#i just noticed the image quality looks terrible :(:(

[bonnie-ollea]

CLICK ON IMAGE FOR BETTER QUALITY

EHEH so here's TSC in my little TOH crossover.

I just realized that my post are terrible quality until you click on the post, I've looked it up and I promise not to make the same mistake again.

Sadly I noticed AFTER making this, so this has the same problem.

Also, I used they/them pronouns for TSC even though I believe all the stickman are male, but I thought non-binary was better idk.

I have a little story, nothing too intricate for these guys, they won't be TOH characters' counterparts, for example TSC isn't Luz's counterpart.

I still have no idea what to do with my backgrounds, lol.

I hope y'all like it tomorrow I'll see who else to make.

[moonwoodhollow]

there's something about a retro kitchen... (★)

[bnhaobservation]

BNHA Observations, speculations and assorted info: The facts taking place during the year that ends with Rei's hospitalization and Tōya's assumed death

So, in order to write my fic, I spend much time observing canon scenes, comparing the manga and the anime version, take note of details, translations and info in them as well as finding out how are some things called.

Since what I noticed/speculated/found out can be of use for other fic authors I thought to share as well.

Resources:

Chapter 31 The Boy Born with Everything (全てを持って生まれた男の子 Subete o Motte Umareta Otoko no Ko) Chapter 39 Todoroki Shōto: Origin (轟焦凍：オリジン Todoroki Shōto: Origin) Chapter 44 Relaxing Day Off (休め振替休日 Yasume Furikae Kyūjitsu) Chapter 93 One For All's Ember (残り火ワンフォーオール Nokoribi One For All) Chapter 166 Be Proud, License Trainees (ホッコれ仮免講習 Hokkore Karimen Kōshū) Chapter 187 Flaming Roar! vs. Nomu: High-End (燃えよ轟け！VS脳無：ハイエンド Moeyo Todoroke! Versus Nōmu: High-End) Chapter 188 Your Father, the Number One Hero (父はNo.1ヒーロー Chichi wa Number One Hero) Chapter 192 The Todoroki Family (轟家 Todoroki-ke) Chapter 202 Match 3 (第3セット Daisan Set) Chapter 204 Tuning Up (チューニング Tuning) Chapter 249 The Hellish Todoroki Family (地獄の轟くん家 Jigoku no Todoroki-kun-chi Chapter 250 Ending (エンディング Ending) Chapter 290 Dabi's Dance (ダビダンス Dabi Dance) Chapter 302 The Wrong Way to Put Out a Fire, Part 2 (火の不始末 後編 Hi no Fushimatsu Kōhen) Chapter 350 Bound to a Fiery Fate (エン En)

Episode 19 The Boy Born with Everything (全てを持って生まれた男の子 Subete o Motte Umareta Otoko no Ko) Episode 23 Todoroki Shōto: Origin (轟焦凍：オリジン Todoroki Shōto: Origin) Episode 25 Todoroki vs. Bakugō (轟VS爆豪 Todoroki versus Bakugō) Episode 49 One For All (ワン・フォー・オール) Episode 88 His Start (始まりの Hajimarino) Episode 90 Vestiges (面影 Omokage) Episode 95 Match 3 (第３試合 Daisan Shiai) Episode 96 Match 3 Conclusion (第３試合決着 Daisan Shiai Ketchaku) Episode 105 The Hellish Todoroki Family (地獄の轟くん家 Jigoku no Todoroki-kun-chi) Episode 106 The Unforgiven (許されざる者 Yurusarezaru-mono) Episode 124 Dabi's Dance (ダビダンス Dabi Dance) Episode 130 The Wrong Way to Put Out a Fire (火の不始末 Hi no Fushimatsu)

Series 4th Outro2 "Shout Baby" by Ryoku Oushoku Shakai

My Hero Academia: School Briefs I (僕のヒーローアカデミア 雄英白書 I Boku no Hīrō Akademia U.A. Hakusho I) - Part 2 Notice from School My Hero Academia: School Briefs V (僕のヒーローアカデミア 雄英白書 祝 Boku no Hero Academia Hakusho Iwai) - Part 3 Awkward Year's-End Soba

OBSERVATIONS, SPECULATIONS AND ASSORTED INFO:

Fundamentally the year that lead to Rei's hospitalization and Touya's death is narrated into two different moments, chap 31/39, in which we've a retelling of how bad it was from Shouto's point of view and chap 290/302, in which we learn instead of Touya's side.

However, there's a fundamental difference in the two narrations. When the story tackles Touya's side, we can more or less pinpoint the dates of when this is happening, the same can't be said for when the story tackles Shouto's side. There's probably a narrative reason for this, Touya's whole story (which covers much more than just this year) is a progression of things going from good to terrible, while Shouto's story is likely meant to narrate the constant horror in which he and his mother lived until Rei lost it. So there's not really a need to pinpoint when a scene took place because that scene likely kept on repeating in similar variants for days, until Rei became unable to take it any longer.

As a result I'll narrate some fact that are part of Shouto's side first, so as to give the idea they likely repeated over and over through that year, while I'll follow the timeline of Touya's side of the story more closely.

So anyway let's dig on what happened that year.

Warning: as tumblr now has an image limit (no more than 30 per post), I had to turn more images into a single one so as to show the full scene. The result is that the image quality in some scenes is pretty low... Please, use the images solely as a visual reference of which scene you need to look at and, for the text check your own copy of BNHA.

TIMELINE

January 11: Todoroki Shōto is 5.

January 18: Todoroki Tōya is 13.

April: Todoroki Tōya starts his second year at Middle school - Todoroki Fuyumi starts Middle school - Todoroki Natsuo starts his 3rd year at Elementary school. - Todoroki Shōto attends preschool.

[Preeschool in Japan isn't mandatory but we know Shōto attended to it as Chap 166 shows on its cover the photo taken at the preschool entrance ceremony... the photo might not be necessarily taken in this year as kids can start preschool from when they're 3 but it just confirms Shōto went at it]

Sometime during the year: Endeavor and All Might talked for the last time.

A note on the translation:

‘Chō hisashiburi! 10-Nen mae no taidan furi ka na! ? Mikaketakara aisatsu shi tokou to omotte ne.’ 「超久し振り！10年前の対談振りかな！？見かけたから挨拶しとこうと思ってね。」 “It’s been a long time! It's from the talk/conversation show from 10 years ago, right! ? I saw you and thought I'd say hello.”

Endeavor and All Might's conversation is called ‘taidan furi’ (対談振り) where ‘taidan’ (対談) means “a discussion between two people which is usually set up as a special occasion and whose topic is set in advance”… while ‘furi’ (振り) is “show”. So basically, 10 years ago they didn’t have a casual chat but ended up together in some sort of talk show / combined interview. The anime makes it even more obvious because in it the sentence is:

‘10-Nen mae, media de taidan shite irai ka na! ? !’ 「10年前、メディアで対談して以来かな！？！」 “I think it's been since we had a conversation on the media 10 years ago!?”

During the year: Shōto watches All Might on television when his father isn't around [shown in chap 39 and 206. We see that Shōto's clothes are different in the two scenes and so is his position, meaning he did it more than once which "School Briefs" also confirms]

“You always were a fan of All Might, weren’t you, Shōto? But you had to wait until your father wasn’t around to watch those video clips in secret. Remember?” [Rei from "My Hero Academia: School Briefs I"]

During the year: Shōto's training is so severe it causes him to throw up. Rei tries to get in between him and Enji protesting he's only 5 and gets hit. [shown in chap 39, 202, 204]

Actually we don't know if Chapter 202 & 204 are placed in this same year (Shōto is still small but Rei isn't present and Shōto and Enji are dressed differently so it's not the same time as chap 39... and likely chap 202 and 204 show two different scenes as well since in one Enji has his moustaches on fire while in the other is his beard... never mentioning in chap 202 Shōto already has his scar so this likely happened post him being burn and could as well take place in the following year, though the fact that Enji has long sleeves might imply it's still winter...) but they seems to show other scenes of Shōto's training which still sees him throwing up and crying, which surely confirm an abusive pattern.

A note on the translation:

'Tōya wa oshikatta. Ore ijō no karyoku o sonaete irunoni. Rei no taishitsu o motte shimatte… Aitsu wa… oshikatta' 「燈矢は惜しかった。俺以上の火力を備えているのに 冷の体質を持ってしまって… あいつは…惜しかった」 “Tōya was close/disappointing/something I feel regret for/deserving better. Even though he has more firepower than me. He had Rei's constitution… That guy… was close/disappointing/something I feel regret for/deserving better.”

Oishikatta (惜しかった) has quite a bunch of meanings like to feel regret for, to find something a pity/pitiful, to mourn but also to cherish, to love dearly, to be precious... and is used to express pity/regret of an "almost but not quite" situation, in "a damn it, you were so close" kind of way.

Very likely the emphasis in the sentence isn't that Tōya could almost do it, but that it was so unfortunate Tōya couldn't do it.

This doesn't necessarily mean Tōya was already dead because it was decided Tōya couldn't fulfill Enji's ambitions way prior his death and way prior Shōto's birth.

BTW, Tōya started burning himself before Natsuo was conceived. In order for their age difference to work, it means Enji started training Tōya when Tōya was 3 (yeah, it's possible he started earlier than this age but I find difficult that a child of 2 could pull it out successfully). As a result it's possible he started training Shōto at that age as well. In case someone doesn't remember it, Quirks don't appear when one is 4 but can appear even earlier (luminescent baby anyone?), Shōto could freeze his own snot as an infant and it's implied that Enji knew Tōya had a fire Quirk when they conceived Fuyumi (meaning when Tōya was 2 months or younger) so starting their training before 4 wasn't impossible.

During the year: While Shōto is scared at the idea of becoming like his father, someone who abuses his mother, Rei comfort him saying he can decide who he'll become. [Chap 39... I pieced back the scene for better visual]

During the year: Tōya is desperate because he can't figure his reason to exist and search comfort in Natsuo [Chap 290]

Likely in sprind, anyway prior to July (as Natsuo isn't 9 yet): Tōya, Natsuo and Fuyumi play together while Shōto can only watch them. Enji refuses to let him join them saying he needs to train and they belong to different worlds. [Chap 302 & 39 & 250]

July 1: Todoroki Natsuo is 9.

Likely summer, though it could be still spring: Natsuo refuses to listen to Tōya’s complains during the night, telling him to go talk with Fuyumi. [Chap 302]

August 8: Todoroki Enji/Endeavor is 36.

Likely autumn (Rei's sleeves are longer): Rei tries to stop Tōya from leaving the house and the two have an argument. [Chap 302]

During the year: Rei begins to break starting to cry way too often to the point Shōto will end up remembering her solely crying and will forget her smiling. [Chap 31]

December 6: Todoroki Fuyumi is 13.

Winter: Tōya’s flames turn blue. [Chap 302]

A note on the translation:

'Hayaumare no chīsana karada ni yōyaku otozure hajimeta nijiseichō’「早生まれの小さな身体に漸く訪れ始めた二次性徴」 "Secondary sexual characteristics have finally begun to appear in the small body of the hayaumare.”

'Hayaumare' isn't a premature kid but someone born between January 1 and April 1. In Japan this is relevant because in order to start school you need to be 6 by the time the 2 of April comes around, meaning the Hayaumare are the youngest kids in the class as they're born in the year following the one in which the other kids, or ‘Osoumare’ (遅生まれ "born in between April 2 and December 31"), were born.

