#like erase me from the timeline

[badassheda]

.

[g1ngerbeer]

do you think they noticed a change, the first few loops. i think they did. because how could they not, cheng xiaoshi and qiao ling, the two closest friends lu guang has, seeing him walk out of the room through a camera shutter and re-enter changed. diminished, faded, sad, the worn and cracking face of an old photograph. more and more tired each time he dives, further and further back with each attempt. every time a failure. and even as he lets the tides of time weather him more - render him a ghost, it feels like sometimes - even as lu guang changes more and more from the person he used to be, so too does that moment of disconnect in his friends’ eyes shorten and fade. because they don’t know him anymore. the golden stretch of time he spends by their sides before it all goes wrong is sliced thinner and thinner with every photo he uses, his touch blurring the memory with blood. each time he fails they know him less - the first him, the one unburdened by the terrible knowledge he now holds and the weight of too many failures.

soon they will never have known him at all.

Because you would notice if your best friend time travelled from a horrible future, but not if he travelled back so far he erased the person he once was (the person you knew) (the person you loved, first. before you loved this newer-older transparent version, never knowing a difference.)

(and this too is a loss to be grieved, he thinks sometimes in the dead of night to the sound of soft breathing in the bunk below, selfishly. but it is worth it if cheng xiaoshi lives.)

(the death of everything lu guang ever was is worth it if it means cheng xiaoshi lives.)

[snickeringdragon]

OH ALSO UNRELATED TO THE LAST POST. been fucking around with a self insert au with my friends in which we replace the cast. i did an... edit? redraw? traced redraw? of the drawing kid doodle with them ^_^

theres nobody missing. trust me.

nobody at all.

[sunnyscript]

Parallax feels for y'all

[mutalune]

me when people hate on aos trek:

[brittlebutch]

fragment of a partially written “what if Evan went through with the magic-exorcism and had his memory of Gowpenny erased?” fic -- specifically a scene in which Jammer/K/Sam track him down to some middle-of-nowhere rest stop in order to meet him again

[myname-isnia]

Ah yes, Magnificent Century, or as I like to call it – “Why the fuck are the most likely Ukrainian girl and the Crimean Tatar woman speaking Russian to each other, what were the writers smoking???”

[steakout-05]

for months now i have had this little story idea bouncing around in my head for an AU of Jetpack Joyride where Barry is stuck inside a big expermental time loop conducted by Legitimate Research to create an army of randomly selected time-travelling soldiers. the idea is very much still rough and i dunno if and when i'll develop it into a bigger thing, but it's a pretty cool idea and it's a twist on the JJ game that i've never really seen much exploration on.

basically, it focuses on Barry, who is the sort of Patient Zero of an experimental concentrated time-fuckery technology LR is working on. every single day, at exactly the same time, Barry goes out to work his salesman job, discovers the jetpack, breaks into the laboratory, takes it for a joyride, eventually gets hit by an obstacle and dies. the next day, Barry goes out to work his salesman job, discovers the jetpack, breaks into the lab, takes it for a joyride and dies. and he does the same exact thing the next day, and the next day, and the next day, and the next day... he's pretty much stuck in a loop of the exact same events happening repeatedly every single day, and he has absolutely no idea about it. that is, until there's a glitch in the system, and Barry progressively becomes a lot more suspicious and paranoid about the situation he's in. the rest of this post is gonna be REALLY spoilery (like i literally just explain big important chunks of the story for several paragraphs) if i ever make this into a full-fledged fanfic, so i'm gonna put it under a keep reading thingy. also it is... quite long and convoluted lol.

as the story goes on, it focuses more on the mental degredation of Barry as he starts uncovering all these weird clues, slowly trying to piece together what's going on and driving himself insane, because every time a reset occurs, his memory of the previous loop ever happening is completely wiped and everything he did that day goes all the way back to square one. since the malfunctioning of LR's technology though, Barry has been getting little nuggets of deja vu and half-remembered fragments of dying before a reset. this eventually becomes him repeating things to himself, little phrases and codes over and over and over in hopes that it will persist into the next reset. this eventually becomes symbols stuck up on the walls of his room and then progresses to entire rituals to help him remember and little behaviourisms like tics and stims to let him know he's in another loop. he becomes more and more panicked and unsettled, paranoid that someone - or something - is watching him closely. additionally, he keeps having disturbing dreams in the early hours of the morning before he gets up to go to work, ones that are symbolic and prophetic, as if they're trying to warn him about something. i've had concepts of him waking up on top of a pile of millions of mangled carcasses that all look exactly like Barry, and having on them them forcefully grab onto his leg and pull him down with the rest of them. it's kinda like the nightmare Woody has in Toy Story 2, but like, dead guys everywhere, lol.

the backstory of this whole thing is kinda insane. basically, Legitimate Research is a sketchy government funded facility that's doing secret time experiments to create the strongest beings for a purpose that's somewhat similar to Brains' Zomb Bomb plan from AOZ (i haven't fully decided yet). Barry is someone who has been randomly selected for their newest version of the concentrated time loop experiment, where patients will be put under looping tests to extract data about their strength, agility and performance and decide what they need to supplement them with in order to create the perfect soldier.

