#like it just completely robs him off his agency and of the fact that his motivations and drive are his own….. like theyre making it all

[cuntstable]

i love reading character analysis posts that start off strong but then right when they seem to be getting to the point they just do a perfect 180 and hit the wall at destructive speeds. like awesome, you DONT get it

[theerurishipper]

I agree so much with your Adrinette post. Unlike a lot of the fandom, I've always been a fan of both Adrien and Marinette so it hurts twice as much to see what the writing has done to them. How did their huge moments get switched up?! She was supposed to be the confesser. I cheered her on for 4 seasons that she would finally confess. Then when the time comes, Adrien does all the cute and risky confession stuff that she was supposed to do. Like what? It might have made her life easier if she were a real person, but as a character? The writers just took away a HUGE character moment from her. A huge triumph everyone wanted. Just gone. After 5 seasons. It makes her less compelling as a character to not have that.

They gave the responsibility for that to Adrien and gave the responsibility of facing Gabriel Agreste and talking to him about Emilie to Ladybug?! Maybe someone wrote the character growth fulfillments on a sticky note and it smudged and they got them mixed up? I think Ladybug should have been there to face MONARCH, but the Gabriel Agreste moments and discovery should have went to Adrien. It theoretically makes his life "easier", I mean in the sense the show is going to position it as. I'd love if they tackled the reprecussions of this, but my money is on them letting that whole senti thing fade into the background never to come up again and he will just live happily in his bubble thinking his dad is a hero forever. But as a character, that just like flatlined him. He is 80 percent less compelling now. His moment. Gone. After 5 seasons. Possibly never to be spoken of again or revealed. Sad.

I don't understand Season 5's thing with not challenging the characters where it counts the most. Neither of them grew. They both did a lot... for each other's plot points. Adrien worked and adjusted his approach to woo Marinette, but that wasn't a character growth moment for HIM because he's always been that way. There was no big anxiety hill to get over there or big change for him. He's always worn his feelings on his sleeve and been kind as Adrien. No internal conflict besides "I want to be with my girlfriend." Marinette stood up to Gabriel FOR Adrien and faced him in the end, but again. Not a strong character growth moment for her considering she has no emotional tie to Gabriel Agreste. There's no internal conflict there besides "He's keeping me from my boyfriend." There's not even the triumph of her beating Monarch because he kind of... wins?

Because neither of them actually confront their assumed assigned character challenges, they both come off extremely uninteresting to me by the end of the season. I can't even agree that Ladybug's character is benefiting here. I am not happy as a fan of either. They didn't allow her any true character building triumphs that she should have as the protagonist. While robbing Adrien of his character arc and keeping him unchanged and blissfully ignorant in his bubble.

I honestly have nothing more to add, because you nailed it anon. Your observation about them completing each other's character arcs is so spot on. You're also completely right about the fact that they are going to breeze over the implications of Adrien being a Sentimonster. The one thing I will clarify is that when I say Marinette benefits from the writing, I mean that at least she gets to do something and has some kind of agency and choices outside of being someone else's prop, whereas Adrien gets none of that. But you've honestly said everything so perfectly and I couldn't agree more.

Thank you for your ask!

[rash0mon]

symbolism and significance of clothing/character design in bungou stray dogs

one of the most admirable features of the bungou stray dogs series is the attention to detail in every aspect. i feel that each time i reread or rewatch, i notice new specifics that intrigue me to analyze further. character design, especially the clothes worn by the characters is definitely one of mentioned specifics. in the bungou stray dogs universe, character design does not possess merely an aesthetic function, but it aids in understanding each character - their personality, motivations, the author/work they are inspired by, and what i feel is most notable - their fate (past, present and future) and how it is intertwined with and depends on other characters. this is what i`ll attempt to showcase in the following, on the examples of a few characters.

atsushi nakajima/ryūnosuke akutagawa

naturally, these two are to be analyzed together as their design was, in essence, made to contrast each other - which, just in the start, hints at the momentousness of one to the other. atsushi is the light, akutagawa is the darkness. atsushi's eyes carry vividness and life inside of them, akutagawa's are pure gloom. however, the two are not completely black or white, they are not distinctly "good" or "bad", as they carry parts of each other - which is shown in the hints of black in atsushi`s design (the black streak in his hair, which we were robbed off from in the anime but alright, and in his clothes). the same concept, just vice versa, is seen in akutagawa`s design.

both wear clothes they got from those dear to them, or rather those who gave them a sense of purpose, a reason for living. in atsushi's case, each of the agency members, in akutagawa's case, dazai. the coat is, in a sense, a remnant of akutagawa's experienced trauma, as is atsushi's hairstyle. just from this surface-level description, it can be seen that these two, are in fact, as i`ve written in my other analyses, two sides of the same coin, yin and yang if you will. they`re similar, yet different - they complete each other.

dazai osamu

at first glance, what is most noticeable about dazai`s design are, of course, the bandages wrapped around entirety of his body. i feel that, other than being remnants of previous attempts, these bandages emphasize his seemingly invisible psychological/emotional wounds, protecting him from the real world, and from further pain.

in the dark era, dazai`s left eye is covered by said bandages. at his deathbed, oda takes them off - from that moment on, oda allowed dazai to "see", both "good" and "evil" worlds - as up until now he had only seen a world of evil and suffering, and was blind to what the rest had to offer. thus his other eye was opened.

although, even if he has seen both sides, he still wears the bandages, holding onto them even while imprisoned in mersault. he is still yet to find his reason for living, and is yet to uncover the wounds he`s gotten throughout his life, if ever. this notion of hiding the real self from the world matches well with yozo of no longer human (who i believe was a big inspiration in the making of dazai`s character).

“I have always shook with fright before human beings. Unable as I was to feel the least particle of confidence in my ability to speak and act like a human being, I kept my solitary agonies locked in my breast. I kept my melancholy and my agitation hidden, careful lest any trace should be left exposed. I feigned an innocent optimism; I gradually perfected myself in the role of the farcical eccentric."

this quote also describes the essence of dazai`s character, in simplified terms.

other than that, there exist other obvious contrasts between port mafia and ada dazai - already seen in the usage of colors. in the port mafia era, dazai wears a black coat, given to him by mori. on the other hand, once he joins the ada, dazai wears lighter clothes, symbolizing his turn to the life of good - some black still remains, however. he now wears a bolo tie with a green pendant - many suspect this was a gift from odasaku, which i also believe. dazai holds onto this as a reminder. of his past, and of what he is to do with his future.

sigma

sigma's character stands out in several ways - as he is the only character not inspired by any author, and is a creation of the book. many characters in the series struggle to find a purpose, but in the case of sigma it is even more apparent. that longing for a reason of being becomes the main feature of sigma`s soul, as well as an initiator of his every action.

he is one of the characters with the lightest color palette. i believe that this symbolizes his innocence and divinity as compared to the other characters who have experienced the horrors of the real world all too well. his outfit demonstrates how he initially sees himself - as a manager of the sky casino. it is, at first, the core and essence of his being. the ambiguity of sigma's character and reason of living is also seen with his hairstyle, which is half-and-half, incomplete. uncertain. just like his existence. it`s as if sigma is an unfinished novel.

rest of the characters

the concepts i mentioned beforehand in analyzing character design are also present across other characters in the series. naturally, they embody the works of the authors they are written after, such as kunikida's design. other characters also showcase their fated connections with others, such as chuuya wearing the hat gifted to him by mori. (i could make a separate post about chuuya`s design and how it follows his development through the series, which i might just as well do later because this is already getting too long). the contrast between the past and present self seen in dazai can also be applied to ranpo's attire (the past being before he met fukuzawa - wearing only black clothes, representing the darkness of his mental state. the present being his current look, which embodies what he sees as his main role and reason - a detective). i will touch up more on these certain characters and their designs in upcoming posts.

and...the color purple?

now, i believe this may be a stretch but as i am obsessed with color symbolism and especially purple, i will just get this out.

now, there are a few characters with purple presence in them in bungou stray dogs, as it's a rather rarely used color. i`d noticed that the mentioned characters all had something in common - an uncanny, almost haunting presence at times, as well as experiencing deep psychological distress or disorder. which made me wonder: what could purple mean in character design? and most specifically - purple eyes, which are seen to be rare among the cast?

you can already draw a correlation between fyodor and fukuchi as purple-eyed characters. but once you add yosano and mori into the mix, the reasoning changes. when you think of it, it`s all characters who have power over human lives in a sense more divine than the other characters - fyodor and yosano with their ability, as well as fukuchi with his sword and persona, mori being a doctor.

but then again, we also have sigma who is engulfed in lighter shades of purple, unlike any other character in bungou stray dogs. which makes me wonder about his possible future role.

[somepsychopomp]

binge watched all of scavengers reign in one sitting! I have many thoughts, though they all feel jumbled up right now. I think the show starts off VERY strong but faces some pretty significant writing challenges as it progresses. Basically my opinion is:

episodes 1-6: an absolute triumph of imagination and environmental storytelling. They have genuinely some of the best ideas for alien life I've ever seen. The human characters are also all interesting, too. Azi and Levi were my favorite plot line but I really relished in how our first glimpse of Kamen is this sad, lonely malnourished man slowly starving to death in a tree... only to be revealed as a violent selfish asshole who genuinely gets what he deserves as the story progresses.

side note- I'm also a huge fan of the weird plant(?) that basically clones living beings and makes The Thing(s). Also Levi is probably the most compelling character in the entire show.

episodes 7-10: I enjoyed episodes 7-10 and maybe 11 so little that i considered giving up on the show in its entirety. To me, this segment dropped the show from like a 8.5/10 to a 4/10 or even lower. They were such an unenjoyable slog to get through imo (no hard feelings on anyone who liked them tho) because of the small crew of new characters we meet. No surprise you're not supposed to like or trust them, but the show just seemed unwilling to commit to them being actually evil or arguably sympathetic characters just trying to survive their own hostile situation, and kinda waffles between the two possibilities.

I guess that's the attempt at a gray area/morally gray characterization but I just fucking hated all of them and they meant nothing to me. Also it really, genuinely feels like the show speed ran Kamen's arc and completely ran out of ideas on where to take his character from here on out. Which is a bummer considering he's the type of character you absolutely love to hate.

And I'm so, so sorry, but I felt nothing when Sam died. TO MY DEFENSE, I can articulate why! Basically, out of all the characters on the show aside from arguably Kamen, Sam gets beaten up the most. He gets his blood sucked during the early storm, then gets wounded by the freaky cloning plant and almost dies from that, and then almost dies from getting buried alive, AND THEN gets implanted with the parasite from that mysterious lady. The best way I can put it is that his character just made me feel fatigued. His situation wasn't the kind where a protagonist suffers injury after injury but gets up anyways via sheer will/desire to complete their goal/what have you (Mizu from Blue Eye Samurai is a good recent example from adult animation who embodies this trope well, for example).

In contrast, Sam just spends too long on the brink of death for the stakes to feel high anymore. He also does nothing to improve his own condition, relying entirely on Ursula, which I think robs him of his agency and depth. In fact, I spent so long prepared to mourn him, kinda expecting him to not survive the planet, that when the time finally came, I already expressed all my emotions and detached myself from his character. I will say that at the very least, I did like his actual death scene and felt it was nicely done and paced.

episodes 11-12: Perfectly fine finale, I had no major problems with it but these episodes just didn't quite hit the highs of the first half of the series. Will say tho, Levi turbo blasting the Hollow was perfect. Love that for them.

Overall, I think I'll have to rewatch the show again when it's not late at night and I have all my wits about me. Maybe I'll change my opinion on it, because I really, REALLY want to like it in its entirety and will absolutely watch a second season if/when it comes out because, despite all its flaws, Scavengers Reign is something genuinely special.

The first half of the series feels like lightning in a bottle and MUST be seen by all sci fi and fantasy fans!! Even though everything is intensely organic and raw, the planet also has this strange biomechanical feel to it, from the shrapnel wind storm to the big triangle-head birds with electric/static feathers to all the animals that look like statues or toys but still live and breathe. It's such a unique take on an alien world and it was beautiful to see.

[queentheweeb]

Tamaki Amajiki X Male Reader

"Suneater you're killing me here." You loved Amajiki so much, you truly do but the boy's lack of self-confidence drives you up all the walls in the vicinity! His mouth warbled as he pulled his hood over his face even tighter muttering self-deprecating things about himself. Why is he like this? He's so amazing! Not only are his abilities on par with pro-hero but, he is part of the Big three! The top 3 students that U.A has! He should be proud of that! That's a feat that so many students dream of being in and he made it with all of his hard work and dedication he just didn't see that.

"You're hurting my eyes with how bright your smile is." You blinked coughing into your hand to hide your blush. How was he for the last year able to do this to you? He always was able to turn you into a blushing mess but because he was always hiding his face he never got to see your reaction. Thank Kami (God) for that. 

"That's sweet of you Suneater. You should be happy with all of your achievements! You're about to graduate and start your own hero agency with Lemillion and Nejire Chan! You're part of the Big Three and everyone knows and loves you, especially for your help in saving Eri! You're amazing!" Amajiki made a noise in the back of his throat that sounded like a strangled cat before turning his whole body and leaning against the wall of the nearest building. You sighed shaking your head at his antics letting him have a moment. You both were on patrol right now and it was slow so you two can afford to take a little break. There were so many things that he just didn't see. He didn't understand how amazing he truly was. All the hard work he put in to be up to par with Mirio and his standards not realizing that he managed to surpass his own limit and go beyond and plus ultra. He doesn't realize how much he's admired and loved especially by you. You had the biggest crush on him, and you're sure it was even love by now. You didn't want to try and subtly pursue your crush until it was confirmed by not only Togata and Nejire but by Amajiki himself that he does in fact like guys. That little bit of information made your heart soar and hope blossom in your gut. You thought that maybe just maybe you'll have a chance to win his heart. You looked at him again as he finally moved from the wall but his face was still covered by the hood as you sighed. He was oblivious to your affections and advances you were scared that if you were to move past the subtle notions you would end up scaring him off. He was already so skittish and any kind of compliment would set him off even though that didn't stop you from praising him.

"We should continue with our patrol now shall we?" He didn't wait for a response as he started walking allowing you to catch up to him. You walked side by side with him engaging in idle chat with some response from him. You decided to stop initiating conversation finding that the silence was quite comfortable and enjoyable with him. You both walked down the streets and paths you guys didn't normally take learning quickly that villains will learn a hero's routine to avoid them at all costs. 

"I hear something." You turned to Amajiki who manifested some animal's ear and then he ran down an alleyway with you hot on his tail. It wasn't long before you both ended up by a bank that was being robbed. The villain was huge with multiple arms that were grabbing bags of money while smashing cars and creating a complete ruckus and mess. One glance at Amajiki and it was enough for you two to formulate a plan. Another thing you were quite smug about, you both worked almost as well as Mirio or even better if you do say so yourself. 

"Hey, big guy! Over here!" You jumped up and down waving your arms to create a distraction. You could have easily taken this guy down by yourself but you wanted Amajiki to get more recognition so you opt to be a decoy as Amajiki came up behind him to subdue him

"Fucking hero." He wasn't pleased in the slightest which was to be expected and he did exactly what you hoped he would do. He moved all the bags of money to three of his arms and aimed to attack you with his free hands. However, what he didn't know was that Amajiki was behind him ready.

"CHIMERA KRAKEN!" You loved Chimera Kraken so much. Call you insane, but you found it sexy and had some very lewd thoughts that you were not proud to admit out loud and would plan to keep those kinds of sexual fantasies to yourself. The villain had no idea what hit him and in no time he was tied up, subdued and you returned the money to the bank. The media and police arrived shortly and you knew how Amajiki got when it came to crowds let alone talking to someone for the news. You made your way swiftly to him after the two of you were done with the police grabbing him by his wrist and guiding him away from the prying eyes.