Winter (likely in a different day as the black bars on the corner hint at time passing by... possibly because when Tōya came back home Enji wasn't there yet?): Tōya asks his father to come to Sekoto Peak with him his next day off. [Chap 302]

Winter (likely in the same day): Todoroki Enji/Endeavor hits Todoroki Rei for not stopping Todoroki Tōya from training. [Chap 302]

Winter (the morning of another day as Todoroki Shōto has just woken up): Rei snaps and burns Shōto. [Chap 31, 39, 249, 302]

“Shōto?” he said, facing the sliding fusuma screen. No response. Natsuo slid the screen aside, not expecting to find his brother inside, but there he was-fast asleep on the Futon that he’s clearly plopped down onto without much care, all askew. Moving quietly so as not to wake Shōto, Natsuo crept over and peered at his brother’s face. He looked surprisingly young, despite the burn scar that sat heavily on his face like a shadow. Having been abused by Endeavor-who’s been fixated on his own ambition. Todoroki Rei had snapped one day and thrown scalding water in Shōto’s face. Natsuo would never forget the pair of tear-filled screams he’d heard that day. How painful it must have been, he thought. Natsuo caught himself extending a finger toward the scar but quickly curled it away when he realized what he was doing. Shōto’s scar probably wouldn’t exist if only the boy hadn’t inherited aspects of both his parents’ Quirks. Maybe Shōto could have enjoyed a normal childhood, full of carefree days playing with his siblings. And yet I couldn’t do a thing… Natsuo had been in elementary school when it had happened. Their father, Endeavor, had ignored his family well-being in pursuit of his ambitions-ambitions he’d projected onto young Shōto. Even now, Natsuo would beat himself up over how he used to be before the abuse really began, recalling the period in his life that had made him feel pathetic and ashamed. Before Shōto was born, Natsuo had sought his father’s love and care, and when Endeavor was around, he would turn into an excited ball of energy, eager for attention. But that love never came. It was only thanks to his warm and caring mother that Natsuo had survived those early years and learned to cope with rejection from his other parent. But after Shōto was born, even their mother grew distant, though not out of indifference. Natsuo could sense how much energy she had to devote to protecting her youngest, her baby, from her husband’s so called training-which most would label abuse- but at that age, Natsuo couldn’t help but feel that his mother had been stolen from him. After witnessing his mother and brother crying and screaming on that horrible day, Natsuo had been overcome with crushing shame. [My Hero Academia: School Briefs V]

Winter (the same day or the one after it... Shōto's clothes are different but he might have had to change because he got wet... on the other side it's also possible that Rei's hospitalization wasn't done the same day but Enji had to do preparations for it): Rei is consequently hospitalized and put in isolation. After learning about his mother's hospitalization Shōto decides to blame his father for this. [Chap 39]

A note on the translation:

'Omae ni kigai o kuwaetanode byōin ni ireta. Mattaku… daijina tokida to iu no ni…' 「おまえに危害を加えたので病院に入れた。全く…大事な時だと言うのに…」 "I put her in a hospital because she hurt you. Good grief... even though it's an important time..."

Enji is actually more specific in what he says to Shōto about Rei's fate, saying he put her in a hospital and didn't call her a fool but uses an expression of general exhasperation 'mattaku'.

Winter (likely on Todoroki Enji/Endeavor’s day off, Tōya's clothes are also noticeably different from the ones he had when he asked his father to go with him on Sekoto Peak): Tōya goes on Sekoto Peak, waiting for his father. When his father doesn’t arrive and the lights go down he ends up setting himself on fire losing his lower jaw before he manages to enter in a stream. He is then found and taken away by All for One. Enji reaches Sekoto Peak but can’t find his son except for a piece of his jawbone. Tōya is assumed dead even if Enji at first claims he didn't want to accept it. However this will lead him to focus even more on Shōto. [Chap 291, 302, 350]

Winter (after Tōya's death): After Rei's hospitalization Shōto will never visit her until he'll be in U.A. High school. Rei's psychological condition will get worse. Fuyumi, despite knowing about her family's sad situation was and will remain too scared to do anything beyond keeping up appearances. Natsuo will gradually forget things but will keep on resenting Enji for what happened to his mother and to his siblings. [Chap 39, 187, 250, 302]

TIMELINE CONSISTENCY PROBLEMS

Either Horikoshi didn't plan the Todoroki timeline or decided to change things along the way as, occasionally, what the characters say happened in a chapter get contraddicted in another... or make them seem uncaring of Enji's neglect of Natsuo (and Fuyumi) and of how he eventually casued Tōya's death.

Mind you, I'm sure they all cared about Tōya's death and about the neglect Natsuo and Fuyumi suffered because otherwise the characterization wouldn't make sense. This is likely a problem in the narration, not an attempt of the narration to deny the care.

Anyway I'm gonna list the problems in narration now. Do with them what you want. I'm sure plenty of people has headcanons that solve them just fine. This though isn't a page for theories so I didn't list any of mine either.

Not all of the problems are terrible (the only ones really bad are the ones that consistently change the timeline/why things happened) but some of them can undoubtedly confuse a reader about the characters' feelings.

Let's start with chap 350.

For start this establishes that Tōya assumed his father didn't come to him on Sekoto Peak because he was too busy with work... so the fire took place not after the discussion they had (which fits with how the timeline decided Rei needed to be hospitalized before Tōya were to burn) but neither on Enji's free day apparently... unless Tōya assumed his father gave up on his free day to work some more which is something he had already done in chap 301, when Enji left and refused to train Tōya even though it was his day off... and this can be Tōya's own way to excuse his father for not coming to Sekoto Peak.

However, after this the chapter has Tōya say he has to go back home because he did and say some awful things so he should apologize to his mother and the others and shows his father what he can do.

The problem is... we didn't really see him doing something awful. Yes, he argued with his mother but this was PRIOR to his flames turning blue, as for his siblings his argument with Fuyumi dated to PRIOR Natsuo's birth and the one with Natsuo to PRIOR his argument with his mother and wasn't even a real argument. He just begged his little brother to hear him out.

If there was an argument that day before Tōya left for Sekoto Peak... if he did something... well, this is completely discharged by the plot. It won't even be mentioned when he and his siblings will meet again... not even mentioning his mother was hospitalized and put in isolation PRIOR to him going on Sekoto Peak, so if he had an argument with her we didn't see, it still was way prior to that.

And the same goes for whatever he did of awful... as I've hard time thinking he's referring to accidentally burning down the peak.

Even his discussion with his father doesn't seem to fit the description and if he blames himself for how his father hit his mother... well, that just feel messed up especially since he wasn't even shown being there to see.

Going on.

Chap 39 said Shōto didn't visit Rei because he blamed himself, while chap 250 says it was due to Rei's psychological condition worsening after Tōya's death... to go back on chap 302 volume version which said she was put in isolation PRIOR to Tōya's death (and therefore likely couldn't see anyone even if she wanted to) and then, AFTER Tōya's death she got even worse.

In the magazine version of chap 302 Horikoshi had Rei state that Enji basically became abusive AFTER Tōya's death, and this is what eventually lead Rei to snap and be eventually hospitalized... the whole thing was corrected in the volume version so now the volume version too agrees that Rei was hospitalized FIRST and then Tōya died.

While the thing got 'fixed', the whole correction was done in a sloppy manner... it would have worked much better if the dialogues in whose two scenes were swapped because, if Rei was already hospitalized and put in isolation, she wouldn't have known if, after Tōya's death, Enji got worse. It's hard to think she's referring to the time prior Tōya's death because it feels like a non sequitur since they were talking of the time AFTER IT.

Since the narration was changed retroactively it's possible that in the first planning for the chapter Tōya's flames turning blue, him telling his father, his father abusing Rei and him running to Sekoto Peak (instead than waiting for Enji's day off) took place all in the same day... or better all in the same night as it's dark when Tōya's flames turn blue and it's dark when Tōya burns on Sekoto Peak.

This however becomes impossible when it was decided Rei was hospitalized PRIOR to Tōya dying.

It doesn't help how Rei in chapter 39 focus especially on how she shouldn't stay with Shōto due to his left side being repulsive to her, when chap 302 magazine version also implied Natsuo's look was repulsive to her and the volume version instead change things and made it all about the way they looked at her (but Shōto never looked at her in such a way though okay, she might have been losing it but she should have still worried more about Tōya who glared at her like Enji and also about Natsuo). Of course the problem of chap 39 is likely that what happens in chap 302 was likely not planned and the story was possibly meant to focus solely on Shōto so, of course, she wouldn't want to be near him and wouldn't be troubled by the other kids.

Shōto is supposed to be kept isolated by his siblings, which is also why Natsuo had no idea Shōto liked Soba as, evidently, they never ate together before. However, when Enji attack Rei from the furniture we see they seem to be all in the same room, the television one.

In chap 291 Enji claims he kept searching for Tōya, unable to believe in his death... but chap 302 presents him as resigned and completely focused on Shōto.

Either because Tōya's storiline wasn't planned yet or to keep the secret, the story in its early stages avoid mentioning him... with confusing results.

Shōto, in chap 39, won't mention to Midoriya how his father might have lead to his older brother's demise. The manga will try to excuse it by saying

'Sotsu-sen shita hanasu mon ja nēdaro' 「率先して話すもんじゃねエだろ」 "I wouldn't take the initiative to speak (about it)."

Only... during his first discussion with Midoriya Shōto:

Asked Midoriya if he was All Might illegittimate son

Told him about his father buying his mother for Quirk Marriage

Told him about his mother's depression and how she ended up burning him

Told him about how he was raised to fulfill his father's expecations and how he hated it and how he'll deny his father by refusing to use his Quirk

That's quite a lot he decided to mention, but the fact he didn't mention how his father also lead his oldest brother to his demise made it seems as if Shōto didn't see Enji responsible for it... which also seems confirmed by how, when Fuyumi asks Shōto how he feels about Enji, he replies he blames him solely for his scar and driving his mother to madness, not a word for his dead older brother or for how his siblings suffered of neglect even if Natsuo made clear he still suffers for it.

Shōto is a VERY caring boy. This narrative choice seems to imply he didn't care about his siblings when it's likely the opposite. He cared for Natsuo and likely for Tōya and Fuyumi too. The way the story is told though, is misleading because it makes him look like he only cares about himself and his mother when I don't think that's the case.

Probably though, back in chap 31 Horikoshi either hadn't planned Tōya's storyline yet or wanted to keep it secret and here he didn't want to repeat the whole narration or give too many hints about Tōya's death so he had Shōto skip it and focus on Rei. It's a choice... but it's not a great one.

Enji also for a long while won't show concern for how he caused Tōya's death.

In chap 93 Enji thinks at how his despair lead him to ruin his family... only again there's no mention of Tōya not even visually, again likely because Horikoshi either hadn't planned Tōya's storyline yet or wanted to keep it secret. Still it seems as if Enji doesn't care he lead his son to death for his own ambition.

Chapter 188 is a little better as, at least, Tōya is shown along with his siblings... but it's still not great because, even though Enji is in the middle of his attempt at being a better person, here he worries about his overheating and seems to focus solely on how he married Rei and with her he had three kids who didn't have the Quirk he wanted and then to a kid who had the Quirk he wanted to fight the over heating, and doesn't concern at all with how, in the process, he also abused his family, lead Rei to madness and Tōya to death, but it can work narratively... even if it's not so great because it remarks something we already knew and doesn't focus on his regret (which would have been more important since Enji is trying to be a better person). But okay, it can work.

