#not that there was anything wrong with his original hairstyle. it's just that there was everything wrong with his original hairstyle!

[dullorangepulp]

My favorite part of the persona 3 movies is how in winter of rebirth, the protag's hairstyle changes! he stops lookin like a depressed early 2000s emo fuckboy, since the bangs no longer cover his eye. It's a rlly great subtle way of showing his arc and i just overall love the new hairstyle sm <3

(doodle reqs open!)

[cycle-hit]

milgram prisoners "fur"sona hcs

haruka - rhetus periander butterfly! i think his dislike of animals would lead to him not really being comfortable with having a mammal, so i gave him an insect 1. because of muu 2. i think the colours match him 3. the butterflies in all knowing and all agony. 4. theyre found around forests and water :) (TO BE READ EVILLY)

yuno - rabbit, mantis, or lamprey! for rabbit it's because people tend to see them as just cute pets but theyre actually quite mean at times and a lot of effort has to be put into genuinely taking care of them. also the reproductive cycle theyre known for whatever. praying mantises yeah its the "eating their mates" thing, also because of her covering "sticky bug"! she also just generally reminds me of a mantis for some reason. lampreys because of "the vampire" and because draining blood, draining warmth etc. they also slightly resemble umbilical cords! fuuta - fire breathing dragon. its bright red. self explainable (salamander, fire...) but also because of his knight motifs! ive also considered a wolf for him bc i think it'd be funny if both kotoko and fuuta had wolves but i think him being a scalie fits more muu - wasp. she thinks its a bee that she's designed. she is wrong. wasp because of "its not my fault", the fact wasp species can be "social" or "solitary", and the fact wasps kill bees. i can also see the argument for just a bee though! especially since once bees sting you they die afterwards shidou - a bird of paradise :). double meaning with the fact it shares the name with a flower. also because i think being one of those rly fancy birds is just like him. "birds of paradise" also has origins in "birds of God". like "aesculapius"! and amane! some birds of paradise also drink nectar from flowers. i hope he flies into a window (ive also considered vulture, crow, raven, and dove (just because of 0507- shidou sees kazui tear a dove apart with his teeth and goes "god i wish that was me", changing his avian instantly)) mahiru - capybara!! friends with everyone even crocodiles. just having fun. classified as rodents (if i was mahiru's boyfriend i would have just eaten the rat rip to him but im different). those images of capybaras with citrus fruits on their head. also she just reminds me of a capybara generally kazui - cat! i dont think i have to explain anything for cat. he would have a nebelung cat specifically though. also hey did you know cats hunt birds- amane - cat as well. sorry. i actually dont really know what breed of cat amane's fursona would be- maybe abyssinian? some sort of tabby? mikoto - has two or three fursonas depending on if you're into the trikoto theory. theyre all very bright neon colours. mikoto has a greyhound, john has a jackal, "green" has an ibizan. all three of these canines are thought to be the inspiration behind anubis, egyptian god of taking care of the dead and acting as a protector for them. anubis is also described as a "gate guardian"! hey. hey wait a fucking secon- (i also just think itd be rly funny for mikoto to be able to merge fursonas with john + "green" and make cerberus) kotoko - i dont think you need my input for this one. go watch deep cover and skip to the end idk. i DO associate her with the hyper realistic 4k hd most beautiful art youve ever seen werewolf images specifically though. i like to think she'd be like "my wolf fursonas colours and design have to be REALISTIC. not like MIKOTO'S or FUUTA'S" and then she turns around and gives it red eyes and her exact hairstyle

[zairene]

in sync, hobie brown x rock angel! roxxi-coded! black fem reader hcs

warnings: fluffy kinda, but none

author’s note: congrats on 3k juice !!! ilysm and u so so so deserve it <3 original event post here / creator: @mypimpademia

you and hobie are the ultimate rockstar couple.

it seemed to be a match made in heaven when you both clicked instantly, with the same passion for creating music and touring the world. it wasn’t hard talking music with him since both of your music taste was drastically similar. with both of you loving rock, you both always had new recommendations for each other.

and because of your broad taste of music, you’re always recommending him new songs that weren’t particularly rock. it could be 90s gangsta rap, r&b, neo-soul, just really anything. you weren’t afraid to try new things so maybe hobie could too!

he still has a keen ear for music. so due to how close you both are and how close he is with the group because of you, he’s often at rehearsals with you guys, helping with things you guys could make better but if you ask him, he just there to see his girl in action.

hobie never misses your concerts. like ever. the only way he’d miss it is if he had some big emergency that he couldn’t possibly pass up but not much is more important than you. you always find yourself sneaking him backstage passes as well, not because he asked but why not for your biggest supporter ever?

regarding being your biggest supporter, he always reposts things on his instagram story about your band—always congratulating you on new collaborations or award nominations. he’s always ready to talk about people needing to buy new tickets for your upcoming shows.

hobie is always in your dressing room and just won’t get out when he’s supposed to. at first, you just let him in for some quality time because that’s honestly rare when it’s the touring season for the band. however, once it’s time for him to get out, he’s making excuses for him to stay. “y’know what. ‘m not even ‘ere.” “hobie, get out!”

and when it’s time for you to go onstage, he’s checking you for any type of thing that looks out of place. fluffing whatever hairstyle you have in, making sure you look ready for the lights that’ll be shining on you for the next 10-15 minutes. and before you go, he never fails to give you a kiss and a smack on the ass for “extra good luck,” in his words, i may add. but you loved him either way so maybe you allowed it even though you would yell at him for it. he always laugh because he knew that you weren’t serious and that was just a way of you being flustered.

arguments and conversations with him were never a common thing. if it was anything about the band and your music, you always put that before your relationship because it was your passion. but that didn’t mean your relationship problems didn’t interfere sometimes and it led you to take breaks to talk things out with him because you were never one to yell or get angry with him. you thought that problems could be conquered with a heart-to-heart conversation, and that applied especially to you and him.

putting the band over him was never a personal thing with him because he knew how much you valued your friendships and music. he just was aware that if he did anything wrong to the point where it would lead to your breakup—you would never stop making music with the girls. and that’s what he loved about you, you never let things hinder your success. fortunately, things have never gotten to that level and you’ll always know that hobie will be there with you every step of the way.

[1ovede1uxe]

07. judgement┊ ┊⋆ beyond the stars

synopsis - you've been sent to join the joestar crew on their mission to defeat dio by... dio? y/n is an undercover stand user who joins the sdc to report back to dio their findings and notes about their stands, up until a few moral dilemmas get in the way of your original mission.

ch. synopsis - sweet moments with the gang(tm).

tw // mention of guns

The map image is inaccurate, I just picked a spot in the Red Sea lol oops

After traversing the rest of the desert, we boarded a small motorboat to cross the red sea. Following some hours of sailing and casual chatter, you redirected your focus to Dio as you reached out to him. Every time you opened your chat with him, it was hard, especially rereading the message about your captive mother. Despite growing close to the Crusaders, you remained determined to keep her safe, persisting with your mission.

After sending your text, Jotaro's comment drew your attention back to the group. "Hey old man, something's wrong. You're going in the wrong direction, aren't we supposed to go West towards Egypt?" Mr. Joestar seemed focused, not responding. "Old Man! You're headed for that island!" Jotaro raised his voice.

"Ah, that's right, I can't tell you why, but there's someone I want to meet before we head to Egypt. This man is very important to our journey."

After docking and disembarking, you wandered, taking in the surroundings. Seagulls called in the distance, and palm trees swayed. It seemed peaceful, almost too peaceful for the Crusaders. Knowing Judgement would arrive in the next few days, you felt a nervous tension. "Is it true people live here? It's so small and looks deserted." Kakyoin said, sharing a side glance with you. You seemed nervous, but not for the reasons the Crusaders thought. "Hey, Hey... someone's watching us from the grass," Jotaro stated, calling attention to a pair of eyes peaking through. The figure stood up and darted away. "That figure looks familiar!" Kakyoin added as the mysterious man ran away. You didn't recognize his face; this was not Judgement's user. Curious, you all followed. Hens clucked in the distance. As you approached a small house with a fenced-in yard, you saw the man with powdered white hair feeding five chickens.

"It can't be!" Polnareff cried. "That hairstyle, could it be?" Kakyoin replied. Even Jotaro had a look of surprise.

"I'll go talk to him; you wait here," Mr. Joestar commanded, holding the rest of you back. "My name is Joseph Joestar. I'm traveling to Egypt with these three- er uh- four people," he introduced himself. You remained confused.

"I won't listen, go away!" The mysterious man bellowed, not even bothering to face you all. "Do not talk to me. Whenever people visit me, they never bring me good news! It's always bad!" The man spun around and revealed his face. "I do not want to listen! Go away!" He commanded.

Polnareff's look of shock quickly became mixed with guilt and grief.

"Avdol..." Jotaro mumbled to himself.

Mr. Joestar explained the man who bears a spitting resemblance to their dearly departed friend. Remorse decorated Polnareff's face.

"Avdol's death wasn't your fault."

"No. It's my responsibility; I have to carry that burden."

Polnareff fled to be alone as Kakyoin and Mr. Joestar continued their discussion.

"Hey Jotaro, what exactly happened, what's going on?" You asked in a hushed tone. You half understood from Hol's perspective, which was very much biased, but you wanted the full story. He explained how the Emperor and the Hanged Man disrupted their journey and caused the loss of their dear friend. You really felt for Polnareff, having begun to grow close to him, or as much as you could have over the week and a half you've spent with the Crusaders. You knew guilt for a few fleeting moments and you knew that he would do anything to get Avdol back, just as you had done everything you could by giving your life to Dio for your mother. Mr. Joestar entered the abode Avdol's father fled to, and Kakyoin rejoined you and Jotaro. "Do you think Polnareff will be okay?" You asked, feeling genuine care and concern for the man. Not only was he dealing with emotional turmoil, but also Judgement was on the loose, and thanks to you, Dio knows right where to send him. "I think he'll be alright" Kakyoin reassured you, putting a hand on your shoulder in an attempt to offer some kind of comfort. Jotaro nodded in agreement, then followed the path his grandfather took. "I want to go check on Polnareff." You said to Kakyoin. He grinned to himself at your kind gesture. "Go ahead, come meet us back here alone, though."