"I have this great restaurant in mind that we can go to later if you're up for it." He was silent for a long time and you were beginning to sweat thinking that you overstepped a boundary somewhere until you were brought back to reality by a soft squeeze on your wrist. 

"I-I wouldn't mind..." He said it so softly and bashfully the blush coloring the tips of his ears and face just plain ol' adoring. It was too much for you to handle without exploding and gushing about it so to avoid that kind of embarrassment on both of the parts you opt to make a beeline for the train station. 

"It's near Fatgum's agency so first, we go to the agency and from there we go out to eat! Sounds good?" Amajiki simply nodded too shy to say anything and you accepted it. The train ride was short it was only half an hour which was enough to calm down the butterflies in your stomach. You were taking Amajiki on a date. You were taking your 3 year-long crushes out on a date and you had no idea how to act or feel about it. You did the best thing in this situation! Let Kami do what it does best and run its course. It wasn't long before you both made it to the stop and walked the short five minutes from the train to Fatgum's office. You both greeted the receptionist and went straight up to where you were greeted by Fatgum himself about to get on the elevator. 

"What are y'all two up ta?" You opt to explain what happened to him making sure to emphasize how much work Amajiki did and how amazing he was again

"He used Chimera Kraken! You should have seen Fat! He was so amazing!" You felt a tap on your side looking down to see that Amajiki had nudged you in the side to get you to stop talking about him.

"Stop saying embarrassing things." You took pity on him and so did Fat a little bit as all he did was ruffle up his hair.

"Well, I left the office open for ya. Make sure ta close it when y'all leave okay? Have fun now." He sent a secret wink and a thumbs up to you which had you turning your head to hide a blush. Damn that guy's intuition. You both silently walked to his office Amajiki closed and locked the door behind you two as you both walked your separate ways to change.

"I'll be out in a minute Tama!" You started calling him by that nickname when it accidentally slipped out one day and yes even though he was embarrassed he didn't necessarily tell you not to call him that so you took advantage and stuck to it even if it was to get enjoyment out of seeing his ears turn red. You quickly put on jeans and a muscle shirt with regular sneakers making your way out to the living room where Tama was already. Tama was wearing a shirt that had an elephant surrounded by flowers and ripped jeans with sneakers. He was dressed so nicely and it fitted his figure so perfectly that you felt your heart palpitate. 

"W-why are you staring?" Shit, you have been caught. Time to bite the bullet.

"You're so beautiful to look at." Dammit Kami strike you down right now and make sure when you're revived you have some common sense. You waited for a response but all you got was a red face and a sputter "That was pretty forward huh-"

"I think you're pretty too." That's it. your world has been spun on its axis in all different directions. Did he just call you pretty? Was this your chance?

"T-thank you..." Dammit don't sound so stupid, be smart! "Are you ready for our date now?" Great. Real smooth Y/N. Way to lay it on him easily.

"This is a d-date?" He didn't seem appalled he just sounded genuinely confused. Screw it all, might as well go all the way. You moved until you were sitting next to him and reached for his hand to hold. He allowed it and you felt a smile grace your features when he held yours back.

"Yes, Tama...I liked you for 3 years...I really want to take you out...If you'll let me." You were patient knowing this was a lot for him to take in. You jolted in surprise when you felt a pair of warm lips press on your cheek and you turned sharply blushing scarlet.

"Let's see w-where this goes." Tama didn't wait for you to answer as he yanked you up and started walking towards the door. You allowed it. You were going to let him lead because this chance was a gift from God and you'll be damned to mess it up.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So what do you think?

[madnessofthespirits]

2, 9 and 17 about Diar and Alter for the character ask game 👀👀👀

2. A canon or headcanon hill I will die on

cu alter: ummmm i'd die for anything. for example:

he's not lancer but he is very much cu chulainn

in EPU (and to a certain extent post-EPU too) he's basically just a guy trying to give himself agency in a situation where he's been robbed of his agency. this makes him act really weird

nothing about him has anything to do with warp spasm cu, even on a meta level

he's got that dissociative ptsd

whenever he's kind or caring i find it moving because he's quite literally been altered to suppress those parts of himself, which goes to show that they're actually too strong to be suppressed completely at all, and that he's fighting extra hard to be that way

(i may be interpreting this question as an opportunity to just share random opinions but hopefully that's okay)

diarmuid: the worst things that ever happened to him were ultimately the fault of awful old men with too much power and if fate would actually notice that and try to do something with what that might mean about him i think that would be a much more interesting thing to explore in regard to his character in fgo (or any other post-f/z media he could potentially be in) than well, most of the other things they've done with him post-f/z instead

also *straight guy voice* he's way stronger than either canon or fans usually treat him as being. urobuchi (or someone else on the f/z staff, i forget who) said he might have won the grail war if it weren't for kayneth being a fuckwad. all of the stuff he's done in his legends is at least as impressive as anything cu has ever done.

9. Scene that first made me love (or hate) the character

cu alter: honestly i think it was during the scene where he fights nero and she's trying to understand his motives and nothing he's saying really makes much sense and she points out that he's not even enjoying what he's doing, which he implicitly agrees with, and then tells her that his only goal is to just keep fighting until he's dead. i remember thinking to myself stuff along the lines of "wow bro that sounds Bad what's your problem" and "oh he's like Fucked Up fucked up i can't not care about him" and really it just made me want to understand him so bad

and then there's the finale scene where he finally admits that he's being forced to do what he's doing because medb used the grail to place him under a geis and it's like sad as fuck because he's been forced to sacrifice the parts of himself that feel joy and love just so he can maintain his honor, and therefore it's also heroic at the same time (this is what i'm talking about when i say that though he may not be lancer he is very much cu chulainn). also the part where's he kind to medb while she's dying in spite of having little reason to be and actually holding clear dislike for her is very touching

diarmuid: i definitely liked him from the start - like he so clearly just wants to do the right thing and have fun at the same time in spite of the fact that he has this horrific past and got saddled with this shitty master - like how could i not care about him? but it's definitely the last couple of scenes he appears in that sealed the deal for me. just seeing him walk away from that shitty encounter with kayneth and turn around and decide he's not gonna let that stop him from enjoying an epic fight with his best friend - and then he experiences one of the most awful fictional deaths i can think of and we learn that this whole time while he's been smiling and taking the high road at every turn he's actually been building up this whole volcano of grief and resentment. the whole thing is just as brief as it is powerful. it's a moment of honesty, it's touching, it's relatable, it's the closest thing to justice he's allowed. it contrasts so starkly with the side of him the audience sees up until then that it comes off as genuinely shocking, and it shows that he is just as glaringly human as he is a perfect knight, and therefore what makes him such an interesting and lovable character. can't imagine how hard your heart has to be to see all that and not care for him at least a little

17. Quotes, songs, poems, etc. that I associate with them

cu alter: i think you will either get it or not, but out of all the songs i associate with him, of which there are many, i think of this one as being the most "his" of them all

diarmuid: i know i've already brought this one up before but:

"when i choose to see the good side of things, i'm not being naive. it is strategic and necessary. it's how i've learned to survive through everything." -- waymond wang in everything everywhere all at once (excellent film btw if you haven't seen it)

also:

[sadistpet]

it's munday and you know what that means . here is me rambling about raikov ( + volgin ) and a common perception of him because im annoying and talkative <3 cw for mentions of sa / abusive relationships

a Lot of people in the fandom view raikov as yet another victim to volgin, being forced into being his lover and only being cruel to his soldiers to appeal to volgin. which like. people can view it however they want, you do you. but i also think that interpretation is deeply boring and cliché and . kind of undermines raikov as a character and reduces him to some... damsel in distress ? i feel like it robs raikov of his agency as a character who's able to make his own decisions ; he can't have chosen this, he had to have been forced into it. and it's silly, because there's so much canon evidence inferring the complete opposite ?

i think this ties into the idea i mentioned that volgin's relationship to raikov was meant to indicate a more tender and "human" aspect to his character, but it just wasn't as blatant as it could've been. take the cutscenes for example ; we get two cutscenes that feature a focus on both eva and raikov's nude bodies. eva is covered in scars, which she mentions are from volgin. they're part of her, cut into her skin, permanent. she didn't want them, and she can't get rid of them if she tries, unless it's via surgery.

raikov, on the other hand, has absolutely flawless skin with no signs of scarring. the only indication he has a connection to volgin is his underwear with a lightning bolt. and that's something removable, something he could easily take off if he wanted. it's under his clothes, after all, where nobody can see -- and still he wears them. why would he if he didn't want to ? sure, you could come up with reasons why, but it seems pretty obvious that he's wearing them by choice. and them being a removable piece of clothing rather than permanent scarring further implies it's something he chooses, and something that volgin is, surprisingly, fine with.

getting into the way volgin acts in regards to raikov. like, oh my actual god, where do i begin. in terms of the infamous homo-picture, we can see volgin genuinely smiling. not sadistically, but like, actual, meeting-the-eyes smile. ignore raikov being the irl depiction of the 😩 emoji because he's getting his dick grabbed. the fact this is a candid picture too implies that this is just how he is around raikov ; genuine, lets his guard down.

not to mention the fact he beats the shit out of snake EXPLICITLY FOR HURTING RAIKOV. like. you cannot get more blatant than him saying "i will make him pay for hurting ivan" and then proceeding to absolutely pummel snake within an inch of his life. not for the legacy, not for the deception, or anything even remotely related to the main plot -- no, it's for hurting ivan. i guess you could say it's a possessive thing, but that's disproven with his battle dialogue if you wear the raikov mask. he says that he thought ivan had been killed. hence, why would it be something possessive ?

IN ADDITION TO THAT. even when he realises that snake isn't raikov, he never lays a hand on him. there's the initial crotch grab, and after that he shoves snake away, but he doesn't EVER hurt him again until snake's raikov mask is removed. only THEN does he beat him. the entire time that snake wears the raikov mask during that scene, volgin doesn't lay a finger on him, doesn't use his electricity powers on him, despite the fact he absolutely could and knows that it isn't raikov.

by putting on the raikov mask during volgin's battle, it gives us even more insight to this. volgin stops attacking you, freezes up, visibly trembles and slowly walks towards snake thinking he's raikov. even his lines -- "ivan. ivan? ivan! is it really you? i thought you'd been killed..." // "how dare you!" // "you will pay for what you did to ivan!" // "i will avenge ivan!" -- all imply that he truly cares about raikov. this is even more evident when coupled with the fact he attacks you even more violently at this point.

and that's not even mentioning the blatant contrast between how he reacts towards tatyana being manhandled by ocelot, who essentially threatens to kill her, and how he reacts after finding out snake must've hurt raikov. he truly does not give a shit about her ( "do as you like." ), he doesn't see any qualms with hurting her or killing her. but raikov ? he beats snake to a pulp for hurting him. he can't even bring himself to harm someone that looks like raikov, even when he knows it's not actually him.

raikov's existence as a joke character is a detriment when trying to find out more about his own introspection and views, but portable ops' recruitment dialogue for him gives us a very small, but very intriguing look into his personality. he is completely different from when we see him in mgs3. he's withdrawn and nearly silent, more awkward and visibly cowardly. far removed from the cocky, snarky, sadistic version we see in snake eater. the only times he speaks up are when revenge is mentioned, but more poignantly, when volgin is mentioned. when he's spoken to by campbell, he remains almost entirely silent besides six lines, two of which are explicitly about volgin :

"…bastard! how could you know!? wait, i get it… you’re an agent of the man they call snake. the yankee who killed the colonel at groznyj grad! and you came all this way to gloat over me…!" "you want me… to join the villain who killed the colonel? not a chance…"

it's clear from these lines alone that raikov is still, six years later, extremely broken up over volgin's death. or, well, "death", but ykno. his entire personality has shifted into one far more morose and dour, and he only speaks up and shows genuine emotion in his speech when it's about volgin. he refuses to join big boss' team because big boss killed volgin. he remembers big boss in the first place for that exact reason. volgin's death has evidently left its mark on raikov. he's not the same man. sure, you could say maybe he's upset because volgin dying meant he lost the person protecting him from retribution, and he lost all his privileges. but then, why doesn't he make any attempt to climb the ranks of big boss' group the same way ? "because it's big boss' group, and he hates big boss!" yes. because big boss killed his lover. he calls big boss a villain for what he did to volgin, so it's clear he doesn't view what happened as a positive. this goes double for the fact he seems to not care at all about being praised and promoted among the ranks of the soviet armed forces. he only cares about revenge.

when you look at it all, it's blatantly obvious that volgin cares about raikov in a way he exhibits with nobody else. and raikov is heavily implied to feel the same way. raikov isn't just another of volgin's lovers, he's someone that volgin genuinely cares about. reducing raikov's character to some kind of damsel coerced into this relationship is not only, in my opinion, deeply cliché and boring, but it goes against all the evidence presented in the games ?

there's some other interpretations i'm not personally a fan of, but do find intriguing and interesting ( such as raikov being EVA / a spy, ) but this one irks me immensely to the point where i feel like i have to refute it. volgin is irredeemably evil, yes. he can be irredeemably evil and also genuinely love raikov. and the small amount we've seen into raikov's mentality support that the feeling is, in fact, mutual. sure, there's claims to make about age disparity and power imbalances, but it's stated pretty clearly ingame - multiple times in fact - that volgin views raikov as an equal.

framing raikov as some kind of victim or acting on harmful urges etc not only goes against the canon, but it strips away the character's ability to make his own decisions. why must he be a victim ? is it not possible - and probable, given the evidence - that he is just as bad as volgin, if not worse, and that's why they're drawn to each other ? is it not possible he chose to be volgin's lover out of a genuine desire for something, be that love or intimacy in general ? villains can be villains and still love like everyone else. they can be evil and still love healthily and genuinely. these things aren't mutually exclusive and acting like they are is very cartoonish !

so yeah. tldr the games heavily imply if not outright state that volgin and raikov legitimately and truly care for and love each other beyond that of just a physical, sexual relationship, and the depiction of raikov as a victim of volgin is a huge disservice to his character and also goes against what we've seen in canon

[divineprank]