Barry was 22 years old when he was selected. he was actually a relatively normal local Fish N' Chips vendor living in New South Wales, but one day, when he recieved an exciting letter in the mail about a new ambitious job opportunity, he completely disappeared without a trace and seemed to have been entirely erased from the minds of everyone he had ever known. Barry had actually been kidnapped and ensnared into a mind-experiments facility of the laboratory, where they proceeded to wipe his mind, proof of his existence and his entire personhood up to this point, and replaced all of it with fake memories to fill in the gaps. he was then placed in stasis and to be injected with high doses of strength drugs as they crafted a new life for him behind the scenes. a new house, in a new state, all with new stories and memorabilia meant to be lived out by new person. now, he was Barry Steakfries in Queensland, a rough-around-the-edges guy with a passion for action movies and destruction. he was a revel with a thirst for chaos and freedom, but he just didn't have the means to achieve it yet. it was all according to plan.

a big part of the story i want to tell that involves him is that at some point, Barry tries to break free from the time loop by doing something different. this takes a lot of pre-planning, memory rituals and repeating details to himself, but after he wakes up from a reset and gets out of bed, he hesitates, choosing to go to a different place to sell his gramophones that day. he deliberately tries his best to avoid Legitimate Research's headquarters as much as he can, and while he doesn't completely remember why he's doing it, he has a deep gut feeling that he should stay away from them at all costs. so he does. and at first, it goes well. the day is different, his choices seem to actually matter and for once, the feeling of deja vu isn't tearing him apart... until a crazy freak accident happens that forces Barry to die and reset the time loop again, wiping away everything he had done that day. Legitimate Research is now forcefully trying to stop him from knowing what the hell is going on by forcing him to die with each now discovery he makes, and Barry has to figure out more and more creative solutions to averting their surveillance and trying to get the hell out of the loop.

Craig will also be involved with the story too!! i'm not exactly sure what exactly the events leading up to Barry discovering and meeting him would be, but it'd be kinda halfway-late-ish into the story where Barry manages to cut off LR's surveillance of him, breaks into the laboratory and searches through its archives for anything relating to time. during this raid, he accidentally discovers the true Patient Zero to this time experiment: a broken, decrepit shell of a man who has been hooked up to a set of wires and locked away deep into the laboratory, never meant to be discovered by anyone, only known simply as #000 'Craig'. Craig was the very first human they used to run an early prototype of these experiments, but through malfunctions in the threads of LR's technology, he ended up knowing too much and tried to break free from his time loop, which resulted in him being dragged out of reality and becoming completely detached from his own time, stopping his aging process completely and practically allowing him to exist forever and persistently through every reset unaffected. LR relocated him and considered him a catastrophic failure, locking him away in a cell deep in the bowels of the laboratory before destroying and erasing every archive of him ever having existed in any point in time. and now, the same thing is about to happen to Barry if he doesn't figure out a way to stop what's happening quickly. Barry, outisde of LR, is the only one who is aware of Craig's existence in this timeline. Barry makes a vow to make sure that he will never ever forget Craig, no matter what happens to him, no matter how many times his timeline gets reset, because he is the only other person on the whole world who truly understands what he's going through.

at the very end of the story, when Barry finally escapes the time loop and is about to enter into a new reality where none of this ever happened, he reaches out a hand to Craig and offers he come with him to live. Craig, however, rejects the offer, sadly confessing to Barry that because of his disconect from the threads of time progression itself, Craig must stay behind and be erased along with everything inside this one and let Barry live his life. Barry protests, insisting that his life wouldn't be complete without him and that they've already gone through so much together, but Craig assures him that this is the best for the both of them, and that Barry must leave him soon before the window to escape closes. Barry gives Craig once last goodbye, holding him close and basking in his presence for the final time. he closes his eyes, presses his head against Craig's and whispers "I promise I'll never forget you." before he slowly lets him go, not breaking their locked gaze on each other for even a second as he steps into the portal and ventures into an entirely new reality, never to return.

i want there to be an epilogue part where Barry starts his new life and goes looking for a place to stay, and he comes across the place where LR used to be, which is instead occupied with a big square fence plot and a sign that says "UNDER CONSTRUCTION: NEW RESTAURANT TO BE BUILT". Barry stares at it for a moment and reflects on everything that has happened. all the hellish experiments that were once held inside this very plot of land, all the trauma he went through to get to this point, Craig's sacrifice, everything has lead up to him standing here, in the right place, at the right time, to finally live the life he should've had to begin with. eventually, he turns away, continuing to walk down the street. he should go check that place out sometime.