"Um, alright." You said, weary of why they wouldn't want Polnareff with them. You approached the shore of the beach to where Polnareff sat pondering. "Hey, are you doing alright?" You asked, taking a seat on the adjacent rock. "Even if it was to avenge my sister's death, I still let Avdol die." He moped.

"You didn't mean for it to happen. It really isn't your fault." You reassured. "But I do get where you're coming from." Polnareff looks at you with curiosity. You explained your story to him, dancing around the middle of your full story in your head.

"I'm glad at least someone understands vaguely." Polnareff tells you the story of his sister, and the battle with J. Geil. You sigh to yourself (I can't believe I'm doing this) and wrap Polnareff in a hug. He embraces it almost immediately. "It's going to be fine...I think." You joke and half smile.

As the sun set during your chat, golden hour had reached you both. "Hey, what's that?" Polnareff points out a glimmering object in the sand. You both walk over to it, and he picks it up. "It looks like gold, I wonder if it drifted from a sunken ship."

"Can you dust the barnacles off it?" Polnareff begins to rub and scrape at the lamp. It glows and he tosses it, a stand emerging, causing a shriek in surprise from the frenchman.

This must be Judgement.

"You get three, tell me three things you desire and I'll make them come true!" He bellowed. Polnareff began to question Cameo, which is what he called himself. "You fake! Are you saying you can make me a very rich man right now?" Polnareff questioned. You decided to have fun in the moment, just to test the waters. "Oh, bring back Lil' Bush!"

"Ugh I miss that show."

"You- you mean the show with the little kid who is George Bush? He's not president anymore. How would that even work?"

"Don't care, want another season." Polnareff laughed along with you at the joke. "Polnareff has summoned me so I will grant his wish." Judgement said, slightly annoyed with you, giving you a look of ‘I’m telling Lord Dio on you.’ "Hail 2 U!" He bellowed and retreated to the lamp.

"That was weird, why didn't he attack us?" You questioned.

"We should watch ourselves. Something is on this island, we should tell Mr. Joestar." You nod in agreement and begin to head back towards the others, only to discover a half buried treasure chest, overflowing with gold and precious jewels. Polnareff knelt down to investigate. "y/n, this is gold from the Napoleonic era, this isn't an illusion and it can't be a dream. This is real treasure!"

Cameo appeared once more, asking for a second wish. You darted off to go tell the other crusaders after Polnareff's quick nod approval. You entered the house where Avdol's father and the crusaders resided. Rushing through the door, you interrupted chatter and laughter amongst the four of the men. "Mr. Joestar! There's a stand with Polnareff and-" A younger Avdol's father stood amongst the group. "(y/n), there's someone I'd like for you to meet. This isn't Avdol's father. This is the Muhammed Avdol. Avdol, this is (y/n), the newest member of our group." Your world was flipped for a moment. I have to text Hol and Mariah about this. You stood there, silent for a second, gears churning. You quickly responded with a bow, "It's an honor to meet you sir, I've heard plenty of great things about you."

"And I've heard plenty of you." Avdol replied to you. You honestly grew nervous, remembering you made a reference about him being dead to join the group. Would they kick you with the Magician back? "All good things I hope?" Avdol glanced around the circle and stayed on Kakyoin for a moment, then replied firmly "Good things. Now, what's this about a stand and Polnareff on this island?"

"Oh, I almost completely forgot. There's this stand Cameo, which is the Judgement card's representative and it apparently can grant wishes. Polnareff sent me to get you guys and let you know, we should hurry back to him." You felt a sence of urgency to return to Polnareff, not only upon intuition, but out of anxiety for someone you hope you can call a true friend, especially after your trauma-dump/bonding moment earlier. You all rushed back to where Polnareff found the treasure earlier. "They were here before I came to you, they must've moved. Lets split up to look for him." You grew nervous, not knowing anything about the stand, beside it being a borderline genie.

Each crusader went in different directions, on the hunt for Polnareff. You darted to a tall grassy area closer to the center of the island, an open plane lit only by the moon. Armed with only the gun you had made with the light a week prior, you creeped around prepared to shoot. The grass rustled and your heart rate increased. You didn't have the crusaders to watch your back. Yes, you had a gun, but you didn't know where the user was, nor the extent of Cameo's power. As your heart rate rose, you felt a chill as the rustling got louder. You headed towards a wooded area, which the tall grass bordered, wanting to get away from the rustling and also a place to hide if needed. Perhaps you could climb a tree to see above the field. As you reached the edge of the plain, you called "Polnareff?" praying for his answer.

Something took a step behind you, crushing the leaves behind you. Driven by anxiety and adrenaline, you instantly spun around and cocked the pistol. Instead of Polnareff or Cameo behind you, you found Kakyoin, who had been searching there prior.

"Woah, woah, it's just me," Kakyoin said, his hands raised in surrender. You let out a relieved sigh, lowering your weapon. "Thank god. Any luck so far?"

"Nothing yet. I was thinking of following Avdol's trail, which Jotaro is doing now, but I wanted to find you first and make sure you were fine."

"Oh, uh, thank you." You replied awkwardly. "But I've got the protection I need." You twirled the pistol around your finger, attempting to look cool. Forgetting it was cocked, the pistol ended up firing into the ground, the shot echoing, and birds from above flew up and out. "Uh huh." Kakyoin raised one eyebrow at you. "Anyways, let's catch up with the others." You blurted out, feeling a bit embarrassed.

As you both strolled under the full moon, a rare, comfortable silence enveloped you. After realizing how long you had been surveying the seemingly endless field of tall grass, you called attention to it. "Uh, Kakyoin?"

"Yes, (y/n)?"

"Do you know where the others actually are?"

"Why do you ask?"

"Because we've been taking an awful long time to reach the opposite end of this field."

"Is that so bad?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, maybe I thought we could spend a little more time together." Kakyoin turned to look at you, his eyes shining that brilliant violet he only got when sharing a moment with you. You got goosebumps, and a light pink shade dusted your cheeks at the statement. Returning to your senses, you ask "Is this really the best time?" You raised a good question for yourself with this, surpassing the current circumstance. Was it a good time to be pursuing romance at all? Also Polnareff is literally missing right now I need to focus.

"Avdol located Polnareff, and he wanted to be the one to go find and be with Polnareff; I'm giving him his space to do so."

"Um, alright." The comfortable silence was now tense, calling attention to Kakyoin's interest in getting to spend time with you. The tension eased as you grew used to each other’s presence and soft breaths. "The moon is beautiful this evening, isn't it?" He mentioned, attempting to ease the tension. He glanced upwards, then to you.

"Yes, I suppose it is." You smiled. He stopped for a moment to just gaze up at the moon. Once you adjusted your gaze to stare at the lunar beauty, he found his eyes wandering back to you. Kakyoin's heart was pounding, nervous about what to do next. Despite being unsure of himself, he took your hand softly, bringing your attention back to him. "Let's continue," he said softly. You adjusted your grip to meet his own, feeling the warmth of the moment between you two.

Is this allowed?

Your hand in his felt comforting to you both, but pumped you with adrenaline as he began to trace circles on the back of your hand, a silent gesture that spoke volumes. You began to ask about Avdol's situation, as well as for what purpose they needed to keep him being alive a secret from Polnareff as a way to keep cool (and keep the blush from rising to your face). The conversation evolved from Avdol to yourselves. You shared your former passions and he talked about his love of art. As you exchanged personal tales, shared passions and vulnerability intertwined, smiles decorating both of your faces as you shared your life stories with another.

Is this okay? You thought as the conversation eased, unsure if growing so close with the so-called enemy was something you could do. His subtle smiles exchanged and the lingering touch spoke a language of their own to you.

As you continued to ramble back and forth with each other, the orange glow of a fire suddenly burst towards the other end of the grassy field, that seemed to stretch to the end of the island. As it commanded both of your attention instantly, Kakyoin’s relaxed smile fell to a tense face of concern. As the mood shifted, you both ran towards the flame. You hear a cry from Cameo. “Impossible! You should be dead!” As you approached the two, Mr. Joestar suddenly appeared at your side gripping your shoulder, bringing you to a grinding halt. Noticing that you weren’t beside him anymore, Kakyoin turned back to you both.

“Let Avdol handle it, okay?” His voice, gruff yet soft, guided the three of you to observe from a safe distance as Cameo, Polnareff, and Avdol grappled with the mysterious situation. A burst of flames enveloped Cameo, toasting him. A small grin plastered Mr. Joestar's face, knowing his friend was back. "Let's head back to the shore and get ready to go, now that we have Avdol," Mr. Joestar suggested as Polnareff and Avdol shared what can be described as a uh, bonding moment.

Jotaro waited on the shore for all of you and you all stood around for a few moments quietly. At the shore, a quiet moment ensued, interrupted by Polnareff's jubilant emergence from the grass, wearing the biggest smile you had ever seen. "Guess who I just ran into!" he exclaimed, initiating an enthusiastic musical performance, "Da, DaDaDa, Da, Da, Da, Daaaaa!" to unveil Avdol.

“Well then, let’s go.” Mr. Joestar said nonchalantly. The rest of the group began to catch up with Avdol as they were before. Polnareff began to yell at the rest of you in shock about how Avdol came back from the dead. Mr. Joestar then explained that he lied about Avdol being alive. “It was all just an act?!” Polnareff lamented.

Amidst the unfolding events, you found yourself once again lost in contemplation. Although your mission tied you to Dio, the camaraderie and unexpected adventures and the secret third thing with Kakyoin with the group stirred a sense of conflicting loyalty. I know I'm here to report for Dio, but there's nothing wrong with having a little fun in the process, I suppose, you mused internally. Rationalizing that Dio's fading foresight focused solely on an intuitive connection with the Joestars, you reassured yourself, "I'm not disobeying, technically. Which hopefully also means Mom's safety."

