#O.O.C.

[glockawood]

{{ I want you to know there is a in-canon reason for why Scarface types with an accent and that is because Scarface is talking out loud and Wesker is typing what he says, so it's Wesker deliberately being overly literal in his depiction and Scarface is just not correcting him.

They are deeply silly as much as they are serious criminals your honor }}

[whereisalicedotcom]

{{ dshkdsfds good night for now I promise to answer the other asks tomorrow I got a little distracted haha-- }}

[heaven-said]

{{ i follow gabe's tag right so it shows up on my dash and there's two fanarts i could reblog, its the gorgeous dramatic death scene or the one about not putting rosary beads in your ass }}

[revclver-jesus]

How do you feel when people say that Takaya is just using Jin and Chidori?

{{ You mean like that one hot take that drove me up the wall? lmao I am going to give you the full blown dissertation here i go-- let's call this essay

The Most Commonly Misunderstood Thing About Takaya's Character: or Why Team Strega Is Not Literally A Cult lol

When people say that Takaya is just 'using" Jin and Chidori, what they're implying in most contexts is that Takaya is incapable of forming attachments and his motivations are fairly shallow-- essentially Takaya is not a complex villain and should be dismissed as purely selfishly motivated and malicious. He's a "simple" villain.

Now I realize....... that I might be biased as that girly that's written him on a dedicated blog for multiple years now, but purely objectively speaking, removing all my own headcanons, using only the information provided to use in canon? It's just thoroughly false, tbh!

First I'll go into why he isn't purely selfishly motivated and then I'll explain his relationship with Strega because I can prove the motivation with just Reload as an example, let alone the novel. Takaya, in Reload especially but even in the original game, I would argue has a full blown character arc off screen. At the start of the game he does appear to be more selfish, he has no real motivation and is just living out the last of his life doing underhanded assassin work-- nothing's really challenging him. But as the story progresses, Takaya begins to express a meaningful ideology-- he develops a greater concern for the world around him and expresses a full blown motivation. He says, in protest to the choices of the protagonist in one of his social events, and I quote: " Choosing to turn a blind eye towards your own power, to the grief of the fallen, to the unchosen and the unloved." Its clear he is not talking about himself here, as he mentions grief for the fallen. Takaya is expressing that he feels grief for something-- he is sorry about something that has happened to someone else, and it bothers him enough to nearly scream about it.

I think, often times, people dismiss what Takaya says as insincere almost automatically without any indication that he doesn't mean the words he's saying besides perhaps being vain and dishonest in other scenes, but these social event scenes are clearly meant to be interpreted as him being unusually earnest. By the end, Takaya is not just trying to keep his own power, but, as he says " this is not just my will but the will of all people. " which all culminates into Takaya's final character arc moment, where, in his final boss, he says the line " I will throw away my pride! " before using an evoker instead of trying to summon without help, implying that he is finally sacrificing his ego to better fight for what he believes in. If he was fighting for a positive cause, this would be a heroic moment, but it is still concrete evidence that his motivation is no longer meant to be seen as purely selfish. He is now fighting for " the will of all people ". He cares about the " the fallen, the unchosen and the unloved."

So what about Jin and Chidori? To put it simply, Takaya is not some puppet master that breaks them down emotionally and treats them like tools. They're his friends, and he happens to have a leader's personality, so they follow him, much like the protagonist he is designed to mirror. Its a lot easier to guess how he feels about them when you don't assume the worst and look at all his canon interactions with them. And even easier to tell if you can manage to read any english translated pages of their strega-focused novel ( which we can assume is fairly canon since Reload references it with the child turned into a large shadow ).

In the novel, as far as I've seen ( its only partially translated ), team Strega is extremely informal and lighthearted around each other. There is no sign that they fear Takaya, as they are willing to tease each other and disagree. The opening scenes of the book quickly establish a sort of family-like dynamic, with Takaya having an older brother-like role. He teases Chidori ( in a bit of heavy handed foreshadowing ) that she will understand why people fall in love when she's older-- of which Chidori sort of says gross and "as if" and rolls her eyes at him. Jin, being the narrator perspective, shows no sign of intimidation when around Takaya, something that would bleed through into their every interaction-- especially the establishing scene introducing the cast-- if that were the case. I feel, even if the novel is not canon, the writer would be instructed not to write Takaya so friendly if he was meant to be a heartless manipulator regardless.

