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ficmashup · 9 months

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Taken

Summary: You join TF141 after something happened on your last deployment. They take you in and while it takes some time, you find yourself warming up to them, and them to you. Perhaps especially to the Captain.

A/N: Nothing like a sprinkle of angst on Christmas Eve. ;) I will be doing a part two for this because I can't resist, but can't promise when I'll post it. Soon, I hope! Have a lovely holiday to everyone celebrating. :)

Warnings: SA mentions if you squint, crass language, death, stabbing, beating, shooting, torture, angst, trauma, overall I just decided to stab the characters in the feels. Just a bit. Happy ending though, imo.

Word Count: 4.7k

Masterlist

It’s not expected, but then again, these things never are.

What kills me the most is that Ghost had to be there, had to see it. I’d rather it had been anyone else just so I could spare him the pain of reopening old wounds. We’d been clearing a warehouse and stumbled upon more than we’d expected. We both realize our mistake at different times and I have a split-second decision to make. I’m ahead of Ghost by a dozen or so feet and hidden behind a pile of crates, so I see the group first.

There’s no time to warn Ghost and if he comes forward, he’ll be shot on sight. So I step forward first. I take out those closest to his entry point and my focus on keeping him safe leaves me vulnerable. Ghost moves in just as I’m grabbed from behind and I ram the butt of my gun backward into my captor’s ribs. There’s a grunt, but he doesn’t let go and I drop my gun to hang from my chest in exchange for the long knife on my thigh. I plunge the blade into his thigh and hear a string of curses spat into my ear as their grip only tightens on me.

I fail to realize that during the struggle, they’ve managed to drag me backward towards a side door. My last view as I twist the knife is Ghost’s wide eyes behind the mask before my head is slammed against the wall and all goes dark.

* * *

I wake up tied to a chair. I keep utterly still and take stock of my body. My head is heavy and I feel the tightness of the skin on the right side of my face from where blood has dried. There’s a sharp sting coming from across my collar bone and my right ankle twinges. A sprained ankle and a scrape, I’d guess. Possibly a concussion. Nothing too bad. My wrists and ankles are tied to the arms and legs of a chair and the rope chafes, but the ties are sloppy. Keeping me here like this was unexpected, then. An opportunity that they couldn’t pass up.

I keep my breathing steady and my head bowed with my eyes shut. All I do for a few moments is listen. There’s shuffling and voices, but they’re muffled and seem to be coming from a nearby room. Multiple people, but more than likely less than a dozen. I take a chance and open my eyes, looking up and finding the space dim and empty. It looks like a shack barely held together by the sand and dirt covering the floor.

“Awake.” A voice with a rough accent comes from behind me and my spine stiffens as he moves in front of me. He’s limping slightly and I get a brief moment of satisfaction at knowing this is the man who grabbed me and I clearly dealt some serious damage. With the dried blood on my face and him being able to walk after clear medical assistance, I’d say I’ve been gone a few hours. The fact makes what’s left in my stomach curdle.

The man says a few words that I don’t understand, then one that I do. “…bitch.”

I chuckle softly. “Unoriginal.” His fist darts out and the hit is harder than I expect. It leaves me dizzy as the weak chair rocks with the impact. Stays on all fours, though. The man grunts and spits at my feet before walking to the door, apparently satisfied with his revenge. He opens the door and shouts something down the hall before looking at me with ill intent in his eyes. I shift a bit in my chair, noting that they’ve removed my uniform and boots. I’m only in tight shorts and my tank top. It’s going to be torture then. Fine. I’ve already been through hell and lived through it, fashioned myself teeth from the mouths of my demons I killed, I can take whatever poor imitation these amateurs try.

Three more men come in and one steps in front of the others. “Why you here?” He asks in broken English.

“To kill people like you.” I answer simply, staring unblinkingly at him.

He gives me a smile. “Coincidence. That is why we here as well. To kill people like you.” It’s a struggle not to roll my eyes. That’s the base of every conflict in the history of the world. He pulls his handgun and aims it at my forehead while I go completely still. “Tell me more.”

* * *

Hours pass. The torture is easy enough to sit through, nothing unexpected, nothing skilled, nothing I haven’t been trained for. The true killer is waiting with my own thoughts. Like thinking that they aren’t coming for me. Stupid. Utterly stupid. Yet the persistent feeling of being unworthy lingers in my chest. And I know that the longer I’m here, the more nagging those thoughts will be.

They can finally be rid of you, no trouble, no hassle, just a lost soldier, happens all the time.

I gasp as a soldier lands a particularly well-aimed punch to my gut and the chair finally falls over. I feel the arm crack at the impact while the group laughs, but the ropes around my right wrist and ankle are now free. My fingers slowly curl around the splintered piece of wood hidden under my body. One of the men waves his hand and another steps forward and yanks the chair back up. I use the momentum of the sudden movement to plunge the long piece of wood into his throat and get my free leg up under me to keep me from toppling over.

The man’s eyes go wide as he chokes on his own blood and everyone else in the room is frozen with shock. I take advantage of that and take the gun in the man’s thigh holster and manage to shoot two men before they draw their guns and one more before they manage to shoot. I use the body of the man I stabbed as cover, but I can barely hold him up. I grunt under the impact of a bullet hitting his dead weight and feel another bullet graze my shoulder before the door straight across from me bursts open. I take advantage of the distraction and shoot one more while the other gets a bullet between the eyes from the intruder’s gun.

I turn on instinct and level my gun at the intruders, stopping my finger just in time when I see the distinct, pale skull mask. “Fuck.” I lower the gun and let the body drop to the floor as Ghost pushes in, but I don’t miss the way he looks me over.

His hand grabs his radio before anything. “Clear, I’ve got the package.” He slings his gun over his back as he reaches me and I don’t realize that I’m trembling until he guides my hand to his shoulder to keep me upright as he unties my other wrist and ankle. My fingers cling to his tac vest like a lifeline.

“Confirmed. If package is secure, move out.” Price’s voice comes over the radio and my heart squeezes at the sound of his voice. I catch movement out of the corner of my eye and my hand still holding the gun twitches before I recognize Soap moving into the doorway to watch our backs.

“Clear, LT.” He reports before looking me over with wide eyes. I must really look like shit then.

“Affirmative.” Ghost responds over the radio with a wave back at Soap to tell him the same. “How bad, G?” He asks gruffly once the flimsy chair falls to the floor behind me and he stands up, keeping his forearms within my reach so I can use him to stand. His fingers graze my arms too, not gripping or grabbing, simply guiding.

My head shakes as I stare at him. “Not bad. Nothing broken.”

He nods in return and pulls out my uniform shirt and pants that he must have collected from the other room. My boots too. “Then let’s go. Can you walk?” I take my clothes gratefully and he keeps to my side while I slide the top on with only a slight wince as the fabric slides over the open wounds covering me. The pants are a little more difficult, but I manage before nodding to Ghost that I’m ready. He wraps an arm around my waist and I lower his hand to my hip as my ribs ache with protest. He corrects his grip and we limp out with Soap leading, gun up.

A few more bodies litter the narrow hall and the room beyond, but the true relief is when we walk outside and I can see the stars. I hadn’t realized how stale the air was in that shack and how the metallic smell of blood had stained my nostrils. I gulp down the cool air before I press my lips together as I hold in a laugh. My shoulders start shaking and Ghost’s pace falters before I shake my head. “It’s fine, I’m fine. It’s just the shock and exhaustion.” Laughter taints every word and I swear Ghost’s eyebrows furrow with concern before we keep moving.

“You get scarier all the time, G.” Soap comments ahead and I can’t hold back a low laugh even as I shake my head at myself.

“I’m sorry. Fuck, I’m sorry.” I breathe as the giggles make every word waver.

Ghost’s grip tightens as we carefully scale down the side of the rocky hill. “Not sure what you’re apologizin’ for. You fuckin’ got taken watching my ass and I’d rather have you laughin’ than anything else.”

My head shakes, the laughter fading as I struggle to keep my feet moving while my body starts to shut down. “I’m sorry for thinking you wouldn’t come for me.” Ghost comes to a full stop now as I look between the men and Soap has shock scrawled over his face.

“Course we did, lass. The hell you talkin’ bout?” Soap’s accent gets a little thicker, betraying how deep my words hit.

Ghost starts to move again and I stumble after him even though he’s practically carrying me on his hip. “Keep movin’.” He grumbles and regret lingers in my chest as we fall silent the rest of the way. At the bottom of the rocky path sits a car and my heart beats a little faster at seeing the two figures waiting there for us. Ghost picks me up and carries me the rest of the way before immediately handing me to Price once we’re close enough. He holds me close and tight for far too brief a moment before sitting me on the hood of the car. The moonlight is just bright enough to make out each other’s features and I can’t get enough of his eyes, even with the worry filling them.

“You broken?” He asks quietly and I can hear how the words drag and crackle on the way out of his chest. His hand perches on the side of my neck, his thumb brushing lightly over my pulse point to feel my heart beating.

I give him a weak smile. “Just a bit chipped. Nothing permanent.” I promise and it’s a gift to see a little tension leave his shoulders. “But I’ve lost a lot of blood. I need to be kept conscious as we head back.”

“Still the medic, hm?” He teases dryly but the attempt at humor soothes me more than anything else. “Gaz, let’s go. Fast and steady.” Price pushes the keys into Gaz’s hands as he passes by with a wink, pushing something small that crinkles in my hand. A real smile tugs on my lips. A candy. We pile in the car and it’s a surprise to find myself pressed tight between Ghost and Price with Gaz driving and Soap in the passenger seat. It’s as if everyone traded seats.

“Did…did either of you grab my med kit?” I ask as my head gets a bit dizzy and I pop the hard candy Gaz gave me into my mouth. Soap turns in his seat with a half-grin, holding up my kit. My hands reach for it, but Ghost intercepts and pulls it into his lap.

“What d’ya need?” He asks as he opens it and looks over the contents.

I shift the candy into my cheek. “Bandages. My ankle’s fucked. Need to wrap it at least.” Ghost glances at Price and they instantly come to a nonverbal agreement as John shifts me closer to him while Simon gingerly lifts my foot into his lap. I frown. “I can do it—”

“Let him. That’s an order.” John’s voice in my ear and the command in it has my body stiffening for a moment, then laxing a moment after. My back is pressed against John’s chest with his arm thrown across my middle, his hand heavy on my hip to use it as a steadying point rather than put any pressure on my ribs. He must’ve noticed how Ghost was holding me earlier. Doesn’t miss a thing, my Captain.

Ghost eases my boot off and my hands clench at the pain, but he’s careful and the steady ache of the rest of my body makes it easy enough to sit through. Once my sock is off too, he takes out a small flashlight and I grimace as the light illuminates just how bad my ankle looks. It’s red and swollen from all the activity I forced it through after the sprain. Ghost starts wrapping and I nod when he looks at me to make sure he’s doing it correctly.

When he’s finished and I’m satisfied, I move to pull my foot away, but he keeps a firm hold on it. He gives me a deadpan look. “Keep it elevated.”

I give him a look back that I’m sure is a bit lackluster given my current condition. “It’s supposed to be elevated above my heart, but that’s not happening in the car.”

“Better this than nothing.” Ghost responds without a second of hesitation and his eyes don’t budge from mine. My mouth opens again, then shuts when Price gives my hip a soft squeeze. My lips purse, but I don’t say another word as I relax into John and try to keep my eyes open. I rest my hand on John’s knee and my thumb slides back and forth as I breathe in his scent.

“Give me a list of injuries.” He says and I nod, fighting through the fog of my mind to think clearly.

“Uh, sprained ankle, head wound, possible concussion, multiple lacerations, bruised ribs on my right side, a bullet graze to my left shoulder, and some bumps and bruises.” I go over the list twice in my head before nodding slightly in confirmation. The car is silent for a few beats and I feel a weight settle over all of us. The weight that comes with caring for someone else and hurting when they’re hurt. I swallow, struggling to accept the feeling rather than struggle against it and feel guilty for inflicting it on others. In truth, it’s a choice they all made. I choice I made too, when I let them in.

“Don’t think I ever asked how you are when you’re the one who needs to be treated.” John barely breaks the silence, but the tension lessens when I hum a tired laugh.

“Oh, I’m sweet as sugar, Captain. Naturally.” That gets chuckles from most of the men in the car.