Interrupting your thoughts, Kakyoin turned back to you, signaling to rejoin the group as they approached the shoreline. "It's almost here! Come on and let’s go!" Mr. Joestar called out. Both you and Polnareff stood dumbfounded as a submarine emerged. "A submarine?! You actually bought this?!" Polnareff exclaimed, echoing the incredulity shared by the group.

“Seriously. Where are you guys getting this stuff?”

You all boarded. Now safe within an unbreachable submarine, you began to cruise northwest towards Egypt.

previous chapter // next chapter // masterlist

I hope someone gets the “JoJo's abridged" reference tee hee. I finally got this out before the end of January! I hope you're enjoying so far. My mom's health is significantly better, and I'm adjusting to my new uni schedule so I hopefully should be able to be updating more. I also have intentions to go back ands edit some of the first chapters. As always, constructive criticism is always appreciated. Also, are y'all liking slightly silly Dio? I'm still trying to figure out how to write him. Taglist is open &lt;;3

taglist: @kerto-p @pancakesyrupthief

[lakesbian]

stirring aisha around in my brain soup pot. there's like zero textual anything for this because wildbow isn't even capable of not objectifying her himself but btwn triggering from fear of rape + various unspecified abusive stepdads + the inherent trauma of being societally sexualized and fetishized as a black girl who, like, Exists and also god forbid enjoys wearing shorts sometimes plus the whole neglect and the thing where the one family member she's really close to only knows how to protect her by controlling her and the sense of being an unwanted nuisance to society in general because of the disability. she is really sooo about wanting to be accurately perceived and wanted but being terrified of being seen wrong & consumed. aisha laborn my girl. anyway i don't have a point to this i just wish wildbow connected the dots and wrote her good. i also wish his dumb ass didn't not only pull the narrative equivalent of the black man dying first (black boy's arc kersploding and shitting itself first) but then have his own damn sister not give a single shit abt him. but i digress it feels tangentially related to her problems disorders that after her loved ones die, w/ the exception of her own brother whom she does not care about because wildbow is insane and needs to be strung up and pelted with tomatoes, she insists on making sure that they're Perceived And Treated Right. alec's first memorial very pointedly capturing the essence of him, particularly the tragedy of his life that everyone else missed, placed where people can't Not look at it, alec's second memorial being faithfully rendered dolls (my doll imagery boy ♥) she insists on people taking care of, her being very vehement about people not disrespecting or misunderstanding taylor's memory, etc. would love to come up with what she does for brian in secret good worm where wildbow doesn't shit the bed everywhere but i haven't thought of anything yet unfortunately. well. i am leaning towards the previously stated memorial leather jacket & hairstyle + her just like. perpetually loudly insisting that he was The Specialest Best Big Brother Ever if anyone ever speaks critically about him. not because he wasn't flawed but as sort of a "fuck you you WILL appreciate how hard he tried only I get to be mean to brian." i digress it's very Augh Ough how she insists on making sure that what's happened to her, the misperception & obscurity she's afraid of, never happens to her loved ones. quite frankly one of the characters of all time ever. aisha laborn rectangular prism. this originally started as a post about why redditors are wrong about shipping aisha and alec but then i started thinking other things so now it is not about that.

[spoilerqueen]

KUNG FU PANDA X WUXIA

K guys, have an idea here and i need some feedback if you know anything about wuxia, Xianxia or just a single danmei, y'know how Kung fu panda is actually based completely on not only Chinese culture but heavily inspired by the wuxia genre as well? You can even see the resemblance on some things, the qi being just like spiritual energy than CAN be stolen, like what happened with kai on KFP 3, the wuxi finger is basically a forced qi deviation, the power that you can cultivate by training, the way that oogway literally ascended to a heavenly realm as a god after years of cultivating spiritual energy, like we only needed Po to bleed from his mouth and we have literally everything for it to be an actual wuxia/xianxia story, so i was thinking, why not make a fan comic of the story of the movies as an actual wuxia/xianxia with human characters and a bit more blood and exaggeration????

You may be thinking "why tf would you want to do that with a kids movie" or even just "why?"

And my answers are: because i love Chinese fantasy and kung fu panda so i want to combine them further, and for the second question i would like to say that just because i want to...but that's not the case my fellow internet people... It is because the human versions of the furious five that i always come across on Pinterest i hate with a passion 🕴🏻

Not to say anything bad about the artists skills or to bash their designs at all, but i would love it if people weren't so forgetful about the fact the furious five are you know... Chinese I feel like people isn't taking advantage of that culture at all

And not only Chinese, we're talking about historical periods of old china were no one was allowed to cut their hair or show skin below the neck

Like why would po wear a tiny shirt? Why would po be bald? Why would monkey be black? (It kinda rubs me the wrong way how some people make specifically monkey the only dark skinned character i think it reads racist ngl 🤨) Why would tigress have a pixie cut? Why would viper show so much skin when she's the daughter of a respectable warrior and would basically be very close to being a princess? Like- things like that are completely fine, nothing wrong to the vision they have on the characters, but to the neurodivergent hyperfixating me, the fact that no one overanalizes anything about this kids movie about a panda eating dumplings is outrageous, it's not them, it's me 😔✊🏻

SO

I've spent a few months organizing ideas on how i believe a more wuxia/Xianxia design of the characters would look like

I've been trying to keep the design closer to the animals they supposedly are but it's kinda hard (◎_◎;)

For Po i keept his body shape and decided a bun or any kind of high hairstyle would be ideal for him since he was a cook and still cooks a lot, a ponytail or half up hairstyle would get on his way a lot. I decided to give him vitiligo to mimic the panda spots on his original design, crashing his weight, height and skin to add the unique factor that was present on the movie by him being the only panda on the valley, He's the only one I've actually drawn yet but it is still in development

For tigress or however tf you spell it, English isn't my first language. I decided to go for a sharp and serious look

To keep it simple, I'll be giving her a light brown shade of hair, i want to avoid giving them vibrant hair colors but still having some nods to their color pallets on the movies, giving her an almost reddish light brown hair and mostly red and orange robes with black accents and accessories as well keeping her original outfit with a few changes. I wanted to give her a ponytail since i don't feel like she'd put all of her hair up; and instead of claws, she will have a variety of knives at her disposal for battle

Next, for viper, my favorite gal

I wanted to make her look significantly more elegant and younger that the rest of the five since, like i said, she is from a prestigious family, i wanted to accentuate how pampered a girl from a good family could look, i also decided to keep her ribbon dance plot, the only reason to why i gave her arms, since i love the idea of her fighting with her legs but that ribbon dance so i decided to give her congenital hand differences as her disability, turning the "her family uses fangs to attack and she was born without them" to "her family uses pressure points to attack and she was born with mostly dysfunctional fingers", this way she would still be considered an exceptional warrior with ribbons that she can control with her wrists and arms. I also want to give her a really really dark forest green colored hair :D

M O N K E Y

For monkey i wanted to go for a little more adult vibe as well as for mantis; i wanted to give him some scruffiness since he started out as a prankster until oogway found him...yeah that family friendly story isn't going to work, let's face it, monkey was living in the streets stealing what he could for fun, my man was a criminal and homeless, he wasn't a good person and even po said so while telling his story to the kids, so, I gave him a style that would resemble someone who once was carefree and from a low social position that still doesn't care much about material things, but cares enough to not disappoint or dishonor his masters. I will be giving him a more yellow and light brown wardrobe to resemble his colors on the movie and as for attack, he'll use a long cane like he sometimes does in the canon

Now for crane (≧∇≦)/

Crane is very simple to imagine as a human so there's not much i can say about his design other than the fans, i decided to give him a pair of fans as weapons, using them to cut down enemies as if they were blades and also to give him the stability to fly, since i won't take away his ability to fly as it is something common on wuxia and or xianxia stories, i like to think he is the only one who trained this flying technique by watching real disciples on temples he'd clean, but still needs his fans for stability and to be able to carry and support the weight of multiple people hanging onto him

LASTLY ~mantis~

The mature vibes~ i wanted to keep him looking a bit more like a warrior since that was his job before training under shifu's roof, he had a reputation and prestige, so i thought he might look a bit more professional; I'll also give him green robes but i haven't decided if he'd use a weapon or not 🤔 I'm also keeping him a short king

So, what do you guys think? Should i go more bold with the designs? Have any feedback or opinions? Because I'd love to hear it! (≧∇≦)/

I'm prepared for this post to flop so bad omg

[mj-ackerman]

SxF Light Novel: Family Portrait Translation Mission 4: Portrait of the Forger Family!? (Part 2)

<<PART 1 . . . PART 3>>. DO NOT REPOST

A few minutes later, Yor returned with a voice saying,

“Sorry to keep you waiting.”

The sound of her voice was completely her usual tone. Relieved, Loid said, 

“That was quick, Yor..Yoooor?”

He was supposed to greet Yor with a gentle smile…but he unintentionally let out a loud yelp.

This is all because Yor’s glossy black hair had all turned into bangs and was covering her face. Not only that, her hair from the chin down was wrapped around her neck like a scarf.

“I-Is there something wrong, Loid?”

Perhaps because her vision was blocked, Yor leaned forward with her hands outstretched in front of her and she slowly approached him. 

“AHHHH!! A GHOST!!”

“B-B-B-BORF!”

Anya cried out in fear, and Bond curled up his tails and shivered. The ghost herself was worried about the girl’s and the animal’s situation.

“Eh? Th-There’s a ghost? A-Are you two okay, Anya, Bond?”

How about you, Yor? Are you okay!?

Loid, who was holding back the feeling of wanting to say that, calmly asked Yor,

“Um, Yor. What did you do with your hair?”

“Eh? No, um..th-this is a recently trendy hairstyle that Camilla told me about. Since we’re here, I thought I’d give it a try.”

“That's a trendy hairstyle?”

“Y-Yes!”

Although it was slightly stumped, Yor responded firmly. 

