sea at Scala and this Scala is NOT the one based on Xehanort’s dreams.

Nonetheless, I still feel confident in other aspects of stuff I brought up here (like how The Final World may not necessarily be sea and sky) so I’ll just keep this up and may repurpose somethings I mentioned here for later

...

Just a few circumstantial things.

For one, we should keep in mind that the Scala we traverse is a dream version of Scala, not the real one. We know dream worlds are can be influenced by their dreamer (ex. Traverse Town and TWTNW in DDD)

With this in mind, isn’t strange that Scala uses monorails and not boats as transport? Wouldn’t boats be the obvious choice for a city surrounded by water?

But then if Scala is not surrounded by sea, then what does surround it?

………….. Salt.

Now stay with me so I can explain my reasoning.

This gonna be a lot of explaining, but as a TL;DR: Scala and the Final World may both be based on the Bonnevile Salt Flats, making it so that both Scala and the Final World are not surrounded by sea but moreso surrounded by salt. This can be backed up by visual evidence and also by a strange connection between The Final World, The PoTC World in KH3, and the Bonneville Salt Flats.

For starters, Scala seems to be very similar to the Final World in terms of color scheme and themes. “Scala ad Caelum” means stairway to the sky and the Final World seems to be where souls go when they’re not yet ready to enter Kingdom Hearts; they both seem to have “purgatory” vibes. Moreover, Xehanort speaks of Scala as if it no longer exists. It is possible something happened to Scala and it turned into the Final World.

Running on the assumption that the Final World and Scala are one and the same, let’s analyze the Final World and what it is made of.

It is suggested to us in game that the Final World is made of sea and sky.

Yet I believe this is fallacious or purposefully misleading. Remember: Kingdom Hearts is a series that tends to tell us one thing and then completely go back on it (ex. Ansem SOD not actually being Ansem, Nobodies not having hearts, etc.)

So again like Scala, if the Final World is not surrounded by sea, then what does surround it?

Well, one could say that the Final World was heavily inspired by the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah (this has been brought up before by a few others). As the name implies, it’s a plain made entirely of salt. These plains are formed when a large body of water evaporates, i.e. there is little to no water present on the plain after this evaporation.

Some areas of the plain may form a shallow film of water with the salt flat underneath, You can see this in the images below. This placement of shallow water over the salt plain can give the illusion that someone is walking on water.

(Image source)

As you can see, the Bonneville Salt Flats form a mirror-like surface, much like the plain in the Final World

Of course our first instinct is to surmise that the Final World is also made of water, considering as Sora walks, there is a ripple effect (you can even see it slightly in the image above below Sora’s feet). But there is also this ripple effect in the Bonneville Salt Flats (refer again to the images above)

Another thing to note is how the pillars in the Final World seem to also be made from salt. Moreover, salt before it is processed appears in cubic/ rectangular forms.

(Image source)

This connection is rather circumstantial though. There really isn’t much else connecting Kingdom Hearts to the Bonneville Salt Flats except these visual similarities.

Or so I thought.

I’m sure most of us would agree that the worlds in KH 3 all help in some way to illustrate or explain important story elements. For example, Arendelle and Corona help illustrate the importance of sacrifice, 100 Acre Wood shows how relationships change, etc.

With this in mind, I noticed something interesting about the Caribbean.

For one, that world is based on Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End.

Guess where part of this movie was shot?

At the Bonneville Salt Flats.

Actually, we see one of the scenes shot there in KH. When we first enter the Caribbean, Sora and co. are on a raft and then fall off a waterfall. (Haha this totally isn’t supposed to mirror the beginning of DDD where Sora first falls into his nightmare and drags Riku with him)

Anyways, after this scene Sora and co. wake up on a barren white plain.

Which again, just like the Bonneville Salt Flats

It’s rather interesting that Sora has a near-death experience in the Caribbean and ends up in a place based on the Salt Flats… and then Sora has a near-death experience at the KG and ends up in a place very similar to the Salt Flats…

Wrapping this altogether, I believe the Final World is intended to mirror the Bonneville Salt Flats and for that reason I do not believe it is made from sky and sea but more sky and salt.

But wait, there’s one more thing. If Scala truly isn’t surrounded by sea like the Final World seems to not be surrounded by sea, then what of the fact that Daybreak Town is underneath Scala?

This puzzled me too. However, I invite you to remember once again that the Scala we see resides within a dream. I also invite you to remember that water symbolizes being overtaken by darkness in KH. Moreover, we have seen something similar to this before in Hollow Bastion.

In KH1, there is another castle underneath the water of the main castle at Hollow Bastion. The superior castle also seems to be a combination of two castles, one light and one dark, as if the original castle was being overtaken by another dark one. Also notice how the water seems to swirl up and surge through the castle, almost as if it is slowly being overtaken by darkness (again keeping in mind that water=darkness in KH)

Yet in KH2, this water seems to disappear after Hollow Bastion is restored from the darkness. But the second castle remains.

This second castle actually has a name. It’s called Villain’s Vale (for more info on that you can look at the wiki page for it which has pretty comprehensive info on it). Villain’s Vale seems to be some kind of dark counterpart to RG’s main castle

Anyways, this all makes me think that Daybreak Town begin underneath Scala’s figurative waters is just meant to metaphorically indicate that Daybreak Town is somehow Scala’s dark counterpart.

I do admit that this is kinda the shakiest part of my theory and I do need to look more into this make it clearer or get a better understanding of what’s actually going on. In fact, I could probably dedicate a lot more time to other facets of this theory.