“Liar.” Soap accuses, grinning back at me and I give him a smile in return. Also, I show him my middle finger. He returns the gesture instantly and happiness flits through me at the simple banter.

“You’re not gonna be difficult for me, are you, sugar?” John whispers just low enough for me to hear and I smile, wincing as it stretches a cut on my cheek.

“I like to think I behave better than most of you do when you need care.” I give Ghost a pointed look since he’s the worst of the bunch and he grunts, shaking his head while Soap and Gaz make noises of dissent.

Price shifts and my grip tightens on his knee until he settles again. “I remember being pretty docile last time.”

“After some convincing.” I return, my eyes shutting for just a moment before I feel light flicking at my nose. My eyes open and see Ghost pulling his hand back, head shaking with eyes on mine. I nod once. Got to stay awake. It goes on like this for the rest of the drive. One or all of them keeping up a conversation with me while Ghost taps my nose, pulls my ear, or annoys me in some other way when I start to drift. When we arrive at base, I can barely give one-word answers because I’m so exhausted.

The men rush me into the medical tent and I hate being set on the bed, hate being the one who needs treatment, hate the starchy feel of the sheets, and hate being poked and prodded. There’s a deep frown on my face as I allow the medics to do their job and they give Price the same list of injuries that I gave him earlier. Only after they hear that, and that I’m going to be fine with rest and treatment, Price dismisses the others and they reluctantly go. Although Gaz slips me another hard candy before he goes and gets a smile out of me.

Price stays. Even after the medics pull me aside and push me into a sterile bath to clean all my cuts after I practically showered in that man’s blood, I return smelling like chemicals and find Price waiting. I give him a look and the corner of his mouth lifts, but I can’t bring myself to verbally scold him. His presence settles me as it always has and that’s something I’m especially grateful for while I’m here.

There are a few places where I need stitches and I sit through it silently, Price and I just looking each other over. Seeing that we’re both alive and safe. The medics wrap my ankle again and lay me down in bed with it elevated while I try to keep my grumbling to a minimum. I’m exhausted, but this place, this position, keeps me on edge. But it’s getting harder to resist.

“Just sleep.” John says with a hint of humor in his voice as he sits in the chair next to me.

I heave a breath, nodding. “I’m not fighting it. Just hard to do in a place like this.” He moves a touch closer and breathing comes a little easier as his fingers slot with mine, the tips of his fingers sliding over the length of mine. He understands more than most why I’m having trouble.

“You’re not going to be alone here. Not for a second.” He promises with nothing but sincerity in those lovely blue eyes. My lips press together.

“I can’t ask you for that.”

“You’re not. I’m giving it to you.” He returns instantly and I can’t help but melt. Can’t argue with that. “Sleep.” His other hand raises to slide over my head, his fingers twisting a few locks of hair between them. My eyes flutter closed at the feeling and I don’t mean to fall asleep, but his gentle touch lulls me into peace in seconds.

* * *

I wake up feeling a slight weight settling on top of me and I’m on alert in a split second, my eyes flashing open and my hands darting out to grab what I can. The person freezes and I end up staring into dark eyes with their wrist in one hand and the collar of their shirt in the other. “Just me, G.” The voice takes a few moments to sink in, but I relax a second later with a grimace as the sudden movement tweaked my ribs.

“Ghost.” I breathe and slowly release him while he lets go of my wrist that he grabbed to keep me from choking him. “Gotta stop meeting like this.” I tease and he hums as he sits in the chair next to me, moving it as close to the bed as he can. I settle back down and note that the slight weight was another one of his jackets laid over my chest. A little smile pulls on my lips at the sight.

“Think I’d have learned by now. Especially since you still have my other jacket.” He flicks his chin towards the one covering me and I smirk while my heartbeat slowly calms. He’s only wearing the cloth that covers his face tonight and there’s no black smudged around his eyes. It’s as close to being Simon as he allows himself to be on base.

“I always meant to return it.” I say honestly, thinking fondly of his jacket hanging in my closet back home. “Think I like it too much now. I’ll get you another one.” That earns me a rare chuckle as he leans forward, his elbows resting on his knees.

“Sounds good.” He agrees and there’s that little glint in his eye that tells me he has something to say. He’s either waiting until he’s ready to say it, or he’s still mulling over the words in his mouth. “Took me a solid ten minutes to get Price out of here.” I smile, imagining the soft argument followed by Ghost shoving Price out of the infirmary.

“Thanks for relieving him.”

He shakes his head. “Not a problem.”

“And you wanted to talk to me.” I help him along a bit with amusement in my voice as his fingers knit together and his gaze steadies on mine.

“I did.” He confirms and now I wait, letting him decide when he’s ready to talk. My hands slide over the jacket he laid over me, grateful for the lack of chemical smell emanating from it. It just smells like him. Like bitter tea leaves and a small citrus tang that usually taints his clothes. Probably his detergent. “I don’t forgive you.” He starts and my attention immediately shifts to him and his dark eyes trained on mine. “I don’t accept your apology for thinking we wouldn’t come for you because that’s bullshit and I won’t forgive you until you never fucking believe that again.”

My eyes widen when I hear the heat in his tone. It’s not that odd to hear Ghost get riled up, especially around Soap, but I’ve never had him take that tone with me. Not seriously. “I know it was stupid.”

“Damn right.” He grumbles and I give him a pointed look for rubbing it in. “Say it. Tell me you know we’ll always come for you.” His gaze is unyielding and I know he means it.

“I know the team will always come for me.” Even to my ears, the words sound hesitant. Ghost’s eyes narrow.

“You say that every day ’til it feels as natural as your fucking name. And I’ll ask you to say it every once and a while. ‘Til it’s a reflex.” I sigh, but his tone is insistent. After a moment, I relent with a nod and he pins me in place with his eyes before nodding back and relaxing again in his chair. “You don’t get to save my ass, then think we’re not coming after you. Never believe that, G.”

“I get it, Ghost. I’ll do it.” Because it’s important to him and because he’s clearly trying to do something good for me, even if it’s something I hesitate to do. “And when I can stand without falling over, I’ll give you a hug for being such a pain in my ass.” The mask twitches and his eyes crinkle so I know he’s smiling.

“We’ll see if you can catch me to do it.” He returns and I smirk, knowing he’ll let me. “Now, go on and pass out. Price’ll have my hide if I keep you up.”

“Mmhmm.” I smile and let my exhaustion catch up with me, falling asleep a little easier with his scent in my nose rather than the chemicals that cleaned my body.

The next time I wake, Soap has taken Ghost’s place and morning light is seeping into the tent. “Morning, lass.” He greets and I give him a bleary grunt in return. “Cheery in the morning.” He quips and I’m about to tell him what he can do with his cheer before he points to a tray beside me. “That’s for you, if you’re up for it. Will ye let me help you up without bitin’ me?” Soap gets up and I nod, grabbing onto his arms as they slide under mine to pull me up into a sitting position.

A long breath leaves me as pain echoes through my body with every movement, but Johnny is gentle and makes sure to stack pillows behind me before moving back. He pushes a glass of water into my hand along with some pills. “Nurses said to give those to ya.”

I raise a brow and take the pills despite how my face hurts. I bet I really look like shit. “They trusted you with a task? I’m shocked.”

He smirks. “At least your spirits are still high.” Soap reaches over and pulls the tray closer to hover over my lap. “Eat up. Took everything in me not to steal your applesauce.” I hum amusedly, picking up the small container first and happily digging into the sweet treat. Soap flicks my ear. “Cruel lass. Careful, I might rethink my offer.”

I pause and raise a brow. “Offer?”

Mischief glints in his eyes and I take a deep breath to prepare myself. “You’re coming to Scotland with me.” He says with a smug grin. “The group we took out last night were the last few we were after, so we’re on leave starting the day after tomorrow. Since you’ve got no one waitin’ for ya at home, I’m takin’ ya with me to see my family. So I can keep an eye on ya.” He winks at me while I blink a few times to make sure I heard him right.

“That’s…that’s not necessary, Soap. I can take care of myself.” I frown as I think of myself laying on his couch surrounded by his family, just taking up space. “I couldn’t possibly impose on you and your family.” Besides, it’s been a long time since I’ve met someone’s family. Parents…I haven’t been around parents in at least a fucking decade.

“Too bad.” Soap answers instantly, leaning back in his chair with his arms crossed over his chest. “I’ve already told my Ma and she’s excited to meet ya. If you resist, I’ll carry you there slung over my shoulder.” I pout, setting my food down on the tray as I try to think of a way out of this. “Come on, lass, it’ll be fun. You only have to stay off your foot for a little while and I’ll be there to entertain you in the meantime.”

My teeth sink into my bottom lip as I look at him and if anyone can pull off a puppy dog look, it’s Johnny. After a few moments I sigh, pressing my fingers to my temple. “You’re sure your family doesn’t mind—”

“They’re fucking thrilled, G. Come on, just say you’ll come without a fight.” He leans forward and nudges my leg gently.

A smile tugs on my lips and I’ll admit the thought of seeing Johnny at home is a tempting one. “Yeah, okay, I’ll come.” His face brightens immediately and his big grin makes accepting worth it.

“You won’t regret it. One minute in Scotland and you’ll never want to leave.” He assures me and I nod along, listening with a fond smile as he tells me about his sisters, his mother’s cooking, and his father’s terrible jokes. To my own surprise, I find myself actually…looking forward to it.

Taglist (hello, lovelies, hope you enjoy. Lmk if anyone wants to be tagged):

@under-the-dirt @jj-ara33 @sorchateas @cherry-blosom-tree

@thriving-n-jiving @jinxxangel13 @emsstuff1 @missmidnight-writes @thereeallink @younggirlgenius @1wh4re1nova @ghostslillady

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speakofthedebbie · 2 months

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you (read: i) asked so you shall recieve: radioapple fic recs august 2024 update!!

the following are the ones from the last post w/some minor changes (think: misspellings and even more osas praising) (sorry for the re-tags!!):

Bedtime Rituals to Try out Before the Next Angelic War by @miribalis

just yes. thousand times yes. so basically my boy luci has some sleep troubles and that somehow leads to a qpr with al look its been a while ok just read it

Managerial Liberties by the same fella

these two tags explain it pretty well

something that sticks out to me about this is that charlie is actually (reasonably) cold to adam and like. im actually surprised with how little ive seen that. i mean i dont think id be exactly buddy-buddy with my besties killer either. only 4 chaps as of writing but already looking to be a radioapple classic. has the same vibe as bedtime rituals, but it is NOT a sequel

devils don't fly (don't expect me not to fall) by @corgiss

also just yes. basically a really not cool joke evolves into a blossoming romance because why wouldnt it. (man if i had a nickel for every radioapple fic that had a masquerade that was sabotaged by the vees- *gets shot bc i cant mention osas yet*)

i’ll hold you close (i’ll stay the course) by the same fella

the entire time i was just going "yas king! put that egotistical flatscreen in his place!!". basically luci reminds the overlords who he is and vox shows he can be more of a threat than he lets on.

ykw fuck it just the entire series (i didnt mention i would give anything to not give a shit (but i do) and my perfect rock bottom (my beautiful trauma) because the first one sounded a lil too angsty and ive gotten enough of that from other sources [pointedly glares at Quietly, It Slips Through Your Fingers, Love {also coming up later!}] and the second is (mostly) smut

Of Saints and Sinners by the forever amazing @morningstarwrites!! (if you see this i have a serious question: is this your first time ever writing a fic? because how do you get so much right the first time- [not even beginners luck could explain this level of skill])

if youre even half the radioapple fanatic i am and havent read this, literally what are you doing?? i could sing its praises until my death bed but ill hold off so i can explain whats happening. basically after burning down a meeting room several times, luci and al make a deal ("not a deal!", luci laments to the void): they will attempt to be civil and maybe even friendly, with some daily compliments sprinkled along the way, and by the end luci will owe al a favour. whats the favour? read it yourself dammit! seriously, 10/10, i foam at the mouth every friday

Quietly, It Slips Through Your Fingers, Love by Starlit_Rainfall (no tumblr in sight, so AO3) (i. urgfgh. what happened. i was just smiling over the fluff while crossing to go to school. where did it go. where did it gooooo)

if thats anything to go by, the last few chapters have been rough. the fluff feels so far away that i cant even explain what happens. luci was waxing poetic about swimming in maple syrup for al, i remember that much. lilith is particularly an asshole even tho we havent seen her yet (or maybe we have. idr, mightve chatted with al) also emily is there (fallen) and has a lil smth to do with als and liliths deal. if you read it, warning for the gut punch of angst that starts chap 32 "She/Her" (though the chapter before that, "Should Alastor Know By Now?" ends pretty rough too)

Freely We Serve by @romanaxe

i dont remember how i managed to stumble upon this but im having a great time. basically alastor is a new sinner fresh in hell (but time doesnt matter and the whole cast is still here) and thinks "what better way to gain power than be the personal assistant of the heartbroken king of hell!" features a 6-7 (rosies words) year old charlie and a morally dubious lilith (also i loved eepy al X3)

A Family Forged in Hellfire by Green_Ghostwriter (once again, no Tumblr, so AO3)

this ones a bit newer (10 chaps), is so far mostly exposition and the slowburn pot hasnt even been put on the stove, but as just a hazbin fic in general i see the potential. basically its a 1920s(30s?) au where heaven decides little charlie doesnt deserve to be raised in hell and is sent to earth with a "foster" family where her actions in life will determine witch realm she will return to after death. her "parents", al and mimzy, are given false memories so they can claim the girl as their own and gee i wasnt kidding when i said it was a lot of exposition. erm honestly explaining anymore would tech be spoiling so go read it!!