“I was thinking that if I’m gonna be drawn, why not with the latest hairstyle, but um, does it look weird?”

“.....Uh….I won’t exactly say I didn’t like it..”

Loid was loss for words.

Needless to say, it was weird. However, if Yor truly thinks this hairstyle is good, even though it’s really improbable, it might hurt her feelings if he says otherwise. 

Just as I thought, using the toilet was just an excuse to avoid having your face painted, right? Or, did you really think that hairstyle was trendy? 

Loid stared at his wife, who had turned into a ghost with bangs, in an attempt to discern her true intentions. 

Ugh….I don’t know which is which. 

Amidst the indescribable tension running through the peaceful corner of the park, Felix said in a flat voice, 

“Um, I think that hairstyle is innovative and good, but the overall color will make it look darker, so I think the old hairstyle is better.”

After telling her so, and without worrying Loid any further, Yor restored her hair to its original state. 

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

“That was a pity, wasn’t it, Yor?”

“.....Y-Yes.”

Yor, who had returned to her normal hairstyle at the painter’s request, was clearly dejected. She was still as pale as ever. 

As instructed by Felix, the three of them sat on the picnic sheet, and Bond was sleeping comfortably on the lawn beside them.

“I want it to have a natural look, so you guys should talk and do things normally. It’s perfectly fine to move around a little.”

Saying that, Felix ran his pencil across the canvas. 

“I’m hungry.”

At that, Anya picked up a sandwich and began to eat it. 

Isn’t that a bit too liberal? 

Loid thought, but the fact that Felix didn’t say anything, he guessed it must be fine. 

Yor sneezed again from the completely cold wind. Looking at her shivering, it must have been cold in her thin sleeveless shirt. 

“I think you should really put on a jacket, Yor. It’s getting very cold after all.”

Loid handed over the front-button knitted hoodie that he had taken off earlier to Yor.

“You don’t want to catch a cold, do you?”

“Ah, yes…..thank you.”

Yor took it and suddenly squinted her eyes. Immediately after that, she put the hoodie on backwards and covered her entire face with the hood. 

Eh….?

Loid flinched at Yor, who was sitting there, unperturbed. 

“Y-Yor?”

“Yes, Loid? It’s very warm here.”

Every time Yor spoke, the knitted fabric around the mouth part wriggled. 

“The wind is certainly getting colder.”

“........”

Anya, who had stopped eating her sandwich, stared at the bizarre figure in silence as she swallowed hard. Felix didn’t say anything, perhaps because he was too focused on his drawing that he didn’t notice Yor’s eccentricities. 

Reluctantly, Loid hid his inner turmoil and pointed out, “The front and back are reversed, you know,” to which Yor replied, “.......I’m sorry, I carelessly put it on.”.

Yor regretfully took off the hoodie, and after putting it back normally, her head drooped again. 

At that moment, a strong wind blew. The edge of the sheet flew in the air and made a flapping sound. At that, Anya yelped. 

“A dust went to my eyes!”

“Don’t rub it, Anya. It’ll only hurt your eyes.”

Yor hastily stopped Anya from rubbing her eyelids with her fingers. 

“Gently open your eyes, look up and try to blink them away.”

Anya, who had been blinking repeatedly as Yor told her to do so, burst into a smile. 

“It’s gone!”

“That’s good to hear.”

Yor turned away, relieved. Then, as if suddenly realizing something, she fell silent. 

She then thought, “.......come to think of it, in the magazine that featured make-up on it which Millie showed me before also said that the eyes make the biggest impression…” she mumbled something in a whisper. 

Her face was extremely serious and there was even a devilish force to it.

“Papa, Mama looks weird.”

Anya quietly whispered. 

“She even became a park ghost earlier.”

As Loid tried to turn away, Yor suddenly exclaimed, 

“AH! The strong wind! I got dust in my eyes too!”

When she said that with a terribly stiff delivery, she squeezed her eyes tightly. And if you're wondering, the wind wasn’t blowing as if it were. 

“This is bad….I can’t seem to open my eyes until around the time we get back home.”

“...........”

Anya’s face became like that of a Noh mask. Loid’s face was starting to look the same too, but he couldn’t leave it as it is. 

“Erm….are you okay, Yor?”

He said this softly as he leaned towards Yor, who was sitting across from him. 

“Let me see it please.”

When he touched her slender chin and looked into her face, Yor, who shivered, opened her eyes in surprise. 

“Ah…waaah”

“Does it hurt?”

“Ah, i-i-it’s not hurt….ing.”

“Please stay still.”

Loid whispered, and when he brought her face closer to him, Yor screamed, 

“EEEEEEEEEK!!!”

“Eh!?”

She pushed Loid’s upper body away with all her might. Loid landed on the lawn a few meters away from the picnic sheet, and was greeted with applause by the people nearby, while Felix gently chided in saying, 

“I think that was a little bit too much of a movement there.”

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

(Note: It's kind of the same as what happened in chapter 35, the difference is that she pushed him and Loid was genuinely worried about her weird behavior 😄)

[rotomartsblog]

I went back and looked at my Chang Triplets redesigns from like nearly two years ago. So here’s just some comments on what I got wrong (most of it) and what I got right (very little honesty), also my opinions on Louder and Prouder’s designs in general

Debbie

Appearance-wise, the closest I got was with Debbie, which isn’t really saying much but still. I predicted her being the sister to keep her hair tied, though I gave her a braid. I did predict her having shadows under her eyes, which was a strange surprise. From what little we’ve seen of Debbie she seems to be more introverted, which I did also predict, but I made Debbie more skittish and not as gloomy. The outfits aren’t similar at all but at least Debbie still wears warm colours.

Julie

The only thing I got right with Julie’s appearance is her having her hair down. I did predict her being into soccer though! Personality-wise, from what we’ve seen, Julie isn’t as energetic as I portrayed her, and is still into her academics which honestly I wasn’t expecting them to keep that trait for any of them lmao. I think out of all their designs Julie’s caught me off guard the most since, aesthetically, it’s the most different from the original. I mean all of them are widely different but Julie is the most drastic change in my opinion.

Billy

I got NOTHING with Billy lmao. Unless you want to say I kinda got the hairstyle right, just messier, but it’s a stretch. Side note, looking at their new designs again I noticed that the Chang Triplets still have their bigger front teeth, it’s just not as noticeable since it wasn’t over-exaggerated. Back to Billy, I also got nothing of his personality right. We’ve seen Billy the most and he seems to just be a chill guy, nothing like the angry punk rocker that I made.

General Opinion

Honestly, I kinda wish that the Chang Triplets new outfits looked like their original ones. This is just a general complaint about the reboot but the designs for returning characters either look exactly like their original ones or just entirely new characters, and I feel like it would be better if the show was able to find a better middle ground. I mean seeing Penny, who basically has the same outfit, next to Michael, who looks completely different, is a bit jarring. With the Changs, I think if they’d just kept their previous associated colours it would have been better. Debbie is the closest since she still has a reddish outfit but it isn’t the same. At least with the other two Billy has blue accessories, there isn’t anything green in Julie’s design!

The reason for this post

Anyway, this whole thread was just to say I’m turning my redesigns into OCs because I still like these designs a lot. I’ll just have to alter their colour palettes slightly and give them new names. Any suggestions on what to change is welcome if you want to give it.

[tacosrobot]

Meet the gang! Or don't, I guess.

Actual character bios under the cut!

RUSTY JACOBS

Full Name: Russell Jacobs

Nickname: Rusty

Birthday/Age: 24 – 5th of April

Place of birth: Somewhere in Colorado

Place of Residence: Somewhere out in the middle of nowhere

Education Level: Highschool graduate but barely

Occupation: Vampire Hunter (self-appointed)

Pets: n/a

Appearance: 

Height: 5’9

Eye colour: Green 

Glasses/Contacts: N/A 

Prominent features: Freckles, lots of freckles.

Distinguishing Marks/Scars: There’s a thin scar running down the back of his right shoulder to his elbow. He has a few tattoos, too. They’re mostly around his shoulders and on his arms, he has no tattoos on his back but has tattoos on his chest and waist. They vary in nature but he holds the record in his friend group as ‘Guy With the Most Spider Tattoos’, he has three.

Hairstyle/Colour: He has ginger hair, cut by himself, of course, is choppy and layered. It reaches just below shoulder length and was once styled into a very fashionable mullet.

Style of clothing: He’ll wear anything he can get his hands on. He doesn’t care about conforming to any sort of gender norms and thinks fashion is a great way to express himself. He always has paint-covered yellow boots on.

Other: He has two nose piercings, a septum piercing and a bridge piercing. He almost got a tongue piercing but he chickened out and got another tattoo instead.

Personality:

Optimist or pessimist: Optimist

Introverted or extroverted: Extroverted

Conflict Avoider or Seeker: Conflict seeker

Personality description: Upon first meeting Rusty, people usually sum him up in one word: ‘irritating’. Once you get to know him a little better, however, you soon learn that it’s not entirely true. Rusty can be annoying, don’t get me wrong, but he can also be considerate and caring when he needs to be. He may give off the vibe that the whole world revolves around him yet outside of trying to be the centre of attention, he’s a gentle guy with a somewhat gentle soul.

Traits and interests:

Strongest trait: Individualistic

Weakest trait: Arrogant

Habits: He cracks his knuckles, or just his fingers in general. Sometimes this extends to his neck too.

Hobbies: 

Photography

Scrapbooking

Painting

Favourites:

Favourite colour: Pink

Favourite music: Electro-pop or anything with synths

Favourite Food: Greasy foods of any sort.

Favourite Literature: Interview with the Vampire by Anne Rice, but literally anything to do with Vampires. He thinks that it’ll give him some sort of advantage over the vampires.

Goal: To get back to Colorado.

Motivation: Seeing his younger sister again.