In the game, the most manipulative thing he ever does to either is when Chidori is pulled back into Strega. Takaya tells her that there is nowhere else she can go and reminds her that death is not to be feared in a way that sounds like he's repeated this mantra often enough he knows she can guess it. This seems spooky, but the tension is immediately alleviated by the flippant and kind of sassy way that Chidori assures them she remembers Takaya's advice. This is not how you talk to your cult leader and this is not a cult, this is something closer to a gang or a club-- at worst, a coven of witches ( considering their team name is "witch" in italian.). They simply have an in-group and out-group sort of mentality, a shared since of identity, and a shared view of the world to go with it, which is to be expected when you've been openly shunned and mocked by the average person ( as seen at the start of the first scene with Shinji ) But this scene, when compared to all their mundane and lighthearted interactions, doesn't imply anything more severe than the leader of your misfit club reminding you why we don't hang out with the normies. You're "one of us" and a level of loyalty and commitment is expected when you otherwise always act as a group.

Yes, he is very cold and indifferent to the sight of his team members getting hurt-- or hurting themselves, for that matter, but the reason for this is obvious. In Reload, Takaya plainly expresses that he is feeling attachment ( for the protag at the moment ) but is avoiding his own capability for attachment intentionally. That scene was meant to establish that he can feel attachment, that he isn't as cold as he pretends to be, to encourage the viewer to see him with a little more nuance. What causes a man to force himself to be colder than he really is? What can cause an avoidance toward emotional attachment? Maybe...... watching 100 children die after being orphaned and stolen away to live underground for years? lmao

And so, when Takaya watches Chidori do self harm or literally sacrifice her life, for one-- he's not going to parent her, they don't have that kind of relationship, and he would be a hypocrite if he tried to encourage her not to do what she wants to to her dying body-- and two, of course he doesn't mind if Chidori dies, he's expecting that to happen anyways. His one greatest gift is his uncanny ability to accept death and the death of others. Mourning you openly is not how he expresses emotion. Especially when he sincerely believes death is a blessing. Its just the way she died that he's a little annoyed by. ( And why shouldn't he be honestly-- the girl threw her life away on the first nice guy she met at the mall just to make his work harder from his perspective, lmao ) BUT. In the comic version of that scene, Takaya does let himself be cut across the chest purely because he hesitated to shoot when he saw Chidori's spirit protecting Junpei. So... that might imply something.

However, if there is any greater evidence against any who claim that Takaya does not care about Jin especially... Takaya's final words, in multiple renditions of the story including the movies and Reload, are to say that he wishes Jin was with him as he died. If there is anyone that Takaya cared for, at least one single character in the entire game, it is above all Jin Shirato.

In the movies its very obvious, with the sad closeup shot of him looking beaten and washed up as he wishes Jin could be here to see it all end with him. I have the scene as an icon ! Look at how emotional the framing is !

So yeah, that's how I feel, it just drives me crazy when people remember Takaya as just Some Asshole lmao-- he IS an asshole! But he's no Chairman Ikutsuki, he has a lot of complexity to him beyond being the guy who killed Shinji, and not everything he does is black and white. There is highly plausible reason to believe Takaya cared for both of them in his own way, but the ever loyal, best friend, Jin Shirato, especially so. }}

[alicesought]

{{ Hello I'm scrubbing through clips today and I always love this part lmao I also think its the one time he curses pfft }}

[phasmascript]

I think Lucifer would be the most fun to make a hsr verse for

[sunrisc-slcycr]

Psssh, Hey. Like this for a Plotting / Starter Call!

[principle-blood]

I LOVE that you have a blog for brother blood, weird question tho…Do you accept request about any (within reason) headcanon questions?

[[ HI BTW this ask is literally a year old, but I just wanted to answer this to vaguely gesture at everyone that yes!! You are !! Welcome to send headcanons asks or asks for him to answer in character at any time !

Ask him about his students, ask him about the teen titans, his weird past, whatever !

I have not been active but I've honestly been silently lurking and poking my head in on this blog for months, sorry for the lack of posting though :') ]]

[winguhiro]

tags!

[mikko-lyn]

i drew angel... :)

[house-steiner-stays-winning]

Memory

Aim. Fire. Fwump.

The gauss rifle in Gewitter’s arm spits, firing its ferrous slug at several times the speed of sound. 

Aim. Fire. Fwump. 

The battle is loud outside, but Theodora can only hear the rushing of blood in her ears. An alarm sounds- incoming fire, SRMs. She dodges, using the jump jets with the utmost finesse to glide the 100-ton mech along the ground with ease. On the HUD, the source of the fire is painted in vivid red, standing out against the cool blues and greys of the battlefield. 

Aim. Fire. Fwump. 

The storefront explodes in a flare of choking concrete dust, chunks of rubble exploding outwards in a wave. Turning back to the objective, Theodora and Gewitter continue their march, towards the sounds of pounding fire that mark the enemy flank. 