I accidentally opinion’d all over myself, and I quickly ran out of character space to respond. I didn’t want to have to type like eight comments because I wasn’t sure if you’d get pinged with a bunch of notifications you don’t want, so I decided to just post it all as one big post if that’s okay!  Maybe it's just because I'm far too invested in my own muse and therefore struggle to release the image I have of him in my head. xD But that voice, to me, sounds really off for the character its portraying. It sounds like a cheap anime dub: like it was just someone hired to get the job done quickly. It was very generic, very ‘monster-of-the-week’; something we might have seen back in the days of the FOXBox or Kids WB. To me there was just no real depth to the sound of his voice. Ganondorf is thunderous, he's grandiose -- he's BIG! Granted, we only got a small sample, but the emotion projected through his vocals was just very weak, too. It was as if the actor wasn’t at all invested in the character he’s reading for. When Ganondorf talks about Hyrule, we should be able to hear the seething hatred drip off of his tongue as if speaking the very name “Hyrule” is like poison in his mouth. This is a Hyrule that has literally driven him to know nothing else but rage and hatred and malice: this is a Hyrule that has stolen his very people away from him. The Gerudo turned their back on their own king and as a result have aligned themselves with Hyrule. This is the ultimate knife in the heart, we as fans have an opportunity to hear a glimpse of how much pain Ganondorf should be in regarding Urbosa and Riju’s very deliberate defiance of their own king and their people’s bloody history... The performance we get, for some reason, invokes images of that “while you were partying I studied the blade” meme. Like, he sounds like some edgy senior in high school that took himself too seriously and suffered a temper tantrum in the middle of the gymnasium because he feels disrespected by the other kids, or something. Like, yeah I’m being a little funny here, but what I mean is the performance is underplayed: like he’s acting with restraint, he’s holding himself back. Whether it’s because of Nintendo’s direction, or he’s a newer voice talent, or he genuinely doesn’t know the character well enough to know better -- I don’t know... And I’ll be totally real: my personal impression of this interpretation of Ganondorf could very well just be confirmation bias. I don’t think so, but I’ll acknowledge that it COULD be. I made a crude remark about how Ganondorf has been neutered by this presentation we got -- which I should be fair and acknowledge the fact that there ARE fans out there who have mentioned how they like the casting, voice, and performance -- but the truth of the matter is, Ganondorf has been in some really bad shape since Skyward Sword. Skyward Sword made some huge retcons to existing Zelda lore by introducing us to Hylia and Demise. Now, I like to write and study and analyze characters, but one doesn’t really need to be any kind of writing genius to understand how Demise’s existence and his actions by the end of the game completely rob Ganondorf of his agency and undermines the guy by overly-simplifying his motivations and by breaking down any dimension he previously had as a man, a leader, and a human. Ganondorf used to be such an interesting character: he wanted so much for the people he ruled over, cared about, and loved. Him and his mothers and his sisters experienced pain every day and saw that not far from their desert was a country protected and thriving off of a fair wind. His heart motivated him. His people motivated him. Pain motivated him. Wind Waker made it clear that his intentions were beautiful before Ganondorf had fallen to his own humanity. He took a knee to his own greed, and power was a seductive mistress.  The reason why the character Ganon eventually took the shape of Ganondorf in Ocarina of Time in the first place was so they could write stories that had a more human element and could thus encourage the player to consider that while the Triforce might represent black-and-white principles, the world itself is much more complicated than that and tends to be much more difficult to navigate which gives rise to more interesting adventures for Link to go on, and morally and emotionally complex challenges to face. But now that Demise’s stupid curse has stripped Ganondorf of any kind of meaningful nuance, Ganondorf has been tragically reduced to a character that’s feeling around in the dark: his culture and history has since turned its back on him so now his feet walk with no meaning. So, to compensate, Breath of the Wild saw the stakes raise and they went the route of the Oracle games where they re-introduced the idea where Ganon is now an evil that is just SOOO EVIL that it literally couldn’t fathom anything else EXCEPT rage and hate, as well as inflicting pain and suffering by lashing out in blind desperation to cause hurt and spread chaos. But then Nintendo went and struck that down just as fast as they re-introduced the concept in Breath of the Wild. So now we’re are quite literally left with a corpse: an empty husk of a really important character that once knew how to impact you with his time on the screen. This nearly unrecognizable shadow of Ganondorf demands that his followers “leave no survivors”, which is particularly disappointing to hear because it’s indicative of the underlying problem that’s been haunting this character since 2011. 

(These three screenshots demonstrate a very important facet of Ganondorf’s character that Nintendo seems to have gotten wrong right off the bat in that trailer. He doesn’t want to destroy everything and leave no survivors. He wants to dominate and take what he feels rightfully belongs to him.)

But I really don’t mean to get into this huge whine-fest about Ganondorf, I’m just... I am just really bummed out because it’s the first time that we’ve seen Ganondorf (NOT Ganon) in a mainline Zelda game in almost seventeen years and it’s hard to see his return take this kind of shape. I love this character to death, I have so much adoration for Ganondorf in my heart and I know for a fact that this is gonna be a great game; I know Nintendo will absolutely not waste our times with Tears of the Kingdom, I know I’m gonna have a total fuckin’ blast playing the game and being able to come face-to-face with Ganondorf for the first time since I was eleven years old will definitely be a thrill of a lifetime.  But it sure as hell won’t be the same.

[spilledreality]

3. We live in a scam economy

Previously.

I finished White Lotus last night. It felt a bit like reading fandom, or watching late-season Gossip Girl, where all the possible sexual couplings and recombinations have been explored, only to settle down roughly where they started. But my biggest thematic takeaway was something like "We live in a scam economy."

What do I mean by a scam? By scam I just mean setting up expectations and then contradicting them. (N.b., this is also how stories, avant-garde poems, and standup routines work. GdF points out that, because of this similarity, scams are the perfect plot structures for films and TV shows: the set-up, the plot twist, the big reveal. But in the real world, in situations where it counts—where we really care about concomitances being reliable—scams take advantage of, and turn these concomitances against us. And their net effect is to undermine the structure of reliable action, the reliability that keeps the social world ready at hand. When we learn that a concomitance can be exploited, is not necessarily robust, does not always hold up, it breaks our ability to use that concomitance in our modeling of the world, in our decision-making. It robs us of a tool.

I think using the word “scam” in this sense diverges from words like “deception” in interesting/productive ways. Deception carries intuitions or implications of a logical contradiction, in a correspondence theory view of language. Scam implies the active setting up of expectations to get something done—to manipulate somebody. It's something proactive and systematic, rather than something post-facto. It emphasizes the pragmatic harms of presenting misleading information, rather than whether an utterance is "true" or "false" (a distinction that IMO is confused, and papers over a pragmatic concern about the misleading).

(Lying about e.g. infidelity post-fact is still setting up misleading expectations in some sense—expectations for the possibly distant future about whether you’ll be unfaithful again, e.g.—but it’s much less direct, so the “expectation-y” aspect isn't as foregrounded.)

Ethan is weak is so many disappointing ways. I think the main one is almost unfair—the show’s logic prevents him from leaving the island, when his ultimate act of agency would be to just leave (ostensibly with Harper). Harper is like a six year old, however, so it’s not surprising Ethan, having chosen to couple with her, is himself emotionally stunted and seems to want to (and to bring about, hyperstitionally) his own cuckolding.

Side note, it is known that Mike White is redpilled—this show's plotting of Albie & Portia, and the Ethan/Harper/Cameron/Daphne love square? The way it shows the structure of a disintegrating relationship as a slow escalating mutual retaliation + mutual desire mimesis leading to all-out warfare and bloodshed? That's a full-blown enactment of Girardean and Petersonian arguments about conflict, with knowing winks to the audience. These are old ideas, but they're here again, and if I had to guess, I think that this is basically Mike White's take on the current political landscape slash cultural moment. (Same difference.)

Anyway, why I bring up Ethan's weakness is because every mark on this show is basically complicit with their being scammed. Even when their suspicions are all-but-confirmed, they still turn to their predator for the final truth of whether they’re being preyed on. It's completely insane. They're like little lambs asking wolves about the night's dinner menu. "Promise me I'm not the evening's entree?"

When Portia finds out she's been kidnapped, she straight-up offers to take a cab, so as to not inconvenience her kidnapper. Instead of immediately getting out of the car and leaving, or even demanding to take a cab, she’s politely offering. Incredible. And then her kidnapper says, "Look, just help me do my job, don't make it hard for me" and she says, OK, fine, and drives off with him to the middle of nowhere. It's a fucking miracle she isn't axe-murdered.

The thing to do when you sense deception is pick at it, like a thorn—and the scammers keep convincing their marks that deception's really like a scab—let it be, let it heal, move on with your life. And it works because... this is what the marks want to do anyways. They want to look away, pretend there isn't a problem. They want any excuse, any assurance, that allows them to keep pretending everything's fine. To not have to deal with the problem.

[emjiroki]

Chapter Six: Armed and Dangerous

Warnings: Robbery, use of shoto’s ice, threat of death, soft break down, shoto being awkward but comforting (as always), Fluff SO MUCH FLUFF

A/N: Sorry its been awhile since I updated last but here we are! Next chapter will be coming pretty quick because I’m excited for what's next! Hope you all enjoy! 

Likes, Reblogs, and Comments much appreciated! 

Messaging each other when you got a free moment was the closest you got to actually seeing each other for the next three weeks. Everything seemed to have gone back to normal and Shoto didn’t know if he liked it or not. It was just a never-ending slog of work, it seemed that since he was injured and needed a week to recover everyone decided that it was his job to pick up the slack. He felt like he could sleep for the next six days straight, the cold night air barely doing anything to wake him up as he hurried to complete the last patrol round of his shift. He was a ten-minute bus ride away from Endeavor’s agency when his crime pager went off, the alert flashing urgently as he moved to check where the address was. 

‘Not too far from here’ Shoto thought to himself, sighing tiredly before turning on his heel to go where he was needed. It wasn’t until another message came through, repeating the address and announcing an armed assailant, that he realized he recognized the address. 

“There’s no way,” He said out loud to himself as he checked again, and again to make sure as his stomach sank. It was the address of the manga store. He nearly dropped the pager to the concrete in his haste to turn on his heels sprinting full out as fast as he could and completely neglecting the fact that he had powers. 

“Bye y/n! I’m heading out, I’ll see you Monday,” Your coworker called from the front of the store only a few feet away from where you were taking a few things off the shelves before lock-up.

“Bye Kiyomi see you Monday! Be safe getting home,” You called back, noting the absence of the bell where you had propped the door open to get some fresh air in from the moderate day this afternoon, expecting snow in the next few weeks you knew you wouldn’t get a chance again. You made your way to the front to close and lock the door before you counted the register and left, finally. Except you weren’t able to get the door shut, couldn’t even get the doorstop up and actually close the door before a heavy hand was shoving you back into the shop.

“What the-”. You didn’t get to finish your sentence before the cold metal of a gun was pressing against your forehead.

“Shut your fucking mouth and give me all the money in the register. NOW” A gruff voice demanded behind a cloth mask, his head covered with a hat and dark sunglasses obscured any features you would be able to see. ‘Fuck’  You thought to yourself, heart practically thumping against your tongue. 

“Okay, I have to go behind the counter,” You said, hands going up slowly to show nothing in your palms. 

“Fine, Don’t fucking try anything or I’ll blow your head off,” The guy snapped, motioning for you to move. You tried to keep calm, stop yourself from shaking long enough to get the keys to the register, and slip your hand underneath to press the emergency button that sent a distress signal to the local police and Hero offices. You breathed a quick sigh to yourself when you saw that he hadn’t noticed, eyes still trained on where he was planning on shooting you rather than where your hands were going. Rookie mistake. You popped the register open and gathered a handful of the larger bills to hand to him first, trying to stall for time because you knew someone would be coming soon. Hopefully the police with their guns drawn. 

“Quit playing games and give me everything,” The guy snapped again, urging you to hurry up. The calmness startled you the most, aside from the gun, why were you not panicking? Tears not rolling down your cheeks. Getting robbed like this, alone and so late, was a big fear come true and all you could think to yourself was to stay calm. Everything was happening so quickly, your hands just barely trembling as you gathered the last of the cash to hand to him and your ears ringing with the pounding blood in your ears, staring down the barrel of this stranger's gun. You only blinked for a moment as you flinched from the loud sound erupting outside, your brain thinking for a split second that he had fired the gun before you felt the cold, a blistering freeze so close to your face that it burned your cheeks. It had really been only a moment, but now the robber was trapped in a pillar of ice with his gun frozen in his hand. He struggled against the icy solid hold, shouting something about hating heroes, fighting to gain physical control of his weapon again to no avail. 

“I knew it was you,” Shoto’s voice reached your ears only a second before his arms were around you, pulling you into his solid chest with a still freezing hand, “Are you okay?”. You nodded, ears still ringing with the adrenaline sizzling through your veins. You were fine, just shaken up. But you couldn’t say it, could barely even draw in the air needed to breathe, so you stayed silent and just melted into his embrace.

“Police will handle you and that pitiful thing you call a weapon,” Shoto said, cold arm still around you as he used his fire hand to melt the ice away from the gun, disarming the robber with a scathing look, popping the bullet from the chamber before emptying the clip onto the floor. You could hear sirens in the distance coming around the corner, a fresh wave of relief crashing over you. 

“Think you’ll be able to give a statement?” He asked, quietly as if he was trying to ease an animal from the corner.

“Yes, it’s fine,” You said, maybe a little more forcefully than you had meant to. This was part of the job description, a risk that comes with working retail like this in the city. Maybe you just wished you had been more prepared and not so careless but you couldn’t handle the feeling of pity in his voice. You were fine. Shoto stood beside you and added in his part of the story when needed as you gave your statement, finishing up with them as you contact the store owner to let them know what happened and the expected clean-up for tomorrow's openers. 

“Officers said you can go whenever you’re ready, open and shut case obviously,” Shoto said after you slipped your phone in your pocket.

“Figured it would be, he’s got all the cash in his backpack,” You said, following Shoto as he led the way back into the store so you could grab your purse and keys. “After this week and all this tonight, I’m ready to go home”. A tired sigh escaped you as you made sure you had everything you needed, writing a quick note for the morning people and handing one of the officers that were still inside cleaning up the villain the spare key to lock the door when they were done with what they needed, including the building owners phone number if they had questions. 

“You on night patrol?” You asked as Shoto accompanied you out to your car, his warm side close to you in the chill night air. 

“Actually my last patrol of the night was about to end when I got the crime call,” He said, a sheepish look on his face, “I swear I’m not stalking you. Endeavor’s Agency is only about fifteen minutes from here”. You laughed, that would be the cherry on the cake for this night to find out he was stalking you. 

“I never suspected you, but I guess that’s always the first mistake,” you said teasingly.

“That’s true,” He said with a soft laugh of his own, “But I promise we end up in these situations from coincidence”.

“Or Fate,” you said with a smile as you watched a blush paint his face.

“I’m starting to believe that myself,” Shoto said, opening your driver’s door for you as you throw your purse in the back. 

“I’ll give you a ride to your dad’s agency if you want,” You said, stomach sinking at the thought of leaving him right now. Your interactions were always so short and you never wanted them to end. 

“You sure? I don’t want you to go out of your way” He asked, muted concern and excitement shining in his eyes. 

“Just get in,” You insisted, leaning over and throwing your passenger side open for emphasis. He didn’t argue further, almost overly eager to climb in as a smile broke his face. It was quiet as you pulled off into the road, your radio playing quietly on the talk show station you had on this morning now playing classical music in the background. It was such a comfortable silence, just like that morning a few weeks ago. The quiet warmth, the lack of expectations to keep words lingering between you, was relaxing. But it also conflicted. Shoto wanted to know everything about you, pick your brain to the darkest depths and live every memory through new eyes, wanted nothing more than to hear you talk and question and think aloud. Just to bask in the simple intricacies of you. And what he didn’t know but hoped for more than anything is that he had captivated you just as much. But unfortunately, the comfort pulled the adrenaline from your system, leaving only the shakes and streaking tears you didn’t notice until you felt them dripping off your cheeks. The choking sob caught Shoto by surprise, his eyes widening in alarm as your shoulders shook.

“Guess the shock is wearing off,” He said laying a soft hand against your arm, “Try to take some deep breaths”.

“I'm sorry. It’ll pass just give me a minute” You apologized, feeling silly as you gripped the steering wheel.

“No reason to be sorry, you got a gun waved in your face. The letdown from an adrenaline rush is rough sometimes,” Shoto said softly, “It was a big problem for me when I first started hero work”. It was quiet again for a moment, the momentary pause at the red-light giving you time to wipe the tears from your face and pull a deep breath in through your teeth. Endeavor’s agency was right around the corner and you nearly kicked yourself, you spent the little time you had with him crying like a damn baby. The parking lot was near empty, from the shift changeovers and a hand full of heroes living in the agency apartments and not needing cars, so finding a place quickly wasn’t a problem. Your hand felt heavy as lead as you put your car into park, dread for his departure sitting like a stone in your chest. He seemed apprehensive as well, sitting quietly for a moment after he unbuckled his seat belt. 