Relationships:

Parent(s): Hank Jacobs, May Jacobs (deceased)

Sibling(s): Mildred ‘Millie’ Jacobs (younger sister)

Best friend: Janey Brinkley

Other friend(s): Emeric Moore (belongs to @viaterra) Donovan V. (belongs to @ross-stories)

Partner: N/A (his last girlfriend died)

Enemies: WILMER KRAUS. WILMER KRAUS IF YOU’RE OUT THERE.

RODDY FAREBROTHER

Full Name: Toddman Farebrother

Nickname: Todd, Roddy (he calls himself that)

Birthday/Age: 19 – 12th of November

Place of birth: Wothead.

Place of Residence: Wothead.

Education Level: Got expelled in year nine

Occupation: Stay-at-home nuisance.

Pets: a hamster named Cricket

Appearance: 

Height: 5’6

Eye colour: Brown 

Glasses/Contacts: N/A 

Prominent features: A significant number of freckles, primarily on his face. He also has a tooth gap; he’s missing his second tooth on the left.

Distinguishing Marks/Scars: N/A

Hairstyle/Colour: Roddy takes good care of his hair, despite how it may look. It’s short, layered and very messy. At some point, he decided to dye it redder than it was originally then settled on some weird shade of pink.

Style of clothing: Anything he can put a worn-down brown leather jacket over. This can vary from shirts to vests and even (albeit very rarely) jumpers. Trousers are often a second thought. He’ll put on whatever’s clean.

Other: He went through a phase of wearing fingerless gloves, no one knows why he did this. It didn’t even look that cool.

Personality:

Optimist or pessimist: Pessimist

Introverted or extroverted: Ambivert

Conflict Avoider or Seeker: Conflict seeker

Personality description: Roddy has a problem with any kind of authority. Friends, family, the police; he doesn’t care because he knows he’s in the right every time. There are exceptions to this rule, he respects his sister and like one other person, plus his hamster, but that’s it.

Traits and interests:

Strongest trait: Independent

Weakest trait: Abrasive

Habits: He has no idea what he’s supposed to do with his hands so he often picks things up to play with. Also scratches his left cheek regularly.

Hobbies: 

Sports, including but not limited to football, cricket and tennis

Cycling

Nature walks

Favourites:

Favourite colour: Red

Favourite music: Whatever the Clash and The Ramones have going on?

Favourite Food: Sausage sandwich with brown sauce and a sprinkle of salt

Favourite Literature: He doesn’t tend to read much, but The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle has a very special place in his heart.

Goal: Play football professionally.

Motivation: Making money.

Relationships:

Parent(s): Phillip Farebrother (deceased), Catherine Farebrother (absent)

Sibling(s): Patricia Farebrother (older sister)

Best friend: ‘Harry’ Hamilton

Other friend(s): That’s literally it. You could be his friend if you wanted but I don’t recommend it.

Partner: N/A

Enemies: Kenneth.

THE CROW

Full Name: Hayden Hayes

Alias: The Crow

Birthday/Age: 24 – 7th of March

Place of birth: London

Place of Residence: Still London, it’s a small world, ok?

Education Level: University Graduate. He got a degree in some sort of science. He doesn’t remember

Occupation: Museum security guard

Pets: n/a

Appearance: 

Height: 5’6

Eye colour: Blue 

Glasses/Contacts: N/A 

Prominent features: His hair is pretty prominent

Distinguishing Marks/Scars: Nothing overly distinguishing about any of him if you look past the fact he’s a vigilante crime fighter.

Hairstyle/Colour: It’s short, black and really messy. It fans out at the sides and cannot be tamed, so don’t bother trying.

Style of clothing: Ignoring his big crow-inspired get-up, Hayden primarily wears whatever’s on sale. He tends to lean towards black clothes, though and has had the same coat for almost five years.

Other: He always, always, always carries a tie with him? For some reason? He calls it his ‘emergency tie’.

Personality:

Optimist or pessimist: Optimist

Introverted or extroverted: Introverted

Conflict Avoider or Seeker: Conflict seeker

Personality description: To be honest, Hayden is kind of mixed up. He doesn't know if he wants to be the goofy comic relief hero or if he wants to be the stoic brooding type. He's street smart but not smart smart. He knows what he wants but he doesn't know how to get it sort of thing. He’s still figuring it out.

Traits and interests:

Strongest trait: Humorous

Weakest trait: Muddle-headed

Habits: Will cut you off while you’re talking. He’s not doing it on purpose he just a little bad at conversations.

Hobbies: 

Reading, he’s a big fan of non-fiction but will sometimes read fiction, too.

Calligraphy

Watching documentaries

Favourites:

Favourite colour: Yellow

Favourite music: Early 2000s dance music

Favourite Food: Crème Brulee

Favourite Literature: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

Goal: Stop the stupid idiot guys running this weird underground network of illegal stuff.

Motivation: Keeping his family safe.

Relationships:

Parent(s): Keith Ashbee (step-father), Polly Hayes

Sibling(s): Dylan Hayes (younger brother)

Best friend: ???

Other friend(s): He goes out with his co-workers a lot; I suppose they count.

Partner: N/A

Enemies: Those freaky little guys in suits who are doing weird illegal stuff under London.

[stormblessed95]

Heya Stormy! (Hope it's okay to call you like that😅)

This is my first ask on Tumblr, so I hope i'm not doing anything wrong, i'm understandable (english isn't my first language, unfortunately) and i'm not breaking any of your rules.

First of all, I really want to tell you that I really appreciate your blog and love how you always support everything with comparisons from your own life (or others) and how you provide us with original content and support us to see them and form our own opinions. 💜

I'd love to ask you some questions and get your thoughts about it. I hope you haven't answered them before and I just missed it (otherwise please link them again!). And I'm hard at work going through your masterlist and your other posts (that's really a lot, respect! And I'm probably still counting as a Baby Army (October 2021) and young Jikook supporter, so it'll take me a while to get through). So...

1. Who do you think is on Jimin's lock screen during the Sunshine-line Wlive in Busan? It looks like the pics from the Vminkook outing in LA so maybe Jimin, Tae or JK? Do you think Jimin would take himself as lock screen? And I heard that Hobi might have been there too, or am I just mixing it up? As far as I know there aren't any pictures of him...

2. I would like to hear your thoughts about the timeline while they were in Busan and about the Taekook beach debate. Simply because I am confused by the different statements and times and your posts and replies often help me to understand. Also, you often point out things or views that I would have missed. And I just enjoy your thought processes and your writing. So first I heard that there were rumors that JK and Tae arrived early (on 13.10?) and that they were on the Busan beach at night (around 3 o’clock?) with staff and there is a video of them (please JK, if you were there with Tae, please show us the pictures, they must be mega cute!🥺🥰) and that they shared a hotel room. And that Koo was in Busan at the time of the video recording for Jimin's birthday. For that another question: do you think Jimin and Jungkook didn't sleep with their parents to protect them or because it was too far away or something? Or maybe there are guidelines from Hybe that all their idols have to share the same hotel for logistics and security reasons? When do you think JK and Jimin visited their parents, the 13th or the 14th? And Tae was out to dinner with his parents and his friend Seo-Joon on the 15th (I'm so happy for him that they were there and he got to spend time with them) and Hobi was also out once (?). Did I miss something?

I recently stumbled across the Jikook timeline by jiminieloved and was extremely pleased with the great sorting and lots of content that was unfamiliar to me. Since Tumblr confuses me and I don't really know who you know and who you don't, I thought I'd mention it. If you know and can recommend other great in-depth Jikook or OT7 blogs I would be very happy. Same goes for non-shipper (but also Jikook or other pairings) translators who gives background on language, expression and culture. And since you responded to a Taekook account the other day (thetaekookcloset), I took a look at that one and liked it. While I don't agree with her/his/their (?) opinion, blogs like this still give me a different perspective, which I think is important and interesting. Plus they often have cute new gifs and pictures. If you know any good blogs about other pairings I'd really appreciate it too.

And now I stop rambling and apologize for this long question text and wish a good night (is it 1 o'clock for me)

P.S. the new pics from today and the dance practice video from Run... 😶😵‍💫🥺 they all look so great, I love Yoongi's hairstyle and Hobi's outfit and who destroyed Jimin's sweater? XD I just love them so much <3

Hi! Sorry it took me so long to answer this. I'll do my best. Lol as for your first question, who's Jimins photo background? I mean, people DO post themselves as their background, especially when at cool places and its a more artistic photo and not just a selfie all the time. Jimin even shared back in 2015 that his phone background was a photo of him and Yoongi together. SO I do personally think its himself at beach. Otherwise the possibilities are that it's either JK, Tae or Hobi. Hobi DID go to beach. There is some speculation on if he was there with the maknae line or by himself at an earlier time, but they all posted photos there and were all 4 there. Maknae line defintely there together, Hobi maybe (probably?) With them too. The 4 of them were all attached at the hip in LA and going on little dates all together the whole time. Lol it was so cute. And it's such a blurry blob from what we can see, it's hard to make any kind of reasonable guess lol

The 4 of them with their beach photos in LA (Hobi, Jimin, Jikook, Tae in order):

2) Busan Timeline! Lol not easy, and nothing is definitive honestly either. But we can try to piece it together in a way that makes sense. Honestly this just feels like the nicest phrased can you debunk tkkr rumors for me ask. Lol No, Tae and JK didn't show up to Busan early. They were in Rehersals with the rest of the members up until they all left for Busan at the same time. Jimin during his WLive stated that they had all just got done rehearsaling together before he went and started his birthday live. But let's timeline it.

October 12th

BTS members all together in rehearsals and practice and filmed the RUN BTS practice video. He was in the same outfit when Hobi caught him in the company building after filming said dance practice (above) and said he just wanted to wish him a happy birthday. Before assuming they went to get ready to travel to Busan.

Jimin then changed his clothes and started his Wlive at 11:49 PM on the 12th. His Wlive ended around 1 AM on the 13th KST time. Link to the live below too

October 13

Jimin ends his live (above) around 1 am and then at some point, presumably all 7 members and their staff get ready to go. They all leave for Busan after this Wlive and then get settled into their hotel. We know they all left then too and not early becayse not only do we see footage of them all there at Hybe on the 12th and not in Busan on the 10th... but they also told us during rhe after concert Wlive that they all came down 2 days before the concert on Jimins bday.