Regardless, I am confident at least in the fact that The Final World isn’t necessarily sky and sea and I am excited to see how that will figure in the series moving forward.

[tartrazeen]

Here's another thing that was missing from Danganronpa - the main games at least, because I haven't played any of the fan games I've heard are out there:

The Ultimate Trendsetter

I still like the idea of an 'Everyone Operating In Full Knowledge of What This Is' DR4 (or v4, I guess), and this is building on that. And I'm being coy with what I'm calling this character type 'cause I don't want to instantly give it away, but basically, this is the Ultimate Rulebreaker. 'Rule' can extend as far as social norms, setting records, or actually inspiring some new trend of some kind. It gives options, but it's mostly to hide the literal 'kills by breaking the rules' thing they've got going on.

Their personality could be anything - brash and inspiring like Kaito, deceptively polite yet lethal like Celeste, or completely blasé until it's Go Time like Chiaki. Doesn't matter, because they can be anywhere on the villain-to-hero scale and it won't change that they'll be an antagonist.

Ideally, this is also someone who's already done the impossible to throw the player off the scent of their tactics. I'm thinking 'Returning winner from the last season, who won as the blackened in the very first trial'. Groundbreaking, right? Technically that makes this DRv5 or DRv4.2, because that's all 15 other students gone after just one round and right when it's the most difficult to get away with something (so many witnesses and people investigating).

They character should be pretty open about it too: "I simply went after the loneliest one before anyone had built any friendships with each other. That way, no one came looking for them until it was too late to tie any clear circumstantial evidence to me. That's usually what nails everyone else - reliable witness accounts. :)"

Let's say this one's the first trial. I think my other theory about the Ultimate Danganronpa Hater and Critic covered the fourth and fifth trials, and my one about hiding the victim's body could be third case shenanigans, but this one's got a definite set-the-tone Case 1 vibe.

So!

Dead kid at the end of a hallway, very openly in plain sight.

The hallway's been clean. The person's been very clearly laid out, suggesting they were moved from how or where they fell. There are obvious signs of death, but to draw from the canon, let's say there are multiple incisions over their body that the Monokuma File confirms is the cause of the death. No weapons or objects are around them.

The victim should be someone who's had some bite to 'em. Narratively, this is gonna be the group's warning to not let the excitement of being on the show overshadow the threats around them.

Extra points if someone from the Investigation side tries to pull off a 'perfected' version of an almost successful murder from their qualifier game, or someone from the Blackened side calls the killer out by recognizing a tactic that they themselves pulled off, except done much more carelessly. No really, extra points: there's some bonus prize in there for any Blackened that makes it to the final two or for any Investigator who wins by killing this time. Good God, after those stupid Truth Swords from DR2, it could even be some stupid Pen Versus Sword motif with Ultimate Might up for grabs as the championship's title. That's exactly what a show that's 56 seasons in would do.

Hell, if you wanna go hard into the "Trendsetter won in the very first round" idea, these are all winners of an earlier game here to play in the Ultimate Championship finals - so everyone's on the same level of knowing what to do, having seen it happen, having seen what works and what didn't, and a solid mix of people who won as the blackened plus those who won by cracking cases. Should be fun to see who won by getting away with murder working alongside those who won through investigation (and hey, that'd incorporate my little Fuyuhiko theory too).

Anyway!

This victim went too hard bragging that they were gonna win, maybe even motivated to get the bonus prize (as a winning Investigator from their qualifier), but surprise, surprise, they're dead first.

The investigation has people searching for the original kill site, the murder weapon, and any opportunity people may have had.

The Trendsetter's going to be helpful in reminding everyone how deceptively difficult the first round will be. True, this is when they have the most witnesses, but they have the least idea of who everybody is and nobody walked in without examples of how to strike. And this person moved fast, whoever they were, which is smart because they now have a series precedent for everyone losing in the first round to a blackened student. Nothing's guaranteed anymore.

Somebody finds a knife. Somebody else finds a sharp chisel. Somebody else finds a decorative spear. All these weapons are in different corners of the school, all have blood on them, and there's not a drop of blood elsewhere in those locations. If we keep to my growing Tartra-verse canon and have the Ultimate Danganronpa Critic here, they might point out how the spear seems like the most likely weapon to fit with this "obvious callback to Mukuro's death in Season 1."

That's the first layer to crack: what's the murder weapon? With the maximum number witnesses in the smallest amount of available space during the first round, it's too risky for someone to drag a corpse from any of those locations to where it is now (plus there's no drag marks in the blood that's pooled), but it's just as risky to bring a weapon from where these three originally were, kill the victim, then sneak it back while it's covered in blood. And a whole spear? No way. In fact, it's looking like that blood was planted to throw them off. They don't even know if it's the victim's blood - that's also risky to carry, so maybe it was the killer's own blood.

All three weapons are ruled out. Nobody found any other weapons, so they're stuck there for now.

The second layer to crack is where the victim was murdered. If the killer couldn't drag anything away without getting caught, then where the victim died probably held special significance. Thing is, the only thing 'special' about this hallway is... well, it's a hallway. It's long and empty, and according to everyone else, far enough away from the others to avoid hearing anything, but there's nothing unusual about it otherwise.

That's right around when someone should ask why the victim was there themselves. They would've had to go there willingly, because the thought of being lured somewhere during these finals seems ridiculous. Were they trying to set up a trap for someone else? But who would the trap be for if that hallway was so far from everybody? It'd make running from a long-ranged weapon difficult - like a bow and arrow or throwing knives - because there's no corners to hide behind, but surely everyone would assume that and avoid walking down it in the first place. The best guess everyone can make is that the victim was following someone else to sneak up on them, but quickly became the prey.