“Well. Guess this is me,” Shoto said glancing back at the massive building with a cringe. His mind and body were so tired even looking at the place made him want to pass out. 

“Guess so,” You said in almost a whisper, both of you looking deeply into the other's eyes in the muted light of the car, “ill see you again soon Shoto, hopefully under better circumstances”.

“But doesn’t this keep it interesting?” He asked, eyes soft as you scoffed with a disbelieving grin. “I’ll text you later”.

“Okay,” You said with an almost sad lilt to your voice. It hurt when he climbed from the car, the shutting door sounding too loud, and you could almost feel his footfalls as he walked away. Why did it feel like this? Like if you didn’t stop him now and let your feelings fall from your chest then you never would be able to. Like this was a fleeting moment, something important. Racing through your fingertips like water and you were letting it. 

It was as if it was a shared thought, something shared between you two with no words because when you opened your door and stepped from your car in full determination to find him, he was already turned back toward you with your name on his lips.

“Shoto” “Y/N”. You both paused in astonishment, the feeling of heat in your cheeks pairing with the visual of his doing the same. 

“Y/N I- I really like you. A lot. In fact, I don’t know if I’ve ever felt this way about anyone before,” He said with a deep shaking breath, “You’ve captivated me and- God I'm gonna sound like a creep but you’re all I can think about”. It was like he took the words from your mouth, the knowledge that he had been under the same distress had a giddy feeling bubbling in your chest as you suppressed a laugh from your lips. He took your hands in his, the dual temperatures so foreign beneath your soft fingers as he cradled them like glass. 

“Will you please go on a real date with me tomorrow? So I can show you that I’m not a fool on a day-to-day basis” He asked, eyes sparkling and flooding with so much admiration and devotion it took your breath away.

“Of course, I will,” You said with a giddy smile, your blush flushing a new as he beamed and kissed the knuckles on your hands still held in his. 

“You won’t regret it, I promise!” Shoto said, butterflies burning in his gut as you leaned up to kiss his cheek, right where his scar was. The soft action left him stunned for a second, blinking like he was on autopilot as you smiled sweetly up at him.

“I can’t wait,” you said happily, Shoto opening your car door for you again as you slid back in behind the wheel, “You better not forget to text me when you get home, want to make sure you’re safe”. He rolled his eyes in an amused faux irritation, this had become a routine over the last few weeks. Shoto had to text you when he got home from his shifts, specifically night shifts, or you would be calling him to make sure he was safe. He started having to remember before his showers because if you called after he was hard under his towel the entire time he was trying to dry off, very inconvenient.

“Of course, I will,” He said with a chuckle, “I’ll pick you up tomorrow around four”.

“Sounds perfect,” You assured, turning your car on as he shut your door. You rolled your window down as he turned to walk back to the agency, a giant smile on his face.

“See you tomorrow, Lover boy”.

[asturlavi]

oh boy, do i have wonderful beast oda/odazai info for you all since this may just be my favorite chapter in all of beast. it clarified a lot about oda's state in this au, and how sad it truly is, especially with all that dazai has done to ensure that oda's safety is certain

before i start, this was initially intended to be a quirky little twitter thread that’s supposed to be kicked off with a badly drawn doodle of something meme. the thread was supposed to be about how wonderfully dumb odasaku can be and how annoyingly frustrating dazai is in the latest beast chapter... and then it slowly devolved into a crudely written essay about small discoveries i’ve made that most likely haven’t been pointed out before, so i recommend that anyone interested in either oda or odazai to check this out 

so i finally got around to reading the new beast chapter and seeing how odasaku constantly devalues himself and finds that he's lesser than the average person is… sad. its been said that him and ranpo are the stars of the ada, every mission trivial with their cooperation, and yet he doesn't see any of that. thinks he struck luck when it came to his entrance exam, which he specifies that it wasn't as a result of his own skills. his inferiority complex is embedded so deep that despite his achievements, he doesn't at all believe he has any worth as a human.

i'm just a tired, ordinary man like you could find anywhere. a third-rate detective, as unexceptional as a fallen cigarette butt on the road.

and his entrance exam was just like dazai's: the azure messenger case, which we all know wasn't at all a walk in the park. one mistake, and it would spell disaster for the city that the ada was trying to protect. no--not just the city, it would also mean the end of the ada as we know it. despite it all, he resolved it much to his own surprise, and it was all thanks to an "unexpected" gift. and that gift? who would it be other than from dazai himself? 

beast light novel ch. 3

(also, this is a shaky claim at best but I feel as if oda fully holds the capabilities to solve the case alone, but dazai knew that with odasaku's persistent feelings of self-doubt, along with his lack of some of the vivacity that dazai held to weasel his way through to information, the outcome of success wouldn’t be guaranteed. and so, dazai lent him something to ensure his success)

and yet, oda is blind to see truly how much intellect and skill he possesses. he doesn't realize how integral he was to the quest of the azure messenger, doesn't acknowledge that without him these orphans would have either slipped into a life of crime, gone to a downtrodden orphanage, or simply passed away, and he doesn't know that despite it all, he's one of the purest characters in the story, even with the darkness that will forever cling to him, a reminder of the violence that marred his past.

not to mention that oda, in one way or another, effectively analyzed the current situation that they're stuck in. he noted that if things currently go the way they're going, no matter what akutagawa achieves, him and his sister are doomed. so, oda brilliantly decided to go after the port mafia itself to prepare for this possibility, and it's nothing short of genius. and dazai plays along with this… because it is oda, after all. 

and everything dazai did, everything he sacrificed, it was all for oda.

now to the underlying tragedy of this chapter. take a look at this panel: 

ever since then, i've been making a living by solving requests that come to the detective agency.

i provide for the orphans

i drink coffee.

i gamble a bit on days off.

at night, i write a novel in the kitchen. 

that's my life.

nothing unusual, right? you'd think that odasaku was satisfied with life, since he has everything he had ever wished for. but in all actuality, he still lacks one important thing.

and that's friendship.

his words sounded so… empty. achieving ones dreams is but one aspect of life that brings one gratification, but doesn't necessarily mean it would guarantee lasting happiness. (think of famous actors or celebrities that spiral into depression even after they've achieved their dreams).

in that panel, he says he cares for the orphans, gambles, and writes alone in his spare time, but not a word of spending time with friends… something he had in the root universe, something that was lost to him in this one.

and he says this all with his face blacked out, as if he's somewhat implicitly dissatisfied (while the kid's faces are present, not at all concealed).

with dazai, he found peace in a place where peace is rare to find. They both completely put their guard down with each other around, and dazai can relax his overly speculative mind with oda. and they understood each other, a level of understanding rare to come by. dazai with his dark jokes easily flies past oda's ears because that's what they are, harmless jokes. and oda with his blunt honesty, which dazai cherishes and never prods him for it.

dazai also saw things in oda that oda was blind to. dazai saw a world of beauty in oda, the ray of light beneath a cloudy sky. he saw both intelligence and wisdom, kindness and generosity. and most of all, he trusted oda, despite dazai’s natural inclination to distrust.

and what oda saw in dazai was vulnerability. despite the front that dazai puts, he can be kind, even empathetic, when the situation calls for it. dazai once gave akutagawa a decision to turn his back against dazai’s offer to join the port mafia, when logic points to the fact that he didn't have to, but wanted to.

dazai also consistently gives atsushi words of advice and shows understanding when dazai was under no obligation to, such as atsushi facing the loss of his previous caretaker. dazai gave atsushi genuine advice, not laced with any malice or ill intent. dazai had even left atsushi to grieve alone, fully understanding that atsushi needed to pour his emotions out in private. there’s more than enough instances of dazai showing this side of himself in both the light novels and manga, but it seems to sometimes be brushed aside. even though the main cast of characters always dismissed this side of dazai, oda has always known that this side of dazai was his truest self.

oda and dazai also talked endlessly about trivial things, calling each other daily for two hours for no reason other than that they each enjoy one another's company. it's pure, wholesome love. they had a mutual trust and understanding between one another, which ango, another friend of theirs, severely lacked in his friendship with them.

oda's dream was to write, gone unfulfilled in the root universe, but he died happily knowing that the one he cares for is living in the path of light. dazai's was to find a reason to live, which he found in oda, and continues to use this as motivation long after oda passed.

in beast, dazai's dream was cut short, ultimately leading to his demise at the end. after all, his one reason to live is now robbed from him. however, oda's dreams have become a reality, but can one really say he achieved happiness? he has the orphans, his children, but they will never understand him like dazai had. he has peace, but is it the form of peace he wanted? spending time alone, on things like gambling, while endlessly mulling how he has no one to spend this time with?

and writing, his one true wish that dazai made absolutely sure to make a reality. but was it worth it, at the cost of a friend who brought happiness and reprieve when everyone else failed to?

i thought of this tale as a matter of equivalent exchange, you lose one life in exchange for another. the scales do remain somewhat balanced, but not over a matter of lives. it's over a matter of personal sacrifices, ones only known to us readers.

and i say "somewhat" because in the root universe, dazai remembered oda when he was alive, so well that dazai can recall memories to near perfection. but oda had completely forgotten dazai in beast, chasing after absent memories and deluding himself into thinking his life is perfect, while numbing himself from the aching hole of loneliness that consumes him inside.

also, oda is surely happy spending time with the children, but what about his lonesome hours? who is he going to spend that time with, in a world without dazai, the only person who understood him and his oddities?

ah, and remember this moment in the root universe? 

now, take a look at this again. no, look closer 

odasaku wasn’t merely gambling for the sake of it, he was gambling on a horse race. and before dazai was arrested in the root universe, he was seen doing just that. 

now, why would odasaku do this? he surely doesn’t seem the type to gamble away his money on something as silly as horse races, because what does someone gain while they pour their money into something so senseless? 

and the only reason i could arrive to is that dazai must have dragged him along to one. dazai is a port mafia executive, with more money than he knows what to do with and a boatload of depression. money probably disinterests him as much as life does, and he used gambling to kill two birds with one stone: ridding of money he doesn’t need, and distracting him from his boredom (and depression). 

and it doesn’t end there. remember when dazai in dead apple had visited bar lupin to pay his regards to odasaku, while reliving a pleasant memory dazai had with him? and he did this because he was preparing for a quest that may result in with the loss of his life, psyching himself up for what’s to come. this is probably bordering on speculation, but i believe that that’s precisely what he did once again in the horse races. dazai paid a visit to a place that oda and him had frequented, to prepare for another dangerous quest. 

also, note that immediately after exiting bar lupin in dead apple, dazai was confronted by ango, which kicked off the start of dazai’s plans. a similar thing happens in the manga, dazai spending time in a place that he and oda had gone to, this time the horse races, and his plan whirls into motion as jono arrests him. i think these similarities are deliberate, in order to establish their significance to dazai and oda. 

this long winded explanation’s purpose was only for me to go back to this panel once again, and say that everything oda spoke about doing, from spending time with his kids, to brewing coffee, to betting on horse races, and to writing in the kitchen, were all moments he had with dazai. 

and see that he has an extra chair that sits unused in the kitchen? at first, i thought it was there for the sake of being there. then, it slowly dawned on me that odasaku and dazai had noted in the dark era light novel that they made a habit of visiting each other, so it wouldn’t be illogical to conclude that it was a chair meant for dazai. a place where he can spend some private moments together with oda underneath the dimly lit kitchen, drinking in the scent of odasaku’s coffee and talking about things that distracts them from their troubles while odasaku whittles away at his manuscript. 

and one last thing before i end this out of sheer laziness, take a look at this photograph of oda from the final moments of the beast light novel.

as oda stated in the manga and light novel, he worked on his manuscript alone in the kitchen... but in the photograph, he wasn’t alone. he’s posing for a picture. relaxed, poised, as if entertaining the one taking the photo. and besides, wasn’t it dazai who insisted on taking photographs in bar lupin with ango and oda in dark era? he must have done the same in that very moment in the beast universe, but this time in anticipation of oda forgetting him. 

in the end, it seems oda and dazai left each other in similar ways, foolishly believing they've sacrificed their lives for each other to better the other's life, but all they did was create worlds where the feeling of happiness will be lost to both respective parties, while also resigning each other to a life of loneliness.

they've forgotten about their one happiness that stems from just being around one another, listening to the soothing tune of jazz playing softly as they talk into the night, the world lost to them as they're absorbed in one another's presence.

it seems like their story is a tragedy of what happens when you love someone too much, to the point that you delude yourself into thinking you're but a tool for their happiness, and with you gone, nothing will change.

but things did change, didn't they?

[amythenia]

A Dangerous Encounter

“Just because you donate millions to the libraries and homeless shelters every year doesn’t change the fact that you’ve also robbed so many lives. You’re a villain.”

“Excuse me, which one of us has 87 standing warrants for their arrest?”

The dance floor was thankfully loud enough to suffocate the poison filled words, the deceit of a criminal and terrifying monster in plain sight. His smooth fingers traced the edge of his wine glass, looking down at the vermin that had managed to corner him.

“You’ve killed dozens.” She hissed. “I can’t believe you’re just…this.”

“Incredibly rich and well-liked? I can’t believe it either.” He grinned. “Unlike some people. What are you doing here anyway? This is a high society party. Don’t tell me you snuck your way in here, [Hero].”

She blushed, furiously red with embarrassment. He chuckled. Cute. “Don’t worry about it though, I’m just here to enjoy. Can’t do that with drama happening…unless you plan to ruin my day.”

“You’re lucky my business isn’t with you.” She grumbled, turning around.

He observed her, her deep black hair was done up in braids and twirled into shape. She wore a long flowing yellow dress with a few pieces of silver and dull jewelry here and there to illuminate it when the light hits just right. It revealed her muscled back, lit by the blue-green party lights. He noted a few shapes, particularly the knife on her thigh and the heavy shape in her large purse that’s probably a gun-it could be a phone as well, perhaps a smaller purse. Something was clenched in her hand. A tracker.

“Now that’s interesting.” He rested his head on her shoulder to follow her line of sight. She gasped softly, trying to not make too much of a commotion. “Someone else has your attention for once?”

“It’s not your business.”

“It’s my party.”

“No, Andira Clementaz is hosting.”

“I’m sponsoring it.”

“One of the sponsors, you’re not special.”

“Ouch.” He mused, folding his arms around her. She tensed noticeably, paled. “Harsh words, my dear.”

She cringed, shoving him off her with a hand.

He raised an eyebrow. So it’s not really him she has business with, considering she didn’t put the tracker on him when he moved in to embrace her. “Who are you looking for?”

She rolled her eyes and took a step to begin walking. He grabbed her wrist, tightly, and pulled her roughly towards him so she would lean on his chest, practically on tiptoes. She squeaked in surprise.

“Who?” He asked, resting his other hand on her bare waist. It was intoxicating, someone so small and ferocious turned to ice at the moment of vulnerability.

“I-” She stumbled over her words and looked to the side. How close they were. “It-um-” She snapped her mouth shut. How soft her lips looked.

“Take your time.” He smiled, noting all of her adorable features, the long lashes, the sparkle in her hair, cheeks he could squeeze.

Why would she cover herself with a helmet when she could stun her opponents like this?

“...Matthias Perriman.”

He froze. “That? You seriously brought weapons to deal with a playboy?”

“What?”

“Matthias Perriman. Owner of Koriscan Agency? He’s known for breaking women’s hearts. Small fry.” He leaned in, studying her demeanor, narrowing his eyes at her revealing dress. “Have you been with him?”