It only takes an hour to fly from Seoul to Busan, it only takes 4 hours to drive. If they left after 1 am, that gave them all plently of time to get into their hotel, settle in, and go to sleep before waking up to rehearse for the concert. Jungkook probably filmed his birthday video for Jimin after getting settled in/before going to sleep right before 5am KST. Almost 5 hours of time between the 2 events (JMs live ending and JK posting) is more than enough time for them to travel there and get settled into their rooms.

They probably rested and then all went to rehearsals later that evening where again, they were all together. Hobi posted again a HBD to Jimin with a video of him FROM rehearsals and Jin posted with him a photo they took after rehearsals

October 14

They spent the next day in rehearsals and practice and setting things up for the concert, that would be the 14th. Jimin and JK probably went to see their parents either on the 13th or 14th to see their families while in town and celebrate Jimins birthday. Sometime when they weren't in rehearsals for odd hours. And as for your side question over why they didn't sleep at their family homes, probably because they were keeping odd practice hours and it was easier and made more sense to stay in the hotel with the rest of their team and all their staff.

October 15

They have their concert! Lol the concert started at 6 PM and ended around 830 PM. Give them some more time to get cleaned up a bit back stage, gather their stuff, leave, get back to the hotel and get resettled in too. And then vhopeminkook do an after concert Wlive for us for just 20 minutes. My Post over that live here. It gets reiterated that they had just all gotten to Busan on the 13th and everything else discussed in the vlive, I basically include in my post linked. JK also mentions having not really gone out to do anything yet while they were there. I'm assuming jikook don't count visiting their family as going to do something. Lol Tae also doesn't eat much of the Ramen snacks, Jikook eat most it. Lol Weverse live link below.

After the Wlive, Tae goes out to dinner with hus family and Hyungshik, his friend from Wooga Squad who all had come to the concert, as well as his manager too. This has been confirmed both by the many fans who saw them there and the restaurant themselves. No other members were there at this dinner.

After the restaurant Tae went to the beach and posted photos to his Instagram that he took while he was out there. Apparently the beach was Haeundae Beach and is quite close to the restaurant that he ate at with his family. So to me, personally, I think it would make more sense to guess that the people at the beach with him were the same people at the restaurant with him. Hyungshik, his manager, maybe a bodygaurd or 2, and maybe his parents too if they decided to come along. Honestly, that just makes more sense to me.

People said it was Jungkook as fact because they claimed the shoe print was birkenstock slipper print of the shoes that JK wore. And that the other shadow who wasn't Tae was wearing a bucket hat and that JK wears bucket hats. (Like no one else owns those shoes, or could make a similar shoe print or wears bucket hats) And someone claimed to have seen them there and posted "proof" which was just a super grainy pixels of what only honestly looked like one person. And for all we know, wasn't even Tae alone but a stranger. Plus that same person was caught lying about other "photo evidence" they had of posting what else they had done that day. Stealing a different armys photo of the line at Magnate. They also proved to be a lowkey sasaeng taking JKs photo after an event where fans werent supposed to really be and posting photos of random motorcycles trying to pass it off as Jungkooks. So clearly their credibility is trash. The evidence just isn't there as proof. And honestly, if JK was there, I'm pretty sure Tae just would've posted him. BUT there also isn't any evidence that JK WASNT there. So it could've been them. Tae could've wanted to go to beach, called up the members and asked if anyone else wanted to go and JK said yes and Taes family all went back to their own hotel instead. So who knows. Passing anything off as fact here is silly. It's likely that it wasn't JK, but it can't be proven one way or the other. Trying to do so is ridiculous.

They claimed Taekook to be sharing a hotel room early (they weren't there early so moot point) or through the rest of their trip because Tae posted the photo above on insta as well in his hotel room bathroom mirror. People found the hotel they were staying at (weirdos) and "proved" taekook were sharing rooms based on how the rooms had the same wall and headboard patterns (they used JKs bday video to Jimin as proof to show his hotel room walls/headboard) and that the bathrobe is the same too (robe you can see is blue/white in the corner of Taes pic).... like hotels don't have a common theme of "things" like walls, headboards, beds, sheets, robes, towels, etc. Lol so again, it's just kind of silly and doesn't make any sense. I'm pretty sure at this point all the members are getting their own rooms as Hybe rents out an entire floor of a hotel for BTS and their staff members when they go places for concerts. Both for comfort and for safety as this is something they can now afford to do. Lol but again, no proof none of the members decided on a hotel room sleepover in any variation. But the "facts" are facts or proof of anything in either direction.

And I think that covers the timeline of the moments you were asking about? Hope that helps some! Thank you for the ask 💜 People fighting about the beach thing was so dumb honestly too. Nobody likes a liar but the weird instance that taekook would never was also so dumb. They are friends who like the beach?? Lol but yeah, the evidence was lacking and it's a weird thing to get so wrapped up in regardless. People need to practice some deep breathing exercises lol If you have more questions or I missed something in this ask, please feel free to come by and ask again!

[bihansthot]

hey😊👋 i see you're an enthusiastic bihan fan like me😍💙 i wanna know your favorite options about him and what you think is canon?

him being originally Asian / Caucasian or white ?

cryomancers originate from edenia so...?

his eye color? blue or brown?

him having short spikey hair (like in my fanart i tagged u) or mk1 hairstyle?

thanks a lot bc i care about ur answers 💙❄️

stay cold😵💙❄️

Enthusiastic is one way to put it! Clinically obsessed is another lol 😂

So with his ethnicity I have always assume he was Chinese, fully Chinese. To me Mama Zero has always been Chinese American because if you look at Kuai Liang’s MK2 win screen he doesn’t look biracial.

Bi-Han in MK1 doesn’t look biracial either:

And although Tony Chung is an American, (Kuai Liang’s face model) he isn’t biracial either as far as I know, I believe his parents are Taiwanese.

That and the iconic song “Chinese Ninja Warrior” always led me to believe that the Sub-Zero Bros are Chinese. They don’t start appearing to potentially be biracial until John Turk becomes the model for Kuai Liang on MK3/UMK3/Trilogy and for Bi-Han in my beloved MKM: SZ but I always assumed they used John Turk for his physique and not his appearance. In the Midway timeline their Mother is an American but like I said I believe she is Chinese American, I guess it’s open to debate though and unless Papa Tobias ever clears it up we’ll never know for sure. Please note I am not saying there is anything wrong with them being biracial, that’s not what I’m getting at in the least I’m just giving my opinion based off of their appearance and the storyline we’ve been given. If they are biracial I feel like they are like Korean Chinese or Japanese Chinese or something like that, not Caucasian Chinese. That’s just my thought though, again there is nothing wrong with them being biracial I just don’t think they are.

Cryomancers being from Edenia is a pretty new concept and we’re not introduced to that until Kuai Liang’s intro with Sindel. It makes sense though as to where their powers come from but that still doesn’t change Bi-Han being Chinese to me, he’s just half Edenian, half Chinese now but as we’ve seen throughout the games Edenians come in all flavors so Asiatic Edenians aren’t out of the realm of possibilities Mileena and Kitana have had Asian face models for a while now if I’m not mistaken. We don’t know Bi-Han’s yet but Tony Chung being Kuai Liang really solidifies their characteristics for me and I’m curious to see if they’re part Edenian in MK1.

Eye color!! Arrgh! The bane of my existence, just kidding. Bi-Han’s eye color is inconsistent at best, I have statues where they’re blue but in MK1 they look brown? My classic Sub-Zero pop funko has black eyes where both movie funkos have blue eyes. I feel like it’s something Midway/NRS can’t make up their mind about. Even Joe Taslim’s eyes change in the movie, at the beginning they’re brown but at the end they’re blue.

Personally I favor my head canon of both are the case! When Bi-Han is calm and relaxed his eyes are brown but when he’s agitated or aggressive or horny they’re blue.

Hair style, I will die on my hill he has an undercut, I don’t care that he has a man bun in MK1 he has an undercut god damn it! You hear me Boon?! An UNDERCUT. You can keep the bun and just make it a top knot kinda deal. I personally like him with short hair best because growing up both of my older brothers had stringy unappealing looking super long hair and I am about as unattracted to my brothers as you can get lol so I always associate long hair with them. I am definitely warming up to him having longer hair but to me it’s not longer than his shoulders. I’m having a moment with it ok?

Hopefully that covered everything lovely! Thanks for the ask!

[bthump]

saw this comment on Reddit about the latest chapter and thought it was interesting:

“The shot of Rickert kneeling down over Guts lying face down on his stomach saying “Guts, is that really you?” parallels the scene of Guts finding Griffith in the dungeon, also lying face down. Just swap the names and they essentially say the same thing.

Personally, I do think the behelit will activate for Guts sometime before the story is over. Or at the very least, it will start reacting, seeming like it wants to activate.

Thematically, I just can’t see it belonging to anyone else. It’s our Chekhov’s gun.

I see only one of two things happening:

The behelit activates for Guts, and obviously he will refuse.

Or

He finds a way to infuse it into the dragonslayer to make it have the same potential as SK’s sword of actuation.

I’m leaning towards the former.

Though, there is one more possibility that I’m just now starting to consider: that the behelit belong’s to Rickert.

It seems like Rickert might become a major player for the final act. I think they might be building him up to be Griffith’s true foil. He evens looks a lot like a young Griffith with his new hairstyle. I’ve always felt like Rickert is the story’s moral center. He might not have directly suffered as much as Guts and Casca, but he still lost all of his friends — all of his family — and was betrayed by the man he once looked up to above all others. However, unlike Guts, instead of running off to seek revenge, or spiraling out into self-destructiveness, he faced the pain of his losses, honored the memories of his fallen friends, and turned his focus towards those precious few he had left in his life. The kid has been through a fucking lot, but he hasn’t let his pain harden his heart or crush his soul. Now, just like Griffith, he went from being a total nobody to an incredible leader at a very young age. But unlike Griffith, his reasons are not vain, selfish ones.”