Probably the worst part is chap 192 because by then Enji is making clear he plans to atone but when he worries about the lives he had cut short, even though Tōya was mentioned, the visual shows us only Rei, as if she were the only life he had cut short (as she ended up in a hospital), skipping the one of his son WHO DIED.

Yes, this is probably to keep the mystery about Tōya but it's still not a great choice since he doesn't seem concerned.

Also probably because Horikoshi either hadn't planned Tōya's (and Natsuo's) storyline yet or wanted to keep it secret in "Ultra Archive" it was said Fuyumi became a teacher solely because she felt bad about the mistreatment Shōto suffered, apparently not caring about the neglect Natsuo suffered or of how Tōya ended up dead.

Fuyumi is also showed 'not caring' when no changes are done regarding to her in chap 302.

In the magazine version Fuyumi saying "I knew our family was broken" with an image of Enji dragging away Shōto and her mother trying to stop it, can be read as "(After Tōya's death) I knew our family was broken" and this allows her to sound like she's in pain for Tōya, Shōto and her mother.

However when the manga version changes things and have Rei hospitalized before Tōya's death, showing her having a flashback of how Enji was dragging away Shōto and her mother trying to stop it, remarks she knew her family was broken PRIOR to Tōya's death but not her feelings in regard to it. This combines negatively with how it was said she became a teacher for what Shōto suffered and paints her as uncaring for what Tōya suffered.

Again, I'm sure Fuyumi cared. It's just when "Ultra Archive" was written either Horikoshi didn't think about this part of the storyline or we weren't meant to know about it so he skipped it, and in chap 302 he merely adjusted things poorly so they ended up having implications he didn't plan.

Shōto going to preschool, where other children are, but being kept isolated by his siblings because they aren't part of the Hero world, seems a contraddiction in the story. While part of it can be due to Tōya's actions when Shōto was a baby, even after Tōya's death it will be said Shōto was kept apart from Natsuo (it's unclear if the same applies to Fuyumi) but then we see that when Shōto is in U.A. he's free to also go out without supervision so it becomes weird how (or why) Enji managed to keep him apart from his siblings, when he was allowed to spend time with whoever he wanted outside of his house... and even in his house he apparently wasn't controlled.

It also doesn't speak so great of Natsuo never attempting to connect with his little brother even if "School Briefs" tries to excuse it by saying it was due to Natsuo's grief.

When giving the green sign to "Vigilantes" Horikoshi likely completely forgot that All Might and Endeavor supposedly didn't meet for 10 years as, in chap 122, the two will cooperate to stop a Villain attack. Since “Vigilantes” takes place AFTER All Might and All for One’s big fight that injured both, it can’t be more than 6 years at the very best but, much likely, it’s less as this takes place at the end of “Vigilantes”. It’s true they didn’t really talk but still, they met.

Also both the anime and the coloured version of the manga give him red hair when, by then, his hair were while.

Credits when it's due though, I don't know if Horikoshi is behind the coloured manga version or another person does the colouring and that person took the anime as inspiration. In the black and white version Horikoshi's design for Tōya is consistent as his hair aren't coloured (while he colour red hair in black), so this could be not Horikoshi's fault.

The anime seems to confirm many scenes took place during night (except for Endeavor searching for Tōya after Sekoto Peak burned)... clearly no one was keeping an eye on Tōya if Enji never noticed how late his son got home and Rei, despite knowing Tōya went on Sekoto Peak to train, never worried about her son being up on a peak alone till late at night...

That's all I could remember/find for now.

The Todoroki storyline remains my favorite in the manga but there's no deny it was handled in a way that ended up contradicting itself, likely sometimes by mistake and sometimes due to change of plans or plot reasons. It's still a great story so don't think I believe the fact it has shortcoming means it's not enjoyable.

[ouroborosorder]

Arknights VFX question: Any highlights or personal favourites as far as the "Stick a whole background/huge jpeg in there behind the character" category of skills goes?

Oh I like this question. This made me consider things I've never looked at before, so thank you for that. I had to do research.

So, there's not a lot of ops like this, and shockingly, I don't have many positive things to say about them. BUT I did find a few interesting highlights I think are worth discussing.

First off, I will leave Eine Variation out of this, as I have made my thoughts on that Thing very clear.

But, my favorite skin in the game actually does indeed have the Background.Jpeg - Specter's As One!

Aaaand it's easily the worst part of my favorite skin. Don't get me wrong, i think it's probably one of the better executions of the idea, since it's like, a skybox, it matches the pallette, matches the artstyle of the skin, it's almost perfect. I wish it was a LITTLE less static, maybe have some distortion ripples across it like waves to keep the stars moving, or maybe have them twinkle a bit or something. But it's fine. But a good effect isn't everything.

Effects relies heavily on the principles of animation, too. Appeal, weight, color, and most importantly of all - timing. Having a proper lead in can make a bad effect good, and having a bad lead-in can make a good effect fucking terrible. And having no lead-in at all will absolutely fuck your effect and make it super clear that you took a jpeg from the skin art and superimposed it behind your operator.

Here. Look at the picture above. Now, I am going to tab back literally just one single frame in the animation and...

oh ...there's no fade in at all. It just literally appears in a single frame. It draws way more attention to itself than it needs to just by virtue of literally popping in. It's SUPER obvious that it's just Skybox.jpeg. If it faded in with some sort of noise mask (which takes literally less than 2 minutes to make,) it would be so so so much better. Again, this is my favorite skin in the game, and I already think S3 is quite beautiful, so this is nitpicking, but this skybox always bugged me a lot.

Now to say a sentence no one has ever said - going up a step in quality from Specter to Hoederer!

I can't fully get this one in a still image and I'm too tired to record a video / gif so just go with this, alright?

This one is ALMOST GOOD. ALMOST. IT'S SO FUCKING CLOSE. The texture is being distorted by a wavelike noise that is giving it the rippling effect of fire, which is the standard thing to do for making a stylized fire. The problem is that... The texture itself doesn't fucking move? It's just being UV distorted, just a bit of offset to the material and I just AUGH.

It's so so so obvious that it's just a static jpeg of fire that's being waved around like a flag to get it to contort into being fire. This wouldn't bother me if the actual fire texture didn't have implications of movement in the little waves and fades and stuff. I hate it it's so irritating it's so CLOSE. But also, animating an entire fire flipbook would have taken a lot more time, and I can 100% guarantee you the VFX artist is also unhappy with this one. Their A team was probably on Arturia or something. Speak of the devil -

I've had a few people ask how I feel about Arturia's S3 after I expressed my hatred for Eine Variation, and I am here to say - this unambiguously fucking rules, for a few reasons.

First and least importantly, THE MONSTER MOVES. The monster itself has slight movement, you can notice its arms wiggle a little and mouth open and close. This is a small thing that goes a LONG way to make it feel way more dynamic and alive. It's also being distorted by a noise like Hoederer is, which is quite nice as a touch, really helps to make that limited movement feel way more significant than it is.

Second, is that the texture is monochromatic, but in a different way than Arturia is. The grays are colder, harsh blue-grays to contrast Arturia herself, who is a very warm gray. This makes it so that it adds a really nice background that looks like part of her, while also standing out and allowing her to stand out against it. It's a really smart use of monochrome to create visual interest using just different subtle shades of gray.

But that bluish hue also serves to compliment the only color in the effect - the blue light from the cello. Your eyes are naturally drawn to brighter glowing things, which is also the only colored spot on the effect - the cello from which her Arts emerge. As a result, the Beastie.jpg fades out of your attention, becoming monochromatic noise, which, due to being just kinda chaotic and aesthetically dissonant, you interpret more as abstract Shape than anything else. That abstract shape then makes a cone which leads you down into Arturia's center, which is her cello, which is where her Arts are coming from.

This is basically to say - These are very emblematic of what I think makes good effects textures in general. They work best when they're not alone. When these backgrounds are part of a larger whole that's all coming together to make an effect, rather than being the centerpiece of the whole thing. When I notice the background, it's a problem, in my eyes. Maybe people disagree. They keep putting them in skins, and a lot of people thought the Eine Variation goat was cool as hell, so clearly I'm in the wrong here, but hey. Who gives a shit.

I'm sure there's way more examples of this, (actually I know there are,) but I'm extremely tired and need to go the fuck to sleep. If there's any particular backgrounds ya'll want me to take a look at, lemme know and I'll get back to you when I've woken from my dread slumber.

[honeypiehotchner]

Devil's Backbone (Unsub!Hotch x Fem!Reader) -- part fourteen

Time for some more technical stuff...and for the truth to come out to everyone else 😳

Warnings: nothing crazy here, just typical profiling

Follow @honeypiehotchnerlibrary and turn on post notifications to be "tagged" when a new part goes up!

Fourteen: What you have done is terrible, and now you carry it with you -- "Four Walls" by Bastille

It was nearly 4pm when you returned to Quantico. You flew up the stairs because the elevator was taking too long. You barreled through the glass doors, earning confused and stunned looks from the entire team, including Derek who was getting ready to leave.

“Nope,” you shook your head at Derek, pointing at him to put his stuff down. “Team meeting. All of you. Where’s Garcia? Rossi?”

“Up here,” Garcia said quietly, standing in Rossi’s office, him behind her. She looked scared. You wondered how much Rossi told her.

“Let’s go,” you nodded toward the conference room. 

You bounded up the stairs, into the conference room, flicking the lights on. You paced at the front of the room as everyone filed in, filling the chairs around the table.

“What’s going on, kid?” Morgan asked, resting his hands on the table. “Are you okay?”

“No,” you answered honestly, ceasing your pacing for a moment. “Rossi, would you like to start?”

He pointed behind him to the bullpen. “I need to see where Strauss is.”

“I’ll start, then,” you nodded, placing your hands on your hips. You removed them almost immediately, feeling the cuts on your back stretching and beginning to sting all over again. At least you’re wearing a dark shirt, in case they start to bleed.

“What is this about?” Garcia asked. “Rossi gave me a location to look into, but it’s just a random motel three hours from here, and everyone’s being so secretive, so can we please—”

“Baby girl,” Morgan shushed Garcia. “Give her a minute.”

“JJ, the files you’re missing are not random, or a coincidence, or a freak accident,” you began, watching them closely.

She stared at you. “...okay.”

“Hotch took them with him when he left,” you said. “And he’s been killing those unsubs since.”

“What?” Morgan said, immediately defensive. “Kid, that’s…that’s a big accusation.”

“Do you think I’d be standing here saying it if I didn’t know that?” you snapped. Morgan stared at you for a second, but eventually relented.

“Are you sure about this?” Reid questioned.

“I’m positive,” you replied. “I don’t want to be, and I wouldn’t be telling you this if I wasn’t certain.”

“How do we know this?” Emily asked. “Have you spoken to him?”

“Yes,” you said, pushing the fact that you had sex with him both times far from your mind. “I just got back from speaking with him. Strauss had me follow him this morning when he left, and he realized I was tailing him.”

“Of course he did,” Morgan said. “This is Hotch we’re talking about.”

“Yes, but it’s not the Hotch we knew,” you insisted. “He admitted to killing Holman and Edwards, and told me there are more.”

“I still don’t— I don’t understand this, I mean, why would Hotch do this?” JJ asked. “We can’t be certain based off a few misplaced files, I mean, that’s ridiculous.” She laughed as she said it, utter disbelief covering her face. “It’s Hotch, he wouldn’t…”

You looked at her solemnly, shaking your head. “I’m sorry.”