“Wha-no!” She huffed. “I’m here because it’s an easy mission.”

“Just contract work?” He frowned.

“Yes.” She replied dismissively.

“Is that why you’re in this revealing dress?”

She turned red again, stumbling over her words. “Well-I-How else am I supposed to get their attention?” She pushed against his chest, though he kept his grip firmly placed on her waist.

“And this contract of yours is legal?”

“Completely.” She said immediately. The lack of nervousness in her voice confirmed it true. “Since when do you care if what I do is legal or not?”

He didn’t respond, but looked past her, and put on a fake smile, the winning grin that inspired thousands and lied to millions. “Percy! Hello there.” He turned her around so she stood at his side like she was arm candy. “It’s been so long.”

“I didn’t take you for the romantic one, Leopold.” A man sauntered towards them from a group of bankers, adjusting his gray suit, though his face was left dark by the dim lights. “Hello, little lady.”

She changed her stance in the blink of an eye and smiled winningly. “Why hello, sir. Otis, was it? I’ve heard of you.” She fluttered her eyelashes. Something is terribly wrong, Leopold thought.

“A pleasure.” Otis kissed the top of the lady’s palm, effectively pulling her away from the villain. She turned for a split second to give a devious wink as Otis bent down. “If I may have your name?”

“Dolores.” She murmured seductively.

“How cheeky.” Leo grumbled, adjusting his tie. He was certain it’s not even her real name.

“Sorry for stealing your date tonight,” Otis shrugged. “Seems I finally beat you as something.”

“Who could resist an actor?” She smiled at him, poisonous. “But don’t worry, I’ll hand you your due too.”

“Come on, Leo, they’ve got a literal soda fountain.”

He chugged along as a third wheel, despised every moment of it as the two acted all lovey-dovey in front of him, ignoring him, annoying him. ‘Dolores’ glanced back at him to make sure he was watching every moment.

[journalxxx]

By Hook or by Crook (4)

Oh God, there’s another one.

The thought came unbidden to Toshinori’s mind, and it engulfed him in the closest thing to pure dread he had felt in years. It had taken two centuries, the sacrifice of seven One For All users, and two of his own major organs to take down a single All For One wielder, and now a brand new one had somehow sprouted right in front of him.

Now. Now that he had finally decided to tackle the hurdle of entrusting a relatively stable Japan to a successor, now that he was weaker and less capable than ever of defending it from a new threat. Now that the deadline of Nighteye’s prophecy was drawing closer and closer. His own gruesome death on the battlefield, and the sudden reappearance of All For One’s quirk. The unavoidable connection between the two facts almost robbed him of his breath.

Toshinori couldn’t tear his eyes away from the boy’s hand. It looked diminutive in comparison to his own, and completely inoffensive. It had the soft, unblemished appearance that suited someone who had never hit anything bigger than a fly, whereas the hero’s skin had long since been roughened by calluses, and his joints slightly thwarted by the occasional fracture. Yet, that single, unassuming dimple in the middle of its palm made it more potentially destructive than a hundred of Smashes combined.

A sort of choked whimper made Toshinori finally raise his gaze. He realized he had stopped trying to school his expression only when he saw his own strung-out stupor mirrored in Midoriya’s features. 

“I-I… Sorry, I r-really have t-to…” The boy took a step back, his hand slipping from the man’s grasp, then he suddenly turned on his heels and motioned to sprint away.

“Hey, hey!” Toshinori reached forward, grabbing Midoriya’s wrist by sheer reflex. He had already wasted enough time and energy chasing slimy villains and rash teenagers all over the town that day, thank you very much. “Where are you going?”

Midoriya froze on the spot, as if shocked by an electric current. His arm was rigid in Toshinori’s grasp, pulling away from it but without any real conviction. His head turned slowly towards the hero but not fully, letting him see only half of the boy’s face. The unmistakable terror etched in those wide eyes made something constrict in Toshinori’s chest.

“I-I’m… I’m so sorry…” The boy’s voice was down a trembling, barely audible whisper.“I didn’t mean to d-do that… I’ve never… I won’t do it again, I swear, j-just…” 

Midoriya’s free hand hovered over the hero’s, maybe having half a mind of prying it open, but he didn’t even dare to touch it. Toshinori let go of him immediately. The kid wasn’t expecting it, judging by his flabbergasted expression, and all he did with his regained freedom was backing away from him with a couple of uncertain steps, bumping into a nearby electric pole with his backpack and just standing there, pretty much like a cornered mouse cowering before a lion.

The sight jolted Toshinori back to reality with brutal efficiency. God, what was wrong with him today? He was handling this abysmally. That was no two-hundred-year-old manipulative slaughterer, that was a child. A child rapidly working himself into a panic, if his onsetting tremors were of any indication. Ironically, the realization grounded Toshinori even more. Frightened victims and distraught relatives were a daily occurrence in his line of work, and his professional composure slipped back in place almost subconsciously.

“You don’t need to apologize. Quite the opposite. You saved everyone. The hostage, the bystanders… even me. I’m not sure I’d have had the energy to keep up appearances after another smash.” He put up his hands and showed his palms with slow movements, keeping his voice low and level. “You did nothing wrong back there.”

Midoriya slowly slumped down the pole, his limbs huddled in a distressed heap. He blinked quickly as his eyes shied away from Toshinori’s, hands bunching up the fabric of his trousers nervously. “...I-I can give it back. The quirk. I want to give it back to its owner.”

“That can be easily arranged.” Something about the whole situation was nagging at Toshinori, but he pushed that feeling aside for the moment. The boy wasn’t holding himself in any way that hinted at specific injuries, but fear could be one hell of an anesthetic. He gazed up and down the road, finding it completely deserted. He still felt slightly abuzz with the adrenaline rush caused by his second encounter with the sludge villain and the recent revelation of Midoriya’s quirk. He gauged that he could probably (possibly, maybe, hopefully) abuse One For All for another twenty seconds or so if need be, just the time to scoop up the boy in his arms and power run back to the ambulances at the site of the accident. That was likely to cause even more distress to the poor kid though, so he’d rather hold off on it unless clearly necessary. “Are you sure you aren’t in any pain?”

“I-I’m f-fine.” The boy wiggled the backpack off his shoulders and rummaged through it shakily, a few tears rolling down his cheeks and his hiccups becoming harder to contain. “I’m fine…”

“Hey, kid. Look at me. Deep breaths.” Toshinori finally ventured a step and a half towards Midoriya, squatting at a reasonable distance to his side instead of right in front of him, to make sure he wouldn’t feel too crowded. Toshinori offered him a couple of tissues (always plentiful in his pockets) while the boy tried to regain a semblance of calm. “It’s all right. I am here.”

That got the boy’s attention. The catchphrase had slipped out of him automatically, without his trademark panache or blinding smile or overflowing optimism, but Midoriya looked at him like he’d been thrown a lifeline nonetheless. The dam broke and big, shiny tears erupted from his eyes as he accepted the tissues and buried his sobs in them. They remained like that for a while, the kid quietly working through his sniffles while Toshinori sat cross-legged on the dusty asphalt, reminding him to take his time whenever he got a little fidgety.

“Sorry if I spooked you.“ Toshinori eventually offered with a small smile, after Midoriya had finally settled down. “I’m a little out of it myself, today. Not the most auspicious first day in my new neighborhood, but what can you do?”

“Uh? Do you mean you’re moving here?” Midoriya asked while he accepted the fourth tissue and wiped away the remaining dampness from his face.

“Mh-hm.” After the debacle on the rooftop, this didn’t feel like too much of a sensitive bit of information to share. Besides, the kid was a fan, so maybe throwing him a bone would help him relax a little more.

“Why? Isn’t it inconvenient for you? I thought you lived in a penthouse above Might Tower, in Tokyo’s Minato Ward, Roppongi 6-12-”

...Ah, he was that kind of fan. Obviously. “Indeed, but I’ve decided to move to… broaden my professional horizons, so to speak.”

“Oh! Are you planning to open a branch of your agency here? Or are you joining some local long-term operation?“ That spark of morbid curiosity in the boy’s eyes made Toshinori regret bringing up the topic in two seconds flat.

“I’m afraid that’s all I can say on the matter, everything’s still under tight wraps. You’ll hear all about it from the news, eventually.” He stood up and patted some dirt off his hands and pants. “Do you live far from here? I’ll walk you home if you’re feeling better.”

“Oh, uh…” The boy gaped at him in surprise. “Thank you, but there’s no need for you to go out of your way! I’m fine, really!”

“Think nothing of it.” Toshinori hooked three fingers under the strap of the boy’s backpack and hauled it over his own shoulder. It hit his back with unexpected oomph. What did kids even put in those things, weren’t textbooks all digital these days? “Clearly this isn’t your lucky day either. I’ll sleep better tonight knowing that you reached your house safely without being run over by a truck or abducted by aliens.”

The joke got a half-smile out of Midoriya, at long last. He held out his hand to the boy to help him back on his feet. The obvious hesitation and near disbelief he couldn’t hide before gingerly accepting the proffered hand gave Toshinori another small wave of unease. There was definitely something strange about all this, aside from the obvious. He gestured for the kid to lead the way, and they set off towards their new destination.

Toshinori granted him a few minutes of silence before breaching the pivotal subject. “So… you have quite the interesting quirk.”

“...Mh.” Midoriya visibly stiffened. So it had been the quirk talk to give him cold feet, rather than a generic reaction to the day’s stress...

“Why didn’t you use it against the villain the first time he attacked you?” Toshinori asked, opting for a more roundabout approach.

“Ah… I’m sorry. I really should have. You wouldn’t have had to waste your power if I’d-”

“Forget about me! Why didn’t you use it to defend yourself? Did you panic?”

“Uh, well, not too much.” The kid shoved his hands in his pockets and dropped his gaze to the ground, his voice lowering to a droning mutter. “I can take quirks, but I don’t automatically learn how to use them. The villain’s quirk looked like it may be difficult to handle. What if I couldn’t maintain a solid form and just turned myself into a puddle of goo? What if some parts of my slime got detached from the main body during the scuffle, and I found myself missing chunks of flesh upon turning back human? What if the sludge was only an outer layer over my body, and without fine control I ended up drowning in it? Stuff like that… I should have just taken the villain’s quirk without activating it, but I was afraid that he’d get even angrier and he’d just beat me up anyway. I’m not, uh, strong. Or fast. At all. I didn’t consider that he might freak out long enough for me to run away…”

Toshinori blinked. “...Sorry, how long had that guy been harassing you before I showed up?”

“Oh, not long at all. Twenty or thirty seconds, I think.”

“And you went through all of that in twenty seconds. While being ambushed and choked.”

Midoriya just shrugged.

“That is… some quick thinking, all right.” Toshinori commented. He omitted the fact that it was a brand of quick thinking that was more likely to get you killed rather than saving your skin during an emergency. Apparently Midoriya would hesitate to protect himself from a violent attacker, but he’d run for the hills the moment the Symbol of Peace gave him a bit of an odd look. The kid’s fight-or-flight response was all over the place.

“I would have used my quirk to fight back eventually, if you hadn’t arrived so soon… probably…”

“...But?” Toshinori encouraged, sensing the unspoken addition.

“But… not many people know about my quirk. Very few, actually. And I’d like to keep it that way. If it’s possible.”

“Why?”

“...It’s not a good quirk.” Midoriya frowned, hunching his shoulders a bit. “One could do really bad things with it.”

“I could squash a man’s skull with my thumb and level a city block with a punch.” Toshinori countered plainly. “It doesn’t mean I’m going to.”

“It’s… it’s different. You can choose to use your quirk only for good, but mine requires…” The boy trailed off, then hazarded a glance at the hero. “You know what I mean. You understood as soon as I told you, I saw it.”

Toshinori couldn’t argue on that point, unfortunately. Still… 

There could be a perfectly innocent explanation for Midoriya to wield All For One. For one, it could be a different quirk altogether, one that simply mimicked Toshinori’s nemesis’, but that wasn’t quite the same, maybe with some unmentioned limitations (although the palm marks made for quite the uncanny similarity). Moreover, much like look-alikes, duplicate quirks between unrelated people weren’t unheard of, although said quirks were usually quite simple ones, like basic physical enhancers or elemental emitters.

What really bothered Toshinori were the boy’s evident sense of guilt and fear of exposure. Virtually any moderately powerful quirk could be employed to ‘do really bad things’, but hardly any children grew up to be so blatantly scared and ashamed of their own abilities. Family and school usually nurtured a degree of confidence and trust in their own capabilities. Toshinori’s knee-jerk reaction was a byproduct of specific knowledge and experience, but Midoriya’s? If only few people knew about his quirk, it must mean he hadn’t used it much, if at all, in the past, ruling out peer pressure as well. What explanation, what innocent explanation could there be for such a strong negative bias, aside from knowledge and experience he wasn’t supposed to have?

“At least your parents know about your quirk, I hope?”

“My mother doesn’t. My father… isn’t really around.” Toshinori couldn’t decide if that last bit of information was a good or a bad sign.

“So… who did you tell?”

“Just one friend and my father.” Ah, we had one likely culprit then. A father that was around but not really. Suspicious. “And now you, I guess. And… everyone who saw what I did to that villain… including the police…” Midoriya looked just about ready to dig a ditch and roll in it. 

“Well, as I said, everyone seemed to think I took care of the matter, so-”

Midoriya shook his head, utterly demoralized. “Kacchan will tell them.”

“Kacchan?”

“Ah, the hostage. He’s my friend, the one who knows about my quirk. I don’t think he’ll lie to the police for my sake.”

“Ah, I see. I hadn’t realized you two were acquainted.” Toshinori offered him a supportive smile. “I guess that explains your burst of heroism.”

“...No one else was doing anything. I saw you among the crowd, but… I thought you couldn’t help.”

The boy had an almost tortured expression, which reignited the deep-seated guilt that had plagued Toshinori in those harrowing minutes. “...I thought I couldn’t help either.” 

“But you did jump in though. Even though… it hurts you?” Midoriya scanned him from head to toe in concern, as if looking for unnoticed signs of damage. “Why?”

“Why did you decide to intervene, despite your fear?”

“I… I just couldn’t let my friend suffer because I messed up.”

“Well, there you have it.” Toshinori simply said. The boy stared at him thoughtfully, apparently weighing his words carefully, before nodding slowly and resuming his perusal of the ground. Toshinori let the silence stretch for a minute. There was still plenty he wanted to ask, especially regarding Midoriya’s father, but-

“I really do want to give the quirk back.” The kid mumbled. “Should I just… go to the police and ask them? They’ll come looking for me anyway, I guess, but…”

Toshinori pondered the issue for a moment, then he pulled his phone out of his pocket. The least he could do was make this whole ordeal as smooth as possible for the kid. “I think I can help with that. Give me your number. I’ll text you to let you know when we can visit the villain. If we’re lucky, it may be as early as tomorrow.” 

Toshinori registered the boy’s contact information as they entered a quaint residential area with neat little rows of numbered buildings, pleasantly tinged with the warm hues of the sunset.

“Ah, that’s where I live.” Midoriya said afterwards, pointing at a nearby apartment complex. “Thank you for everything, All-”

Toshinori shushed him with a sharp gesture as he gazed around the street nervously. “Please, don’t call me that when I’m in this form.”

Midoriya froze, then bowed respectfully. “R-Right! Thank you, sir! I’m sorry for causing you so much trouble, and taking so much of your time, and-”

Toshinori waved the upcoming barrage of apologies off and bid him a good evening, waiting for the boy to leave. Which he didn’t do.