The Red Thread That Binds Us by @scun-gilli

{{future me prefacing this by saying i have no idea where i was going with yesterdays thought process, all you need to know from it was im on chapter 27. also scungilli your comment is making me very worried 😟 well theres no mcd tag so im sure itll fine, right? RIGHT, SCUNGILLI??}}

basically its a king x kings guard au where al and luci grow up together and only grow closer after a. certain life event for al (its fine guys trust :)) [she said, like a liar]) then al is sent off for royal guard training school (ik its not called that i forgor 😭) but dw he comes back. just watch out for graphic depictions of injuries (i think thats this fic) angst and a sneaky eve bc radioapple fics are allergic to happiness (or maybe im not looking hard enough lol) (also im really tempted to make the friendship bracelets they had 👀)

somewhere down the line by kj_crwm (AO3 link)

this one starts off as human!alastor/lucifer but by the middle(?) its just regular radioapple. basically al is encountered by luci while finishing off a job who agrees to keep quiet. luci just keeps on showing up, reveals hes the devil to which al us just like "lol ok" and eventually they get in a relationship (ooh lala 👀) but they break up after saying some hurtful things to each other (oh nono 👀) with luci promising al they will never cross paths again. if you watched the show then well. you know that doesnt happen 😂 most human!al radioapple have al summon him (no hate to them) so this was an interesting change of pace

new recs below!! ↓↓

Alastor and Lucifer do whatever the Hell this is (series) by Vagabond_Sloth (personally asked, no Tumblr, but they might make one 👀)

i know this is radioapple fic rec post but... *cough* Husk and Angel do a Romance for some soft huskerdust *cough* anyway- basically, a perplexing flower arrangement leads to a blossoming something between the resident radio demon and king of hell. seriously, its some good shit, and the author is really nice!

A Compliment A Day by @decembercamiecherries

spinning this around in my head at all times

basically, a classic "charlie makes al and luci compliment each other as a bonding excessive" but it does not disappoint (check out her other three radioapple fics too)

a lovely night (lalaland is that you??) and pancakes, small talk by @mirotic_chess (X Twitter account)

in a lovely night they do a lil dancey dancey and in pancakes, small talk luci makes some pancakes!!

Sin and Sentiment and Time On My Hands by demon_fawn (supposed Tumblr leads to a dead end)

oh my god future debs here and i am so fucking tired of doing these descriptions but. um. the plot for sin and sentiment def seems very interesting and time on my hands is an incomplete (but good!) attempt at radioapple week. hmm not sure if they still post bc the most recent update was july 12th

honestly just every radioapple fic by @otoshigo (i think ive read all but Forbidden Fruit of the Poisonous Tree)

if you look underneath the little island that is radioapple, on god otoshigo is one of the creators holding it up. all 19 (yes, 19. we eatin good tonight [excluding forbidden fruit]) of their radioapple fics are fantastic, buuut if i had to recommend anything specific: A Guide to the Care and Maintenance of the King of Hell (fuck count furfur!) and The Devil's Trip to the Big Apple

not to continue the trend, but basically anything by @thief-of-eggs (even the singular huskerdust) but personal recommendations: Trust and Hair Pets and Let Me Be Your Shelter (sickfics 🔛🔝)

idk if youll catch me doing the descriptions for these anymore shit was exhausting

tagging time!!!! (i want to end it all)

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mimikyu-oli · 1 month

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William got the bright idea to use Faz-goo to heal his youngest son's head trauma. 🙂

It's pretty instant and Michael is none the wiser.

The boy only have a faded scar on his face but no actual damages.

MCI happen and Michael's protectiveness is kicking.

And then, Elizabeth disapear and he start to freak out when his brother isn't in sight.

It takes some times (and support from Jeremy), but he get through it.

The bite of 87 happen.

William is like "Good ridance! One less pest to deal with!".

But then he saw the look of devastation on Michael and the father instinct kick.

William: Well, if it worked the first time.

---

These goo-entities genuinely think they are the original person.

They don't know they are clones.

Until Circus Baby Entertainment and Rental.

Then it's a literal existential crisis happening.

Michael: Evan is goo!

Jeremy is goo!

Does everyone I know are goo!?

Michael: Am I goo TOO!?

👁_👁

---

Existential crisis power 3.

Supprisingly, Evan is the one who is the less affected.

Or more like he shows it less, but he's still upset about it and doesn't want to burden his brothers when they are clearly overwhelmed by it.

Meanwhile, William, since day one, is:

Stage 1) This is the "What makes someone a person?" and "Is it still the same?" dilemma.

Stage 2) This is not my son.

This is just a replic of him.

Stage 3) My oldest love a bunch of goo. What a weird one.

I'm going to go away from him.

He's old enough to deal with his problems and his goo pet.

Stage 4) Bloody hell! My son love a dying man.

I'm going to do him a favor.

But he's also:

Look! Evan!

Your brother replaced you.

Look how nice he is to it.

Do you feel... angry?

Betrayed?

(He is talking to a gooeyfied Evan possessing a little animatronic bear.)

Evan is feeling self-deprecating.

William: Shite.

My son is pathetic.

---

[It's the idea of the person and the goo are exchanging places. And William, knowing it because of all his experimentations on rats (and Evan is the first human guinea pig.), takes the goo and put it in some kind of jar/core he put in the bear. (Same concept as in spirit possessing things but with goo. And it's like putting a battery in a toy.)

Although, I don't know what he does with Jeremy yet. 🤔 (He's not throwing him away.)]

---

So yeah, Michael is in a state of "they are not them, but they also are."

It's a bit easier with his brother since years has pass, but with Jeremy...

Well, it's either a year or a few months since the bite for him.

---

Michael and Jiji: 18 in 1987.

Evan: 5 years younger. 13 in 1987.

AND THEY ARE ROOMATES!!!!

---

Evan (Or Goo-Evan) see Jeremy as an older brother.

It's kind of ironic after the later is switched and then discover it.

No one knows what to think nor understand after that happen.

---

Goo-Jeremy wake up while William was collecting the gooeyfied Jiji and asked himself "What is Dave doing here?".

He pretends to be asleep until the man is out of the room.

Some times later (around a few months to a year or two), Michael goes in Circus Baby Entertainment and Rental and find some files he brings with him. (Since he has peoples waiting for him at home, he goes right instead of left. And spend a joyfull night with Ennard.)

---

Reaction of the reveal:

Jeremy: Panic attack caused by an heavy existential chrisis and the fear of being left by Michael.

Michael: He's dealing with the same dilemma as his father in 83 and trying to calm down Jiji. (With a sprinkle of existancial chrisis too.)

Evan: Frozen in place while staring at the situation happening right in front of him.

#fnaf au #fnaf #five nights at freddy's #michael afton #william afton #c.c. afton #crying child fnaf #fnaf evan #jeremy fitzgerald #jeremike #faz-goo #existential crisis #sorry if it's weirdly structured #I was talking about it with someone #and I just copy-pasted it #😅#A Goo-ly Situation au #AGS au

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cod-dump · 1 year

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"and also happens to be a colonel" Colonel Konig, purely because all of his original team mates died in combat and he was the only one left that had the clearance for the position.

Oh my- The angst potential! Konig hating his rank, continuously saying he didn't earn it, he was the only option. Sprinkle in survivor's guilt, his anxiety, and some self-esteem issues and what we have right there is a beautiful story! Could also add Konig not wanting to let others too close because the trauma of losing his team still hurts and he's scared to let anyone in again. Yes he's an old man in this, an old man who never learned to cope with what happened and is just stuck in this cycle of self-hate and isolation.

Oh yes, some good shit right there

#cod mwii #call of duty #modern warfare ii #cod könig #cod konig #ask #thanks for the ask <3 #kortac #kortac operators #old man konig #colonel könig

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polarisbibliotheque · 3 months

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Hii!! so i just want to say first that i love love the way you write dmc fanfics. The way you just understand them, makes all their action seem like something they'd do. And well, if it doesn't bother you, may I ask a few advices on how to write Vergil, young and current? I'm trying to write a story and I think your input would be very helpful since you're probably the most accurate Vergil writer there is. Thank you andI just want to say that your fics helped me out a lot mentally. Thank you for bringing the characters to life 🫶

You just left me floored, loved to death, giggling like a 7 year old in public, and I thank you wholeheartedly for that 🖤🖤

First of all, thank you SO much for your words - and wow, I am absurdly flattered that you think so highly of me as a writer, really! I mean, I'm just writing my crazy shenanigans here, I don't expect much hahahaha words like yours make my day and, honestly, you made my whole week!

I am SO happy what I write helped you mentally. I do write to help myself in that regard too, and seeing I was able to have an impact on someone else, it makes everything worth it. That's what Dante would have wanted :')

Asking me for advice doesn't bother me AT ALL! Feel free to ask anytime you want it - by all means I see myself as someone so good as to give advice, but I've gained some experience and it's always good to share! Maybe I'll say something that makes sense to you!

So, without further ado, a few advices on writing Vergil - young and current - down the cut 'cause I haven't written it yet, but knowing myself, I know it's gonna be big :)

(spoiler: it's huge *puts on fool hat and jingles away*)

I sprinkled some things here and there about Dante and Vergil on this blog, but I think it'll be nice putting it all together in one place!

I recently got an ask about which MBTI personality I think it's Dante and Vergil, and there's a LOT on BOTH of their characters in there. You can find it here.

(I won't repeat the things I wrote there, 'cause oh boy this one's got bigger than I expected)

But oh, Verge, this little emotionally constipated goth man *sighs* he's Mr. Darcy from Pride and Prejudice. I'm not even joking.

But all of that aside, I do keep a few things in mind when writing him. I've said before I have many similar personality traits with him and I think it makes it easier for me to write this little bitch (affectionate).

Vergil is pretty much shaped by his trauma. You could argue Dante is as well, but differently from his twin brother, Vergil never really found acceptance. Yes, the twins lived through the same thing but the fact that Eva managed to save Dante and not Vergil is crucial to both characters.

Dante has survivor's guilt and depression from all that happened. He can't keep a deep connection to save his life, 'cause he keeps everyone at bay - he thinks his demonic blood is a curse and he is the reason everyone perishes. So it's best if people keep away from him.

But even with that, Dante loves being around people. It's what makes him so fond of his human part and, in my opinion, it's what made Dante healthier than Vergil. He seeks connection and humanity, he wants to use his strength to protect the weak - like Eva once used hers and sacrificed herself to protect and save him. That is crucial to Dante's character.

Vergil, in the other hand, believed for a LONG time he was left for dead. That his mother chose to save his brother because she loved Dante more and Vergil was left to die. He was left all alone in the cold, in a cemetery filled with demons who slaughtered him in quite a gruesome manner. If he hadn't find the rage, strength and power inside of himself that day, he wouldn't have survived.

Vergil learned he is on his own, his own family didn't love him (even if he was wrong, that's the impression he had for a LONG time) and the only one he could count on was himself. That made him withdraw completely: be wary of people and their intentions, shut himself to the world, allow only strength and power to come through his personality and keep his vulnerabilities and feelings shut down in the darkest and most protected place of himself because if he didn't, that could be his death.