“No,” she said, shaking her head back at you. “This…this can’t be—”

“It’s true,” Strauss said, breezing into the room with files in hand. She passed them to each member of the team, and one to you. “This is the investigation that is now open into the murders committed by Agent Hotchner. Can you turn the screens on?”

“Yeah,” you nodded, reaching for the remote, turning the TV on. CCTV footage appeared instantly, and you had to look away.

You hadn’t noticed the camera across the street at the gas station. You should have known it would have one. They almost always have at least one, no matter how shitty the quality of the camera might be.

The image was grainy, but clear enough. Hotch had you against the car, your chin in his grip. The room was silent as they watched Hotch force you to look at him. Force you to listen. And you did.

Rossi was the first to speak, only for you to hear. He stood next to you, resting his hand on your shoulder. But you refused to look at him.

“Are you alright?” he asked. “I didn’t know he hurt you.”

“I’m fine,” you said, louder for everyone to hear. You lifted your head, and Rossi’s face softened.

“Y/N…” He went to touch your arm, most definitely to offer comfort, but you slapped his hand away, the noise drawing everyone’s attention.

“Sorry,” you said. “Anyway, um— He got in my car and held me at gunpoint and I had to drive us away to where there was no cell service,” you admitted. “We argued. He told me to leave him alone and not get the team involved in this, but obviously,” you waved to the room, “I couldn’t do that.”

“You’re bruised,” Reid said quietly, his fingers touching his chin.

Instinctively, you raised your hand to cover where Hotch had his grip just hours ago. It was strong, but you didn’t think it was strong enough to bruise already. 

“This is obviously not a normal circumstance,” Strauss began, “but normally, the team the agent belonged to would not handle this. I am overriding that rule because I believe you are the only set of people who can find him. And we must find him. I received a call a few hours ago that another unsub had been murdered.”

Your eyes snapped to Strauss’s. “When?”

“Two days ago,” she replied. “His name was Steven Landam.” 

JJ locked eyes with Rossi. “That’s one of the files I’m missing.”

Strauss sighed. “I figured as much.”

“I’ll get the list of all of the files,” JJ said, pushing her chair back from the table and leaving the conference room.

“Agent L/N,” Strauss said, motioning to you. “I need to speak with you privately.”

You nodded, following her out of the room and into Rossi’s office. But Rossi did not follow like you expected him to. 

Strauss shut the door and stood in front of it. You didn’t know if she thought you might run, but it unnerved you nonetheless.

“Is there anything you would like to tell me regarding your relationship to Agent Hotchner?” she asked, keeping her gaze trained on you.

You swallowed. “No ma’am.”

“Do I need to ask again?” she pressed, raising her eyebrows at you. “What did I witness on that camera?”

“You witnessed him trying to intimidate me into lying to you and the rest of the BAU,” you replied firmly. “You should be thankful he didn’t succeed. Or do worse.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“He threatened to kill me,” you said. “Multiple times.”

She studied you. “But there is nothing to your relationship with him.”

“There is no relationship at all,” you replied, meaning it for the first time. “There’s nothing.”

“Should I take you off this case?”

You tried not to let that get to you. “If you do, I don’t think you’ll find him.”

She nodded once. “Good answer. That is all.” She opened the door and stepped out, and you followed, returning to the conference room. Where you should be.

JJ was back with her list of missing files, the team crowding around the table still. She crossed off Holman, Edwards, and now Landam. That left three other names. More than you wanted there to be, but it could have been worse.

“We’ll need to narrow those down to two, hopefully one that we’re sure of,��� you said. “He’s determined, and he knew where he was going. We don’t have much time to catch up with him.”

You felt it when everyone turned to look at you. You continued to stare at the list, but the silence remained.

“Can you guys stop staring at me?” you asked softly. “Please?”

“Sorry,” Reid murmured, shifting in his chair.

“I know it’s a lot,” you said. “I know I’m asking a lot. And I know you have questions, but I can’t answer them until we find him, so we need to just— We need to find him, okay?” You lifted your head. “Help me find him.”

“Okay,” Morgan nodded. “Let’s start where we always start. Profile. What do we know?”

“He’s killing unsubs from cases we worked on,” JJ began. “The unsubs were acquitted or given a short sentence.”

“Were any of them not convicted at all?” you asked.

“Uh, I’d have to check, maybe,” JJ said. “Garcia, can you bring up um— Matt Philips, Danny Newman, and William Pearson?”

“Yep, yep, and…yep,” Garcia replied, her fingers clicking on the keyboard of her laptop. “Philips was acquitted,” she said. “Newman served two years, got out on good behavior, and Pearson…Pearson died last year in prison.”

“Oh,” you blinked. There was one impossible option, at least. “Okay. So, Philips, he was acquitted, what did he do?”

“That was the same year as Holman,” Morgan said. “He did not like Hotch.”

You looked at Morgan. “What do you mean?”

“I remember that,” JJ said. “They were at each other’s throats.”

“Was there ever a physical fight?” you asked.

“No,” Rossi said. “It never got that far. But I remember him. When we got the news that he was acquitted, it didn’t sit right with Hotch. It didn’t sit right with any of us, but it bugged Aaron.”

“Bugged him how?” you asked, frustration settling in. It had to be Philips that Aaron was after now, but that meant nothing to you if all you had was the name.

“I don’t know,” Rossi replied. “He didn’t talk about it. I’d ask, and he’d say he was fine. And we went on other cases, and I stopped asking. I thought Aaron had let it go.”

You sighed. You needed more than that. “What did he do?”

“He murdered entire families,” Reid said. You could tell he didn’t want to tell you about the case, but he continued, because you stared him down. “Wife, son, and father. He…” Reid averted his eyes to his hands. “He made the father watch.”

You closed your eyes, all of it making sense now. “The others killed families too, didn’t they?”

“Yep,” Morgan said.

“Okay, so Hotch is killing these unsubs because they didn’t…what?” JJ said, exasperated. “Get the punishment they deserved?”

“Exactly that,” Rossi said quietly. “He’s taking matters into his own hands by killing them.”

“So, he’s a vigilante,” Emily said.

“Kind of,” Reid replied. “Vigilantes typically operate in a group or in a specific community, and they don’t discriminate between criminal charges. Technically, Hotc— He’s on a revenge spree.”

“I figured that,” you said, settling down in a chair and putting your head in your hands. “What does that mean, Reid, normally?”

“Well, it—” He stopped himself.

“Reid, please.”

“It means he’s incredibly hard to predict,” Reid added. “Unless we know the exact, specific reasoning and details of the event—”

“We do,” you insisted, lifting your head. “We know Foyet killed his wife and son, then he killed Foyet, but it wasn’t enough revenge, so now he’s killing these old unsubs. Why isn’t that enough?”

“Because these aren’t personal,” Reid explained, looking just as pained as you felt. “These aren’t old friends or family members that wronged him.”

You understood that, but it didn’t make you feel any better. “Where does Philips live?”

Garcia typed frantically. “Stony Creek. About two hours south of here.”

You furrowed your eyebrows. “He went west, though, he wasn’t going south.”

“I know,” Garcia. “You were outside Bridgewater at the motel. Almost to West Virginia.”

“Okay, where would Philips be, then?” Emily asked. “Where’s he from?”

Garcia typed quickly, her eyes scanning her screen underneath her glasses. “Uh, born in Texas, moved to Missouri when he was five, stayed there until he was twelve, then moved to Ohio.”

“Okay, um…” you paused, trying to get your bearings. “He probably— Fuck, I don’t know.” You leaned over to Garcia. “What else can you tell us about Philips?”

“Well,” she chuckled. “He graduated high school top of his class — weird. Never went to college, bounced around states and jobs for his early twenties, racked up a few petty misdemeanors until his first sexual assault charge when he was twenty-five. He collected those like candy for the next six years, then the murders of the families started. Two years of those across the US until we found him, and he was acquitted, not enough evidence, blah blah blah.” She scrolled. “Ah! He got married. Well, then got divorced two months later — yikes. And they— Oh no.”

“Oh no? What? Why oh no?” You leaned over, reading her screen. “Fuck.”

“What?” Emily asked.

“They have a son together,” Garcia said. “And his wife died ‘suddenly’ last year, so Philips has custody of the son.”

“What?” JJ said. “How did she die?”

“Natural causes,” you read from the autopsy report. “Natural causes at twenty-eight? Are you kidding me?”

“Okay,” Morgan said, trying to steer everyone back. “Okay— So Hotch is going after this guy because he killed families, got off easy, and now has custody of a son. He must think Philips killed his wife.”

“Uh, the autopsy report does look fishy,” Garcia said. “Not to defend him but…never mind.”

“Would Hotch go after a guy with a kid, though?” JJ asked. “Would he kill the kid, too?”

“I don’t know,” you muttered, shaking your head. You wanted to say no, he wouldn’t, but you didn’t know anything anymore. He was out for revenge, and he was going to do whatever it took to get it, no matter who got caught in the crossfire.

+++

This unsub was smarter than Hotch thought. He wasn’t at all where Hotch thought he might be.

He should’ve seen that coming, considering this was the only unsub able to evade Hotch the way he had. It pissed Hotch off, yet he admired the chase. It made things interesting.

Besides, Hotch had one other unsub he had to handle. It seemed like a worthy pitstop.

[class-1b-bull]

Rating class 1bs hero costumes!

(Also sorry about some of the images being kinda blurry my phone makes every picture I screenshot or download drop quality rip)

Awase/Sen

Awase - 4/10 - not only is the color scheme boring but a lot of it doesn't make sense to me and overall just kinda looks bad in my opinion

Sen - 7/10 - I like the spirals all over and the colors are good but the spiral around his neck makes his neck look long asf also it annoys me that his under shirt is only spiraled at the top and bottom but not the middle

Kamakiri/Kuroiro

Kamakiri - 9/10 - the hella dark green looks a little off in my opinion and the shoes are weird but overall I like it.

Kuroiro - 8/10 - again... weird ass shoes. It fits him and his quirk really well but it feels like its missing something yk

Kendo/kodai

Kendo - 8/10 I really like her costume and it fits her and her quirk well but I dont like the shoes (it looks like she doesn't have socks on)

Kodai - 10/10 by far one of my favorites its simpile yet it looks nice :>

Komori/Shiozaki

Komori - 9/10 I love it so much but the shoes being pink annoys me so much also the spray bottles look off but I cant tell why

Shiozaki - 8/10 she looks really nice and her costume fits her really well but its kinda bland

Shishida/shoda

Shishida - 5/10 really boring and I dont get the blue thing around his neck but its nice i guess

Shoda - 3/10 the only thing about this costume that I like is the eye piece and tracker thing on his gloves the rest is terrible

Pony/Tsubaraba

Pony - 8/10 theres little bits and pieces of the costume that bothers me but overall its a pretty solid costume.

Tsubaraba - 6/10 i fucking hate the shoes and knee pads on this dude. Plus the color scheme is a bit boring and it looks more like casual attire than a hero costume

Tetsutetsu/tokage

Tetsutetsu - 8/10 its all good but theres a bunch of little details that annoys me like the big red circle on his chest and the little metal rings in his pants and stuff like that

Tokage - 7/10 her costume is kinda boring but I can understand why. Also I dont really like the rings around her wrists mostly because of the color.