Drama starts. Team Investigation starts accusing those bloodthirsty Blackened for automatically knowing how to kill somebody trying to murder them first in some warped fight or flight reflex, and Team Blackened starts accusing the Investigators of all chasing the bonus prize by getting away with any kind of murder. I'm not expecting any kind of friendship from these folks, but absolutely a kind of mutually beneficial alliance that every Battle Royale gets into. It's easy here at first because there's that divide of "who won and by what method".

I wouldn't be surprised if the Ultimate Trendsetter was behind it either, having convinced (or implied) that if all the Blackened work together, at least two of them could survive to the end and win the bonus. It'd trigger a counter-alliance among the Investigators, who'd very quickly realize (by having the Trendsetter again imply) that if they didn't band together right then, they'd be on their own against a newly unified Team Blackened. Whether or not the Trendsetter was telling the Investigators the truth, Team Blackened would either already honestly exist or be deceived into needing to exist now that Team Investigation was locked in.

This all 'implies' that the Investigators are the only ones who'd kill somebody that won as an Investigator (again, because Investigators don't get a bonus prize unless they kill this time). At the same time, it 'implies' that that's the perfect cover story for the Blackened, as if a bonus prize - they don't know what it is - would magically be enough to ignore the real prize of winning Danganronpa at all.

In other words, no dice on the murder site.

Finally, they start going through each other's alibis. The Trendsetter's sounds rock solid - they were in their room trying to get some rest. Any snarky accusations of "Resting up so you could murder us?" is met with, "No, I'm sick. I have a cold. And I'm on Team Blackened, so I can't get the bonus prize by killing." Some others on Team Blackened - and only on Team Blackened - can vouch for this account, which leads to more, "You're all covering for each other," claims. That one's snubbed off as extra ridiculous because everybody knows accomplices can't win unless they're the ones actually killing. It looks more and more like Team Blackened has no incentive here, while Team Investigation is lawlessly prize-hungry. The two cliques click even further into place.

The thing is, this is a competition. Right now, if they don't solve this case regardless of what 'team' they're on, one person is going to win at everyone else's expense. Team Investigation bites the bullet on working with their very smug enemies by doing what they do best: investigating.

Each person on Team Blackened explains how they got away with murder to mine those stories for clues - things to look out for in this case. Team Investigation narrows in on those patterns for everyone: an open kill is no good because these need to be sneaky, and nobody kills someone that'll make them the obvious murder suspect. Killers either try to frame someone else or play off the victim's trust (even if it's only a temporary truce) to get them alone.

Well, no one's been framed for this. The problem is that it seems like a ghost did it. They can rule out suicide because it's the first round of the finals and the victim really wanted to win. But when it comes to the other pattern - trust - they hit another wall. The victim would've been someone who won by investigating until the end of the season, and who was openly declaring an intent to kill and get the bonus prize. Team Blackened wasn't going to work with anyone like that, and Team Investigation wasn't going to be anybody's accomplice. That should technically mean nobody trusted the victim enough to talk to them and build up any kind of friendship.

... Which sounds really, really, and suddenly familiar.

They ask the Trendsetter how they won their round. The Trendsetter reminds everyone about their alibi and how no one stood to gain anything by lying to corroborate it, then re-explains.

Let's just commit to the Ultimate Danganronpa Critic being here. :P The Critic points out that while nobody could trust someone on Team Investigation because of the bonus prize, by that same logic, everyone could absolutely trust someone on Team Blackened. That makes Team Blackened the suspects again, which is about to cause more drama before the Critic says, "We also know that a Blackened won their season in the first round before by targeting someone who was lonely and before anyone could become friends. So our killer is probably someone who helped make sure the victim had no one on their side, even if they were doing pretty well at that by themselves."

This is when both teams start discussing when the cliques were made. Sure, there's a bonus prize, but the Critic runs through all the other 'prizes' Monokuma's promised in the past. Is that what they're naturally aiming for? Or did someone convince them that the other team was aiming for it, just to keep everyone scared? And as they dig and dig, they realize the Trendsetter was the one who put the 'two teams' thing into motion.

The Trendsetter handwaves that by saying Monokuma's also had millions of dollars as the prize before, and anyway, the thought would've occurred to everyone eventually. People just like being in groups - it happens. Except the Ultimate Danganronpa Critic points out that every season where someone won by investigating, it was because everyone eventually worked together as a group. The ones who refused were usually the ones who died first - or, in the Trendsetter's case, won immediately. When it comes to why the victim was in that hallway, there was a way to lure someone down it after all: the same power of friendship that brought the Trendsetter here for the championship.

The Trendsetter's going to entertain this. If they're the suspect despite such a strong alibi, how did they kill the victim from their bedroom? The Monokuma File said they died from being stabbed all over their body, and the killer wouldn't have been able to leave with a blood-covered weapon (or blood-soaked clothes) without being seen putting those three weapons back or returning to their room.

The Critic's got answers for that too: those weren't the murder weapons. The killer could've prepped those as false evidence while they were investigating and could take their time walking around to those corners of the school. As for how the victim got stabbed, the killer left that part up to their accomplice.