Obviously there are elements in the comment that I know you will disagree with like the Griffith being selfish and the part where they say guts would never sacrifice. but I think the thing about the parallel with Griffith and also the stuff about Rickert is a thing I haven’t seen people consider yet. Sorry if you don’t like other peoples comments being posted here, I know you don’t like what happened with the metas but my intention isn’t to criticise this comment I just found it interesting and I kept them anonymous

Yeah no, I personally don't see anything wrong with discussing comments made publically, and yeah nothing about your vibe comes across as malicious or anything. I don't want to encourage these kinds of asks because they obviously do bother some people, but I'm not gonna turn them down either unless I get bad faith vibes from the asker, or whoever originally posted it makes it clear they don't want others discussing their takes.

So yeah my thoughts on the subject:

Basically I see their point about Rickert being the moral centre of Berserk - idk if he's a prominent enough character for me to describe him that way, but he's definitely meant to be a foil to Guts in how he handles the Eclipse and losing all his friends, and to illustrate a much healthier method of coping, forging new relationships and goals.

I think it's a stretch to suggest he's meant to be a foil to Griffith, a better version of Griffith in any sense. Like there's no indication that he's leading the troops here first of all, he's just one of them. I wouldn't describe him as a leader, certainly not without further information.

And I doubt the behelit is Rickert's, for the same reason I doubt it's anyone's except Casca's, possibly Guts', or mmmmaybe Serpico's: there's no foreshadowing of a despair condition or sacrifice material. It's possible Miura was just gonna cram it all in at the end, like surprise! lol, but idk, that feels cheap to me. It'd be disappointing if so, imo.

Also I do think there are Griffith in the dungeon parallels right now with Guts falling apart lol, so maybe that's purposeful? But I think Guts' despair is more likely to lead to the armour taking over than the behelit opening. Mainly because Guts doesn't need two separate ways to give in to his inner darkness lol, and now that he has the armour the behelit is both redundant and probably too permanent for a protagonist. The armour is perfect in that he can succumb and then be pulled back to himself after crossing a moral event horizon. The behelit is a little too conclusive whether he says no or yes to monsterism. Also the armour is just Guts' style. Passively make an agreement to become a monster? No, but lose his shit and start ripping people apart? Absolutely.

[fourseasonsfigs]

Catching Light

We've seen this scene in fig form before - in official fig form before, no less...but I think this is the cutest rendition yet!

There's just something about the way the fig maker modeled Wen Kexing - it's pretty spot on, isn't it? And the little bloody hand reaching up is just perfection.

Here of course is the inspiration for this scene - Episode 35. I took a screenshot and zoomed in on our two favorites here. Pretty spot on, if you ask me.

Episode 35 was something else, wasn't it?

It's very infrequent now that I get figs with box art, and this was so cute I decided to take a few unboxing-type pics.

I really love these type of boxes! I guess it's just as well I don't get them very often any more, since my stack of flattened boxes is teetering towards unmanageable proportions anyway, but I still wouldn't mind adding to the pile.

Me tearing into the boxes with gusto!

The innards. You can see here that the figs came with a rock to prop Lao Wen up on, and with a bonus of red and blue trashcans. These trashcans of course refer to Youku's viewer contest during airing, where some enterprising viewer recreated this scene with red and blue trashcans:

I still giggle whenever I see this picture!

All the goods, unwrapped!

...and the back of the goods. You can see how Lao Wen's hair is kind of curved out and up in the back - that's room to tuck the rock up under his hair to prop him up.

Alright, before we take a spin around the figs, I do want to add a few more screenshots of Lao Wen and A-Xu's faces during this scene, so you can see how close the figs are to the originals:

So great. I love these figs so much!

Ah, the iconic angle! As you can see here, Lao Wen is propped up by the included rock, and his hair just drapes over it. I just literally put the fig on, and he was steady and secure. No messing around with which side or anything, either way works. I could rotate him around pretty easily too with the rock - just pick up the whole thing and move him. I didn't bother gluing him down to the rock or even using museum putty or anything, since he hangs out on it just fine by himself.

A-Xu also stands up just fine...no issues here. This is a really well designed set of figs all the way around.

This is a good view of Lao Wen's hairpin in A-Xu's half bun hairstyle.

I love the detail of the very slight train in the back of A-Xu's beautiful blue robe. This is a nice angle to see some of the drape of Lao Wen's red robes from the back.

Another good angle to see how Lao Wen is resting on that rock. I was going to say, that can't be comfortable, but it's sure a lot more comfortable than say, a sword through the chest.

The faces on these two, I can't even!

This is a good angle to see the details of their robes, and a fantastic view of Lao Wen's golden guan. Please also note the smudge of dirt on the side of Lao Wen's mouth (to our right of his mouth, right past the smear of blood), that is definitely a detail in the original:

I'm just so pleased with these figs! I don't like to compare fan figs, but I am always happy to compare to the official ones:

(Speaking of, here's my blog post on this set if you want to read it)

I like the official ones too, don't get me wrong, but I will say this fan set has personality in spades. We also get all the beautiful leaf embroidery on the costumes on the fan set, which the official versions never have (still weird to me), and of course all the very accurate blood and dirt, especially on that tiny little reaching hand! I just love this set, I can't even tell you.

We saw the bottoms-up pictures earlier in this post, so here's the top-down angle. Speaking of cute hands, this is a great angle to see them both!

The fig cards are lovely - double sided, with the quote on the back, "there's light on you, I want to catch it and see".

Here we have the flattened boxes that you've seen before. THANK YOU fig maker for having their hands touch on the art. I love this set!

Material: PVC

Fig Count: 465

Scene Count: 31

Rating: Iconic!

[link back to Master Fig Index for more posts]

[nicepeach1965]

KR: Character Info: Shroom-Koopa Alliance

Sorry bout the wait! here it is!

Ex-Queen Peach Toadstool - Straight to the point, and somewhat jaded, Peach still has a bit of a haunty side..but she's been slowly working on it. She's trying to be 'nice' but...really it's just hard right now just give her a break. - The born heir to the throne of the Mushroom Kingdom, Peach grown up to well..the ideals the King and many of it's subjects had for her. Koopas bad, power is good, that's all she grew up with. Loving Mario...that was her greatest mistake, and that combined with all of the revolutions...kicked her off of her throne. And that's where our story begins. - Has no mastery over her given heart power, and at the beginning of this tale, can barely even use it. - why no of course she's not slowly having feelings for the nice turtle man whaaaaaaaaaaat - Appearance: Think of her casual wear from Super Mario Odyssey, expect a bit more grime and dirt on it, a knapsack at her side, and a knife hidden in her shirt pocket. Carries her parasol with her at almost all times.

Koopa King Bowser Koopa Sr. - For a guy feared and hated by many of the Shroomian inhabitants of the land and it's allies...he's really not a bad guy. He's just a single dad, trying to take care of his kids and his kingdom, and helping the former queen get back on her feet. What could go wrong? Certainly not love... - The King of the Koopas hatched from an egg shortly after the death of his father. Raised by his father's royal advisor, he was nurtured with love and taught to treat everyone kindly, because even the worst people have good inside of them. He took this to heart, and now teaches the same lessons to his own children. He applies this lesson daily, as he attempts to make peace with the tyrannical King Mario. - He still has a bit of a temper, but currently he has it more under control. Still wouldn't recommend pissing him off, however. - Appearance: Just think of regular Bowser, only with a blazing red cape trailing him, and the swooped hairstyle he had in Super Mario Odyssey. (Idea by Loog/Keeb, one of my co-writers!)

Royal Wizard Kamek - Kamek serves as the guardian of the Koopa Royalty, often assisting King Bowser or Prince Junior in all sorts of ways. While he may be occasionally fed up with nonsense coming from the royalty or the King's subjects, he does all he can to ensure the royalty's safety, as well as the kingdom's prosperity. - The royal assistant, wizard, and father figure to King Bowser. Kamek's role in the kingdom changed after the coup, becoming the main strategist and executioner in regards of movements against the Mushroom Tyranny. While he hides it pretty well, Kamek could not bear if anything happened to the Koopa Court. - Appearance: Kamek's outfit is hardly changed from his original form. However, in order to boost morale and keep a trustworthy appearance (plus to make himself look decent), he uses his magic to look younger than he actually is, managing to keep a straight posture and sporting short, black hair. (Idea by Co-writer, Marie)

Royal Servant Toadette - The only Toad that decided to travel alongside the former queen, it is..very unclear how she feels about it all, but she always seems to have a chipper attitude about her situation. - On the surface, Toadette seems as sweet as pie, very much loyal to her former Princess. However, beneath the surface, she's rather bitter, and if she's pushed to far, who knows how much longer she'll stay loyal... - "oh look at the little fella OH SHES KINDA A LIL FUCKED UP-" - Appearance: Just think of regular Toadette, only with a bit more of a tattered coat. Keeps a picaxe on her.

Prince Bowser Koopa Junior - Junior looks up to his father in every possible way. He tries his best to be kind to everything, though sometimes his immaturity can get in the way. All Junior wants in life is for the stupid Mushroom Kingdom to stop messing with his Papa so that they can all just relax. Junior is also very creative, and loves to draw. - Prince Junior was born roughly around the same time his seven siblings were adopted into the family. As such, he's had many role models in his life. His siblings taught him how to defend himself, Kamek taught him how to stay safe, he taught himself how to draw and paint, and Papa taught him to be kind to everyone. - Appearance: Junior is mostly the same, save for his bandana being swapped out for a red cape much like his father's (Idea by co-writer Loog/Keeb)

Aaaaand that's all for this post! Soon I'll post more about our villains, but of course, these fellas do have a lot of other allies, this post just- got a lil long. Haha. Enjoy~! 

[luna-loner]

🎃 A Happy Halloween With The Big Five 🎃

Gakushuu

Much to everyone's surprise, Gakushuu actually likes Halloween. Name a better occassion to show off his splendid sewing skills.