“Uhm.” Midoriya pointed at Toshinori’s shoulder with an awkward smile. “I need that…”

Oh, right, backpack. “Whoops, there you go.” He tossed Midoriya’s belongings to their owner and watched the kid bustle up the stairs of the building and into one of the apartments. Then he fetched his phone and picked the third number on speed-dial.

“Tsukauchi? Do you have a moment? ….Ah, fine, thank you. Listen, can I drop by your place this evening? Something’s come up and I’d rather not discuss it on the phone… No, but definitely worth looking into sooner rather than later…”

He hung up a couple of exchanges later, after agreeing on the time for the meeting. Toshinori decided he had enough time to make his way back home, shower and have some sort of passable dinner before ruining his friend’s evening. And then he would head back home and he would sleep, even if he had to repeatedly bash his head against a wall to achieve that. He inhaled deeply and let out a long-overdue, exhausted sigh. 

What a day. 

Hopefully tomorrow wouldn’t be quite as taxing.

“THIEF”

Izuku was stuck on the spot, his feet and ankles wrapped in a thick layer of sludge that stretched on the ground as far as the eye could see. The faint light filtering from both ends of the underpass gave it flickering, changing hues, now green like bile, now brown like vomit, now black like tar. It smelled like sewer and dirty toilets. 

“BASTARD”

The slime clung to the walls of the underpass, climbing on them as if endowed with its own will. It crawled up higher and higher, and then went on to expand onto the ceiling. Its surface boiled and squirmed producing disgusting squelching sounds. Izuku looked away from the revolting goo-coated structure he was boxed in, he looked towards the exit, hoping that something, someone would show up to drag him out of that hell.

“GIVE IT BACK”

Someone emerged from the sludge, a few meters ahead of him. A man. A flabby, hairless, mucky man, with haunted eyes and a mouth open in a silent scream. He sweated slime, cried slime, drooled slime, from every orifice and every pore of his body. He waded towards Izuku slowly, an arm extended before him as if to grab him. Izuku couldn’t stand that sight either. He aimed his gaze at the ceiling, right when a huge bubble of gunk popped right above him, and chunky dollops of filth splashed on his face, into his nose and mouth.

“OR I’LL RIP IT OUT OF YOU”

Izuku coughed and heaved, trying to expel the repulsive substance from his pipes, but two cold, slick hands clamped around his throat, trapping it in his body. He could feel the ooze drip down into his lungs, his stomach- he could feel it wiggle and push, like a living parasite trying to break free from the flesh constraining it. Izuku scrambled to tear the man’s hands off him, but those too melted under his fingers like the same fluid that was everywhere, closing down on him, choking him, pulling him apart from the inside-

 Izuku woke up with a whole-body lurch that nearly sent him rolling off the bed, sweaty and breathless. He took in the familiar shadows of his room, and the red numbers of his alarm clock floating in the darkness at his eye level. 

6:20 AM.

Izuku turned on his belly with a frustrated groan, sinking his face into the pillow. Sure, he’d had a pretty harrowing day yesterday. It was bound to leave him a little shaken and maybe disturb his sleep for a while. But seven nightmares in the span of as many hours seemed slightly excessive. Especially seven instances of the exact same nightmare, sentient goo and Munch-like villain and all. The boy fumbled blindly for his phone to check if he’d received any new messages in the last fifty-five minutes. He hadn’t, of course. He prayed that All Might would contact him soon, it didn’t take a degree in psychology to guess the nature of the ‘unfinished business’ his subconscious was so keen on grilling him about.

He stared at the screen blankly, wondering, for roughly the hundredth time, if he should call his father. On one hand, he very probably should. If the man had deemed that little scuffle with Kacchan emergency-worthy, surely a mess this humongous in size warranted a call as well. On the other hand… Izuku didn’t really want to. 

The previous night’s news broadcast had covered the sludge villain incident rather haphazardly, it being a relatively contained accident with no serious consequences or injuries. Izuku was sure they had bothered to touch on the fact in the first place just because All Might had been involved, and the number one hero would receive prime time coverage even for something as trivial as being spotted buying soda at a convenience store. Curiously, Izuku hadn’t been mentioned at all, not even indirectly. Kacchan had been named and shown as the victim, the other heroes had been acknowledged, but All Might had been appointed as the sole person responsible for the resolution of the mishap. Not a word about any irresponsible middle schoolers joining the fray.

Izuku had taken it as a promising sign. All Might had likely interceded for him with the police and obtained a modicum of discretion about his involvement, at least in regards to the media. The hero had been so very understanding the previous day - just thinking about it made the boy almost tear up anew. He had barely reacted to the shocking revelation of his quirk, he had tolerated his unseemly outburst, he had spoken to him as if… as if Izuku was just another innocent victim caught up in a bad situation, rather than a potential menace. He hadn’t hesitated even for a second to offer him his hand, despite knowing the threat that Izuku’s own hands posed. He had… he had made him feel safe, and trusted. He had allowed Izuku to hope that maybe, just maybe, this whole thing could be fixed, that Izuku could handle it with his help, even without subjecting his father to undue sniveling.

And, objectively speaking, what could Izuku’s father do at this point? Izuku doubted that, regardless of his governmental position, the man could prevent the truth from spreading once it had reached both the police and the number one hero. Izuku could make an educated guess about his reaction too, and it wasn’t all that encouraging. It was too late for stern recommendations about secrecy, or for disappointed sighs and gratuitous snark about Izuku’s blind faith in All Might’s mediation skills. And, to be perfectly honest, Izuku dreaded the possibility of finally and completely alienating the sympathy of the one person that had supported and advised him for his whole life, in his own peculiar way. Yes, it was childish of him. Yes, he would have to tell his father anyway, eventually. But he’d rather do it after the matter had been settled, hopefully for the best, and after he’d had a little more time to gather his thoughts and figure out how to word it a little less unfavorably for himself. So, there. It was the 28th of April too, he could wait another day or two, at least. No biggie.

By breakfast time, Izuku had reviewed the issue three more times, had another nightmare, and accepted the fact that this was going to be a long day. 

School went by in that typical hazy fashion that was the result of intellectual activities synergizing poorly with a sleep-deprived brain. Izuku kept eyeing Kacchan warily throughout the first three classes, harboring the half-baked notion of addressing yesterday’s events. He regretted doing it the very moment he opened his mouth to greet him during recess.

“What?” Kacchan growled without sparing him a single glance.

“Uh, ah, I…” How are you was one possible conversation starter. A bad one, for sure. Worrying about Kacchan’s well-being implied that he may not be okay, which implied weakness, which invited aggression as a counter-argument. Did you tell anyone else about what I did yesterday was downright rude, as if Izuku’s quirk was more important than his friend being almost murdered. In fact, any reference to the villain incident was a minefield. Braver classmates than Izuku had already made their inquiries during homeroom, and Kacchan hadn’t taken kindly to their snooping. This really was a bad-

“WHAT?” Kacchan barked, turning sharply towards Izuku and banging his fist on his desk for emphasis.

“Uh, nothing! Just saying hello! Hi! Bye!” Izuku fled the classroom without looking back before Kacchan decided to force-feed him his own shoes.

The first bit of good news of the day reached him during lunch, under the guise of a text.

Hey kid! We can drop by the police station this afternoon at 5 if you’re free

Izuku brought up the virtual keyboard to reply, but he stopped with his finger poised over the screen. He blinked at the unlabeled string of digits identifying the sender.

He had All Might’s phone number. One of many, probably. Definitely one of the lowest priority lines. Or maybe just some sort of burner phone for communications with civilians only. Still. He had All Might’s phone number. All Might was texting him. The realization made him half-choke on his rice.

Should he save it? Would that be a breach of confidentiality? Even if he used a not-too-obvious handle? N1? SP? AM? Ante Meridiem? ...That would just make it more suspicious, wouldn’t it? He’d just… commit it to memory for now. In case he ever needed it again. For purely altruistic reasons.

Sure, I’m free! Thank you very much for the help!

Izuku’s phone chimed again a couple of minutes later.

We’ll come pick you up at your place

That ‘we’ raised a small wave of anxiety in Izuku, but he willed himself to suppress it. He couldn’t expect All Might to shield him from any and all interactions with the force. It’d be fine. He could handle this.

The perspective of visiting the villain revived Izuku’s attention for the remaining lessons, only for him to crash back into fidgety inactivity as soon as he got home and found himself without anything to do for almost two hours before the agreed time. Homework was out of the question, he was too distracted. He figured a nap would be the most inoffensive way to while away the time while also recovering some higher brain functions. And so it was only with a mild heart attack that Izuku was roused by the ringing of the doorbell at 4.50 PM.

“Young Midoriya! Good afternoon!” Even at a glance, Izuku could tell that All Might was in better shape than the previous day. He stood a bit straighter, his smile was a bit wider, his hair was slightly less chaotic. He was also wearing slacks and a button up shirt that, while still dramatically oversized, made him look a bit less like a phthisic hospital runaway. “Are you ready to go?”

“Yes! Thank you so much for going out of your way to take care of me!” Izuku declared with a rigid bow to All Might and to the other man standing by his side - definitely a detective, judging by his stereotypical trench coat.

All Might patted the man on the back with an even bigger grin. “This is Naomasa Tsukauchi, my favorite detective on the force! You may speak freely before him, you won’t find anyone more trustworthy in the whole of Japan!”

“A pleasure to meet you, Midoriya.” Tsukauchi politely removed his hat and shook the boy’s hand with an amused smirk, a sign that he was probably familiar with the hero’s odd choice of an introduction. He then peeked behind Izuku’s shoulders towards the inside of the house. “Isn’t your mother going to join us?”

“Ah no, she had a doctor’s appointment booked for today. It’s fine though, I’ll just send her a text to let her know where I’m going.” Izuku had warned his mother that he may have to visit the precinct soon. He had had to justify his singed and grimy school uniform the day before, so he had told her that he’d been marginally involved in the sludge villain incident, and the police was likely to want to collect his statement on the matter. It was only by pure chance that the news broadcast hadn’t outed his abridgment of the facts.

“Ah… We were hoping to have a few words with her too, actually.” Tsukauchi glanced at All Might, whose eyes darted briefly between the detective and the boy.

“I… may have forgotten to mention that.” All Might scratched the back of his neck with an apologetic grimace. “Well, I guess it can’t be helped. We’ll catch up with her another time, if necessary.”

Izuku had the sneaking suspicion that being All Might’s favorite detective came at a price. Tsukauchi just sighed, before regarding him with a gentle smile. “Well, if you are sure you don’t mind coming with us all by yourself…”

“I don’t mind at all!” Izuku hurried to reassure them. 

A minute later he was in the backseat of Tsukauchi’s speeding car, typing a message to his mother and struggling to suppress a monstrous yawn, courtesy of his interrupted nap.

“Tired?” All Might asked, intercepting his gaze in the rearview mirror.

“A bit. I didn't sleep well last night.”

“Ah, I know that feeling.” The hero’s expression mellowed in sympathy. “I’m sure you’ll rest more easily once this is over and done with.”

“I hope so.” Izuku pocketed his phone and gazed at the moving buildings out of the car window, mostly just to break eye contact. Somehow All Might’s open kindness felt undeserved, especially for something as trivial as a bunch of spooky dreams. He focused on more urgent matters. “So, uh… how are we going to do this? Does the villain know I’m coming, will I explain things to him? Will you, uh, keep an eye on things from outside or accompany me...?”

“Well, we were thinking of throwing you into his cell, locking the door and letting the two of you fight for dominance and ownership over the quirk- “ All Might grinned widely in response to Izuku’s exasperated gape.

“Yagi!” The detective reprimanded him, only mildly scandalized. The name bounced a few times around Izuku’s brain, plain and mystifying at the same time.

“Sorry, just trying to lift his spirits.” 

“You have nothing to worry about, it’ll be perfectly safe.” Tsukauchi provided, clearly having a much better understanding of the state of Izuku’s spirits despite knowing him for a scant ten minutes. “The villain will be in his cell and we will escort you inside, of course. You won’t really interact with each other, as he’ll likely be deeply asleep.”

“Asleep?”

“Yes. The apparent loss of his quirk has upset him greatly. He’s barely spoken since we took him into custody, and he’s spent the whole night in severe emotional distress. We would have transferred him to a hospital this morning if you hadn’t agreed to help so promptly. As things stood, we simply had a doctor prescribe him a strong sedative. Hopefully he’ll settle down spontaneously after you return his quirk.”

The man’s words weighed on Izuku’s heart like a ton of bricks. Damn, that was… horrible. He’d been holding onto someone else’s quirk for barely a day, and it had already caused that much sorrow. That wasn’t how Izuku’s power was supposed to be used. It would never be, as far as he was concerned.

“I’m sure he will.” All Might commented, all traces of humour vanished from his demeanor. “Don’t worry, kid. It’ll be a matter of a minute.”

Izuku nodded, and didn’t speak again for the rest of the trip. When they reached their destination, he let All Might guide him towards the detention area of the complex while Tsukauchi wandered off somewhere else, probably taking care of the bureaucratic side of things. He reappeared relatively soon, and they entered one of the cells all together.

The cell was small and mostly barren, furnished with only the most essential goods and surfaces for a relatively short stay. Idly, Izuku wondered what systems they had in place to prevent a… slippery criminal such as the current occupant from escaping from toilets or sinks. Surely they were prepared to- he realized he was spacing out. He should just get on with it.

The villain was indeed sleeping, huddled in a small foldable bedding on the floor. Izuku had barely caught a glimpse of the man’s human form the previous day, yet he was identical to how he’d envisioned him in his dreams. His subconscious was just that observant, apparently. It suddenly occurred to Izuku that he hadn’t even asked for the man’s name yet. The news broadcast hadn’t reported- he was procrastinating again. Just do it, Izuku.

The boy glanced questioningly at the detective, who made a small gesture to indicate that he was free to proceed. He approached his assailant and crouched beside him. The villain’s hand was sticking out from under the blanket, next to his head. Izuku rested his palm against the back of it, and simply willed the quirk out. 

Just like that, it was done. Izuku stood up and stepped back as the man’s body swiftly changed its texture and color, morphing and rearranging itself until a vaguely man-shaped, green heap of goo had replaced the slumbering human. The villain remained dead to the world throughout the entire process.

“...I’m done.” Izuku whispered, quite redundantly. He peered back at the two men at the opposite side of the room, and he didn’t miss the quick, sharp side-glance they’d just quietly exchanged.

“Thank you very much for your cooperation.” Tsukauchi said with the utmost honesty once they were again in the hallway. “While you’re here, would you mind if I collected your statement about the incident? It won’t take long, we already have a clear picture of the situation thanks to All Might.”

“Uh… Okay.” Izuku had hoped, rather optimistically, to skip that part, but he had no reasonable excuse to refuse. Tsukauchi led them to an empty room a couple of corridors further ahead, and held the door open for them. All Might lingered on the threshold.

“May I sit in?” His question was aimed at Izuku for some reason, rather than at his friend. 

“Of course!” Izuku confirmed, when both adults just stared at him in silence, clearly waiting for his permission. The hero thanked him with a small nod and an equally small smile.

They all sat around the desk in the middle of the room, Tsukauchi on one side, and Izuku and All Might on the other. It struck Izuku as a little strange, automatically expecting the two upholders of the law to face him side by side. He wondered if it may be a setup for some sort of good-cop-bad-cop routine. Not that either of them seemed especially suited to the latter role. Tsukauchi was very much the embodiment of professionalism, and All Might… All Might looked especially non-threatening in that moment, almost meek. He was sitting very tidily, big hands folded in his lap and long legs pressed against each other, occupying a remarkably small space considering the size of his frame. It made Izuku straighten his back and sit more neatly by reflex.