Manga/honenuki

Manga - 5/10 its very creative and I like the concept with the ink bottles and such but it looks weird and a lot of it isnt practical. I just think it could have been done better ykyk

Honenuki - 6/10 it looks ok but it just looks like a rip off of seros or iidas yk? That and I dont think it fits his charachter that well.

Bondo/monoma

Bondo - 4/10 he looks like a mustard bottle... I know he was going for a bottle of glue but this is honestly terrible ngl.

Monoma - 10/10 he looks classy asf, it fits his character well and I like the overall fit. Also im only now noticing this but he has 2 belts on...

Reiko/rin

Reiko - 9/10 I really love her costume but the big fluffy area around her neck looks like it would be annoying

Rin - 10/10 - by far my favorite hero costume (i am extremely bias) i like the colors and its inspiration <3 bro looks majestic <3 <3 <3

[dduane]

Just a quick note about DeviantArt...

...for the nice people who anonymously (or otherwise) messaged me about what was going on with AI over there.

I see from the various articles making the rounds that there was confusion about the opt-in/opt-out status of AI usage of people’s DV art. I’m clear on the situation now: thanks to all.

And that said: I’ve still killed my old DeviantArt account, for a number of reasons. 

It wasn’t getting any use (i.e., even I tended to forget about it almost all of the time)

Over the course of nearly seventeen years, very, very few people noticed it

I have other, much more effective ways to store and manage my digital art and photos these days

So it was time to let that account go: and I have.

...There were only seventeen or so items in the account, about half of which weren’t either terribly noteworthy, or vitally important to keep... so those I deleted, knowing I have copies elsewhere. Of the ones I did decide to keep, anybody desperately anxious to see what kinds of photomanips I had in there is welcome to go have a look at the Google Photos album where I’ve got them stored.

The one of the gentleman at the top of the post, though, is by far my favorite. It was taken with a Sony Clié (anybody remember those?...) in the early 2000s, in the up-against-the-back-wall bar of one of my favorite restaurants in the world, Brasserie Federal in the main train station in Zürich, Switzerland. This handsome space was once the station’s second-class ticketing hall: its stained glass ceiling is worth seeing.

...The gentleman in the image above—who’d been having a beer while waiting for his train and watching the football—struck me as looking as if he’d just dropped in from another century. He kindly agreed to let me take his picture (though plainly wondering why on Earth I was so interested). ...When I got home, I massaged the raw image with a Photoshop plugin called BuZZPro 2.0 (now no longer supported, as the company no longer exists) for a more watercolorish quality: and there it is.

...Anyway, thanks to everyone for the assistance! It’s much appreciated.

[alpydk]

Eclipse (Part 12) - "Sequester"

Next chapter is another of my favourites - But this one has Rolan living life to the max!

Ao3 Link

“My dear, Tav. It has been too long.”

You had passed through the portal with Lúthien, glad to see that your old friend Rolan was still in charge of Ramazith’s Tower. You remembered the day he took over so many years ago, surpassing the Elven wizard and becoming master. He’d tried to play it off humbly, speaking about how the tower had always been destined for him and you’d smiled as he’d then gone on to have no idea how anything worked around him. Now, he seemed much more competent.

“Rolan, you really need to do something about the projection at the door. It has about three phrases and none of them work if you have even so much as a slight accent,” you lectured before wrapping your arms around him and hugging him tightly. The long-needed contact with someone almost brought all of your emotions to the forefront, and it took a lot of your focus not to unload everything on to him instantly.

He laughed, his tail whipping around you both involuntarily, and he quickly pulled himself back from your grasp with a slight blush of his already scarlet tinted cheeks directed away from your smile. “Well, a projected image is required. It can’t be expected that I’m to be downstairs with the common rabble, can it?”

“You’re just as terrible as you used to be.” You smirked before noticing Lúthien out of the corner of your eye trying to pull a book from a throne shaped collection. “Really? That’s what you’ve spent the years doing?” Looking at the literary seating, you motioned for your daughter to find something else to investigate.

Rolan noticed where your gaze lay and chuckled before walking in its direction, his presence enough to cause Lúthien to scarper. “Well, a wizard needs his hobbies when the drive to carry out research is dwindling.”

You sighed, curious about what other random artistic displays he had come up with over the years here. It reminded you of a day with Gale where, in a rare moment of downtime, he had spent hours on a spell to arrange all his star charts onto the ceiling, creating a replica of the stars in the sky. You’d asked why he hadn’t just conjured them as normal, only to be told this was something essential to his research. It hadn’t been; he had just been experiencing a rare bout of boredom.

“But Tav, I suspect you are not here to complain about the service at the front desk or about my choices of pastime. What brings you to me after all these months? Waterdeep missing wizards of my calibre?”

“But of course,” you playfully said, having missed the time with your friend.

“As I suspected. The quality of Blackstaff has been slipping since that debacle all those years- “ He realised his poor choice of words as he saw the sight of your body language bristle. He didn’t need to say any exact details, as there had been so few accidents in the history of the academy. “Ah, my apologies.”

You nodded, knowing he didn’t mean any harm. He just had a habit of forgetting himself sometimes. “It’s actually that debacle I’m here about.”

---

Gale was growing increasingly frustrated at the projection in front of him as it ignored his requests. He spoke slowly and deliberately, trying to get it to acknowledge what he was saying. “I…need…to…”

“Welcome back, valued customer,” it interrupted in Rolan’s cheerful tone.

“Oh, for the love of…” sighed Gale tiredly. “We’re not going to get anywhere at this rate.”

Shadowheart stood under the stairs, looking towards a woman who was whispering to the other customers. “Gale, perhaps that is who we need to speak to.”

He rubbed at his brow, taking his eyes off the projected image. Why couldn’t they just hire a real person to help? It would be much more effective and less time consuming, he thought to himself, raising his eyes to the ceiling above him. An essential incantation. He noticed star charts hung above him, the curling parchments overlapping, the smell of the ink on the papers, and with it, he heard the sigh of a woman. Taking his eyes from the unnecessary art, he saw her smile and knew from then on that he wanted to create stars for her and for her alone.

“Welcome back, valued customer.”

The charts were gone as he looked back up and remembered where he was; another memory placed. “Well, it can’t be any worse a solution than this.” He relaxed his shoulders and followed Shadowheart to the back of the store with a hope of finding the answers to what the crown was and how it could be used for their benefit.

---

Mystra sat amused at the spectacle before her, that all her pawns were again in the same place. Never could a mortal go against fate, and it was fate that was bringing them together, her control of the weave pushing the pieces around as if they stood on a lanceboard of her creation. She had spoken to Elminster about her wishes, and although he had not questioned her, he had also not been as willing to follow orders as he had in previous generations. Too many times had she been asked about why she wanted not only the crown, but Gale and the child as well, and each question she had batted away with annoyance. What did it matter to him why? All that should matter is that it was her will.

A cruel smile emerged on her lips as she thought of Gale by her side, his astral form embodied with hers once more. She had missed this sensation, this feeling of being alive. It was one thing to live for eternity, but another to experience it, and few would ever understand the demands that came with immortality. She watched as Gale heard of the book that would tell him all he needed, as he walked up the stairs with a new determination in his eyes. Her gaze turned to the child as it stepped towards the portal, ready to leave the sanctum of the tower, moments away from meeting its fate.

---

Rolan had tried for some time to get the crystal ball to work for you. He’d conjured up images of others with ease, even letting you see Avernus for a moment and one of his tiefling contacts which fought there. But Gale had not appeared at all, the magic artefact instead glowing lightly before the shadows set in once again.

“And the sending spells no longer work, you say?”

You nod your head knowing that all these factors together mean one thing: that Gale is gone. Despite everything, the spells, the words, the distance travelled to be with him; you had lost him again. Your mind tried to tear itself in two. It wanted you to break down and accept the harsh reality in front of you, for you to have to return to Waterdeep without him and ultimately lose all hope, but a small part of your heart refused those truths; not until you had heard it directly from the one responsible, from Mystra herself.

You barely spoke as again the crystal ball went dark and Rolan took it for his collection. It was Lúthien, hurrying to the portal, excited for the next destination, that caused you to say something. “Thank you, Rolan.”

He smiled with sympathy before he spoke with care to you. “Tav, do not lose hope. My life has not always been one of constant success. You may not even believe this, but I, too, had my share of failings.”

His words caused you to let out a light scoff and nod in agreement. They may not have been much, but they were enough to let your hope simmer deep down.

“Oh, before you leave. Maybe the young girl would like a souvenir of her time at the tower?” He knelt, signalling to Lúthien for her to collect something from him, and she ran over with enthusiasm.

You were not sure what he handed to her as he waved his hands around in a mock magic trick, pulling something dark from behind her ear, but you appreciated the gesture, nonetheless; that this small moment would be one that all of you would remember fondly.

---

Gale walked past the portals and stood casually as Astarion picked the lock behind him. “Knock would be much more effective, my dear.”

Astarion scowled as the first lockpick snapped in his hand. “Maybe so, love, but it’d also have every person in here looking at us.” The lock clicked, allowing the vampire to open the door. “Besides, knock would mean the absence of these delicate hands.”

Gale moved aside, allowing his companions to enter the small room now accessible to them and gave a thankful smile to Astarion for his help in this task. After everything that they’d been through together, he was grateful that any of them were willing to indulge him in the way they were. It would have been so much easier to just reach the Absolute and detonate the orb, and yet they were willing to going to such extremes for him; now breaking and entering a magically enforced vault. He followed them and carefully closed the door behind him, ignoring the prickling of the weave that brought goosebumps to his arms.

---

She could not believe her own eyes as the young girl turned back to Rolan, missing the opportunity to exit the portal and run into Gale. Fate again had gone against Mystra’s will. The goddess of magic herself, again being made a fool of in her own domain. She clicked her fingers, allowing the spark of magic to flicker in her eyes, a volcano erupting in a distant area of Faerûn. As she took a deep breath, she fought against the rising fury and concentrated on finding Elminster, quietly issuing her commands to him. She had not wanted to do this; she had wanted to remain an observer, but now it was becoming too late. Speaking to Gale herself would be her only option.

---

Lúthien ran out ahead of you from the portal, her hand held out in front of her with the small black coin. She paused, looking at the metal door which stood closed nearby, and then shook her head like she was being bothered by a tiny insect.

Asking her if everything was okay was met with a nod before she hopped down the stairs one by one and you glanced at the door before following her, ignoring the familiar warmth that brought goosebumps to your arms.

---

His insane laughter could be heard far and wide as the tiefling called for the child, handing her the soul coin and distracting her for just enough time for Gale to leave the upper floor of Sorcerous Sundries. Oh, how he enjoyed this game, with no purpose other than to stand in Mystra’s way.

“Three petty thieves standing in a row; one chose sword, another chose bow. One petty thief with magic in her eyes; fell and chose love, which then brought lies.”  

He cackled as a volcano erupted, knowing that the eyes of the other gods would be drawn to her. Was the Lady of Magic losing her touch? Was it time for someone else to step in and take up the mantle? All this frustration over a simple mortal brought him such glee, and he stood from his throne; his arm held out in front of him to the nothingness of the chambers. His audience of trophies watched over him as he saw himself as the lord of his own manor; everything there, a witness to his magnificence.

He spoke with a faux chivalry in his tone. “Mystra, my dear. May I have this dance?”

“Never. For my heart belongs to another!” A high-pitched voice came from his lips, a mockery of the goddess.