Onward, she urges, feeling the throb of the reactor ramp up in time with the beat of her heart. The Atlas thunders down the causeway, shaking the very earth itself with its steps as it nears its prey. With a bestial cry, Theodora leaps, soaring into the air on streams of ionizing plasma, carried aloft on the lifeblood of her machine as she falls upon the enemy from the crimson sky. They number five, she is only one. They are utterly beneath her, they never stood a chance. 

With a single blast from the lasers, one of the light ‘mechs’ cockpits flashed into slag, pilot atomized before they’d had a chance to fire. The second managed to get a shot off, but missed entirely, the PPC flashing harmlessly over Gewitter’s left shoulder. 

Aim. Fire. Fwump.

The Marauder listed as the 200kg metal slug punched through its superstructure, fires sparking deep inside. 

Aim. Fire. Fwump.

It was dead, falling to the ground with the protesting scream of a collapsing building. 

Two more were upon her, close-range heavies equipped to kill at point blank. No matter, she was no one-trick pony, after all. She and Gewitter struck out, in unison as they delivered a tight jab to the rightmost mech, knocking it stumbling backwards. Next, a point blank shot with the ER lasers on the second mech, sending molten debris flying into the air as the high-intensity light burned into the cockpit at a range far closer than its designers ever intended. Finally, bringing the staggered mech into view, she delivered the Gnadenschuss.

Aim. Fire. Fwump.

As the smoldering wreckage of the engagement listed to the ground, Theodora took a breath, savoring the scent of scorching metal, tangy sweat and ozone that always filled the cockpit. 

Wait, she suddenly realized, with sickening clarity, and a sense of Deja Vu. There were five.

In an instant that seemed to last forever, she turned, so agonizingly slowly, to face where she somehow knew the final ‘mech to be. 

Just in time to stare directly down the barrel of an AC-20 as it fired. 

With a gasp, Theodora sat bolt upright in bed, loose hair flying wild as she clutched at her chest, then her missing leg, panicking until the here and now reasserted itself. Talabad was 10 years distant, now. She was on Helios, in the tent she shared with her wife, Melisssa. 

Speaking of Melissa, by some miracle, Theodora had managed not to wake her. She still slept soundly beside her, the gentle rise and fall of her chest and ever-so-slight whistle of her breathing like a melody to Theodora’s ears. 

Best not to wake her. Theodora thought. She gets so little sleep as it is. No sense in me adding to her stress.

So, she moved, quiet as she could, scooting to the edge of the bed. With ease of long practice, she slipped the soft fabric of her suspension sleeve over the stump of her leg, ignoring the phantom sensation that plagued her after remembering the battle that had taken it from her. 

Tomorrow would be another day of hell. But at least they’d face it together.

She grabbed the prosthetic, slipping her leg into into it with gritted teeth, letting out only a quiet hiss as the neural laces connected, sending a brief flash of searing pain up to her hip. She stood and dressed, in the SLDF uniform pants and black T-shirt she favored when off-duty, and exited the tent. 

It was quiet, at FOB Hawk. Quiet as the grave. After all, tomorrow, they would fight titans of steel, and they would win, or die. So Theodora did not blame them for getting all the sleep they could, while they could.

But, since she was yet awake, she walked, through the silent tents and burned-out buildings, to the place where the giants of ferro-fibrous alloy stood sentinel at the campus edge.

With all the familiarity of a path tread a thousand times, she marched through the tomb-like stillness to where her Gewitter awaited her, skull helm leering as it always had.

With a sigh, she slumped against it, reveling in the feeling of the cold steel against her back, so different from that day on Talabad, yet still the same in every way that mattered.

[mirrormania]

[[ I was suddenly struck with this thought that I miss writing this freak! I don't know why! Its been so long though, I'm just glad they didn't lock me out of my account.

But then I see how many people are still liking my threads and asks and things, people are still following this blog? Sending me messages? And now I feel bad! I had no idea anyone would still think about this guy after so long after the short came out! Thanks for still checking out the blog! Sorry I didn't check in sooner!

I mean my dash itself is dead but still-- ]]

[heaven-said]

{{ oh NOOOO now I have the funniest mental image of Gabriel running through ancient egypt with a large sack just reaching into people, tearing souls out of children, shoving them in the bag, running to the next house without a bloody X like

" no this is good this is great-- " }}

[revclver-jesus]

{{ me quietly chuckling in a dark corner every time someone says they have a verse just for being on team strega }}

[alicesought]

{{ It was actually this little lighthearted moment when you first spy on him with his pawns that made me like his character so quickly in the first place dsgkdsk }}

[phasmascript]

Guys

I need him