The Trendsetter's about to explain the thing about accomplices again when the Ultimate Danganronpa Critic goes full Byakua-Is-Smarter-Than-You and Nagito-Is-Admiring-You about how they never said there wasn't an accomplice, just that the accomplice couldn't win as the Blackened, and how they're so delighted to see something completely new after 56 seasons and be there to see it firsthand! The accomplice in this case was the one person completely unaffected by the killing game: Monokuma himself. Those stab wounds are impossible for someone to pull off from their bedroom, but completely possible to trigger remotely - say, for example, by skewering someone with a bunch of spears. This means that 'homage' to Mukuro's death was not the Critic exaggerating.

This is ridiculous, the Trendsetter will protest. Monokuma can't interfere with any of the students, so there's no way anyone can ask him for help. The Critic'll point out that no one would need to ask. Once a rule was broken, Monokuma would send those spears out automatically. The only thing they need to prove now is which rule was broken.

The Trendsetter's gonna be all kinds of upset about this. For one thing, even if that's what happened, why is the Critic singling them out as the suspect? Why not anybody else? But the Critic assures everyone that once they figure out the rule that was broken, they'll have the proof they need to know who was behind everything.

The group - working together - goes through the list. For the championship and especially these finals, almost every rule that was previously in effect is back in play, minus any that contradict each other. This includes classics like "The game will continue until only two students remain (à la Rule 6 from DRv3)," "Destroying any property without permission is expressly forbidden (like Rule 10 from DR2)," and of course, "Sleeping anywhere other than the dormitory will be punished accordingly (just like Rule 3 of DR1)." The Critic puts the question to the group: the victim looked pretty laid out on the floor, didn't they? What if they weren't moved anywhere so much as they...

... laid down?

Oooooh boy, the Trendsetter is not gonna be happy about that one (and neither's the Ultimate Danganronpa Hater). First question: someone had a forbidden nap and that suddenly makes it a murder?! The Critic says yes, because if it was only a rules violation, they wouldn't be having a trial. The victim had to have been set up. So now that they know how the victim died, they can finally reveal the murder weapon.

(Cue the too-stupid-to-live one going, "Huh?!?!?! I thought the spears WERE the murder weapon?!?!?!" Like an idiot. Worse - like a casual.)

The Critic asks Team Blackened - everyone who vouched for her - why it wasn't strange for the Trendsetter to be going to sleep while the rest of them were still awake. When they repeat that the Trendsetter had a cold and needed sleep (cooperating, finally), they start digging into any proof they had that the Trendsetter was sick at all. Some coughing maybe, but nothing extreme. The nap, certainly. Definitely the cough syrup the Trendsetter'd been drinking.

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

A murder weapon that no one would suspect, that wouldn't leave any blood, and that could knock someone out if they - for example - both drank from the same spiked bottle as friends. After all, even if there was a bonus prize for killing and it was only for Team Investigation, no one here was just going to drink something handed to them. Unless, maybe, whoever was handing it to them drank it too, to prove it was safe. And the Trendsetter did go right to bed at the same time the victim was comfortably on the floor.

With such a tucked-away hallway, it was unlikely people would stumble onto the body right away, and it wasn't as if anyone would come looking for the victim with everything that was said. Just like the Trendsetter's previous game, there was likely going to be a lot of time that passed before the evidence could be tied back to them, but what sealed their fate was true to the spirit of Danganronpa: witness testimony - and for the very alibi the Trendsetter themselves had set.

That stupid 'you must sleep in your rooms' rule has bugged me as being useless for so damn long, on top of that 'you cannot destroy property without permission' rule. The whole point of this is to use those rules to someone's extreme advantage, and in my mind, the Trendsetter won their first round by asking Monokuma for permission to destroy a surveillance moniter, then covered it up like an hay target and swapped it in ahead of the Ultimate Archer's next bit of practice. They were gonna wait for as long as it took after they got close enough to learn that person's schedule, and it was just the right amount of time for them to be far enough away while still getting the first and only kill of the season.

Hell yes, Monokuma would go for that. Shit would be hilarious af. The rules were available to everybody. But without the same convenience of having someone known to regularly impale something with sharp sticks, the Trendsetter picked a different rule to break. With that, they might've set a trend for winning on the first round, but they clearly couldn't keep the Ultimate Streak. :)

100%, the Critic would be saying that out loud lmao, before going to back to whether this still counted as a Mukuro homage or something between Sakura and Sayaka.

There's also no way that they, having absolutely been on Team Investigation, wouldn't bring home the ending that should've happened for DRv3's last trial: the detective will finally be the one that does it.

Bonus prize acquired. :D

[yespleasefandomtrash]

AlMei Week 2017 - Hair/Travel

In this chapter you get see a few pieces of the puzzle start to fall together! Hopefully now you want to read it. Enjoy Day 4: Hair/Travel. Each prompt is addressed here, but briefly, and at the end and the beginning respectively (give or take).

Read this chapter on fanfiction.net here.

Read Day 3 here.

Disclaimer: Sadly, I do not own Fullmetal Alchemist.

xXxXxXx

Mei tapped her foot impatiently as she waited for Alphonse to arrive at the station. It wasn’t that he was running late – if anything, she was excessively early – but she just felt unusually jumpy. At first she’d thought she was being watched or something of the sort, but quickly dismissed the idea as ludicrous. The more likely reason was that she hadn’t gotten much sleep the night before, which was unfortunately far too accurate.

Nightmares had tormented her. They flashed between Alphonse’s and Winry’s and Ling’s and even Edward’s dead bodies, all gruesomely stabbed to death like the victims of the serial killer. Despite how mature she considered herself to be, Mei knew that there was no way she’d ever be able to perform an autopsy on any of them. Ever. No matter what the circumstances were.

She shuddered. The thought made her nauseous.