The questioning did proceed very smoothly at first. Tsukauchi let Izuku narrate his version of the events without interrupting at all, just humming and jotting down a few lines in his notepad now and then. All Might was just as unobtrusive, volunteering a sentence or two when Izuku happened to stumble on his words, or when he openly allowed him to recount the little scene on the rooftop, since the detective was already in on the big secret. Smooth sailing all round, until the point when Izuku had to bring up his quirk.

“On the subject of your quirk… when did it first manifest, exactly?” Tsukauchi asked.

“A little less than two years ago.”

“Ah, you’re quite the late bloomer! And you’ve only shared that fact with your friend Bakugo and your father, is that correct?”

“Yes.”

“And your father is one... Hisashi Midoriya, right?” Tsukauchi fished out a sheet of paper from the folder he’d retrieved before beginning the interrogation. He slid it across the table so that the boy could read it.

“Yes.” Izuku blinked, an undefined sense of unease gripping him all of a sudden. “...Why did you bother printing his personal details?”

“You’ve been filed as quirkless in the national registry after a routine medical examination when you were four years old. Your registration hasn’t been updated since then, as far as I could ascertain.” Tsukauchi explained calmly.

“Y-Yeah. I know.”

“...That is a punishable offense, I’m afraid. An accurate quirk registration is mandatory for all citizens.” Tsukauchi’s expression softened when Izuku utterly failed to hide his dismay. “This has no consequence on you, as minors aren’t expected to take care of these things by themselves, especially since quirk recording is often carried out when they’re extremely young. Your mother bears no blame either if, as you say, she’s as clueless about it as the rest of the world. But if your father knew and neglected to sort out the necessary paperwork for so long-”

“Oh.” Oh. Oh crap. Izuku had never thought of that. Why on earth had he never thought of that? Why, in almost two years, had he never considered the legal implications of all that secrecy? Why hadn’t his father? “Are you going to press charges against him?”

“Not yet. We’re at least going to get in touch with him and hear him out before taking any further steps.” The detective gave him a genuinely reassuring smile. “But even if we did, there is no cause for concern. These bureaucratic hitches are usually settled with a small fine.”

“I-I see.” Izuku gulped. He wasn’t going to wait until May. He was going to call his father as soon as he was alone. This probably wasn’t going to snowball into a lengthy legal conundrum, but still…

“What’s his occupation? I’m reading ‘administrative assistant’ here, which is a bit generic…”

“I don’t know much about that. He works for the government, I think, and he always says that all his activities are classified, so I try not to pry... Too much…”

“That is very judicious of you. I wish you could teach some of that tact to my sister…” Tsukauchi sighed, only half-jokingly. All Might let out a low chuckle at that. “Does your father know that you’ve been so reserved about your quirk so far?”

“Yes.”

“And he didn’t find it odd in the slightest?”

“...No.” 

“Why do you think that is?” Izuku was suddenly very aware of both adults observing him quite intently. He really didn’t want to make things look any worse for his father. He could… slightly reframe the truth, maybe.

“I, uhm… Mine is a bit of a unique quirk. Difficult to use without, uh, stepping on other people’s toes. And I’ve been quirkless for most of my life, and… it’s no mystery that I envied other kids a lot because of that. I was worried that my schoolmates could be wary of me if they knew that I could… act on that envy now.”

Tsukauchi hummed, twirling his pen slowly between his fingers. “I can understand your concern. But quirk counselling is specifically designed to help children cope with such issues, and you’ve been missing out on it because of this extreme discretion. Your father should have realized he was doing you more harm than good by letting these fears fester in your mind.”

Izuku dropped his gaze on his father’s profile sheet. Detective Tsukauchi had a point, but… the matter was more complicated than that, as well as intricately intertwined with his father’s job and the troubled history of their quirk, and… Izuku didn’t want to delve into any of that at the moment. 

“We’ll definitely schedule some counselling sessions for you in the future, I’m sure you’ll find them beneficial.” Tsukauchi hesitated. “...Did something catch your attention?”

Something did, in fact. Izuku was idly skimming through the content of his father’s profile, and a couple of details were giving him pause. The first was, unsurprisingly, his father’s listed quirk. Fire Breathing.

...nor do I have it printed in bold letters in my personal documents…

Yeah, Izuku wasn’t going to bring that up. The other thing, a little more surprisingly, was his photo.

“Oh, it’s nothing, just… I haven’t seen any photos of my father in a long time.”

“You haven’t seen ‘any photos’ of him?” Tsukauchi cocked his head curiously.

“Yeah… I’ve never met him in person, he travels a lot because of his job and he never has enough time to stop by. I only know what he looks like because of an old photo my mother showed me. I haven’t seen it in years too, so…”

“Only a single photo, uh? And this picture here doesn’t strike you as familiar?”

Izuku observed it more closely... No, he was surely mistaken. “No no, there’s… there’s definitely a resemblance. Mine was a very old photo, taken before I was born. And it wasn’t even a photo of him specifically, he just happened to be in it, at an odd angle and in the middle of a crowd… I’m sure this one is more accurate.”

“Are you still in possession of that photo, by any chance?” All Might chimed in unexpectedly, his bright eyes narrowing slightly.

“Yes, I think so… Hang on, let me check.” Izuku fetched his phone, opened the internet browser… Crap, it really had been a long time since he’d looked at the thing. Back then, he’d saved the file his mother had passed him on a free online storage site that… hopefully still existed? He hadn’t used it in at least four years. Was his account still active? Could he even retrieve the credentials with his current email address? “Uh… Actually, I don’t think I can get it right away. But I printed a copy of it once, it should be at home… somewhere…” Stashed in one of those boxes of old notebooks and magazines on top of his wardrobe, right? Or had it been thrown away when they had moved to their current apartment…? He fiddled with his phone with growing discomfort, acutely aware of the utter unhelpfulness of his babbling.

“We’d certainly be grateful if you could retrieve that photo for us, when you have a minute.” All Might finally conceded, taking pity on Izuku's floundering.

“Sure! I’ll try to find it as soon as I get home.”

“Much obliged.” Tsukauchi flipped quickly through his folder. Izuku was about to ask why the mention of that photo had sparked their interest so much, when Tsukauchi put Hisashi's file back into the folder and closed it with a snap. “Well, I think we’ve covered everything. Again, you’ve been immensely valuable to us, Midoriya.”

Izuku let out a breath he hadn’t noticed he was holding. All Might positively beamed at him and flashed him a thumbs up, which was its own, heart-warming reward. They all stood up and made to leave, when Izuku remembered he owed the two men a proper thanks.

“Ah, I really appreciate that you used your influence to… to get the papers off my back. It was… unreasonable of me to ask, but I  really  appreciate you humoring my hope for discretion anyway. I hope that it wasn’t too much of an inconvenience.”

Tsukauchi and All Might traded a puzzled glance. 

“We did nothing of the sort, kid. What makes you-” All Might stopped, as if struck by a sudden thought. “Ah! You did mention it yesterday, didn’t you? That you were expecting your friend to expose your quirk…”

“Yes. I… I imagine Kacchan told the journalists, and you took care of, uh, correcting his version?”

“No, no, there was no need to.” All Might waved his hand dismissively. “Your friend didn’t mention you at all. He was on the verge of fainting when you rushed in, he’d been strenuously fighting back against the villain for a while by that time. He was too exhausted to notice your intervention, and you bolted immediately afterwards. He never realized you were there.”

Izuku’s jaw dropped half-way open, but he shut it immediately with an audible click. 

“...Ah.” Kacchan hadn’t realized. The bystanders hadn’t realized. The police hadn’t realized. All Might hadn’t really realized. That meant that no one, no one, would know about his quirk right now… if he hadn’t gone and spilled the beans about it himself. If he hadn’t dumped an unnecessary confession to the number one hero out of sheer, emotional anxiety.

...Boy, that next phone call was going to be one for the ages.

[shinsorokiri]

S/o Loses Memory and Quirk

Kaminari Denki HCs

Genre: Angst

Warnings: Language, violence, mentions broken bones, a panic attack, panic attack symptoms, sad Denki

A/N: Ngl writing angst for Denki did something to my little heart. He only deserves happiness and I’m mad at myself for giving him sadness lol. Anyways, I hope you enjoy! I’ll be writing one like this for All Might next so keep your eyes peeled for that one!

Shinsou, Aizawa, Hawks, and Dabi

Todoroki, Bakugou, and Kirishima

Kaminari Denki | Chargebolt

You are his partner in crime

You’re the one who is always there to take care of him when he goes dumb

You’re the one who is always there to comfort him when he feels like an idiot

You’re always the one who is there for him

And he’s always the one who is there for you

It’s been that way for years

Ever since you transferred to UA your second year of high school

The two of you became fast friends

Best friends even

And his flirty nature made it so it wasn’t too long before the two of you entered a real relationship

The two of you EXUDE the most chaotic good energy that even Bakugou finds it kind of endearing

But unbeknownst to his friends

Denki can get really fucking serious when it comes to you

It lowkey shocked you the first time you saw him act like that

And it was all because you were sparring with him and you tripped over your own damn foot and face planted 

You figured he’d just point and laugh at you but he ran over and checked you EVERYWHERE to make sure you weren’t hurt

mans even SCOLDED you

YOU WERE SCOLDED BY DENKI KAMINARI

But you lowkey LOVED it because like

Wow

He does like me !!!

Of course that was in your final year at UA

The two of you are now pro-heroes at separate agencies

And boy oh boy does Denki worry about you

He can’t help it

He has seen you run into a wall because you were trying to rely on scent instead of sight “in case you get stuck in a dark room with a villain”

He worries

But he also knows you are strong

And also a hot badass who can take on anyone

Well

Almost anyone

Midoriya could probably kick your ass but that’s just because it’s Midoriya

But in all seriousness

He isn’t even patrolling today

He has the day off actually

And Denki has never baked anything before in his life

But

He knows that there’s been this mysterious villain giving your agency some trouble recently

So he wants to make you some of your favorite cookies

Or at least try to

And then have a lil movie night

He’s a clingy little shit

And he wants to destress you so

He will refuse to let go of you for the rest of the night goddamnit!

So there he is

Taking the semi-burnt but still edible cookies out of the oven

His favorite program on in the background

When suddenly

His show gets interrupted

And the hero scanner the two of you have goes off in your living room

He immediately turns his attention to the television

Stopping in the middle of the kitchen 

Still holding the cookies

When he sees live footage of you falling from a 3 story building

Onto concrete

He drops the pan

And literally sprints out of the door

He doesn’t even have shoes on

But he doesn’t give a single Fuck™

He rushes down the stairs of the apartment building the two of you live in

And gets to his car in record time

Mans be speeding to the hospital he knows you’re gonna be at

You two had a plan in place with each other and your agencies that if anything would happen to either of you

You would both go to this specific hospital so you two could know where the other was at all times

Of course he was crying while speeding

And his heart rate was way too fast for him to be functioning

But he had to get to you

He had to

And he did

He pulled into a parking spot reserved for pro-heroes and ran inside the emergency room

When he asked about you the nurse told him you were currently in surgery for some severe bone breaks

He got a nasty taste in his mouth

But he just nodded

She told him he could wait in the waiting room

And he did

He sat down in a chair

And he was trying so hard to keep it together

So 

SO

Hard

But eventually Kirishima, Mina, Sero, and even Bakugou showed up

To be fair

Mina and you did work at the same agency

So she saw everything that happened

They immediately went over to him

And he looked up at Mina

And deadass this is the first time any of them see how genuinely serious Denki can get

He asks Mina what happened

And she hesitates

But his face is dead serious

There are obviously tears leaking out of his eyes

But his stare is wildly intense

And Mina knows that if she says no he’ll just keep asking or ask someone else at the agency

So she tells him

“Well… we were patrolling, like usual, when that villain that’s been keeping us on our toes showed up. They’ve never… done anything other than rob people and knock them out so we thought hey this should be easy. Especially since (Y/n) was there. When they saw us they ran into a building and we chased after them and when we had them cornered on the roof they did this weird… sneak attack? But not really? I don’t know it was… odd, they had this like patterned fight technique and they hit (Y/n) in a few different places, and she went to use her quirk to fight back but… nothing happened… and then they hit her like at the bottom of her skull and she just… fell down unconscious. And then they… threw her… off…”

She started trailing off at the end because a sob tore through Denki’s throat

And then he started hyperventilating

Luckily Bakugou and Kirishima were there to help him out

They get panic attacks frequently, so they managed to calm him down and get him to breathe again

And they stayed with him for as long as they had to

Eventually after hours 

A doctor came out and approached Denki

“Pro Hero Chargebolt?”

He stands up very fast

He’s informed that you are out of surgery

And that the surgery went well

However they noticed something odd in your MRI results

It seemed that a portion of your brain was damaged?

But not quite 

It was still functioning

But something about it was off

And they had never seen anything like it before

It was like certain parts of your brain were blocked but everything else was fine

Upon hearing this Denki’s heart broke

And then after hearing the part of your brain that was impacted was the part that contained long term memories

His heart shattered

“We’re afraid she may have severe amnesia. We’re going to keep running tests to see just what is going on, we think it’s the quirk of that villain. A lot of the victims of their crimes have blockages in their muscle groups, but we’ve never seen a blockage in the brain from them.”

Denki is quiet

He literally doesn’t say anything

Until he whispers

“Can i see her?”

The doctor nods

And he leads him to your room

You’re still asleep 

And you’re covered in bandages and casts

It breaks his heart

His friends texted him to tell him they went home but if he needs them at any minute that they will be on their way to the hospital in ten seconds flat

He appreciates it

But right now he really just wanted to be alone with you

He just sat next to you

Holding your hand

He was even moving your pointer finger to trace the Lichtenberg Figures trailing up and down his arms

You always do it when the two of you are cuddling at night 

It helps him sleep

And reminds him that you love him regardless of his faults

And right now he just

He really needs you

This goes on for an hour before he feels you start to move

And he freezes

“(Y/n?”

You open your eyes

And squint at him

“Uh… h-hi… aren’t you that guy in my new class…?”

He stares at you

Completely deadpan

Before laughing a bit

But it isn’t a happy laugh

It’s very much a sad laugh

“Yeah. Yeah, I am.”

“Cool, but um… how did you know my name already?… Are you crying?”

Yes

He was

He was laughing and crying at the same time

He probably looked like he was losing his mind

But he really did just lose his whole world so

It’s a prompted reaction

“Yeah. Yeah, I am.”

His voice was more strained this time

“Are you… are you okay?”

“Yeah, but you’re not. And I didn’t save you, and now you don’t know who I am, and I’m just… I’m so sorry, babe. I’m so sorry.”

The laughing stopped

Now he’s just sobbing

In your mind

You’d seen him a few times while touring the school

And he was always laughing and smiling

Always

So this was shocking

And you’d be lying if you said it didn’t tug on your heart strings

You instinctively reach out to grab his hand

And he grips onto it so tight

Almost like he’s afraid of letting go

“…You called me babe?”

He tries to even his breathing

But he nods

“I don’t… I don’t even know you, I-”

“You do. You do, but… you don’t. It’s… it’s complicated and I’m a literal dumbass so… I’ll call a doctor. They’ll explain.”

And that he does

And the doctor does in fact explain

And after the doctor leaves

You ask him to tell you about your relationship

And he does

He tells you even the smallest details

From the time that you painted the nail on his right hand middle finger pink because he lost a bet and he ended up liking it and buying nail polish for himself

To the time that you two told everyone you break danced all night to break in your new apartment when in reality he turned on Lover by Taylor Swift and the two of you slow danced in your living room

All of it

And he even managed to slip in the fact that you’d remember all of this after he caught the villain who did this to you

And he will catch them.