(insert "what a fucked up dream for a baby to have" ending from 'then what' here)

[aibafiles]

2005 timeline split theory is basically all but canon at this point. like it's not a theory anymore it's just how it works. i know this to be true in my brain

[smol-blue-bird]

I feel like every writer/producer/etc in charge of every major franchise in the world is infested with brain worms that do nothing but sit in their minds all day whispering "kill off all of the fan-favorite characters! retroactively make that happy ending miserable!! destroy the expanded universe to make way for our controversial sequels!!! do itttttttttt"

[revengesworn]

man okay so i’ve been thinking about the ending and the ways i think it’s flawed/my frustrations with it, but also why it does still work enough for me to at least not ruin the series as a whole/how it still tries to fit with the themes?? and i’ve also been applying headcanon to make it work better for me and to make me feel happier about the series overall, so if you’re curious!! take this post lol. (under the cut for length + manga spoilers for the whole series below!)

What initially bugged me about the ending most of all, and I finally managed to put it in words lol, is that there was never an explanation for how Mikey and Takemichi managed to leap back in time and fix everything. Because of that, to me, the key message of “everyone can be saved” and more importantly/centrally, “rely on your friends/don’t try and take on everything alone” gets muddied a bit?? Because it feels more like luck that things happened to work out. Like, Mikey finally puts his full trust in Takemichi and as a result - he ends up killing him!! And seemingly only manages to go back in time due to “luck”/an unexplained miracle. So the message it seems to (accidentally) send is that Mikey was right to try and take on everything alone, because when he put his trust in Takemichi he like. ended up killing him/his worst fear was confirmed??

That perspective on it was enough to put me off the series for a bit ngl, but I still love Tokyo Revengers overall - it has so much good in it that I really wanted to keep liking it, and I do think that the series isn’t completely ruined by the ending! And the main reason I’ve come to think that is because despite everything I just said... even if it’s only indirectly, it is Mikey choosing to open up to Takemichi and trusting him (by releasing his dark impulses after Takemichi said he could handle them) that led to the chain of events that triggered the happy ending. Like, in the end, he believed in Takemichi and trusted him to save him, and was rewarded for that narratively by being given the chance to time leap along with him. The message of “trusting/relying on others” is still there, in the end, even if it’s not as strong as it could’ve been as a result of the indirect way it happens. Hopefully that makes sense, and I hope it can help people come to be at peace with the ending a bit more to think about how it fits the themes of the series!

But also, as for my own reading of the ending... I’ve applied some headcanons that make it work even better for me as well, without actually contradicting canon (I hope). Headcanons are as follows:

So in my mind, Shinichiro’s curse actually had two aspects to it. The first was the punishment for choosing to kill in order to gain the power - but that punishment was technically already paid when Kazutora killed him later on. So Mikey’s curse/dark impulses was, according to this headcanon, not actually a result of Shinichiro becoming a murderer at all - most likely it was just due to the old man’s malice, wanting to hurt the people around Shinichiro as well.

Shinichiro being punished was fair, Mikey being punished for someone else’s crime wasn’t. So maybe the universe (yes, i am giving the universe some level of sentience here lol) gave Mikey a chance to break that curse, if he chose to open up about his struggles and didn’t try and take everything on alone. That could’ve been the condition for breaking the curse for any number of reasons - Mikey has always had a fixation on being “strong” and a hatred of weakness, so maybe the universe just decided that that was a suitable condition, since he’d have to overcome his flaws to do so??

Of course, predictably, Mikey did try and take it all on alone and refused to open up. And I’m not blaming him for that! He clearly thought it was both the only way to protect everyone, and was also deeply afraid of rejection from the people he loved if he actually talked about his issues - on top of letting them down/burdening them. But the point is - if you interpret the curse this way, the final time leap at the end of canon makes sense - it was because Mikey choosing to trust Takemichi to shoulder his burdens fulfilled the condition for breaking the curse. That’s still sort of  the case even without headcanons, but here it’s much more directly a result of how the curse functions to begin with, so (at least to me) it feels much less like luck that things worked out??