Vergil didn't learn to protect the weak, because he wasn't protected when he was weak. He learned to survive, because when he needed the most, no one was there and his own will was the only thing that could save him. If he had given up, he would've died - no one would come, no knight in shiny armor, no powerful protecting demon, no sacrificing loving human mother.

✨That's why he's an asshole✨

Hahahaha jokes aside, that's why he's so laser focused on power, I think. When he was younger (around DMC 3), he finds Dante again and there's a hatred for his brother because he believed he was left to die and wasn't loved as much as Dante (as always, our red devil being a clueless himbo who just got lucky to be around Eva, poor guy). He wants to prove he is better than Dante, that he was worth something, that he too was worth saving - even more than his brother.

To some extent, up until that moment in DMC 3, Vergil is better than Dante (regarding power). He's got a lot of knowledge and control over his demonic heritage, things Dante didn't even know he could do. But Vergil is so blinded by his hurt and in so much pain he can only deem himself worthy if he beats Dante down, if he wins, if he gets all the power in the world.

I don't think he ever wanted to kill Dante - he just wanted to win. Like a kid, going "see, mom, dad, I win, I'm worth as much as Dante!!" - quite tragic, really.

With his power thing, it's not a desire for power for it's own sake, but as an armor. Given everything that happened to him, that Vergil has this thing of "only I can protect myself and I can count only on myself to save my life", it's very understandable that his logic takes him to the path of "if I am the most powerful being in this world, I will never bleed and I will never hurt again".

So, even if he says on the outside he is power hungry because he wants to honor his demonic heritage and humans are weak, on the inside it's actually that he's trying to carve his heart out from himself so he won't feel nothing and stop hurting - as well as gain all the power he can so NO ONE can make him feel scared, vulnerable, weak and powerless like he did that night when no one appeared to help him.

Vergil hides his pain under a mask of cruelty and hubris - since being honest means being vulnerable to him and that is something he's got a deep aversion to.

Current Verge has dragged himself out of Hell in a crumbling body. If Dante hadn't "killed" him as Nelo Angelo, he probably would've never been free of his shackles with Mundus, but once again he was left for dead (even if not intentionally, I know Dante would have gone through all the layers of Hell to bring his brother back, but VERGIL doesn't know that). Once again, Vergil had to muster all his will, his power, his demonic heritage to drag himself out of that godforsaken place.

He didn't know Nero was his son, he just took Yamato back 'cause he didn't really had time to explain everything that was going on. Vergil was on the brink of death, it's not like he could think logically about everything he was doing and weight pros and cons. He needed to survive. That's what he does.

It's only when he separated his human and demon parts that he came to realize a bunch of things - because Vergil never really had time to do anything else other than surviving; and thinking too much, going over your feelings and past trauma, doesn't do anything good when you're stuck in survival mode (been there, done that).

After he gets both of his parts together and goes back to being Vergil, he knows a lot more than he did before, because V allowed his heart to feel and to process all that pain he didn't allow himself to process before - because if he did, he would probably break, like V himself was falling to pieces.

He knows his mother loved him. He knows it wasn't Dante's fault. He knows it was all a tragedy and no one is to blame - he knows he wasn't left there to die: Eva died trying to get to him. It honestly changes everything he's been thinking for the past 40 (if I'm not wrong...?) years.

That's why he wonders, if he was in Dante's place all those years ago, would that change something? And honestly, it probably would. Because everything Vergil did was from a wound he couldn't bring himself to heal from that fateful night.

Therefore, current Vergil is a lot more accepting to his feelings - but internally only, he won't let it show. He also understands his thing of wanting to surpass Dante wasn't his brother's fault and it's something he has to work on.

Not saying he won't be a little bitch sparring with Dante all the time and keeping score over stupid stuff, because that's EXACTLY how these two function - but now Vergil is fueled by healthy sibling rivalry and fun instead of inferiority complex and pain/hatred.

Vergil's path is a lot similar to Anakin from Star Wars: fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate and hate leads to the Dark Side of the Force. If the Jedi Council had understood Anakin's upbringing as a slave, his deep love for his mother - and for all the beings on the Universe, I argue, because he did want to become a Jedi to free all slaves - his overflowing empathy, his deep feelings, his love for Padmé, etc., Anakin wouldn't find himself vulnerable to the grooming of an older man who saw all this and took the opportunity to twist it all to make him feel pain, fear, anger and hate.

If Qui-Gon Jin had trained Anakin he would've never turned to the Dark Side, I will DIE on this hill and fight EVERYONE, even if I love Obi-Wan

Star Wars ramblings aside, that's Vergil in a nutshell. And I think with him older, currently, he can finally see all of that, because he had a chance to be just demonic, as Urizen, and just human, as V - noticing how everything that happened to him shaped him to feel pain, fear, anger and hate, doing desperate things to protect himself and feel safe.

I argue Vergil hasn't felt safe for a single day in his whole lifetime, and that matters. Because in the end, that's how I write him: a wounded stray dog who knows only pain and hatred from the outside world.

If you try to approach him, he'll first bare his teeth, bark and try to bite you - not because he's mean, but because he's stuck in survival mode and that's his first response to ANYTHING. Just like a wounded stray, you have to approach carefully, offer kindness and show him you're not there to hurt him.

And just like a stray dog, he'll eventually melt and accept that kindness - he just has NO IDEA how that feels like.

✨What about Nero's mother, I hear you ask?✨

Hahahaha so that one I have some doubts myself. I often imagine two scenarios and I still haven't chose one of them to satisfy my heart HAHAHAHA

That might be me projecting, of course, but because of ALL THAT, I don't see Vergil as being open to relationships and one night stands - he takes things too seriously, and that's part of his character.

He either decided to try it out empirically with a one night stand with someone who was kind to him and he wanted to understand that kind of experience to understand himself better and out of curiosity (look, I know this sounds crazy, but that's exactly what I did on my first kiss with a super random guy at a party and I was like "oh, well, that's not for me, I'm gonna stick to kissing people I love, this sucks" and it took a weight off my shoulders)

oooooor he was treated with kindness for the first time in his life and that broke him for a while, he melted under a soft touch and gentle words and couldn't resist trying out new experiences he only had by proxy from his books - and when he woke up next morning, he was reminded how broken he is, how powerless, how not worthy of love not even from his own mother, and left because that would lead to nowhere. Because of him. Because he wasn't worth it - she probably fell for his looks, his heritage, his outside, but when she knew his inside she would run in horror.

Again, Vergil has a lot of issues, the poor man.

When I'm writing Nemesis, we have young Vergil - laser focused on power, proud as fuck, stepping over anything and everything to get what he wants, because life favors the ones who survive. The weak ones should die, that's the law of the jungle and he won't waste his time saving those who can't do it for themselves like he did for himself. When he sees the reader struggling to keep fighting him to protect others, he sees not only Eva, but himself in a will of a survivor who will go through excruciating pain to save themselves. He values that and admires that - admiring the reader as an enemy and having utmost respect.

When he's older, he's trying. And he has a LOT to learn - but his partner has to understand he's the stray dog who knows nothing but harshness. Vergil is quiet, methodical and disciplined, knowing how to live only with himself as company. But now he has a family: he has his brother back, he has a son, he has the whole crew to live alongside him. That's new, harrowing and comforting at the same time.

So, when in doubt, think about how a wounded animal would react - and how you would have to act to be able to approach and help.

Vergil, differently from Dante, is forever stuck in survival mode and has forsaken his humanity so he could keep going. As a younger man, he's ruthless and won't spare efforts to get what he wants because he is desperately trying to not feel vulnerable and worthless as he usually feels. As an older man, he's trying - in his own stupid Mr. Darcy way - to recover, to understand himself better and finally heal that horrible wound in his heart.

But of course. He is still proud, observing, regal and prone to overkill here and there and showing off his skills. These are all inherent to his personality.

(Also. Vergil enjoys some dumb fun sometimes - he only lets it show a tiny little bit when competing with Dante over ANYTHING. If Dante says he can eat a cheeseburger in three bites, Vergil will go above and beyond to eat it in two. Everyone thinks he's just being stupidly competitive with Dante and wants to win against his brother no matter what, but that's just his way of being fun)

Phew! That's quite a lot on the blue devil! Hahaha it isn't everything I keep in mind - of course there are the other things like him being reserved, more on the quiet side, intellectual, methodical, a lover of beauty (like literature, philosophy, poems, etc.), stupidly independent... But I think those traits are more "worldwide" known.

If you take all his trauma and how it affected him into consideration, I think, his personality follows easily. You understand a lot better how he would react in certain situations - in the end, that's what being a writer is all about: creating characters and watching how all of them react to situations given their backgrounds and baggage!

I'm so sorry it's such a HUGE answer, but I do hope it helps. There's a lot to unpack and I didn't want to just "oi, he's a traumatized asshole, that's it" - because you miss the nuances if you just work with that perspective.

Thanks a lot for asking, though, I had fun writing this little essay on Vergil, the man, the myth, the legend HAHAHAHAHAHA

Hope you have a nice weekend and have fun writing!! If you need any advice, even on writing in general, you can always ask me again! As you can see, I'm happy to help and I do love sharing what I know xD

#polaris speaks #asks #answered asks #anon ask #vergil #vergil sparda #character analysis #character breakdown #one hell of a breakdown apparently I had one too while writing this HAHAHAHA #so sorry anon for the essay but like Vergil I don't speak too much in real life but if someone asks me to write OH BOY #I'm only shutting up next month #also I do have a character sheet I downloaded ages ago that I ALWAYS use to create my original characters and stories #it helps a lot to write after filling it up #so if you guys are interested I can share the main topics that help the most when writing/understanding characters #also anon feel free to share your writing with me when you're done!! I'll be happy to see it!

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hypaalicious · 1 year

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Why I think Nocturne is way better than the OG Castlevania series

Sorry, when I try to shut up about this show I be like

so here’s my unsolicited, highly biased word vomit that will contain spoilers at the end (but those will be under a cut) so read at your own risk! Okay, leggo

It’s actually diverse.

One thing about high fantasy is that it’s almost always Eurocentric. Even if it’s not set in Europe, the characters are gonna inexplicably have British accents because we associate that with high fantasy. We’re gonna have European style “old” clothing choices. And if everyone isn’t white, they might as well be because they’ll only throw in a couple ambiguously brown side characters and call it a day. Or if they make a main character a POC then best believe everyone around them will be white.

Nocturne, tho? Oh, you can tell it’s made with more than just a sprinkle of representation. They didn’t just make Olrox indigenous, they tied his Aztec lineage in beautifully. Annette was a slave but it’s not flattening her character because of it. Drolta came to slay but even she has her authentic background. Which leads me to my next point!

The Black characters especially are done tastefully.

Like… don’t get me wrong. I love Isaac. He was the only reason I stayed tuned into Castlevania past season 1, LMAO! But his backstory felt like straight trauma porn cooked up by a non-Black person who wanted an excuse to see a Black man whipped for character development.

Zodwa Nyoni wrote some episodes for Nocturne and she put her FOOT in it. When it came to addressing Annette’s time as a slave, her connection to the Orisha through her bloodline… I was gobsmacked at how accurate everything was and now I know why LOL! Like, for me, it’s always gonna be hard to see slavery in fiction but I can’t say shit bad about how it was tied into everything in this show. Annette’s ancestors play such a huge part in her growth and it just warmed my heart to see a Black girl whoop some colonizer ass without it feeling hamfisted. 🥹

The token relationship is the cishet one, everyone else is gay asf

I love that trope flipped on it’s head, ngl LMAO! I, by default, HC everyone as bi anyway but MAN was it nice to see Olrox and Mizrak speedrun enemies to lovers and a hint of Drolta’s devotion/gayness to Erzsebet.

I know the majority of my fictional character thirsting leans male but don’t get it twisted; I jump for JOY for gay shit in media 😂 The only reason I don’t thirst as hard for female characters is because I prefer my men fictional but my women real.

That being said, this series sent me into bi panic and I’d like to be manhandled in a room by Drolta and Olrox.

Nocturne’s first season plays out neater than the OG’s first season.