She glanced at the watch on her wrist. There was still another thirty or so minutes before the train would leave. She was tempted to board then and there – anything to take her mind off her dreams from the night before – but knew she couldn’t just abandon Alphonse.

“Mei!”

The Xingese woman turned upon hearing her name, and a relieved smile broke out across her face when she saw a certain blonde Amestrian heading towards her. “Good morning to you, too, Alphonse.”

“I hope I’m not too late,” he apologized. “I overslept this time around. In my defense, however, it was Ed who ‘accidentally’ threw the alarm clock into the wall.”

Mei laughed, her depressed mood disappearing quickly now that Alphonse had arrived. “Don’t worry, you’re good – and I don’t even want to know how he tried to claim that was an ‘accident.’”

“Let’s just say he wasn’t very convincing,” Alphonse chuckled. “Anyways, at least I’ve finally arrived. Are you ready to board?”

“Obviously,” she smirked, rolling her eyes. “I’ve been here for ages now.”

The blonde flinched. “Wow. Way to make me feel guilty.”

She rolled her eyes again. “Oh please. Don’t blame me – you’re guilt-tripping yourself here. Let’s go.”

xXxXxXx

The train ride in itself was relatively uneventful. Being that it was so early in the morning and the fact that it was a weekday, few people were riding. On the bright side, it meant that the two had nearly an entire car to themselves.

Mei realized she had brought absolutely nothing to do – excepting paperwork, of course, which she could only work on for so long before it felt as if her brain was dying –, but thankfully Alphonse had thought to bring a deck of cards. The games got pretty intense.

But the trip was not a particularly long one, and in just over an hour they’d arrived at the station and were making their way into the town.

“Alright,” Mei said, pulling a folded piece of paper out of her back pocket. “I’ve written down Mrs. Hughes’ address on here. And although I want to go there right now...” She laughed awkwardly. “It’s barely six o’ clock right now. That’s a bit early.”

Alphonse snorted. “Right. Just a bit.”

“Ha ha.”

“I know. I’m hilarious.” He looked around. “Since it’s only a few minutes after six, want to get some breakfast? I’m sure there’s somewhere we can get some food from.”

Mei hesitated. When she’d woken up that morning she’d had no appetite – her nightmares had made sure of that. But she was feeling better, so... “Why not?”

After only ten minutes of searching they found a quaint little place that actually happened to serve breakfast all day, though it wasn’t necessary in their case. The two ordered their food, but quickly felt an awkward silence fall upon them when the waitress left.

Mei felt blood rush to her cheeks. Was this a date? Or just a casual outing with a close friend? Something awkwardly in between?

Unfortunately, the latter seemed to be the most likely..

Unable to stand the silence, Mei reached under her chair where she’d placed a small briefcase and opened it, pulling out a thick stack of papers. “Let’s go over what we know with this case.”

Alphonse chuckled. “What we know, or what we suspect?”

She smirked at him. “Hmm. Well, how about both?” The first page was a general summary of Hughes’ autopsy report that Riza had managed to obtain and had then faxed to her. “We know for certain that Hughes’ death was caused by the gunshot, not being stabbed. According to this it basically punctured his heart. We assume he was killed instantaneously, though there’s always the minuscule possibility he managed to survive for a few seconds after.”

“And after he died it’s likely the killer propped his body up in the phone booth,,” Alphonse continued. “Do you know if he died outside of it, though? Or was he on the floor inside?”

Mei flipped through the folder to the image of Hughes body that also showed much of the area surrounding it. “Hmm...” She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “Based on the amount of blood inside the booth, I think he was shot in there and then fell to the floor. After that our killer probably sat him up.”

“Why would they bother doing that?”

She shrugged in response. “Who knows? I can’t pretend to ever understand why sociopaths do what they do. My best guess is that there may have been some kind of evidence that would have been left behind had they not moved the body.”

“Maybe another print of some sort.”

“It’s certainly possible.”

“And like the other victims, he was stabbed a total of six times,” Alphonse continued. “But you suspect three of the wounds were created before he died.” He glanced up at her from the photograph he was studying. “I don’t think you’ve told me what made you think that. Like, what sent those red flags to you.”

Mei blinked. “Oh. You’re right. I don’t think I have.” She shuffled through the photos Fuery had provided them with until she found the close up of Hughes’ wounds. “Alright. Look at this.” She pointed to the three stab wounds with blood clotting around them. “If these had been made after his death, the blood shouldn’t be clotting. It would have continued to flow. This implies they’re premortem.”

Alphonse frowned. “How do you know the blood isn’t just dried?”

She bit her lip. “Technically speaking, I don’t, which is we really need to exhume his body. But many of the factors wouldn’t add up to the blood being able to dry in the first place. For one, the night he died was unusually humid – wet air would slow the process of blood drying. The paper Riza sent me also says Hughes was discovered approximately twenty minutes after his death. That’s not much time for blood to dry. Also, the other three don’t have dried blood around them – so why would these?”

He nodded. “I see. Then it is rather unusual for there to be blood like that.”

“Exactly. But, as I said, I can’t be completely sure until I perform an autopsy.” The Xingese woman sighed. “What I really want are valid suspects. Because right now we have none whatsoever. Luxure has an alibi, we have no real reason to suspect Neid besides instinct, and I’d swear a hundred times over in court that Yoki didn’t do it.”

Alphonse frowned before a smirk slowly crept onto his features. “I’d say we have a little more of a probable cause to suspect Neid than just instinct.”

She raised a brow at his comment. “Oh really? Like what?”

“Mismanagement of a crime scene.”