Hopefully that explanation made some kind of sense LOL i might just be talking nonsense or being pretentious, and if so I apologize!! But for me, I like the concept because it’s just expanding on themes that are already present in Tokyo Revengers just a little more. Personally, if I had to rely too much on headcanon to fix everything, I’d still be super dissatisfied, but since I can tell what Wakui was going for/that message of the story is still present canonically to some extent, I’ve come to feel decently satisfied with the ending overall now!

On another note, I’ve also seen people complain that the show loses impact by making Mikey’s actions a result of the supernatural and not trauma, since it turns the show from an explanation of real-life issues into just a convenient curse that explains everything. I actually think this is a completely fair criticism tbh, but I tend to imagine that what drove Mikey to violence was actually a result of the curse AND his trauma mixing together. Specifically, the curse caused the violent urges, but it was his trauma that led to him being unable to resist them, and his views on strength and weakness that led to him being unable to manage them healthily, if that makes sense??

Anyway this post is already too long so. Share your thoughts and headcanons on the ending below, I’d love to hear them!! <3

[den-kunn]

liu kang the wattpad writer

where he thinks plot twists are so cool and totally don't create plot holes

[kneworder]

my mom hates spoilers so much that i'm watching tua4 with her bc i need to complain about it with her and she won't let me say a word until she's seen it

[lovinggreeniehours]

sorry guys im not having a very nice day

[anadrenalineslut]

do you understand how much of a chokehold on society you would need to have to inspire a pop punk band to use your thematic cores as the inspiration behind their ALBUM????? like to actively structure an album around your metaphors and jokes?????????

[eufezco]

BIRDS OF A FEATHER༄

the tva erased you from your timeline when logan died, you've been living in the void since then.

angst + fluff. no use of y/n. english isn't my first language (!)

you couldn't take your eyes off them.

you were at the table sitting next to logan, on his other side was laura. he held wade's dog while she played with it and you couldn't take your eyes off them. you couldn't believe it. you had to pinch yourself a few times to confirm that you weren't dreaming.

you thought you'd never see a scene like that ever again. the two of them together. how many times you had looked at the sky and cursed the universe for not giving the three of you more time?

when your logan died, the time variance authority decided that the sacred timeline didn't need you anymore so they erased you and sent you to the void. you preferred it that way, you didn't want to live in a timeline in which he was gone but you were also angry because they didn't have to drag little laura to that place with you.

you didn't remember how much time you spent in the void but seeing how laura had grown into a woman, you guessed that it had been a long time since you left your timeline.

when you got to that place, she was just a child. scared, angry, who had just lost the most important person in her life. and you were just the same, except that you were not a child and you had to take care of both of you. no matter how much you wanted to die, you had to stay alive for laura. but also for logan, for the way you both cried and held his bloody hands while he died and for not letting her be what they made her for.

and no matter how strong your mutations were, you didn't know how long you would have lasted there if it hadn't been for elektra, johnny, blade, and gambit. they found you when you were escaping from alioth and let you into their hideout. they explained to you how things worked there and eventually, they allowed you to stay with them.

until one day you walked into that same hiding place, and there he was, drinking gambit's alcohol and wearing a yellow spandex suit. you felt your heart beating so hard that it seemed to be fighting to get out and reach him. you brought a hand to your chest to feel it. it had gone so long without beating that way that sometimes you thought you left it buried with him in your timeline.

logan also felt his heartbeat accelerate but he quickly took his eyes off of you and drank a long sip from the bottle. he wasn't alone, a deadpool was with him, you recognized the suit, they were quite popular in the void. he shook his hands and gave little jumps of excitement. you looked at him confused, did you know each other?

—of course, you are here! there's no you without logan and there's no logan without you! do you know how hard it's been to find a proper wolverine? there are so many fucking timelines without one because you died! —deadpool exclaimed when he saw you. —and this one is not even a proper wolverine! you know they call him the worst logan? and he won't tell me why they call him that, can you believe it?—deadpool acted offended, you didn't know what to say. —wait... —he turned to look at logan. —was there a she in your timeline? i didn't get to meet her, they're usually nicer than you.

logan ignored the question and simply drank from the bottle again as he stormed out of your hideout.

he avoided you as much as he could. he did not look you in the eyes, he did not address you when he spoke. how could he? the last time logan saw you, your lifeless body was piled up next to scott's. shame consumed him even at the thought of just approaching you. his hands trembled, a knot formed in his stomach, his pulse quickened.

you came over to talk to him that same night.

logan was sitting in front of the campfire, alone, with a bottle of liquor in his hand. how many had he drunk? he saw you approaching and tried to convince you that he wanted to be alone but you still sat next to him.