Like… okay. My main beef with the OG series was that after they defeated Dracula, the rest of the show felt like a meandering fanfic. Sure, there were a few badass moments, but the energy kinda faltered for me and I was bored with a lot of it. I hope they don’t do the same with Nocturne; they left off at a nice cliffhanger which builds anticipation for the next season and… idk it feels more cohesive already? They coulda speedran kicking Erzsebet’s face in like the OG trio did to Dracula but I’m so glad they left us a lil something to look forward to.

Alucard’s glow up >>>>>

I’m chronically online but I’m so glad I went into this series blind because the way I GASPEDT when he showed up at the end

Like damn for the past fifty-leven years he was in that castle by himself going “do I wanna talk to Sypha and Trevor plushies again or do I wanna make myself even more of a bad bitch?” Then he chose the latter, went to the salon, got his hair bleached platinum along with some sew in extensions for volume, beat his face with Fenty, and said “sorry Drolta but there can be only one vampire baddie on this earth and hunny I’m TAKIN IT”

He looks more like his video game design this way too, which I love! I hate that he took out Cuntress McSlay tho 😔 Drolta I will always love you!!

Mmkay. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to start a cult to Olrox real quick. Erzsebet ain’t the only god walking the earth and I feel he just needs good marketing!

#I don’t know what to do until season 2 😩#there’s just so much I want to see but I have to WAIT #Annette is badass now but I know her character development bout to go CRAZY #her and Richter gone have biracial babies just watch!!#wonder what her ancestors gone think about her being with a colonizer tho 👀#ah well Richter will treat her right I know it #oohhh I bet her locs will be down her back by the end of this series #Richter better get his long hair too!!#castlevania nocturne

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itsniceoutside2day · 1 year

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long unplanned John Constantine thought vomit because I’m hyper fixated GO-

In my opinion I don’t think John really works in the new 52 world. Johns been thrown in this world of super humans and monsters and John at the end of the day is just a guy with some magic under his belt. The reason why I feel John doesn’t really work fundamentally now is because some of the story’s he’s in are more focused on these big and powerful events that are good vs evil with these other super humans when John should be in story’s that are with other people about cult/demonic entities with global or personal issues mixed in. John was in story’s that talked about the aids epidemic, homophobia, fucking Margret thatcher, Vietnam war, racism, neo-nazis, and then would also tie it in with personal issues like trauma, depression, suicidal ideation, sex, and drugs and then in the same breath would sprinkle in some supernatural to help keep the story moving and interesting.

Because John was made by vertigo he wasn’t really made with the dc superhero universe in mind and it shows because he’s not exactly powerful. Sure he has magic but it’s basic and more used as a tool than for fighting, and that’s where a lot of writers forget that his power isn’t his magic it’s his intelligence, he’s a con man above all else.

Honestly the best thing would be to take him back out of the current dc universe and give him his own, with the occasional crossover characters like swamp thing or Zatana or anyone else as long as they fit the rules of this universe (no Superman no Wonder Woman etc) I think a version of Raven would be an interesting side character to see in this hellblazer universe that wasn’t already in the vertigo roster. But this is just a thought I had and I don’t think dc Will ever do this.

Some of the smaller nic-picks are that John was punk as shit in almost every sense but now John kinda feels like… neutered and basic. Like he’s some times only used to be the comedic relief especially if it’s about his bisexuality. Old John didn’t really openly joke/talk about his bisexuality like he does now it was always pretty much hinted at (and I could go on all day about how queer coded this man is). And honestly while that’s one of the things I wished the old comics explored more that doesn’t mean I like how the new comics are now. let John be the little uncensored whore (respectfully) he’s always been and still be sarcastic, cynical, and self deprecating old man.

Rant over I’m sorry to anyone who decided to read through all of that

#hellblazer #john constantine

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misscammiedawn · 1 year

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Penlight Spoiler Reviews (Sayori Part 2)

Download Penlight (Pay what you like) from Itch.io here

Past reviews: Quick Review - Nozomi Routes - Sayori (Part 1)

Turq's reviews: Hiroko Robot - Hiroko Tickling - Nozomi Zombie

So... last time we met with Sayori and turned her into a Doll.

This time we're going to discuss the impact of Personality Play on a person and outright give Sayori dissociative identity disorder. As a person diagnosed with DID and a victim of personality play abuse I have a lot to talk about on this topic. I hope you don't mind me being a little over-indulgent.

CW: The Alter route will discuss topics of IRL hypnotic abuse and the long-term effects of personality play on a person's psyche as well as perspectives of how DID presents in my personal experience. I put the reality segments in italics to help people skip over them.

ALTER ROUTE:

Note that the name I refer to the Alter by in this review is the name I gave her. It is not even remotely canon. Aiko, Megumi and Yuri are the default names given by the game. Please do not take the naming convention I used to reflect DeMille's authorial intent. I use it mostly to match the screenshots and give some more pump to a narrative twist.

The first half of the review contains some seeds of discussion topics that I want to grow out so I highly recommend reading that one.

This route is my biggest hypnotic trauma being played out in visual novel format. I'll sprinkle my thoughts on the reality within the fiction. I'll put the reality pieces in italics if you want to skip them.

So if the Doll Route is based on the concept of boundaries and respecting someone's comfort then the Alter route answers the age old question of "What if your hypnotist were hit by a bus" that is to say, what are the impacts of going about your life with dangerous and permanent programming still in your head?

I suppose another theme would be one I vibe with intently. "Be careful who you entrust your mind with"

Sayori asked "what's the worst that could happen?" at the start of his hypnosis scene. Sayori, always so careful to think about things before committing takes her time with the doll suggestion. What if she didn't advocate for herself and set up firm barriers?

"What's the worst that could happen?"

Alter Route is a winding map of many paths and much of it is still yet to be written. The route begins with Sayori being asked to adopt a carefree persona who hates to study (and has a crush on Kyou). He also specifies that this persona will have no idea that Sayori even exists.

You, the player, are given a prompt to provide her a name.

I called her Sapphire. First playthrough and so shall again for this review. I picked that name with intent. I'm still not 100% sure it was a good idea, but I did.

Is it because of the alliteration? The blue hair? My referring to my hypnotic eyes as having a "sapphire flame"?

I said that this route was my biggest hypnotic trauma being played out on the screen?

In 2003 a dumb 19 year old met a man online named AW. AW saw that teenager's mind was fertile ground for character play. He planted a couple of alters in that kids head but none were as beloved nor as important as his little recruitment doll. His "slave" (oh how I have grown to hate that word) who he trained to bring him pretty girls...

The name I feel comfortable with in this current era of my life is Dawn. I prefer people call me Dawn when I am in this headspace, though I don't mind being called Camden and can tolerate being called Cammie when it is said by someone affectionate of us as an individual. But I am fractured. Diagnosed with DID in 2023. I type about it every now and again.

He called me Sapphire.

It was the name of a roleplay character... I even have Sue-Chan art commissioned of her. I have another piece at my bedside desk and have had it much of my adult life.

I have done a lot of thinking on if my DID is a result of this extensive play or if my DID simply made my mind more susceptible to it. The question is moot for the most part but I have found comfort in believing that there were elements of our heart which we were unaware of at a young age...

And AW reached in and found those elements within us. He found the part of us that was unburdened by sexual or gender repression and was able to personify our hypnosis obsession in a way we simply could not otherwise. He saw it. He identified it. Named it... Then dared to claim ownership of it.

In the game, Sayori takes to the suggestion swimmingly. She embodies the traits of this alter personality. She becames [Sapphire]. Giggling and acting shy around her beloved Kyou, she demands a tour of the house and Kyou becomes increasingly concerned that this act is going a little too far and you are given your first option.

For simplicity's sake I'll divide the path into 3 distinct branches (I made up the names for clarity as they do not have names on the official route tree):

Golden Ending - In which Sayori is woken up in Kyou's room and is so freaked out by the lack of memories between going into trance and waking up that much like Doll Route she refuses to let Kyou hypnotize her until she feels confident of the safety. In this route [Sapphire] does not come out ever again.

Day Lost - In which Kyou does not wake Sayori up and lets [Sapphire] go home and spend a night at home and isn't woken up until the next day at school. In this route Sayori's trust is broken enough that she seeks Nozomi's help, not Kyou's in saving her from this situation.

Week Lost - In which Kyou does not wake Sayori up and instead he decides outright to program [Sapphire] to be the dominant persona and avoid detection from the outside world.

For the Golden Ending there are a number of prompts during Sapphire's (let's drop the bracket gimmick and just call her that, it's better than saying Alter Sayori over and over) brief stint where you are given the option of bringing Sayori back and after she is justifiably upset about waking up mid-conversation in a different room you are given an option to summon Sapphire again.

I like that the chaotic nature of the initial encounter allows a number of options to go between what essentially are the options of "let Sayori exit Kyou's room" or "let Sapphire exit Kyou's room", especially as Kyou himself is making a decent number of assumptions about Sayori and her willingness to go along with the suggestion.

Kyou is a very big believer in the idea that a person's willingness to obey a suggestion is equivalent to a person's consent to the suggestion. This is because Kyou is a dumb kid and he is playing with fire.

If he does not try to force Sayori to calm down by imposing the carefree persona upon her she will accuse Kyou of projecting his infatuation of Nozomi onto her and become frustrated that he would dare override her core traits with such dangerous programming.

She notes that hypnosis shouldn't make her act the way she clearly was acting and admits this requires further study after cram school. She insists Kyou dedicate himself to further study on the topic too.

His study, which to his credit he does commit to, comes up empty. He believes Sayori is in denial that part of her yearns to be carefree and act as Sapphire had.

Sayori does her own research and...

Sayori is best girl.

She admits herself foolish for going along with it but is committed to the science of understanding what is happening to her. As a test she tries to resist Kyou's sleep suggestion but when she put her head on the pillow she was compelled to sleep deeply. She could not stop it. No matter how hard she tried.

She recognizes that the best hypnotists in the world could not do as Kyou has done.

Kyou gets defensive and starts a fight which escalates. At present you only have the option to apologize but there is a greyed out option for future in which you can bring Sapphire back.

I'm interested in seeing that path in the future.

After the pair talk it through Sayori thinks to involve Nozomi as a third party consultant. She wants to see if Kyou's hypnosis is as powerful on anyone or if it is just her and she knows Nozomi will instantly agree to this.

Sayori is a bad friend. In Doll route she refused to allow Nozomi to interfere with the hypnosis but in this route she weaponizes her knowledge of Nozomi's hypnosis fetish in order to have someone to test on. Even the safest penlight hypnosis has the potential for danger and it's hard to reconcile her involving Nozomi, even in a route where Kyou has proven himself not a shithead.

After school they test the penlight on Nozomi.

and it confirms in Sayori's mind the hypothesis that the penlight is odd and makes hypnosis act in ways it shouldn't. She even notes that the CIA have been trying to do what Kyou has managed for decades and a random high school kid accidentally stumbles on it.

Sayori really hates how Kyou just bumbles into success when she has to fight so hard to scrape by.

Now in the Nozomi route I mentioned that the timelines are pretty rigid for Sayori and to a lesser extent Hiroko. Sayori has cram school every day except for Sunday (which is a day taken by Hiroko's tennis tournament) and much of the Doll route requires maneuvering around study club, an optional obligation, and cram school which is necessary or she will be contacted by her father.

The other Alter routes will involve consequences for Sayori's grip on her responsibilities relaxing a little. Here she is still trying to be everything she should be while dealing with this extra stress.

That all said, she rushes out of the scene when Kyou finished the simple down and up with Nozomi. She has to go to cram school. She vanishes so fast that Nozomi is left sitting at the table running her fingers along the table and processing the fact that a fantasy from her mind control stories just came true and it's all suddenly over.

So Nozomi, with an opportunity to make her fantasies come true, tries to convince Kyou that it would help Sayori out to do more tests. She insists that it is in Kyou's best interest and she promises that if Sayori is upset then she will take full responsibility. She gives Kyou as many outs as possible to tempt him.

You have to deny her twice.

If you accept then there's a rough draft of an unfinished path but it also provides the most Sleepyhead moment in the game.

I swear to heaven Sleepyhead is going to cosplay Nozomi Akemi at a hypnosis convention one of these days...

Turning her down is one of the most mature moments Kyou has in any route.

His crush has just begged him to do the thing this entire affair was for and he turns her down.

I'm proud of you Kyou. You're a good boy. Also Nozo truly cannot be trusted around hypnosis.

You're a lovely girl, Nozomi, but you're insatisable. We all love you for it. But you cannot be trusted.