It took a moment for his words to sink in. When they did, she burst out laughing. “That’s very true, isn’t it?” She absentmindedly examined the photo of Hughes’ body. “That Neid guy really seemed off to me. His whole attitude reeked of something bad.”

“Maybe he needed a shower.”

Mei whacked the blonde with the folder. “I’m going to ask you to shut up, sir. I don’t need your sarcasm right now.”

Alphonse chuckled. “My bad. But I agree – he was definitely radiating suspicious vibes.”

“Yoki mentioned that he couldn’t tell whether the person who left with what we assume was Hughes’ autopsy report was a man or woman, and Neid seemed pretty androgynous to me, so...” She shrugged. “Not a defining factor, but something we shouldn’t dismiss immediately.”

“Most attorneys don’t have a case without circumstantial evidence,” he reminded her. “It’s always good to keep an open mind.”

“I know,” she replied. “But I want some concrete evidence as well. As soon as we’re able to get a court order and have Mrs. Hughes’ permission, I will dig Maes Hughes’ body up myself if I have to.”

The conversation ceased for a moment as their food was placed down in front of them. After thanking the waitress they watched until they were certain she was out of earshot before continuing.

“I want to examine his wounds first, clearly,” Mei said, taking a bite of the omelet she’d ordered. “The sooner I’m able to look those over those, the better. I’ll also check his body for trace evidence, but I doubt there will be any.”

“You can also see if there’s any DNA underneath his fingernails,” Alphonse suggested. “He might have put up fight.”

“The paper Riza sent me said that they found nothing, but I can’t say I trust the government as far as I can throw them. So I’ll definitely check.”

“Agreed.”

“I’m going to do everything that requires in-depth work before I check for latent prints, since the glue used can destroy trace evidence and might interfere with his wounds.” Mei snapped her fingers, putting her fork down to grab the close up of Hughes’ body. “I forgot to show you this. These three wounds. The ones I suspect are premortem.”

“What about them?”

“If you look carefully, they seem to be a slightly different shape then the others. It’s possible they were made by a different weapon.”

Alphonse frowned as he examined the photo. Then his eyes widened. “I see what you mean. The edges appear to be different on the sets of wounds.”

“Exactly,” she agreed, relieved he hadn’t dismissed her conclusion. “The three I suspect to be postmortem are much smoother compared to the other three, which are more jagged.”

“The ones with smooth edges almost look as if they were made by a sort of spear,” the Amestrian mused. “Interesting choice of weapon.”

Mei couldn’t help but laugh at his thoughts. “I’d say they align more with that of an ice pick or a similarly slender tool, but I do understand where you’re coming from.”

He flushed at her statement. “Right. That makes a bit more sense.” His phone dinged, distracting him. “One sec.” He pulled it from his pocket and swiped, eye moving as he read the message on the screen. “Well, we’ve got some good news,” he said, a broad smile forming on his lips. “Ed managed to get a court order for us to exhume Hughes body!”

Mei beamed. “Perfect! Under what grounds?”

“Incomplete autopsy.”

She laughed. “Well, that’s close to enough to the truth.”

“Now all we need to do is get Mrs. Hughes permission,” Alphonse said as he tucked his cell phone away. “I don’t about you, but I’m just about ready to head to her house.”

Mei’s eyes sparkled. “Do you even have to ask?”

xXxXxXx

“You’re completely sure this is the right place?”

“Mei, you’re the one who gave me directions – which I followed exactly. Shouldn’t I be asking you if we’re at the right place?”

The Xingese doctor rolled her eyes in response. “You’re so funny, Alphonse. Been hilarious the entire day.”

“I’m well aware.”

“Alright. Let’s go.” Mei took a deep breath before walking to the doorstep and rapping sharply on the wooden door, silently trying to figure out how to explain to the poor woman what exactly she needed to do with her husband’s body.

The door creaked as it slowly opened, revealing a little girl with dirty blonde pigtails and bright green eyes. “What do you want?” she said suspiciously, crossing her arms over her chest. “My mommy’s tired right now so it better be important.”

“You must be Elicia,” Mei said as warmly as she could muster. “Elicia, I need to speak with your mother – it’s very important. Could you tell her Doctor Chang would like to see her?”

“And Alphonse Elric,” her Amestrian companion added.

Elicia’s eyes narrowed before she marched off into her house.

“Well, that was an interesting first encounter,” Alphonse remarked. “She’s a cute little girl, though.”

Mei nodded, though she’d only been halfway listening to him. It felt as if a mixture of guilt and anxiety were eating away at the inside of her stomach, and she was absolutely petrified of how she was going to talk to Gracia Hughes. She wanted to tell the woman the truth about how necessary it was to exhume he husband’s body, but wanted to soften the blow at least to a certain extent, and –

“Are you Doctor Chang?”

Mei felt a quiet squeak escape her lips. “Y-Yes ma’am. I am.”

Gracia Hughes was a tall and rather slender woman with short brown hair and warm eyes. “Let’s not talk out here,” she said, stepping out of the doorway. “Come on in. I’ve just put some tea on the stove.”

Mei followed her into the house, Alphonse right behind them. Gracia led the two to the main room, where Elicia was playing with building blocks in the corner.

“Please, sit down,” she said kindly. “I’ll be right back.”

They did as instructed, sitting next to each other on the couch.

“You seem a bit tense,” Alphonse murmured to her. “You sure you don’t want me to do the talking?”

Mei shook her head. “No. It was my idea to exhume his body, and I’m the one who will be performing the autopsy. I have to be the one to explain it.”