He lowered his arm, his delight turning to anger, and the flames of his eyes burnt brighter with the rage. “You dare to choose someone else when I am here!?” His voice rose into a yell, and he hit out aggressively before falling forward onto the naked cobblestones beneath him.

Growling a little tune, he slowly got back up to his feet before returning to his throne, a creation to seat his own madness.

“Three petty thieves living in the sky; one chose magic, the other to die. One petty thief with madness in his eyes; born into chaos, cursed only with lies.” 

[imminentinertia]

(I added an image description to the gif)

Now that everyone's forgotten about it it's a great time to word vomit about Last Twilight, yes? But it was only recently I finally managed to finish the last episode of Last Twilight and I have Thoughts and I needed to digest.

I also have A Very Personal Frame of Reference for how I judge media dealing with blindness. What I have read about Last Twilight has been a lot of delight, a lot of disappointment with how the story went, analysis of colours and outfits and dialogue and narrative elements, but I haven't yet seen much about the depiction of vision loss. Soooo *cracks knuckles*

(I bet I've missed some posts about it, though. I'd like to be pointed to such posts)

As for me:

I had an older relative with severe vision loss thanks to untreated glaucoma (get your eyes checked regularly once you hit 40! Glaucoma is treatable).

I grew up with two friends who had lost an eye as small children - one also had severe vision loss in the remaining eye, the other had a well functioning eye. Actually I know more people my age who have lost an eye and I did then too, but I was close with these two and I guided the near blind one often.

I have a younger relative, someone very close to me, who gradually went from perfect vision to near blind. That's the most important person from everyone with visual impairment I've known, in this context.

Let's just say I had a beady eye (sorry) on Last Twilight when I first heard of it, since I have a fair bit of experience as friend, relative, guide and activist when it comes to visual impairment. I've tried moving about with a white cane and I've learned braille (I don't remember much, though). I've provided the audio commentary when watching films with blind people, more times than I can count (and I've explained several times, with various degrees of impatience, to seeing strangers that yes, blind people can enjoy the cinema). I know a fair bit about this, I believe.

Which means I'm rarely terribly impressed with media depictions of visual impairment and it's something I tend to focus on.

As for Last Twilight:

HOLY SHIT SEA'S AMAZING ACTING

(I added an image description to the gif)

If anyone tries to claim he's not doing a fantastic job, they're objectively wrong. One may argue that artistic quality is subjective as it's invariably judged against a set of agreed upon conventions rather than true objective measures, but if you hold Sea's acting up against any agreed upon good acting and find it lacking, you need to look again.

I noticed him slipping (eyes focusing when they shouldn't) twice. Slightly. In the gif above, if a seeing character was delivering that line, the actor would focus on Jimmy when he turns his head. It's natural, there's movement and seeing people's attention is drawn to that, especially when it's this close to us.

Sea doesn't. He fucking doesn't. He looks like Day is concentrating and listening and feeling and he fucking doesn't even glance Jimmy's way even though that's what every cell in his human body wants him to. And that's just one of a million examples of how instruction, coaching and Sea's talent and effort offers up a Day that seriously seems visually impaired.

Sometimes, when a seeing actor is playing a blind character, they get instructed to - or choose - to go so unfocused that they look empty-brained. Some plaster on a vapid smile and/or Stevie Wonder head movements (you should know that Stevie Wonder turned blind very quickly after his premature birth, and he has no idea of how seeing people move. Adults who go blind are unlikely to move like him). Sea, however, looks like his brain is focusing but his eyes do not.

Day is intelligent and goofy and angry and bitter and worried and snarky-funny and sad and delighted and all of it shows on Sea's face, while his eyes look the part. It's so well done, I'm in awe.

Sea also moves exactly like my near blind younger relative and it's fucking uncanny. It's like seeing them. The often hesitant steps, the slight lean forward, the way Day uses his hands and fingers to figure out where he is and what is close to him, it gave me goosebumps. The way Day uses the remains of his sight to look at things is so like seeing my relative that I literally gasped the first time I saw it.

All the awards for Sea, please. And quite a few for Aof Noppharnach and the visually impaired acting coach. By the way, I never caught the coach's name, so if someone knows it I'd love to know.

HOLY SHIT A NEAR BLIND CHARACTER GETS TO BE COMPLEX

(I added an image description to the gif)

That doesn't happen as often as one should think. When the story is about being/going blind, the blind character is often either a super brave little ray of sunshine, or terribly tragic. Day is neither. He is all of it. He is human. He's so well written it makes me need to chew on my fists, he has all the dimensions.

Mork is arguably a bit less rounded, but Mork wears quite a few masks, and he is absolutely a human being, not a pretty cardboard cutout.

HOLY SHIT A NEAR BLIND CHARACTER GETS TO DO REAL NEAR BLIND PEOPLE STUFF

(I added an image description to the gif)

It doesn't happen as often as one might think. Fumbling somewhat, using a white cane (often in a completely meaningless way), wearing dark glasses all the fucking time - those are the staples of token blind characters, all too often. One of my favourite scenes in Last Twilight is actually when Day reads Morks contract, because it showcases a visually impaired person using his phone as a reading tool, perfectly real-looking. Well done! Kudos! Standing ovations! Now stop him there and don't let him do the stupid unnecessary breakup

Running with a seeing guide and using a phone for lots of text to speech/speech to text purposes. Going to events, libraries, bookshops, markets, parties. Going out to eat, watching a film. Day does all this with a caretaker's help for some, but not all of it. Blind people do things like this. They're not special little miracles for it, they're just people who hopefully have access to decent assistive products. Entirely too often main blind characters don't get to do many of these things. Entirely too often they're just vehicles for some inane moral of the "stay positive" variety, unless they're in a tragedy.

For the record, in the scene where Mork uses a white cane inexpertly, to put it mildly, it's quite obvious to me that Aof was aiming to show us Mork's sheer desperation. Mork's personality has extremes, and trying to put himself in a blind person's shoes and making it a lot of people's problem seems like something a distressed Mork could in fact do. The result is that he looks like a Bad Blind Character, but that's fine, just like the actors portraying those characters Mork doesn't know shit about what he's doing.

HOLY SHIT THEY DIDN'T MAKE DAY PERMANENTLY BLIND. WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT

(At this point it's probably no surprise that I added an image description to the gif)

Yes. Well. Day gets his vision back in order to live properly happily ever after. I was mad as fuck about that for a while, and about the incredibly stupid breakup and time skip. I'm still mad about the most useless breakup plot fuckery ever and the time skip, and the general clunkiness of the final episode, but I'm not mad anymore about Last Twilight not showing that blind people can have true happiness.

It's about the audience, eh. To an audience of almost exclusively seeing people (I assume), losing one's sight is a frightful thing and doesn't make for the happiest of happy endings, and Day's condition is actually treatable. So production gave him his sight back. It would have been a notch braver to not do that, but a sweet romance isn't necessarily here to be all that brave. They did a lot of good work with showing how Day could manage many things on his own, with the right aids, and when the vast majority of the audience can be assumed to be seeing, showing how near blindness isn't crippling may be good enough.

After all, people are ignorant about blindness and will offer to help only to grab hold of the blind person's arm and drag them along, which is BAD, but if you've seen that guy on Last Twilight do guiding right maybe you'll do that yourself, if your assistance is needed some day. Maybe you'll listen to what the blind person is saying instead of assuming they lost their brain along with their vision.

And it's always a hell of a lot more convenient to see than to be blind, so when you have a condition that can be fixed, go ahead.

Except for that one fucking doctor making it sound like Day had three months left to live while it was just another few months until his vision would go completely, and everyone in the room (Day, mum, Night, Mork) just accepting that, I think Last Twilight did a really good job of showing that while there are great inconveniences to losing one's vision it's not being sentenced to sitting at home and feeling helpless, like Day starts out. It did a great job of dealing with an overprotective mother and a terribly guilty-feeling brother, too.

I would have liked Day to stay blind and end extremely happy, and I think it's bit of a waste of a character to heal him from the very premise of the story, but I'm not angry. Not anymore.

Although I greatly disliked the happyhappyhappy seeing ending, I was annoyed with most of the dad arc and the speedrun Night/Porjai romance, I loathed the breakup part and I hated how Day never took responsibility for his own actions leading to the accident where he got the cornea damage (although I will grudgingly admit that it's actually something that lends a whole lot of realism to Last Twilight and to Day), all in all, I honestly loved this show. No show is flawless, and Sea's gorgeous acting alone is enough to make up for a lot.

I recommend this blogger on how to write blind or visually impaired characters, if you'd like to know (a lot) more.

[venuscnjunctpluto]

🥊Nina and Logan Relationship Synastry🥊

Credit: @venuscnjunctpluto

*I recently watched an interview w these two and their energy towards each other was interesting . Obviously their relationship has attracted alot of drama due to the his boxing opponent cyberbullying Nina*

🥊 first and foremost Logan is a Pisces Venus. These men are looking for someone kind, empathetic, and fairytale like. Women who are in distress, emotionally vulnerable, dealing with grief and trauma. Obviously people aren’t perfect but it takes some time for Pisces Venus men to learn this. When they are young they will fall in love with the idea of a girl who will turn out to not be what they wanted. They will hold onto this woman while still longing for their true fantasy and usually this leads to cheating. They are constantly displeased with the realities of a relationships /!; If you do not fit their fantasy you’re done for. These men can really disregard women who don’t fit their ideal and use this to justify sleeping around because the women weren’t “worthy” of good treatment anyway. They have to learn there is no prefect partner and everyone has bad days but loving someone despite all that is the purpose.

🥊Pluto in 10th his reputation is all over the place. He’s done some terrible things and this is something he’s struggling with. I think he’s worried that he’ll never find someone he genuinely likes because he doesn’t think he deserves it. Also, indicates image obsession and control issues. Nicki Minaj also has this a shes made statements about her husband being w her with or without the fame and during her hate train era.

🥊regarding her past, Ik a lot of Aquarius mars women who don’t view intimacy the way society wants them to. I love love love Aquarius mars women lol and I do not agree w the slut shaming. Not to mention the person (Dillion) who is fueling a lot of the slutshaming has mars conjunct lilith. This might indicate he directs his anger towards women who are outspoken, nonconformist, or overtly sexual as those are themes of Lilith.

🥊Logan has moon square neptune which mean his relationship with women is not always clear to him. He could be very empathetic towards women to the point he gets manipulated or he’s the manipulator.

🥊Logan has Venus in the 1st so he’s attracted to Martian qualities in a woman. He also has mars in the 7th so his marriages could be very chaotic and Rocky. Nina is an Aries sun + Aries Mercury

🥊her moon is in his 12th…. It’s a big he’s not seeing her for who she actually is. She can pick up on his emotional cues and sensitivities. He mentioned noticing her years ago on a super-bowl ad and it’s a high chance he dreamt about her. He views her as someone who needs protection from this “big bad world”. I think he literally called her an “Angel” and a “Saint” 😭😭😭. He is especially attracted to this overlay because he’s a Pisces Venus.

🥊also as a Capricorn rising a big thing for him is settling down with someone they can start a family with and marry. He’s made it clear he wants to marry Nina and have children. They take having children very seriously because usually these people were forced to grow up too soon and they don’t want to inflict that onto their own kids.

🥊her mars in his 1st he looks exactly how her ideal man should be. I’ve had this synastry before you’re just very very very attracted to them. It can get to be a lot when the 1st house person starts to “put on a show” and do too much lol.

🥊her Venus in his 2nd…yall saw that ring right?💍 and they seem very big on physical touch as he mentioned Nina loves PDA.