Look back to the Doll Route and the thing with the culture festival application. Sayori ruins her relationship with Nozomi because he couldn't trust her around the promise of hypnosis or Kyou with the temptation of working with Nozomi.

It's interesting when we get to see these dramatic irony stings.

The next day Sayori turns up and tells him to destroy the penlight. If you refuse then Kyou will force Sapphire out again use her willingness to go along with Kyou to entrance her again and both deprogram Sayori and erase Sayori's memory and then the next day utilizes Nozomi's offer to test more to do the same with her. Alone again but he still have his penlight.

In the good ending. He uses the penlight to deprogram Sayori and destroys the penlight. The story cuts a few months later and Kyou has become a regular at Study Club and is picking himself up. He is treating Sayori's insomnia via therapeutic hypnosis and is truly thinking about becoming a real life hypnotherapist.

He also pulled off the culture festival and though Sayori was not involved, Nozomi kept him on his toes.

The pair have grown close and know a lot about one another's lives to the point of which Kyou asks Sayori on a date to an arcade and she is surprised that he would ask her to such a location and Kyou mentions her talking about how much she enjoyed arcades before high school.

Sayori notes that they may be having a date but she still is still moving if she gets into med school and they won't last long. Kyou acknowledges that it's worth enjoying the moment even if it doesn't pan out.

I love her.

Now this route involves erasing Sapphire in both good and bad ending. She barely got to exist. Less than 5 minutes into the world.

Shall we go back in time to that initial encounter and meet her now?

An interesting part of the Alter routes where Sayori and Sapphire are bouncing back and forth (intentionally or unintentionally) is that this is the only route that has "rules" to keep a track of.

Any time Sayori is turned into Sapphire or Sapphire is turned into Sayori there is a complete void between times that the Become... trigger was used.

Sapphire recognizes that she was given a trigger to have a "carefree and fun" persona installed and assumes that "Sayori" is the name of this. Any time someone calls her it she becomes more and more aware of the situation.

Another rule is that Sayori and Sapphire have a common history and this is a really interesting thing that instantly caught my attention and proved that DeMille understood the assignment and either studied dissociative identities or is quite capable of understanding how they are expressed.

There is nothing about Sapphire that isn't part of Sayori. She is not how Sayori would imagine someone without inhibitions or a caricature of a carefree person. Sayori simply remembered a younger point of her life when she used to visit the arcade with her father and how her life felt before she became weighed down by expectations and the stress of not being able to keep up with her studies.

Look up at those last two pictures. That's Sayori at the end of the Golden Ending and Sapphire at the start of the Alter path. That smile isn't unique to Sapphire. Sayori can smile like that too. She can visit the arcade and have fun. That is a huge part of the story that is being told here. There truly is nothing within Sapphire that doesn't already exist within Sayori. They share a beautiful blushing smile.

It's not fully developed as a story where this was the core of the tale would be but I think that is something that makes it all the more effective. It's succinct. A concept I am completely blind to but I do like it when others pull it off. I am not saying that Sapphire is 12 year old Sayori (well. My thoughts are more nuanced than that at least. We'll see what I mean a little later). I am saying Sayori was asked to conceptualize a carefree version of herself and Sapphire was constructed from the emotions that she was once familiar with.

Which makes for not just an effective story, but a reflection of reality.

AW met us from a roleplaying group. Sapphire was not the only character we played in those days. But she was the only hypnotist character. When we were a teenager we were deep into reading hypnotic theory. We burned through so many books between ages 16-25. But there's a difference between reading how to do a thing and doing it.

But Sapphire was a character and so in posts she would think about different types of inductions by their name and talk about things like convincers and depth signals. She spoke in a grandiose pattern. She was confident. In charge. Dominant.

I don't know how many people AW had us hypnotize but he recognized that we did not have the confidence to do so when we were lucid. But in Sapphire's headspace there was no filter, no cogs turning... it was fluid. A person who knew their stuff, believing they knew their stuff... no delay, no bravado. Was I what I imagined a hypnotist to be or was I just a version of myself unburdened by a shame of kink, a fear of eroticism, any notion that this was not who we were and what we were built for.

I recall in the 2010s when my friend group met "me" in my iteration at the time... there was no hypnosis that time. Just a call from the heart to fill a void in a tabletop scene. Our playable character was transformed into the personality of a femme fatale and we needed to act as her with no time to prepare. We closed our eyes and reached inward. Sapphire is not the shape we sought but it was the shape that reached up and took control in that moment.

We think about that moment a lot. I took the name "Honoria" that day. The shape of "me" had changed. I wonder what shape I was before AW got a hold of me. Sapphire existed before AW... but he poisoned her. Changed her into something else. It makes me wonder what experiences, emotions and memories forged me. I wasn't always here. But now I am...

And I don't just disappear in silent moments or the years between activty.

I'm also a sucker for rules in storytelling and so when things like which name is spoken out loud or the trigger is used I am keeping these things in mind. I wanted to mention that early as it plays in as we go.

So Kyou does not bring back Sayori and Sapphire laughs about how Kyou's hypnosis must have failed when he calls her "Sayori" and she does not recognize the name.

And with Kyou's negligence on full display, Sapphire heads out of the house, not even recognizing her own name. He assumes she'll just snap out of it when the situation calls for it. He doesn't realize the level of distress that can be caused by leaving someone in a literally "altered" state interact with the world and their life.

We used to call it "channeling". Evidence had shown that hypnosis could let our younger self do things that they couldn't do in an unaltered state. Eventually they started to lean into it. At work. In intimate situations. When they needed to perform. When they needed to play a character, to push through barriers of fear and doubt. Close your eyes. Let yourself enter a flow state. Become the person you need to be...

We were already a transgender woman pretending to be a man. This just made us a transgender woman pretending to be a man needing to pretend to be other people just to function in basic life tasks. It felt pathetic. It felt so alienating from my sense of self. I didn't identify with my body or my mind. In seeking ego death we hypnotically abused ourselves to the point of which we were just an idea of a person who had a legal name that didn't feel like our own...

I did this to myself, I would think.

The next day Sapphire ambushes Kyou at the gate. He notes it's odd but he's just happy there's someone happy to see him.

Kyou doesn't realize this is the alter personality and calls her Sayori, convincing her that Kyou is still trying to make the hypnotic compulsion from the previous day work.

Kyou's reply is not to tell her to Become Sayori again. It is to panic about what Sapphire will do when she hears the wrong name being spoken by the teacher and her friends...

In his defense, Sapphire did scold him in trying to trigger her in a public place.

But he still prioritizes a comfortable landing for Sayori over the danger of allowing Sapphire to run rampant.

This priority is the source of much of the drama in the One Day situation.

During class people do infact call Sapphire "Sayori" and she is horrified and confused by it.

We are given two options.

"It's a prank" - Change her back

We'll focus on change her back for now and come back later for "It's a prank". After all. Kyou may be able to tell himself that he is prioritizing Sayori's safety and doesn't want to wake her up to a public setting but the longer he puts this off the more distress both Sayori and Sapphire will be in.

It would be irresponsible to actively encourage this situation to continue by gaslighting or worse programming a woman in distress to lean into her altered headspace to avoid confronting the reality of the other persona being upset when they wake up.

...so let's have Kyou bring Sayori back.

Penlight hypnosis causes the hypnotee to blank out entirely. We saw this directly in the "Reversal" route. This counts for altered states too. We had seen it when Sayori woke up suddenly in Kyou's room and we saw her reaction to it in the Golden Ending path.

Imagine how terrified she would be waking up a day later with no memories of her night. Knowing that some other version of herself had lived a day in her life. Spoken to her parents. Attended school. Acted as if it were here.

The sentiment makes her sick to her stomach.

Sometimes in our emails and chatlogs we find little bits of evidence of our actions and behaviors, areas of the internet we had posted in with no recollection, even after system discovery.

AW had Sapphire make her own Yahoo account to send messages from, I have the sign-up email in my inbox. When I saw it my blood froze cold. I still do not know the password and it has been locked from my attempts to get in. It terrifies me to think of all the things I would see if I managed to get in.

I don't think I can describe the powerlessness and vulnerability that comes when you realize that the continuity of your own experience has been disrupted and even in the face of evidence you're unable to reconcile it. You know that it was you. You cannot deny that. But it still remains alien. You have no memory at all of the situation or scenario. It makes you feel so hopeless and untethered.

She takes it fairly well, given the circumstances.

Sayori retreats to the rooftop club ordering Kyou to stay the hell away from her. She is beyond terrified.

Kyou, being Kyou, instantly starts internally pouting about how he is not at fault for how people take his hypnotic suggestions and that it is unreasonable to blame him when hypnosis cannot force someone to do something they didn't want to do.

Typical Kyou stuff.

He does note he should have been better about safety and beats himself up a little about his mistake, though.

From here the school week continues on with Sayori avoiding Kyou. She instantly speaks to Nozomi, someone she knows can help her with matters of hypnosis. Nozomi even gives Kyou a firm talking to and tells him in no uncertain terms "you hurt my friend. You have to atone. On her terms, not yours."

Nozomi is wonderful. She really gets to shine in this route as she is the voice of ethics in hypnokink. Ironic, given how quickly she throws that all away when she has an opportunity to go under for herself but she knows her stuff, she knows her ethics.

It speaks to how much a person can let their own safety disappear when they are given opportunities to play. I'm certain all the older members of the hypnosis community had some brushes with dangerous individuals due to their own level of self-neglect.

But Nozomi does know what ethics are and she wants to protect her friend. She does a fantastic job of it.

She acts as a mediator and invites Kyou to her house the following day so that Sayori has a safe space to work out what the heck is going to happen next.

At Nozomi's house they gather together and Nozomi lets Kyou have it, she all but screams at him.

(Nozomi and I share a soapbox)

The rant Nozomi gives on ethics at this point is one of the highlights of the game for me and not just because of my connection to the reason she's yelling. She speaks passionately about how ethical hypnosis is performed, she uses the word "hypnotee" several times (proof that DeMille is read up as the fictional space and public consciousness tend to favor "subject") and notes how Satoshi, the senior from last year's show, had performed correctly.

Nozomi's anger at Kyou is something that reminds me of a number of my close friends in the best possible ways.

Sayori even notes that she is certain Kyou meant no harm and that she forgives him. Nozomi's reply is "Not until he gets on his hands and knees"

Better be careful, Sayori. Nozo is coming for your "best girl" crown.

Sayori is Sayori though and she is not going to submit herself to deprogramming hypnosis without understanding the situation in full and having control over how the matter is handled. This may not be the consent/rapport version of Sayori's story but she is still the same woman. Well, Sayori is anyway.

Sayori notes that the level of control that Kyou has demonstrated matches years of conditioning with a hypnotist and shouldn't be replicated with 2 sessions worth of trance.

AW and I met in 2003. I broke it off with him in 2010...

Sayori wants to understand the rules and pontificates that if they are as she thinks then if Sapphire came out she would not recall anything between the last time the trigger was used and the present moment. Sayori is also certain if she heard the trigger phrase she would be incapable of resisting it.

To prove this she asks Kyou to use it.

And it works. Sapphire returns, giggling at the magic trick of Kyou teleporting her from school to Nozomi's house. She's just delighted to be out of class. She is hypnotically compelled to hate studying after all...

Sapphire takes it all in stride and seems to have no qualms with Nozomi's presence, outright saying that she assumes Nozomi invited them over because of her "hypnosis-loving giddiness". Sapphire knocks Nozomi off her balance by outright identifying her fetish and laughing at how Kyou clearly picked up on it too.

All Kyou needed to do was say "Become Sayori" again and the scene would be over, hypothesis confirmed. Alas, what can go wrong must go wrong and Nozomi's mother enters the scene and Kyou prioritizes the comfort of Sayori waking up in an awkward position over her safety.

He convinces Nozomi to let the conversation play out and just trigger Sayori when the mother has gone. Right? Sorted.

A small chat turns into lunch.

Lunch stretches on and Sapphire starts talking it up. We learn a little more about Nozomi's board game hobby and the fact she has a secondary friend group she plays games with on some evenings.

Sayori's phone goes and Sapphire excuses herself to answer it... and then goes missing.

The next sequence is a lovely wild goose chase of Nozomi and Kyou unable to find Sapphire (her phone is turned off!) and worrying that Sayori's father referred to her as "Sayori" and Sapphire worked out she's the installed personality and ran off to prevent anything happening to her.