—what was i like?

logan took a long sip of alcohol when you asked. he said nothing, just stared into the fire, so you decided to take the turn. —you were grumpy, i guess that doesn't change in any of your variants, and you wouldn't have worn that yellow spandex suit in a thousand years.

he looked at you with a frown when you said that. the same way your logan would have looked at you. you continued talking. —you were stubborn, never asked for help, and you were tired all the fucking time because you worked your ass off to get us out of the shitty place we were living in.

he stared at you in silence while you talked. the person you were describing definitely sounded like a version of him.

—you always said that i didn't need to wait up for you but i know you liked it when you came home late at night and i was there and i know you hated the way i folded your shirts but you never said anything because you knew i didn't know how to do it any other way.

you felt a lump forming in your throat. you turned your head, hiding your face from logan so he couldn't see how you used your thumb to wipe away the tear rolling down your cheek. —but you were so brave, and caring, and i loved you with all my heart. you always looked after me even when you were fucking dying with each passing day.

by the tone in your voice and how well you remembered every detail, he guessed that your logan was suddenly taken away from you. oh, he knew that feeling so well.

you were about to get up and leave, you didn't want to bother him anymore and you had already overshared enough with him, when all of a sudden, he started talking.

—you were the sweetest. fuck, i never knew why you were with me. i always thought you deserved better, but there was no way to get you off my ass —. he closed his eyes and shook his head. —and i tried, i tried to push you away and get you to find a guy who deserved you, but there was no way. and i didn't really want you to do it because i was so fucking in love with you.

logan drank from the bottle, trying to let the alcohol sliding down his throat drag with it the tears forming in his eyes. —you liked to read in the garden of the mansion on sunny days and when it rained you'd open my bedroom window to listen to the rain and get into my bed while i was sleeping so i could keep you warm.

there was silence as logan took another sip, almost finishing all the alcohol. —and i left you to fucking die.

the worst logan. at that moment you understood why he was called that, you didn't him to explain it. wade said that in all the timelines he had visited, there was no you without logan and there was no logan without you.

however, in his timeline there was logan but there wasn't you.

he was called the worst logan because he was doomed to live in his timeline without you.

you grabbed the bottle from his hands and drank the alcohol left. —yeah, i couldn't save you either.

you kept each other company that night. most of the time in silence, watching the fire consume the wood, other times you commented on the situation, you talked about cassandra nova, the people you had met there in the void, he even asked you about laura. and at the end of the night, you were sitting next to him with your head resting on his shoulder and him watching you sleep peacefully.

the next morning you headed off to fight cassandra nova. you knew that logan would end up joining you, it was in his nature.

you and laura managed to remove the helmet from juggernaut's head and you ran to give it to wade. when cassandra opened the portal using strange's ring you were there, you could've left with wade and logan, but you couldn't leave laura there. cassandra's allies had pulled themselves together and she was struggling to fight back.

before you went to help her and logan jumped into the portal, he wrapped one of his big arms around your waist and pulled you into a kiss. you rested your hands against his chest and closed your eyes, enjoying those few seconds of your lips pressed together.

—oh, fuck. seriously now? i know how important fan service is for marvel but we literally have a chance to get the fuck out of here—. wade complained.

—i'll get you out. you and the kid, i promise i won't leave you here —. he said as he started walking backward towards the portal. you nodded, if there was one thing you were sure of, it was that no wolverine in the multiverse would break a promise.

and just as you were right about all wolverines being grumpy, you were right about that too. agents from the time variance authority went into the void to get you and laura that same day and now you were having dinner with him, laura, wade, and his family.

you couldn't take your eyes off him.

he had the same look in his eyes. that little sparkle in his deep brown eyes. he was happy, smiling as he played with the dog and laura, calm knowing that you were by his side. you looked away from him when he caught you staring.

—what is it?

you shook your head and pressed your lips together, showing him a little smile. —nothing.

—come on, spit it out.

—it's just... i feel i could fall in love with every version of you.

logan nodded slowly, his eyes were now fixed on yours. —i've had the same feeling.

wade, who was distracted with vanessa but not enough to not be paying attention to your conversation, decided to intervene. —oh honey, wait until you meet the crucified one. you will want to take that back.

you and logan looked at each other confused.