🥊Nina has Venus trine Pluto so it’s no shocker that her looks and beauty lead her to be engaged to someone with money. These women can use their femininity to gain access to other peoples funds, secrets, and fears. They know relationships aren’t just about “love” and they easily find themselves playing the game. However her Pisces Venus is still a hopeless romantic at heart.

🥊he has Venus square pluto and he’s definitely used relationships or flirting for content purposes. He made it a point to say he didn’t want Nina to feel like content so he kept their relationship private. He is attracted to women with access to money and bonus points if she’s secretive.

[fernandoswarcrimes]

𝓒𝓵𝓪𝓷𝓭𝓮𝓼𝓽𝓲𝓷𝓮 𝓜𝓮𝓮𝓽𝓲𝓷𝓰𝓼

Sneak Peak.

Summary: the secret meeting this is part two to 𝓟𝓻𝓲𝓷𝓬𝓮𝓼𝓼 𝓟𝓻𝓸𝓽𝓮𝓬𝓽𝓲𝓸𝓷 𝓟𝓻𝓸𝓰𝓻𝓪𝓶 Warnings: bit of a sad snippet Note: I can’t wait for you guys to see the full thing tbh

Taglist: @weirdestmentalityphilosopher @totostables @yourmom-lmao @dessxoxsworld @aracee @buendiabebeta​ @stillbreathin @flyingmushroomss @moneymasnn​@christianpulisic10 @pierre-gasssllyy @heavengirls111​ @evans-dejong @hungryhungarian @charlie123456789 @glitterquadricorn @Mariar31 @mick2mercedes @squirreljoe

Comes out January 25th at 8am CT✨

“You look like him, you know.” The blue eyed girl softly spoke as she looked up at him; nobody had forgotten the French driver. How could they when Charles was nearly a spitting image of him. Despite the older driver being from Nice, his ashes rest in the Monte Carlo cemetery, in a tomb amongst the other prestigious and famous people the city had laid to rest. He had the same eyes and smile as Jules, she was sure if you put a picture of the two side by side it’d be a hard game of spot the difference.

But Charles was different than his godfather. She could see the sunflowers that circled his irises, something she found enchanting because that was something not many people had, how when he laughed his eyes crinkled and the dimples in his cheeks deepened his laugh was a sound she never wanted to forget. She noticed he was shy, yet outgoing once he got comfortable with someone. Scared yet cautious of letting people get close to him, for good reason. His accent leaned more towards Italian than French unlike Jules who’s accent was softer and more distinctly French. It was little things like that, that made the two nearly the same yet polar opposites. She was sure the boy next to her was a real life Disney Prince, she couldn’t find one bad thing about him. She would found out later he is fiercely competitive and a terribly messy packer. He was perfect in her eyes, even if he did think his restaurant could beat her lemon sugar crepes, that was debatable.

Charles could say the same for her. “You look like your grandmother, the famous Grace Kelly.” He didn’t watch old movies a lot but he knew of the city’s former princess from the fifties. Nearly everyone did and the girl next to him looked almost identical to the late American actress that had a lot to do with the city being how it was today. Her mark was left everywhere, street names, the hospital, she even had a famous Hermès bag named after her, which he noticed the shorter girl was carrying the day he met her and again today. The actress would continue to live on through her granddaughter in more ways than one. She had the same soft facial features, baby blonde hair and bright enchanting eyes.

But yet the younger girl was different, far from the personality her grandmother had. Gracelinde was ladylike yet elemental she could easily bend her personality to whatever the room needed her to be, suggestive of icy mountain heights and untouched potential, he noticed it at first when they had sat down for lunch how she held herself back, she’d get excited over something and quickly mask it closing in on herself to not show how she truly felt as if she had been scolded for doing it in the past. He assumed it was due to living the life of a royal, she couldn’t just be herself she had an image to upkeep and he hated the fact she thought she couldn’t be herself around him just yet. But beneath it all, was a protected heart of genuine gold like that of the Amber Room, the missing eighth wonder of the world was standing right next to him in the heart of Monaco's own princess, ready to be revealed if the right person were to come along and prove to her they deserved to be shown it’s beauty that had been hidden away.

Both young adults had such similar admirable qualities so much so that to some, looking at the pair was almost like seeing a reflection of those they resemebled from the past.

Almost.

[nordicfatcheese]

Thoughts on the new Heroscape: (For context I got the Age of Annihilation master set and the Battle for the Wellspring box, both bought pre-painted)

The box has that flip up velcro flap on the front, just like the old master set boxes!! God it brings me back.

The maps are nice, small and plain but that's what master set maps are like.

The walls are really cool. You can do a lot of fun things with them, especially if you don't lock them to the grid and instead just place them loosely on top.

My dad has noticed that if you just deepened the holes in the corner parts of the walls, you could stack them two high. We're gonna try playing with one on the drill press, will report back.

The Wellspring Water tiles in the Wellspring box look like cum. Like they're just half transparent white tiles, they look more like ice than anything else. And looking at pictures on the website, they're supposed to have like rainbow shimmers in them? But they just? Don't?

The map instructions don't have pictures of the finished maps, which is just bizarre, and there are several errors in the instructions. It wasn't much of a problem for me, but I've been playing Heroscape for 15 years. For new players it will be very confusing.

The new figures are all nice molds, although the paint jobs I paid extra for are very lacking. Lots of models have bits that are clearly unpainted, and the overall quality is very poor, even compared to old Heroscape models. Definitely recommend painting them yourself if you can.

The bases of the models are also all just plain brown, no cracked earth and skulls stickers anymore. It looks terrible next to the old bases.

The new dragon is HUGE, its tail alone takes up three whole hexes behind it. I don't know how it's going to play, I'm gonna try it out in a couple days.

The dragon's base is also warped, it has a wobble to it. Gonna try to fix it with a heat gun later, will also report back.

It has a cool ability though, where it places vine glyphs. There's a naga-like hero in the Wellspring box that places water tiles too.

Speaking of glyphs, I like their rules (especially like the one that disables flying) but the images on the glyphs themselves are very simple, just black line drawings. They look terrible next to the old glyphs.

LOVE the new evil Raelin, her manticore mount looks straight out of He-Man and it's awesome. I also love how she looks just the same as she did in the cartoon when she was evil, down to the pendant and everything.

There are three unique squads in the AoA box, and everything else is a unique hero. Heroscape already had an overabundance of unique heroes in my opinion, and this is not helping at all. Some common squads would have been much appreciated.

The new models are also too homogeneous. They're all this vague sci-fi/fantasy blend. Classic Heroscape had a clear distinction between sci-fi, fantasy, and historical models, and that clashing of genres was one of the coolest parts of Hersocape.

Overall a bit of a rocky launch, but nothing is a deal breaker. My biggest concern is model variety, but everything so far I think has been from the failed Hasbro thing, so I'll give Renegade the benefit of the doubt for now. More than anything though I'm just so happy to have new Heroscape after so many years.

[inappropriate-dance-breaks]

Women's Olympic Gymnastics All-Around Final Leotard Review

I really struggled to find photos for a lot of the athletes from this final because Getty Images had approximately 1500 of Simone and a maximum of 2 for anyone else, if that, so I had to go back and screenshot some of them which is why a bunch of them are low quality or really unflattering.

I'm also only putting up one picture if both from one country wore the same leo.

Flavia Saraiva and Rebecca Andrade - Brazil

Brazil have really done well on the leotards so far and they didn't disappoint in the all-around. We've got a beautiful yellow, nice rhinestone designs, and smiley athletes. What's not to love? 9/10

Georgie-Mae Fenton and Alice Kinsella- GB

I can see that they've got a very specific theme happening with the vertical stripes that I noticed the dive team are wearing too, and I applaud the consistency, however it really works much better for diving than gymnastics. It's a decent shade of red but I still don't like the design. 3/10

Kishi Rina and Haruka Nakamura- Japan

They. They just. Rewore the terrible leotards from qualification. Why? 1/10

Kaylia Neymour- Algeria

A bit basic but I like that the gold kind of looks like tassels, which is fun. Could have dialed it up a bit more. 6/10

Naomi Visser- Netherlands

She's got the same rib stripes that I like on Haiti the other day, and there are some white stripes in the mesh at the top that are different. It's fine I guess but I'm not dazzled. 6/10

Ruby Pass- Australia

Australia's committment to this teal colour with simple yet effective geometric designs are continuing to delight me. She barely has any stones on her body but the design is fun, it's well-executed, and she even gets some yellow in the stones around the upper arms and shoulders. It shouldn't be so good and yet it is. 9/10

Sarah Voss- Germany

I love Sarah and her unitards. The burgundy colour is so pretty and the back has some nice little criss-cross straps. The design on the chest could have been a bit bolder but I don't hate the overall look. 6/10.

Ava Stewart- Canada

The blue maple leaves are back! This time they're a bit smaller and concentrated along the belly to show off the illusion neckline. I'm not sure I like the deep neckline as it feels a bit swimsuit to me, but I appreciate the attempt to change it up. 6/10

Ellie Black- Canada

I like the idea of the lightning but I am once again not sold on the shade of gold we've used here. Some good ideas but I think they could have been executed a lot better. 5/10

Ana Barbosu and Amalia Ghigoarta- Romania

This seems to be a red version of their qualification leotard but I still don't really like it any better. The stripe under the arm is still great. 3/10

Bettina Lili Czifra- Hungary

It's a bit basic but I actually really like the design on the chest so I'm not too mad about it. 6/10

Helen Kevric- Germany

It's very classic in style and I like that they included several different colours and they even got the gold colour right!!! We also don't usually see a giant eagle on our leotards so this is a fun change. Retro, simple, yet well-executed. 8/10

Manila Esposito and Alice D'Amato- Italy

I have still yet to get excited by this design, even though they've worn it in 3 colours now. It's a bit boring and it's missing contrast. I do like the colour this time though. 5/10

Filipa Martens- Portugal

I want to like it but something about the stripes is throwing me off and I can't quite put my finger on it. 5/10

Simone Biles- USA

I like the chest and I see what they were going for on the sleeves but I don't think they got the sleeves quite right. I also still don't like stars on leotards. 6/10

Ou Yushan- China

A blue version of their team match leo and it's still fabulous. 9/10

Qiu Qiyan- China

A blue version of their qualifying leotard. My main complaint about the red was that the black looked awkward and I think they've solved that with the white, it looks a lot more natural. 7/10

Suni Lee- USA

This is really beautiful. The colours mesh nicely, I like the delicate design all throughout, and I like the almost scalloped second neckline that the stones create and the mesh blends in pretty nicely with the lycra. She's also got similar little flowers in the mesh to the Korean ones I liked during qualifying. I think it's executed very nicely. 8/10

Luisa Blanco- Colombia

Yes. The neckline is different, the patterns are lovely, and I LOVE the bedazzled halter layer underneath the neckline in the darker colour. It has shimmer, it has depth, it's gorgeous and creative and I love it. 10/10

[anderswasrightt]

about a year ago, i walked through the living room while my dad was watching pawn stars. terrible show i don't recommend it. anyway, there was a guy pawning some art of this charcoal drawing of an angry-lookin dog, and i stopped and was like "oh my gosh i love that 😍"

unfortunately, they had already said the artist's name and i didn't wanna bug my dad to rewind his show, so i just left. but it kept bugging me bc i REALLY liked the art, so i went on fb and some of my friends and i tracked down the episode on hulu and finally got the name of the artist.

he was a mexican communist named david alfaro siqueiros and the drawing is called el guardian de la paz. you should read his wikipedia article sometime bc he led a wild life. i decided i needed to have this drawing on my wall, so i hunted far and wide on the internet trying to find a print or poster of it that i could frame, but i could not find a damn thing 😔

so i tried to find a high-quality digital copy of it so i could print my own damn poster on a printing website, but i couldn't find one of those either! 😫 turns out the drawing is not even on display anywhere, and it's still under copyright, so there are no prints or high-quality images available of it IRL or online.

i went back to facebook and moped about it in a post, and a friend of mine who is very good at touching up photos went ahead and found the highest resolution image he could find online and enlarged it so it could be printed on a poster. i was worried that it would turn out blurry or noticeably low-quality since he'd enlarged it so much, but i decided to take my chances anyway

so i ordered a poster of it from one of those printer websites that mostly do business cards and posters for companies and shit, and when it arrived i was surprised at how good it looked. i ordered a frame for it and now it's on my wall.