He hesitated, but nodded. “Alright.” He took her hand in his and gave it a quick squeeze before letting go. “You’ve got this.”

She smiled softly, too anxious to be flustered. “Thank you.”

A few minutes later Gracia returned carrying a tray with three steaming cups of tea resting on top of it. “It’s green tea,” she said apologetically. “I did put a little honey in it, though.” She handed them each a cup before taking her own and sitting down in a chair across from them. “So what do you need, Doctor Chang?”

Mei bit her lip. “This might be a bit difficult for you to hear, Mrs. Hughes...” She ran a hand through her hair. “Sorry. I don’t know how to put this.”

Gracia smiled at her, and despite being warm it was also tired. “It’s fine, Doctor Chang. I know who you are and what your study lies in. In fact, I have a feeling I know why you’re here.”

Mei blinked in surprise. “Really?”

“I assume it’s about my husband’s death.”

Mei hesitated, then nodded. “To some extent, yes. Mrs. Hughes...” She took a deep breath, then said it. “I’d like your permission to exhume your husband’s body in order to perform a second autopsy.”

Gracia’s eyes widened. “What? Why?”

“We have reason to believe his first autopsy was deliberately performed incorrectly,” the Xingese woman explained. “He was the only victim of the serial killer who was not sent to my office, his autopsy report that I received from the FBI was stolen from me, and there are many inconsistencies in what we’ve heard from people who worked the scene compared to the pictures and basic report we managed to get together.”

Gracia placed her hand over her mouth. “You must be joking.”

Mei laughed bitterly. “If only, Mrs. Hughes.”

Silence filled the room, the only exception being the light taps that echoed from the corner of the room as Elicia stacked blocks together.

Gracia placed her cup down, her hands quivering. “Doctor Chang...”

“Ma’am?”

“If... If you exhume my husband’s body, will you be able to find out who killed him? And who killed all those other innocent people?”

Mei blinked in surprise, not expecting such a question. “I mean, I can’t make any promises, Mrs. Hughes, but –”

“Doctor Chang.” Gracia’s tone was a combination of stoic and pleading. “Tell me the truth.”

Mei didn’t know what to do. Was the woman referring to the real truth, or the truth she wanted to hear?

“Please.”

That sealed it.

“Mrs. Hughes, it is certainly possible that I will be able to track down your husband’s killer,” Mei said, “but on the other side of the coin, there is a chance I will not be able to do so. Trace evidence has almost certainly been removed from his body, and it’s highly unlikely I will find any DNA on him. But I may be able to find latent prints, and I suspect there’s some sort of value to be found within his wounds – I’m just not sure what.”

Gracia’s fingers were laced together and her entire body tense.

Alphonse spoke. “Mrs. Hughes. Mei Chang is not only the most skilled chief medical examiner I’ve ever met, but also an excellent detective. Anyone else would have reported the loss of the autopsy report and never thought about it again. She not only reported it missing, but helped find information about who might have taken it – including going to the FBI and continuing to ask questions there. And upon finding out that something was off about your husband’s death and that the government is somehow involved with it, she still continued to search for answers. I nearly drank a bottle of water mixed with cyanide that was meant for her – and she still refuses to give up. Trust me, Mrs. Hughes. She knows what she’s doing.”

Mei was speechless. Alphonse made her stubbornness and refusal to submit to the government sound almost revolutionary, when in reality there was no way it was even close to being that awe-inspiring.

Gracia sighed, carefully picking up her tea and staring into it. “My husband was a good man, you know. He loved Elicia and I more than anything else. There were times when I wondered if I really deserved him. When the news of his death was brought to my door I fainted on the spot.” She laughed half-heartedly. “Can you believe it?” She sighed a second time. “I was in shock. But above all else I wanted the person who murdered him caught. I wanted them to rot in prison for the rest of their days. The FBI agents who were working the case at the time assured me that they’d be able to catch the killer in no time.” Her grip tightened on the cup. “They lied. They lied because the person who killed my husband is someone within their ranks.” She stared at Mei, her green eyes fierce and yet lined with tears. “I know you can catch them, Doctor Chang. I’m sure of it.”

Mei smiled at the woman, certain her own eyes were brimming with tears as well. “I will. I promise.”

xXxXxXx

“That was quite the promise you made.”

The two were on the train back to Xing.

Mei sighed. “I know. I just hope I can keep it.”

“I’m sure you can.”

Mei hesitated, before slowly asking, “Alphonse... Did you mean what you said? About how I know what I’m doing and all that?”

Alphonse stared at the Xingese woman in surprise. “Of course I did. Why?”

A small, relieved smile fell on her lips. “No reason.”

Silence fell between them, neither one inclined to break it. It wasn’t awkward – simply there. Almost like a calm.

And calm it was – until Alphonse’s phone rang, startling the duo out of their reveries.

The Amestrian quickly pulled his phone from his pocket and answered. “Hello?” His brow furrowed in confusion. “Havoc? Is something wrong?” He paused. “Are you sure?” He sighed. “Alright. One moment, please.” He moved the phone from his ear and covered the mouthpiece before turning towards Mei. “Havoc wants to talk to you. It’s about Luxure.”

Mei’s eyes widened before narrowing in suspicion. “Alright.” She accepted the phone. “Good morning, Havoc.”

“It’s still morning?” There was a sigh from the other end of the line. “This day is moving by way too slowly.”

“Was there something you needed to speak to me about?”

“Right. Do you remember how I said Luxure and I were together the entire time three – four, now – nights ago?”

“I do.”