[carol-effing-danvers]

Steve Rogers is a Monster

Yeah, that’s a hell of a title, isn’t it? Strap in, it only gets worse from here. 

(click here if you’d prefer to read this on AO3)

Forewarning, if you enjoyed the epilogue for Endgame, this particular essay is not for you - and no, I am not bashing the Steve/Peggy shippers, you are beautiful human beings who make the fandom brighter and I’m happy that at least someone in this fandom got the ending they wanted.

Additional warning: if you expect this to be another Civil War debate, you will also be disappointed. There has never been a measurement invented that can adequately describe how much I loathe the verbal dick measuring contest that seems to pass for human interaction between Tony Stark and Steve Rogers in this franchise. It’s not funny or entertaining - it’s exhausting, uncomfortable, and frankly it’s rather lazy writing.

This is about the very specific way that the epilogue in Endgame completely changed the way the character of Steve Rogers can be interpreted, and I don’t just mean the very illogical and contradictory way that time travel is explained, both in the movie itself and the fact that the writers and directors have two completely different views on how that worked out. 

I mean that the choice made by Steve Rogers in the very last minutes of that movie alters the way I view each and every one of his actions starting from The First Avenger and that alteration is exactly what I want to talk about, because whether you view it as deserving or not, what Steve does at the conclusion of Endgame was the most selfish thing humanly possible. Time is a thief, but somehow Steve managed to steal even more than Time.

Side note here: I understand that I am a completely biased Stucky shipper, a friend to Barnes and Noble, a Starbucks aficionado - sorry. Anyway, I’ve always believed that Steve and Bucky were destined blah blah blah, but I was never expecting a Stucky ending. Disney wasn’t going to do that, and I knew that, I wasn’t bothered that Steve and Bucky weren’t doing the smoochies by the end. But Bucky’s facial expression during those last minutes was gut-wrenching. Like...I have no idea what kind of cues the script and directors gave him, but in the future, please don’t ask Sebastian Stan to look sad unless you want soul-crushing devastation. It’s not Seb’s fault, his features are just arranged that way - but the fact that the editing staff allowed Sam to be sad though elated to be entrusted with the Shield and Bucky looked like his soul was being physically torn out of his body was an… interesting choice. 

Other side note: if you’re writing about time travel, I’m begging y’all to get your facts straight. Or just don’t write about time travel. It almost always sounds better on paper than it does on screen and it means that you’ve opened doors to more questions than you’ve probably got the answers for. I know this was about trying to set up the idea of the multiverse, I get that, but there were better and less messy ways to do that, and I know that because I’ve done it before. @Marvel: Let me write you a six-way orgy you fucking cowards~

By going back in time, Steve robbed Peggy of the future that would have been hers - not only that, he’s robbed her of even the chance of making the choice between those futures, because you honestly could not tell me with a straight face that Steve told her the complete truth of what he had done and she would be okay with him alternating the very course of the future. It doesn’t help his case that he has a history of not disclosing truths that he knows will be painful or inconvenient for other people in his life.

He robbed his loved ones - Sam, Bucky, Wanda - of the years they would have spent with him. Sure, he ‘came back’ after Peggy passed away, but they are adults in the prime of youth who knew him sixty years ago in his own time and he is an old, old man who has lived an entire life completely separated from them. He is practically a stranger with a name they know, but a history that no longer belongs to any of them - not even his oldest friend. They have him back, but judging from his age, they’ll be lucky to get even ten more years with him. Assuming of course, that any of them can stand to speak to him - I certainly couldn’t blame them if they tell him to go to hell and take his dad jokes with him. 

Steve has stolen away their friend and dropped off an elderly and dying near-stranger in his place, and this is treated by the writing (and the majority of the acting) as a wild and unexpected but not tragic event. 

Is it really that unexpected, though?

I recall seeing a Game of Thrones essay on Daenerys across my dash (I’m sorry, love, I don’t recall who you are since it’s not a fandom I’m in, but if someone knows who wrote that, please post the link!) which detailed how her ending in the series was foreshadowed many times by her penchant for bloody killings and her habit of surrounding herself with her own fawning friends.

Months after reading that, I had the thought: though Steve is never really shown thinking about Peggy after Civil War, except in a few scattered scenes in Endgame, was this foreshadowed? Whether you believe that his actions are justified or not, what Steve does is still, in the end, selfish at its very heart, and Steve Rogers is not a selfish person. 

Oh no, my dear friends and readers. Because taking this action has solidified and clarified Steve Rogers as the biggest and most selfish asshole in this whole universe.

Steve does not do the right thing, Steve does the thing that will most make him feel better. The fact that this often happens to be the right thing in the end is more the result of happy coincidence than any special sort of moral authority that the man holds. 

Rescuing Bucky Barnes and his fellow captives in a prisoner of war camp from being experimented on by an insane Nazi eugenicist? That was not a moral stand, that was endangering himself, Peggy Carter, and Howard Stark because he couldn’t handle the reality of his best friend being killed in war.

Sacrificing himself by putting the Valkyrie down in the Arctic Circle? That was not about sparing human lives, that was about Steve seeing his friend die right in front of him and not being able to deal with the grief. There were ways he could’ve prevented the plane from killing people without killing himself.

Trying to make Bucky remember who he was? And later on, saving him from the government agencies who wanted to hunt him down? Although, arguably, that last one is also just good common sense - Steve was already shown that government agencies could and were corrupted by HYDRA and he’d also seen how dangerous the Winter Soldier could be when unleashed. 

Steve did, I think, truly believe that this was the right thing to do, but it was also about keeping his connection - his very last, since Peggy had descended into dementia caused by Alzheimer’s before she ultimately died - to a past that for him, was only months or years ago, rather than decades. In some ways, this is completely understandable - Bucky might be the very last person left alive who truly knows who the real Steve Rogers is, because the rest of these people only know Captain America and we are consistently shown through multiple movies how uncomfortable this makes him.

This gets...considerably less and less understandable as we are shown Steve’s growing relationships with Natasha, Sam, Wanda - even Sharon, though she barely gets any screen time and they share the most awkward kiss I’ve ever seen - and indeed, what might be the most uncomfortable kiss in cinema history.

Side Note 3: This is made even more awkward by the director’s choice to have two of Steve’s friends watching them the whole time - seriously, who even does that? Why would you make them do that? Only sociopaths make out with their friends staring at them like that. It’s so fucking creepy - and don’t even get me fucking started on the fact that she’s also apparently his own niece. AHHHHH!

But we are shown, over and over again, that Steve is capable of building close meaningful relationships with people in the present. They don’t know his whole history, but they do know Steve Rogers rather than Captain America and they care about him deeply. 

Side Note 4: Notice that I don’t count Tony Stark among those people - despite this strangely persistent narrative that the various writers and directors tried to sell to the audience, Tony and Steve were not friends. They were never friends. They were colleagues at best, but these were two men who neither liked nor understood each other very well, but had to work together. And sometimes that’s okay, too. (Oh dear, I just gave the Stony fans a fit too, didn’t I? Sorry, guys. Enemies to Lovers is a great trope, I support you!)

But let’s set aside Steve’s gross betrayal of the people who loved him. We’ll also ignore the question of whether the motive for these good actions has tainted the actions themselves. Because even without questioning these, the conclusion of this story arc still transforms Steve into the biggest monster this franchise has. 

The very fundamental way that the writers and directors can’t agree on how the time travel mechanics in their own story work mean that Steve has just done one of two things and they range from shady and very questionable to absolutely fucking horrific. 

The first, that he’s created his own alternate universe to exist in, is morally dubious at best. Even the people who support this theory and liked the ending seem to feel that it wasn’t necessarily a ten out of ten on the moral goodness spectrum. They’ll say things like ‘he deserved to have his happy ending’. Even that phrasing seems to acknowledge that doing this was the opposite of the right thing. It just considers doing the wrong thing as being justified rather than horrifying. 

But let’s examine this first idea for a minute - even this, the more innocent of the two implications, means that rather than really processing his grief or dealing with the repeated tragedies and losses that have occured in his life, even as he was running group therapy sessions and grief counseling, Steve Rogers chose to escape his current life by creating an alternate universe that specifically allows he himself to live out his own fucking fantasies of the way his life should have turned out. 

That, in case you are not aware, is wildly fucked up. I thought I was playing pretty fast and loose with Steve’s characterization when I turned him into an extremely polite serial killer but as it turns out, I clearly just wasn’t setting the bar high enough, because that’s somehow even more fucked up than being an undercover child soldier with a small sadistic streak. 

Hm, and now I feel I should have been more creative there...

The second, and even more horrifying option, is that this older Steve Rogers has been in this world the whole time, watching as things unfolded just as we’ve seen over the past decade, taking ‘the slow way’ through time. 

Side Note 5: I do kind of understand why you would do it this way, because that’s really cool and shocking when you say that! Until you think about it for longer than three seconds and suddenly you realize…

Everything that has happened here, every tragedy and downfall these people experienced, happened because Steve Rogers lived his happily ever after with his beautiful wife and did absolutely nothing to stop it. He got to fuck Peggy Carter and watched as his wife built an empire of intelligence networks, knowing that her efforts were completely in vain because her agency was rotten to the core and he never told her.

Every horrifying act committed by HYDRA under the guise of SHIELD was permitted through Steve Rogers’ negligence. And that’s just the wider big-picture worldview, large and shocking, but not personal. 

What about the people that Steve claims to actually care about? 

This means that Steve lived his whole life in contentment with his wife and children while his best friend was physically and psychologically tortured for over seventy years and just...let that go. 

He allowed one friend to murder another in the nineties, when the Winter Soldier was sent after Howard and Maria Stark. Then their child was being advised by a greedy self-interested warmonger who paid terrorists to drag him off to be tortured and slaughtered, and Steve did nothing about that, either. 

Bruce Banner was exploited, experimented on, and made into a monster against his will in the failed pursuit of recreating what was done to Steve, resulting in billions of dollars in damage and dozens or even hundreds of lives lost, and Steve allowed that to happen, too. 

Like Bucky Barnes, Natasha Romanov was physically and psychologically tortured for others to use her as a living weapon - except that this was probably happening to her since early childhood, and a man her future self loved and trusted implicitly did nothing to save her from this upbringing. 

The Maximoff twins are shown to have not wealthy but loving parents who are murdered in front of them and they both endure days of laying in the rubble of their ruined apartment, wondering if the bomb in their living room would go off and kill them. Later, they are taken in by HYDRA, experimented on, and recruited as child soldiers to the cause when they show signs of having supernatural powers. They start a series of events that result in the destruction of a major city and the loss of what is probably thousands of lives. Pietro is murdered while trying to help the Avengers to stop this, and Wanda suffers the loss of the very last living person she loved. None of these things seem to have bothered Future Steve. 

Steve “I can’t sit on the sidelines when I see a situation go sideways” Rogers, planted himself on that fucking sideline and observed for nearly eighty years as friends, colleagues, and his own wife were lied to, brainwashed, tortured, vilified, and hunted down like animals.

And then there Steve Rogers himself - not the Endgame Steve Rogers, the Steve Rogers who brought down a Nazi plane and will lie beneath the ice for seventy years while everything he knows disappear (mostly) innocent of these horrors, the life he would’ve lived stolen from him by a stranger with his name and his face from another universe.

What I’m saying here is that if you consider this idea for any amount of time, it took Steve Rogers less than ten minutes to become the most evil and disturbing figure in the entire MCU, only (not really tho) contested by Thanos himself. 

Gross and poorly reasoned libertarian ethics aside, Thanos genuinely believes that he did what he did for the sake of the entire population. It’s made fairly explicitly clear that Steve didn’t do this for anyone but himself. 

Call me crazy, but if everyone you know needs to suffer and multiple planet-wide devestations have to happen in order for you to get your happy ending, you might be the bad guy. 

Maybe I’m just old-fashioned?

[the-golden-ghost]

A Masterpost of Final Thoughts So I Can Stop Spamposting and Go To Bed

While I did LIKE this season we... definitely got robbed of a lot. I was hoping they had time to plan and make this the Finale Season but it seems like they didn’t.

It really just felt like a lull in all the chaos. A nice little slice of Backstory for those paying attention to the train lore, but mostly just a standalone Fun Adventure about two guys with a long history.

Which is why I said before that it felt Season 1-esque. Seasons 2 and 3 actually were starting to delve into the gritty realities of the train - Season 2 covered the denizens and how they’re essentially cogs in the machine; sentient, but with no will and no agency. Just puppets playing out whatever role the train sticks them in and rarely do they ever make it out. Season 3 got darker and basically threw in your face the fact that sometimes the train fucks you up worse than you were before and then kills you.

There’s a lot of stuff similar to that, that could have been covered. And now we’ll never see it and it bites. 

This season really didn’t Raise The Stakes very much. I mean... I was pretty certain (though not completely) that they wouldn’t kill off Ryan or Min. What I was almost expecting to happen was for them to realize they couldn’t get off together because Ryan gave up his exit, and then stay on the train permanently. But that didn’t happen lol

The ending was still cute though! Finally we get a fun IT theme song

Kez was pretty interesting as their denizen, I think she’s the first one we’ve seen that actually had to Grow As A Person along with her passengers. Atticus was just there to save his car and was more an agent of the B-plot in Season 1. I guess one could make an argument for Lake... but I wouldn’t consider her to exactly be Jamie’s denizen. That was Alan Dracula! And Tuba... well.

Not enough Cat. I mean it’s Kate Mulgrew. You got Kate Mulgrew and didn’t do anything with her? Shame.

The fact that J K Simmons was in this season killed me dead though

The voice cast is always so peak

So we get to see The Tragic Fate Of One-One but only in the background. This season judging by a comment from one of the creators about Ryan and Min’s birth year (1966) takes place in 1984. I don’t know if we got a date for season 1 so correct me if I’m wrong but I think it was supposed to be early-2010s. Which means One-One was trapped for over 30 years.

OH LORD. ONE. We got to see him as a brief shadow in season 1 but now we got to see him in his prime if only for like fifteen seconds. He really does seem like what we all expected him to be - a well-intentioned but indifferent force who intends to change these people for the better but is unfeeling and completely aware of the fact that they may die in the process.

Which reminds me of how people theorized that perhaps the train only kills people accidentally because it was damaged in all the seasons we’ve seen? Because Amelia took over and fucked with the coding? Nope! One’s just a bastard

He’s also eerily godlike. He creates everything and watches over it but lets everything play out as it will. It’s even slightly implied that the train controls the creatures in the wasteland outside the train, which means that within this pocket dimension, every denizen is of One’s making and the fate of every being depends on his control. Ominous.

I can’t believe the cute little robot ball from season 1 canonically has a body count. You heard it here last!

Which 1. Makes Amelia’s line “I was trying to keep One at bay!” from season 1 a lot darker and 2. Makes you wonder if any of Amelia’s motives for splitting him and usurping the train was for humane purposes? I doubt it, cause her number skyrocketed and she didn’t seem to be interested in stopping the death toll, only in rebuilding her life and resurrecting her husband. But still

Was that one of One-One’s original VAs voicing One? In the season 1 episode his voice is just an amalgam of theirs, and it’s spooky, but this sounded like a different voice entirely. But he only had three lines so it was hard to tell.

So basically this season’s A plot was “two best friends work out their differences and grow as people” and B plot was “magical bell learns how to stop ruining the shit out of everyone’s life” and C plot was “Amelia Fucking Usurps A Minor God”