Remember how I said the timelines of the game are rigid. Saturday is a good day for this to happen. Sunday is Hiroko's tournament after all...

...and Saturday is cram school for Sayori...

Her dad was upset she wasn't there and Sapphire, hypnotically induced to hate studying, hung up on him and turned off her phone and ran off to have fun.

The goose chase has some wonderful characterization of Kyou and Nozomi bickering, a brief Hiroko cameo and some character history for Sayori.

They find Sapphire at the arcade. In every route, as noted by the ending of the Golden Ending, Sayori has fond memories of going to the arcade with her father prior to high school and she was actually remarkably good at video games and found them relaxing fun.

Sapphire is just built from that feeling after all.

I do not know how much research DeMille did in this route. Turq told me in reading blog entries (this specific route was written this year) that DeMille was not happy with how this route was written and I was surprised to hear that. As a person with DID and former victim of personality play abuse I felt the nuances were handled remarkably well.

One of the theories of DID (which is a dramatically contested topic in psychology. I should do a post on the 3 major theories that are kicked about someday) is based on Attachment Theory. In child's psychology they are developing aspects of identity, self and personality which are typically reinforced by their relationship to caregivers and the stability of their environment.

Attachment Theory posits that while the child is developing they come to have subconscious expectations of their environment based on how they are treated that cause a level of anxiety and avoidance with Secure Attachment being low anxiety/avoidance and Disorganized Attachment being high levels of anxiety/avoidance. Disorganized Attachment is more than just anxiety/avoidance, though. It comes from unstable environments where the child cannot reliably act in a certain way to get their needs met. Caregivers and authority figures do not respond well either via abuse or neglect (for instance an alcoholic mother may be violently and angry towards a child at night and then loving and apologetic in the morning) leaving the child feeling confused and afraid and unable to rely on stable protection and affection. Thus the personality and stable sense of self does not develop as the child is not modeled a correct way to behave, leaving them without a stable core.

Add in some cPTSD to the mix and you get some fun stuff happening in the brain.

Incidentally Disorganized Attachment is something that comes up in the development of BPD (which includes Identity Confusion as a diagnostic criteria) as well, which is why some psychologists believe that DID is just BPD with extra steps. As I said it's a contested field.

That all is to say that Sayori's relationship with her parents is strained. They are always working, something she and Kyou bond over, and she herself is busy to the point of breaking trying to live up to their expectations. Maybe I'm just headcanoning it but Sayori and her father clash a lot when Sapphire goes against his wishes.

So it is truly remarkable to me that Sapphire regressed to the point in her life when she used to visit the arcade and play games with her father. Sayori always refers to him as "father" and (in this route) Sapphire always refers to him as "daddy". I chose to put weight on that, even if it's not intended by the author.

Every one of her routes this love of video games exists but you'd never see it if she didn't have a reason to let it shine. It's not that she's ashamed of it. She just cannot be the person she was before and it's part of the reason she resents Kyou. Kyou can just take it easy and coast without even trying. She's sacrificing SO MUCH and cannot even feel confident about her ability to succeed.

Sapphire just takes the weight of that responsibility off of her.

Oh it's been a while since I used a photo. I got caught up talking about psychology stuff. I do that sometimes. Here. Have a Sayori kicking Kyou's butt at Street Fighter!

Sayori decides that this proves her theories about the penlight hypnosis without a shadow of a doubt and requests Kyou allow her to hypnotize him with it.

She does so at Nozomi's home and much like the Nozo-Reversal route we have a quick blank out from the induction to 20 minutes later. Nozomi and Sayori worked hard to be safe about their suggestion and we witness one of the most interesting scenes in the game from an ethics standpoint.

Kyou remains in trance and during this 20 minute window is forced to deprogram Sayori and remove Sapphire and sleep triggers from Sayori's mind.

We'll get more into the ethics of just erasing Sapphire in the final segment of this route...

Kyou argues that the penlight isn't a mind control device and Nozomi, clearly done with Kyou's denial and is about to get into an argument when Sayori steps in and notes how Kyou believes that the penlight is just a hypnosis tool and not a mind control device and if such were true then he would not obey any programming that he did not want to.

She orders him to break the penlight.

Kyou obeys.

But he fights the compulsion.

He fights it with all his might.

Seeing just how much he struggled in this scene reminds me of the ending of Nozo-Trance where Kyou commanded her to be his girlfriend. The penlight can overrule agency and in this moment Kyou cannot resist. He screams, begs the girls to stop, swears at them and cries out at the top of his lungs.

But he obeys.

Kyou is livid. Yelling at both girls that they had no right to subvert his will and destroy his hard work. He even threatens to build another one... and it is in this moment when...

Sayori hugs him and shares a moment of perspective. They had both been violated by the penlight and left to feel confused and afraid at the complete lack of control they each had in their own mind.

The ending to this route is actually rather positive. Sayori's father relents enough to let Sayori ease from her studies a little as it is clear that she had a burnout that erupted in her behavior during Sapphire's reign and that she was working better with full rest anyway.

Any Sayori route tends to include a note that moderation helps her more than obsessive study. Burnout will actually kill her but she needs to make the change from inside. She's a proud woman with a firm sense of control on her experience. She does not want to be told what to do, but she benefits a lack of pressure.

Kyou, Sayori, Hiroko and Nozomi start a D&D campaign together and Sayori finds an affinity for acting out characters in the setting.

Trust me, I can relate.

So this is what happens if Kyou wakes Sayori up on the school day after creating Sapphire.

...what happens if he didn't?

What happens if Kyou is arrogant enough to think Sayori is better as a carefree lady who hates to study?

What if Kyou decided he wanted to keep Sapphire?

"It's a prank" Route:

Every now and again I pull up my chatlogs with AW and one question plays in my head over and over again.

"How could I trust someone like this with my mind"

I pulled up chatlog and did a word search for "memory" to see if he ever did amnesia shenanigans with me. I found this exert:

AW: so she's pretty much wholly brainwashed at this point AW: her memory, personality, beliefs etc… are all customizable AW: she's got a second, deeper moral compass now. 'right' is what pleases master, and 'wrong' is what displeases master

As I read this all I could think was how did I let someone talk to me like that. How did any part of me accept that he could be allowed to mold us... it was such a violation.

If there is one thing I am grateful for it is that hypnosis in reality is not hypnosis in Penlight. The things AW commanded us to do were unconscionable. But we simply did not obey. But we did not run from him. It took him trying to make moves on people in our vanilla real life to make us break it.

If Kyou decides to trick Sapphire into thinking everyone is calling her Sayori as a prank, she instantly starts to threaten Sayori's entire career by complaining about study club and how much she hates school. Kyou doubles down.

Kyou doubles down in the worst way possible.

He hypnotizes Sapphire to always hear the name "Sayori" as Sapphire and to always unconsciously refer to herself in speech and writing as Sayori. By the absolute grace of DeMille Kyou remembers enough to make this suggestion in a way that saying "Become Sayori" will not be heard as "Become Sapphire". Though in my opinion the fact he even thought to close that loophole speaks to how unethical he is being right now. He knows what he is doing and is doing it anyway.

When Kyou is a little fuck he really makes me hate him...

During this hypnosis session Kyou starts thinking of Sayori as "Sapphire's other personality" before internally correcting himself to say "real personality".

That's one of the biggest themes of this route. "Real".

In the first two routes, Sapphire was a suggestion gone awry. Her autonomy (as well as a good use of "compartmentalized memories" in dialogue) is noted in the "Bring Sayori Back" (Day Lost) route but it is in this route that Sapphire and Sayori are treated as full dissociative identities.

Having just committed an atrocity on Sayori and helped smooth out any wrinkles in the personality he installed in Sayori's mind (that is commanded to have a crush on him), Kyou wakes her and she confesses her love. Kyou reciprocates.

Kyou's denial is legendary enough that if DeMille revealed he had a hypnotic compulsion to have the worst possible take in any scenario where the player isn't controlling the situation, I'd believe her.

Sapphire is all about the public displays of affection and starts being intimate and close to Kyou at school, pulling him to the rooftop club. There she mentions that she is dating Kyou and they are practicing hypnosis for the cultural festival.

Nozomi's hypnosis radar is pinged.

After Hiroko incredulously calls her bullshit, Sapphire doubles down and states that she is going to have a proper date with Kyou during the coming weekend. When reminded that mock exams are coming up and she should be studying, Sapphire happily says she will blow it off in order to spend time with her love <3

Nozomi's bullshit detector is pinged.

However, Nozomi is Nozomi. So she simply chimes in that as Class Rep it is her duty to help with the cultural festival and she must be involved in this hypnosis show. There is no options in this. They will attend Kyou's house tomorrow and there is no ifs or buts.

Sapphire also proves she cares about her friends and notes she is prioritizing Hiroko's tennis match for Sunday. Sayori is a good friend, even when her moral limitations and over-controlled behaviors are turned off.

Why, yes. I do know what I typed in the last review.

Have you considered Sayori is best girl, though?

Nozomi spends the day scripting out what will happen with the hypnosis session (no shenanigans, just scripting) and is enjoying herself but then Sapphire gets the phone call. Same time as it happened in the previous route. Sayori's father is livid that she is not at cram school. This time however we get to hear the argument and it is fairly pointed.

Sayori cannot avoid going in this route. It's interesting to note the differences between Sapphire without Kyou's reinforcing her presence in Sayori's mind and how she is here. The other Sapphire just hung up the phone. This one ended up going.

Nozomi excuses herself before noting "Sayori has never missed school. Not once. Not regular school of cram school."

She notes the discussion about second personalities and knows damned well what is going on here.

My beloved audience, behold! It is the thesis statement of this entire route. Also I will remind people of what Nozomi's first action is when she gets a hold of the penlight in Nozo-Reversal route.

There are so many times in this game where characters make overt ironic references to other routes. This is most certainly one of those moments.

After cram school Sapphire and Kyou meet up for their date and Sapphire talks about how she had intended on getting in a higher level high school but had not been able to be accepted elsewhere. She was happy to have Nozomi and Hiroko still in her life but it marks the moment that Sayori had become obsessed with study.

She visits the arcade and notes how she used to visit with her dad. Once again I note the fact that this Sapphire is less childish than the previous one. I feel the "Bring Sayori Back" Sayori was regressed to who she was before high school, referring to her father as "daddy" where here she calls him "dad" every time. Sayori always says "father".

Kyou's hypnosis has integrated Sapphire and Sayori and more importantly associated the memories, just not the behaviors. This Sapphire is an adult and she has full ownership over her actions during high school and has decided that she does not want to be that person anymore. She is happier like this.

Sapphire plays an arcade game and thanks Kyou for letting her "relive a happier time in her life" before dragging him down for dinner.

The two bond over their estrangement from their parents. Kyou is from a broken home with a father he barely sees and Sayori/Sapphire have a paramedic mother they barely see and a father who doesn't do anything to help anyone and Sayori/Sapphire disagrees with what he does and they argue about it.

She had wanted to become a doctor to make them proud even when they did not have economic advantage but Sapphire is not as sold on the idea. A doctor needs to keep up on study for their entire career. She has no interest in such a life.

Kyou starts to realize he is making a huge mistake and that programming Sayori to go against everything she stood for.

Finally realizing what Nozomi was trying to tell him before he realizes that he's done a horrible thing and tells her that they have to break up. He confesses everything. That he used hypnosis to change her personality, that he expected she would snap out of it, that he is going to throw her entire future down the drain and it's not right and they have to stop.

Then Sapphire pulls the rug out from under him.

We have just lost cabin pressure...

So you may have noticed that I was calling her by the alter's name this entire time.

The game text is still calling her Sayori and has been since we reprogrammed Sapphire to unconsciously hear the name Sayori as her own. Kyou has been calling her Sayori. The entire game up until now has been treating this character as if she is Sayori but with her personality adjusted.

This scene has the game switch the name card back to Sapphire.

She's known the whole time that she is the installed personality. She worked it out on the first day when people were calling her Sayori. The installed personality was supposed to be "carefree and fun-loving" and she sees those traits in herself. Therefore it stands to reason if she behaves in the way Kyou's hypnosis was supposed to make her act and people called her the wrong name then she is the one who Kyou created.

And she's okay with it.

Moreover she knows Kyou can just say "Become Sayori" and be done with it.