ANYWAY, that was a fun story about how the power of friendship and disdain for copyright laws can score you swag-ass posters for your room. 😎

[ragamuffin-ponies]

I got these commissioned by DreamZ, one of my favorite artists. Please check out her art and engorge her to make more Rarijack content:

Hopefully that link works

This is about to get serious I think. At least as serious as I can get on my fucking Tumblr page called Ragamuffin Ponies 😭

A couple months ago I had an extremely intense anxiety attack because I couldn't find a good profile picture on my fucking discord. I wanted one that was Rainbow Dash but with short hair. I ended up using the following picture

This image was edited and uploaded anonymously to derpibooru. No artist is known. I used ai to upscale the image to HD, it was pretty low quality before.

Even looking at them not to check the sources I can feel my chest tighten. I'm still not sure why I got this way, but it was the catylist to find out why certain things like this have been meeting me feel so terrible for as long as I can remember.

I'm still figuring it out, but I think a lot of it can be chalked up to some sort of gender dysphoria. No I have not talked to my shrink about this yet. Shortly after graduating college I befriended a plethora of trans, nonbinary, or otherwise genderqueer/transexual individuals. It's crazy now quickly people you've never met in person can become such integral parts to your life. One of my favorite aspects of the human existence for sure. Anyway, hearing them talk about their trans experience, especially one of them in particular, I caught myself going "wow I was exactly the same way when I was a kid," or "I've thought the same thing all the time."

I used to be pretty transphobic, and although there is one specific person I've hurt dearly (who I have fully apologized and made up with all these years later) I never went out of my way to harass anyone because I wasn't evil like that, just wrong. I always told myself "yeah I'd rather be a girl but I can't do that because something something biology facts and logic". I have long hair and when I cut it I hated myself. It's not a suprise that when I shave my arms and legs I stop literally making myself sick and my sh desires go away by at least 60%. It's a lot of bullshit that I think most other people would have maybe all picked up on by now, but idk if anyone has.

Now, I'm not trans. There's definitely things I still like about being a guy I think. Genderfluid is a label that I think really fits me, but I'm NOT COMING OUT OKAY? For now I'm still cis. This is all very new we're talking a couple months. It's more like I'm questioning right now.

I really want to reach out to one or more of my trans friends for help, but I'm afraid where to start. Number one I don't want to just vent to them. I definitely don't want to say the wrong thing and trigger or insult them. But most of all I don't want to be a burden.

Also right now my brain wants to just stay in the closet forever. But that's worse than bisexuality, which I only need to hide from my parents and grandparents. With it being my actual gender idk how long I can keep the jig up. Lol I say that like they don't already know I'm bi and it's not just some big dumbass game. Completely by happenstance, I managed to explain what genderfluid was and naturally they were like "wow what kind of world are we living in" and it definitely visibly upset me but I don't think anyone noticed. I just went into my room quickly. And that was months ago, before I was even confident in my self-diagnosis (which again, I'm still not sure about. I might still be cis or I might be something else. No clue bro). So I don't ever tell my parents, okay, then what? I tell my brother? My girlfriend? My irl friends? My internet friends? Random strangers on Tumblr?? I settled on the last one for now. I still need to figure out what the fuck is even happening to me.

I'm glad this is happening when I'm in the safest, just emotionally sound, financially / mentally stable point I've been in in my life though. The timing is great because I can take as long as I want to figure this all out.

PS. I only haven't mentioned it to my gf yet bc idk how the hell she'd react, plus it's all still so new, both my emotions and our relationship. She is VERY gender nonconforming, very butch. Except she is completely cis gendered and straight as an arrow. Plus her being a gender enigma aside (and I am being very presumptuous when I say this) a lot of her friends seem homophobic, although she isn't. Obviously. Don't want to get too far into it bc I don't want to seem judgemental of people I haven't met but I've seen enough to make me already hate two of them maybe three. And that's just through social media and like three conversations. I might try to drop a few hints here and there, because I think if anyone should know it should be her, right?

PPS. I hate the genderfluid pride flag it fucking sucks and genuinely that might be on the cons list. Same reason I'm bisexual instead of pansexual even though I'm actually pansexual, the pansexual flag sucks and the bi flag rocks don't @ me

Anyway DMs are open if you want to help me the fuck out

[from-ultra-space]

Nori’s First Mission

//This will be the second entry in Nori’s Stories, a collection of drabbles and short stories about the little blue dude or his little blue friends. This one is unrelated to the first but if you want to read it you can find it linked in my pinned post. Nori’s First Mission covers, well, Nori’s first mission out of the city. It happens many years before the current time and includes: blood, major injuries, mention of death (although no one dies), a little bit of found family, Nori imaging a sunrise, and is overall pretty long. I was hoping to show a bit more than what I have but that would take too long so just posting as it is. Hope you enjoy :)

-Mod Cucco //

     It was a little while after the team originally found Nori that he went on his first mission. He had been trained in common Ultra Beasts (specifically how to avoid them) and general procedures for how things worked. Still, just because you're trained in what to do if something goes wrong doesn't mean that's always what happens. It was supposed to be something simple, the mission that is. Nori was going to follow a few of the members in the Ultra Defense Force outside the city, collect some basic data to update their records, and maybe learn some stuff from more experienced people along the way. 

     The sky was always dark but Nori was noting it anyways, just like how he noted the sound the group made as they walked further from the light of the city. Osmund, the lady in charge of the expedition, marched confidently in front with something that could be considered a flashlight. As Nori was the only Recon Squad member there he also marched in the front, and even though it was just to gather the highest quality undisturbed data, it made Nori feel important.

     After a few minutes of quiet walking Osmund decided to be the first one to talk. "Your name is Nori, right? Sorry, I'm terrible with names."

"Yes, at least I think my name is Nori," he said back, "I'm not quite sure after all that's happened"

Osmund nodded, "I heard about that. I'm sorry Phyco couldn't find your family, not to mention losing your memories must have been a struggle. Still, I'm happy to have you working with us!" She smiled when she patted Nori on the back. "Just a tip but you don't need to be stiff to be professional. If you keep your posture relaxed while talking all fancy it helps your back and your confidence."

Nori hadn't even noticed he was tense until she said that. "Oh uh… thanks!"

"Hey It's my job. One of the reasons why Phyco sends all the new guys with me. That and the fact that I've walked this route so many times I'd notice if anything was off."

     They walked for a while longer after that. Nori noted (just as he was told) every rock and ancient building foundation. Each sample was one more weight added to his already sore legs until he eventually asked for a rest. Nori carefully went through his data and thanked his suit for being comfortable even if it was a little bulky. From the vantage point he was at there was still light emanating from Megalo Tower and for a moment Nori could imagine what a "Sunrise" might have looked like. Maybe there would be stars, tiny sparkles in the sky that would represent the people's dreams. Maybe there would be farms longer than buildings were tall. Maybe there would be "Trees", plants so big you could live in them. Just as Nori was about to write this down in his Personal Thoughts section of the notes he got interrupted by Osmund.

"We must have taken a wrong turn." She said, "I don't remember this place. Dalis, what's the distance to Megalo Tower?"

One of the members of the Defence Force, who must have been Dalis, looked down at an instrument with a confused look on his face. "That's strange, the number hasn't changed since I last checked it," He thought for a moment, "That must have been at least 20 turns ago. It's just… strange. I did a full diagnostic on it before we left, there should be no issue with it."

"Well nothing we can do about it now. Let's turn back before we get into any trouble… Nori, what's beeping?" Osmund asked.

Nori didn't notice anything though. It took him a bit to find what instrument was going off, his energy monitor. The small device was beeping like crazy, probably for so long that Nori had stopped noticing it. To put it simply, this was not good. "This is not good." Nori replied.

Dalis yelled, "Alright everyone get going. GO." Immediately everyone picked up the pace. Someone called the headquarters for a Lunala but it wouldn't arrive until well after the standard time simply because of how far out they went. Nori was so caught up in the group that for a little bit he didn't even notice that Osmund wasn't following them. 

"Osmund, come on!" Nori called out. She didn't move, just stared in the direction everyone was running.

"oh no. not good." Osmund murmured. "DON'T RUN THAT WAY" The entire group halted as Osmund finally ran to catch up with them. "TURN AROUND NOW!"

Nori was confused. Why wouldn't they head back? Why was it so bright all of a sudden? Nori's head hurt and he felt like he might fall over. Where had he felt this before? The world seemed to slow. Behind him the universe tore itself in two, and a monster entered the world. 

     Nori turned around In horror, his legs shaking as two hands emerged from the Wormhole, each larger than him. The hands forced the rift wider until the creature’s torso could fit through. Before Nori even had a chance to think, the Ultra Beast’s long needle of a mouth had focused its next target, him.

It was that moment that the Buzzwole came crashing down like a force of nature and everything went red. Somehow Nori wasn't dead. Somehow Nori was still conscious and as he lifted his hand to his head he felt something there aside from the blood. Don't panic, he thought, pleaded really, Osmund. Where is Osmund? 

     Nori crawled through the rubble spread by Buzzwole's entrance. He could see the destruction it had caused now,  people fell to its might, some fled but probably wouldn't get far. Finally, he saw Osmund. She was trapped beneath a rock that fell when she must have shoved Nori out of the way. He stumbled across the chaos until he fell next to her, both terrified and in pain. It was there that they waited for help. Osmund was nearly dead, barely breathing but still struggling to stay conscious even if it was only to warn Nori everytime the Beast returned to look for them. It felt like a long time before any help arrived.

     Sometime between rescue and being transported back to the city Nori must have fallen asleep, because the next thing he remembers is waking up to Phyco and Soliera looking down at him. He was told that the Buzzwole had been defeated and that everyone had survived, even if they did so with injuries. A large chunk of rock had to be removed from Nori’s head and it would leave a permanent scar just above his eye, but surprisingly he and Osmund sustained the most damage. Ms. Phoris (as Phyco had called her) would most likely not be able to go out on missions due to complications with her legs. Still, that certainly wouldn’t stop her from training others in the future. Nori would always be her favorite student though, enough that she even gave him her last name.

     While much has changed since this incident (mainly safety procedures) it’s content continues to affect those involved. Aside from the main physical injury Nori received, from this point forward he almost refused to get too close to any kind of Ultra Beast or pokemon. It also kickstarted Nori’s relationship with Osmund, one of the primary people who he considers his family, as he has none by blood. Like a few other of the accidents Nori continues to find himself in, it still bothers him a little, even if he won’t admit it.