“Well, I was wrong. I forgot that around eleven at night she left to visit a friend or something, and didn’t return until almost two in the morning.”

Mei’s eyes widened. “Are you completely certain she was gone during that time?”

“Yes. Positive.”

“Thank you for notifying me of this, Havoc. You have no idea how helpful you’ve just been.”

“Right. Yeah.”

Mei’s heart sank as she heard the depressed tone in his voice. Whether Luxure was guilty or not, she may have just destroyed Havoc’s relationship with her. “Havoc...”

“I’ve got to go now, Doc. I’m glad I was able to help.”

She slowly handed the phone back to Alphonse, guilt weighing down on her chest. But what could she have done?

“Ed,” Alphonse said, not noticing Mei’s distress. “Do you know when a team will be sent to exhume Hughes’ body? Yes, we got Gracia’s permission.” His eyes widened. “Really? That’s going to be a definite help. Thanks for telling me. I’ll give you a call if there’s anything else we need.” He hung up. “Mei, I’ve got some good news – Hughes’ body is being exhumed as we speak. You might be able to perform the autopsy sometime this evening.”

“What?” she said, shocked. “Really?!”

“Yep.”

“Oh, this is brilliant!” The Xingese doctor grabbed the briefcase off the seat to her left and opened it, grabbing each and every sheet of paper within it. “I need to go over all the details of the case again. I want everything to be as fresh in my mind as it can.”

Alphonse rolled his eyes, chuckling. “I should have known.”

xXxXxXx

Mei held the door to the morgue open while Winry pushed the cart with Hughes body lying on it inside. Alphonse had offered to help, but Winry had refused – she’d been doing this for almost two years, after all. Instead Alphonse carried the bag that had been buried with Hughes into the room and set it on a side table.

“Alright,” Mei said, pulling on gloves and switching on the light above the body. “Let’s get started.”

The two girls began the long process of reverting Hughes to the state he’d been in before the funeral. That included undressing him, removing the glass caps from beneath his eyelids, and scrubbing the makeup from his face. Alphonse simply stood to the side and watched, not wanting to interfere.

Mei frowned as his wounds were revealed. “Why wasn’t the blood cleaned off his body?” A closer look revealed that it had been – but only in part. Dried blood still lined the edges of two of the wounds. “That’s rather odd.”

“But not unheard of,” Winry added, acting as the voice of reason. “If his autopsy was rushed and likely ‘forged’ as we suspect, then it makes sense that they wouldn’t bother to do a complete job.”

“Fair enough,” Mei conceded. “Can you grab the camera and take pictures? Get as much detail as you can in it.”

“Roger that.”

Mei started examining the gunshot wound in Hughes chest. Despite that he’d been in the ground for a few days, it was obvious to her experienced eye that the bullet had been the cause of his death and not the stab wounds. The government was not lying about that.

She noticed Winry had finished photographing the stab wounds and moved down to examine them in greater detail while her assistant moved to take pictures of the gunshot.

Just as in the images Fuery had given them, the three wounds she suspected to be premortem did not match the ones she considered postmortem. They also varied slightly in shape.

“They have to be from a different weapon,” she murmured. “There’s no way they’re the same.” The Xingese woman turned to face Alphonse. “Can you open the bag that was buried with Hughes? I have a sneaking suspicion I know what’s in it.”

The blonde officer nodded before carefully undoing the rope that kept the sack shut. After making sure his gloves were on completely, he removed a small knife from the bag, dried blood still coating the bottom half.

Mei took it from him and compared it to the wounds on Hughes’ body.

To her surprise, however, it did not match.

“What?” she said, confused. “How can it not...” She trailed off, her eyes widening. She spun on her heel. “Winry. I need you to test the blood on this knife and get a DNA sample.”

Winry frowned. “Why?”

“Because I don’t think this blood belongs to Hughes.”

Winry’s jaw dropped. “You’re kidding me.” She accepted the knife. “I’ll be right back.”

“Why do you think that blood isn’t Hughes’?” Alphonse asked curiously.

“For one, the edges on that knife don’t match up to the ones one his body,” Mei pointed out. “I’d bet some naive officer found it at the crime scene and put it in the wrong bag.”

“What makes you think that?”

“Because everything else in that bag was a personal item of Hughes’, wasn’t it?” After seeing Alphonse nod, she laughed, shaking her head. “Wow. Do you have any idea how lucky we are that knife happened to be in the bag?”

Alphonse whistled. “That could certainly help progress this case.”

“Oh, you bet it could,” she agreed. “Anyways – I need to finish looking over him before I cut him open.”

The Amestrian flinched. “Thanks for that image.”

“You’re very welcome.” Mei picked up a magnifying class and slowly continued to examine the stab wounds. Minutes later, Winry ran back into the morgue.

“I’ve got some very interesting news for you, Mei,” she said, blue eyes gleaming in the bright light of the morgue. “You were right – this blood is not that of Maes Hughes. And guess what?” She held up a small plastic bag. “I found a hair stuck in it. Long, dark hair. And it doesn’t look like Hughes’ at all under the microscope.”

Mei and Alphonse exchanged excited looks.

“Were you able to find out whose DNA it is?” Mei asked.

“Unfortunately, no,” Winry frowned.

“Alphonse?”

“Yes?”

“Call your brother and have him get DNA and hair samples from Luxure and Neid.”

“Way ahead of you, Mei.”

xXxXxXx

I have no idea how Winry got DNA results back so quickly. Story magic, I suppose.  I hope you enjoyed this chapter, and I'll be back tomorrow with Day 5: Adventure/Home!

Read Day 5 here.