Him and Yukiko decide to dress up as a vampire couple.

They design the costumes by themselves. Gakushuu, being the perfectionist that he is, obsesses over the smallest of details! It is imperative his costume captures his elusiveness and charisma. He's gotta look stylish, too!

He even uses gel to smooth back his hair, giving himself the classic Dracula look. This is possibly the first time the Big Five have seen him in a different hairstyle. They know how paranoid he is about anything happening to his hair; did Yukiko somehow convince him to do it?

Since he's naturally pale, there's no need to powder his skin. Plus, he's confident he'll look horrendous with it anyway.

Of course, he's not forgetting the fangs. Those are crucial!

His cape barely reaches his ankles so he doesn't have to worry about it getting dirty. However, he has to lift it up whenever he sits down.

This perfectionist idiot spends a good deal of the party worrying about his damn costume that his date and friends have to constantly stop him.

Seo and Araki

These two also decided on a common theme every Halloween. It's a best friend thing.

For this year, it's superheros. They're going as Batman and Superman.

Araki proposes more original idea: How about they attend as Bruce Wayne (Seo) and Clark Kent (Araki), and they pick the DCAU incarnations since they're very popular? Seo likes it and agrees.

Except...people keep asking who they're supposed to be. He's lost the number of times he's yell, "Bruce Wayne! Bruce. Frickin'. Wayne!!"

Araki isn't as bothered because he's too busy taking a picture of the lovey-dovey vampire couple every 2 minutes. Makes you wonder if he dressed up as a reporter just to bring his camera.

He doesn't care if people don't know who hr's supposed to be. He just grins and opens his shirt tp show them the Superman T-shirt underneath.

Not that he has to do it often, thanks to his "Clark Kent" name tag. His camera has a DIY Daily Planet sticker.

Seo is never listening to Araki again.

Seo tries to put on a playboy millionaire act so people can get a damn clue on who he's supposed to be, but they think he's Tony Stark and tell him he got the costume wrong.

Ren

Prince Charming

No one's surprised, for as long as the Big Five have known Ren, he's mostly dressed as handsome male characters that are popular with the ladies.

His costume is store-bought, so no effort on Ren's part. Gakushuu is judgemental.

For most part, they leave him with his Cinderallas and Snow Whites.

Then he spots the evil witch herself, Hazama and runs. Not a very charming thing to do, but Ren is not dying on Halloween! Never!

Koyama

Being a huge Fantasy fan, Koyama decides to be a wizad.

He too put a lot of effort in his costume. Gakushuu is pleased to see someone else so dedicated, and Yukiko has to stop him from going full critic mode.

His costume has classical and modern elements and gets a lot of attention from everyone, especially girls. (No, Ren is not jealous. So what if half his princess harem left him to gush over the mysterious, terrifyingly hot wizard?)

Even Aarki's taking pictures of him like crazy!

Out of everyone, Koyama has the most fun at this party. Who knew having a civil conversation with people was more fun than yelling and looking down on them? Huh...

When some people ask about book recommendations, he won't shut up! This boy is a self-certified, self-proclaimed Fantasy encylopedia.

Ren wonders if Koyama, with his magic and fantasy obsession, can protect him from you-know-who. Before he can ask, he's shocked to find his supposed savior happily chatting with Hazama!

Bonus: Karma

By pure coincidence, which Gakushuu is highly skeptical of, we have another vampire.

It looks like Karma's barely put an effort into his costume. Guy just showed up with ripped jeans and a black T-shirt, plus some piercings. The only indication that he's a vampire are his fangs. This is your modern day blood-sucking bad boy.

And Gakushuu, never has he been offended in his life! This minimalistic style is an insult to the long (and unnecessary) hours he's spent on his own costume! What was Akabane thinking? Has he no shame?!

So Gakushuu spends a good hour or so critiquing and nitpicking Karma's so-called costume. It leads to one banter after another, until the two banter over every little thing. They're even competing over who's the better Dracula.

Gakushuu thinks he's the winner by defualt because unlike his uncultured rival, he's actually read the book!

Is Karma going to give up? No, he's going to imitate every popular Dracula incarnation in the media.

Yukiko sits a few steps away, reading Koyama's spell book out of boredem.

She later drags her boyfriend away by the cape after politely threatening to have Hazama curse Karma if he tries annoying Gakushuu again.

Don't mess with an angry vampire lady and her date, Karma.

[aplacetosharemyfics]

The Downfall of Susan St. Clair: Who are the James Family?

I feel incredibly sad and angry that Paramount Plus has chosen to drop Rise of the Pink Ladies and remove it from its services. But I will endeavor to keep posting this fanfic on a weekly basis to allow the dream of the Pink Ladies to stay alive for 14 more weeks. I hope this helps someone.

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

“Have you heard of the James family?”

Susan slipped onto the couch beside her mother. If she posed the question casually, relaxed into the sofa, and didn’t look her mother in the eye, it could be passed off as a merely curious question. Nothing more.

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

Through late into last night, Susan had been pouring over her yearbooks, dating back to first grade. In each book, Susan was front and centre, her hair combed, and dress pressed, the picture of perfection. The girl from Home Economics, however, was nowhere to be found. Returning to the latest yearbook, and pulling out a magnifying glass, she carefully studied each and every photo. Finally, in the background of a photo featuring her and Buddy after their narrow loss at last year’s closing Football game, someone else had realized the camera was pointed at them. It was the same terrified eyes that had stared at her from the grass of the Football field. Pleased with her detective skills, and with a more concrete image of the girl’s face, she scanned through the class photos. There were a couple of people who matched the basic description, she’d spotted them the first time through. But then her finger paused. The little photo under her manicured nail was of a dull girl, her mousey hair darkened by the grainy photograph, a plastic smile plastered on her face. Flipping back to the original photo, she compared the two girls. Details were hard to see, and she had changed her hairstyle for the class photo, but there was no mistaking that this was the same girl. Maisie James.

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

“Hmm?”

Her mother’s eyes raised from the cross-stitch she’d been dutifully filling in, cold as she regarded her daughter. Susan found her resolve shrinking under the hard gaze.

“I didn’t recognize the name,” she admitted.

She offered a weak smile. Indeed, she couldn’t remember a James family, though she prided herself in knowing all the important families in Rydell. Maybe they were just a little poor, or a little new. Maybe her mother would accept her as a friend.

“I wouldn’t get involved with them, darling.”

Susan felt her heart drop. There were plenty of families Mrs. St. Clair wouldn’t be seen dead fraternizing with, but very few she would speak about with such anger. All hope that she could make Maisie a friend was out the window. Or – she reasoned – a friend her mother knew about.

“Why do you ask?”

Susan straightened her face, smoothing her skirt. She didn’t want her mother to see any emotion.

“I was looking into students to help Buddy with his election.”

It was a lie she’d perfected earlier, and instantly her mother’s face relaxed. Buddy always had that effect. He was the perfect boy, could never do anything wrong, even when it was him who … never mind. Susan had occasionally – bitterly, and never out loud – said that if she liked Buddy that much, she should marry him herself.

“I’m so glad that you’re finally getting back together.”

Susan didn’t bother to correct her.

“So, for Buddy’s campaign, what was wrong with the James family?”

“Ah,” her mother started, settling back into the couch into her gossiping position, hand resting on the arm of the chair and legs crossed under her skirt. “Where to start? Well, for starters, no one has seen the father for years. The mother claims he’s overseas on business, but I’ve heard that he divorced her and moved in with his mistress.”

Susan gasped at the right moment, earning a little smirk as her mother continued.

“And the mother has been seen hanging around pubs and bars, drinking to her heart’s content, they say. I’ve tried to be nice and invite her to tea parties, but she always ends up ruining the mood.”

She shook her head, bemused at the nerve of people these days. After all the effort spent inviting her over, and finding people she should be able to relate to, she could only go and ruin her hard work.

“What about the daughter?”

Brought out of her thoughts, Mrs. St. Clair blinked at the sudden question.

“Daughter.”

There weren’t many questions that could stump Susan’s mother, and she racked her brains quickly to avoid the embarrassment.

“There was a girl who used to attend the same etiquette lessons as you. A few years older, I think.”

Susan considered the information for a second. Did that mean her mother had forced her into lessons meant for older children? Or was Maisie slow at picking up the teachings? It was in the next second that she realized the contradiction in her mother’s answer. How could someone a few years older than her still be in high school? Quickly thanking her mother, she rushed upstairs.

Upon finding her name last night, she had considered the hunt over and hadn’t looked further. Skimming through the earlier issues, she searched through the names. If she was a few years older and had been held back, then, surely, she would have started school in a different year initially. But there was Maisie, in the same first-grade class as her, hair pulled back into bunches. In every book, in the same year, was Maisie.

Taking a deep breath, Susan closed the books, putting the magnifying glass back into the drawer. Her mother must have just been confused.

----------

“It was a western.”

Maisie looked up from her breakfast to find her mother staring at her.

“The movie at the drive-in. It was a western.”

Maisie made a non-committal noise before returning to her food. It was too early in the morning to be talking about movies or drive-ins. Such things suggested some form of sociability. But her mother wasn’t finished.

“You said it was a high-school drama.”

Maisie swallowed. She’d completely forgotten about the drive-in and the lie she’d told when she returned. So much had happened that it felt like years had passed.

“And it didn’t finish early.”

Raising an eyebrow, she waited for her daughter’s explanation. She thought she had raised her better than this.

“I …”

Maisie winced. There had been a deal riding on the event. But how was she supposed to tell her mother that she’d gotten bullied, so sitting in the seats in front of the concession stand was impossible?

“I ended up …”

The seats were full? That wouldn’t work, so many kids had their own cars that the seats were almost always empty.

Mrs. James sighed. She knew her daughter, knew how much she struggled in social situations, and knew how cruel kids could be.

“I will let this go,” she started, allowing a smile to form on Maisie’s face before dropping the bomb: “If you go to the Pep Rally tonight.”

Maisie’s stomach dropped.