And she is NOT okay with that.

"What is this "real" business? I am as real as can be, Kyou. Do you mean to say I am not the original? That I am a creation that must be destroyed now that I have inconvenienced you?"

"Kyou, I am no parlour trick for you to put away once it has been used. I am real. I have lived a life."

"Do you... do you really think you have the right to take that away from me, Kyou?"

Sapphire explains she has existed as a feeling within Sayori for some time and that her experiences these past few days are her own and belong to no one but herself.

Flooding with tears she says that what Kyou calls "fixing" her is actually Killing her.

One thing I see argued back and forth in support groups is the concept of a core/original/real personality. Many therapists, especially those approaching from the perspective of the IFS model and expect there to be a "Genuine Self" waiting to emerge. I do not share this viewpoint and even if I did , how ethical would it be to assume the birth identity is the only valid one when we've been living as a woman for 3 years.

Even still... would "birth identity" and "the original" even be synonymous. I consider "birth identity" to be the boy from London, not the person in the stories we were told of our childhood.

I may not have full memory of my childhood but I am fully aware of the things the "little monster" did. I wasn't allowed to grow past it. Suspended from school 3 times, expelled once, hospitalized a kid by cracking his head on a concrete pillar, stole, broke into places, got brought home by the police a couple times. All before hitting 10 years old.

I do not know who that child my father would tell me stories about was. I don't identify with him. I do not feel him inside me. I am aware it was me who flooded the toilets, punched a teacher and broke into abandoned buildings.

I also remember the refrain in my head in those young years "don't be like them." I remember moments of oblivious bliss and moments of being consumed by an all powerful righteous fury in my heart. Simultaneously a happy child and an angry adult. Seeds that would grow into Cammie and Camden. Yet neither of those were my name... they wouldn't be for another 20 years.

When we transitioned. We didn't know we had DID. Camden had been running the system for a few years at that point and was finally able to express openly and outwardly... and so on days when we couldn't present femme our self-loathing and emotional volatility increased. We began to hate with a burning passion any expression of masculinity and our English heritage.

We began to hate our birth identity existing within us. We tried to erase him. End him.

It's actually a common practice for people going through gender transition. Here's a comic that makes the point more clearly than I ever could. See my tags for it? This comic convinced me exactly what the game is saying firmly. The Boy has a right to exist within our heart. We don't get to put him away just because he's not convenient to our gender expression anymore.

Kyou is told firmly that to erase Sapphire from Sayori would be murder and that Sapphire believes Kyou is a better man than that. She acknowledges this is a heavy topic and gives Kyou time to think. Our little idiot hypnotist is left completely out of his depth, forced to accept that he has given life to this alternate personality and such gifts cannot be revoked lightly.

What follows is a sequence at school where the rooftop gang gather and Hiroko stresses about her performance in the tennis tournament may impact her scholarship giving Sapphire the opportunity to show how carefree she is about scholarships. Nozomi confronts Sapphire with the knowledge that she is an installed persona and is horrified to find out that Sapphire not only knows this but does not care to be "fixed".

The conversation also bounces back and forth between using the names "Sayori" and "Sapphire" enough that Hiroko and Nozomi notice traces of Kyou's meddling. He confesses that he has programmed her to hear the name she is comfortable with whenever someone is clearly addressing her.

Nozomi is LIVID at hearing Kyou tried to mitigate harm by disguising it. She knows just how monstrous and unethical that is.

This is something that I fear isn't delved into enough within the ethical routes of the game. There are shadows of it here but I really feel like there needs to be a route that is specifically about owning mistakes.

As Turquoise pointed out in his NozoZombie review, a good hypnotist can still make no errors and still hurt a person. Kyou is entirely the type of person to utilize amnesia suggestions to bury mistakes and put things "right" but typically this only happens in the bad endings of routes.

I know too many people who played in the 2000s with dangerous hypnotists who crossed boundaries or made abreactions and tried to make the hypnotee forget rather than owning their mistake. I truly feel this is a topic that DeMille would knock out of the park if it were the sole focus for a storyline.

I also want to know that Sapphire's speech patterns at this point of the story are unique to her. Sayori has a grandiose way of speaking and the way that Sapphire talks is in character for Sayori but where Sayori's expanded vocabulary and wordy ways of speech is treated as her being a little loquacious, Sapphire embraces the concept of "eccentric", utilizing some phrases that she uses as a point of comfort such as "as you like".

Oh and as a British expat, I do love when I can feel DeMille's nationality bleed into this Japanese setting. It just makes me happy in the same way playing a 90s era RPG with American pop-culture references or seeing Brock eat a "jelly donut" would.

On the rooftop Nozomi caves in to despair, realizing that her friend is the one being killed. Sapphire insists that Sayori still exists within her mind but she has no reason to yield her existence to her. Nozomi's crying starts attracting attention and so Sapphire concedes that Sayori needs to be part of this conversation but it has to happen later in a safer place.

"Wait! Not here. And certainly not now [...] do you have any idea how Sayori will react were she to wake right now? In this place?"

Sapphire says that they need to perform the hypnosis in the privacy of the study club, where Kyou first hypnotized Sayori.

If you've not played this route yet, I want you to cast your mind back. Kyou did indeed hypnotize Sayori for the first time in the study club. This is a true statement.

But there's something odd about it, don't you think?

Kyou notices too but cannot quite identify what it is until Sapphire says that in order to make a safe landing spot for Sayori the conditions need to be perfectly replicated. Including Kyou and Sayori being alone in the room.

What is she scheming, I wonder?

After school Sapphire enacts her role as head of the study club and Kyou waits until afterwards to meet with her. Nozomi makes a final plea to bring Sayori back and tries to explain that Sapphire is not a real person and that the fact he can erase the hypnotic trigger is a proof of this fact. Kyou, who has spent time with Sapphire and recognizes her as a unique entity, disagrees.

Kyou's denial is legendary, though. Nozomi is making sense. She feels this "Sapphire" is simply Sayori following hypnotic programming, acting in the ways that Kyou told her to act and there is no separate individual. There is just programming that needs to be removed.

I like that this argument is left as a firm disagreement between Kyou and Nozomi. The ethics are dirty as can be in this situation. Kyou literally created a personality that is hypnotically compelled to love him. Earlier in the route Nozomi says that Sayori is "under duress" when Kyou says they are in love and that is right.

The situation has spun out of control and now the morality of it has become ungovernable. It is wrong for Kyou to permanently change Sayori into his girlfriend, it's the same situation as the endings where Kyou forces Nozomi to become his girlfriend. It is wrong to deprive Sayori of her autonomy, her life, her years of hard work.

Erasing Sapphire should be a cut and dry case.

But Sapphire is advocating for herself and does not consent to being erased. The whole situation boils down to whether or not you believe Sayori is following hypnotic conditioning or if Sayori and Sapphire are separate individuals with autonomy.

To add in further moral murkiness, Sapphire has come up with a scheme.

She will finish out her high school career pretending to be Sayori. Acting as a stuffy and studious woman, friend to Nozomi and Hiroko and stay away from her beloved Kyou. Earn their freedom by going through the motions and then after school is over she can return to Kyou and not have to worry about her parents or friends or society nagging about her behavior ever again.

Obviously that is an unacceptable circumstance.

Makes it easier to just ignore Sapphire's consent. She's not "real" after all...

But Sapphire is smart enough to know this may be the case and has selected the Study Club as the location of their hypnosis instead of Kyou's home.

That's the thing that was odd about the location. Kyou hypnotized Sayori in the study club for the sleep suggestion. Sapphire was created at Kyou's home.

She knows that if Kyou tries to bring Sayori back then he will be forced to manage the fact that she has lost 5 days of her life. Sapphire is so intent on living that she has put Kyou in a position where refusing her is disadvantageous. Sapphire is an evil mastermind when her back is to the wall.

In her mind to "include Sayori in this conversation" would be to destroy herself. Once she loses her ability to advocate for herself then Kyou would be the only one who could speak to Sapphire's autonomy and Sayori, Nozomi and Hiroko would never treat her as "real".

We know this. Nozomi said as much just before this meeting.

Sapphire admits, she has no right to demand this of Kyou (though she did think to put him in a position where refusing would end poorly) and that if he simply remembers her and keeps her in his memories then it could be enough.

You are then given the option to bring Sayori back or not.

Bring Sayori Back - Go Along with Sapphire's Plan

Should you go along with Sapphire's plan then she will have Kyou use a fake trigger to "bring back Sayori" and invite Nozomi to come into the room and begin acting out as if she were Sayori.

As soon as Nozomi comes in she keeps asking Sayori if she's okay. Telling Sayori that it's been 5 days. That Kyou hypnotized her.

Sapphire sells her role and is as livid and rigid as one would expect Sayori to be. Nozomi starts peppers every sentence with Sayori's name. Truly concerned about her friend.

Then Nozomi proves she is smarter than Kyou and knows her shit with hypnosis.

"Sayori" does not even react. She is hypnotically compelled to hear either name and internalize it as the name she should hear. Nozomi said Sayori every sentence in order to slip in a "Sapphire" and see how she reacts.

Sapphire fails to notice and Nozomi knows that the pair of them had lied to her...

In despair she once again cries for her friend to come back and Sapphire springs into action.

We get a timeskip to the final day of school. "Sayori" hangs out with her friends and Kyou remains a social parriah. Everything has gone "back to normal".

As they pile out of school Hiroko notes that Nozomi looks jumpy and just doesn't want to be there. Sapphire looks at Nozomi and assures her that she is amongst friends and she shouldn't be so tense. That if she had anything that was concerning her she could speak up and she would be happy to help her see things in a new light.

We flash back to the study club room.

Sapphire didn't use the penlight. She threatened to use the penlight.

She kept Nozomi in line via threats because she enjoyed watching the discomfort in her face whenever Nozomi was caught in the moral quandry of doing something or not fighting against this injustice. Sapphire gets off on having power over people and making them stew in discomfort.

Full credit to @spiralturquoise for pointing out that in the doll route there is a moment where Kyou has a thought box where he is convinced Sayori is enjoying his discomfort.

I am convinced that Sayori in every route enjoys watching people in moments of discomfort. It certainly explains her reactions to NozoZombie's stage show and why she makes the best audience member to be watching the events.

There are actually a number of little bits of foreshadowing in other routes. In one route Hiroko even jokes about how "we don't need two Sayori's around here". I look forward to replaying the game and catching the little asides.

DeMille has a very firm idea of who these characters are and is so gifted at maintaining their internal consistency. More impressive given how each character is dramatically altered when they interact with the penlight.

The bad ending concludes with Sapphire reuniting with Kyou andf starting their new life together with her performing a little bit of jabbing at him to see his own discomforted face contort as he struggles against the morality of his actions.

This ending has Kyou and Sapphire break off from the world and alienate themselves from family and friends to dive into a life consumed by one another. I find that this is one of the more intriguing fail conditions of the routes. Isolation is a big theme of all the bad endings. Whether Kyou ends up ostricized due to his misdeeds, sacrifices connections with the girls for what he feels is the safest option or is consumed by a hollow life where kink has consumed everything.

The doll bad ending is of a similar calibur where Sayori has no cares or interests outside of how wonderful hypnosis feels and so Kyou finds a full time job in maintaining a hypnojunkie and his life entirely becomes about catering to those needs.

Intimacy and connection is the good end. Isolation, even when alone together, is a bad end.

But that's a bad end. Let's bring Sayori back instead.

Kyou's lip trembles and he mumbles out his apologies. Sapphire just smiles back and closes her eyes in acceptance.

"You... You need to Become Sayori again."

Sayori wakes up and is stunned, scared and confused. Nozomi rushes in to hug her friend and they go to Kyou's home in order to sort things out. It was where the suggestion began and thus it seemed prudent to handle it there.

Nozomi and Kyou explain everything and Sayori listens and absorbs. She is numb by the end and tells them what it felt like for her. There are no memories at all of her time as Sapphire and she could not impact anything from within their mind, she was simply trapped in a void.

Kyou takes this as confirmation that Sapphire is a being unto herself.

Sayori agrees, noting that her hubris enabled this and that she should have been careful to entrust her mind to an idiot clod. She now has a dissociative identity to show for her arrogance. Sayori fully accepts that Sapphire is a separate entity born from her thoughts, emotions and memories and does have a right to exist.

Sayori is the best girl and I love her.

She gives Kyou two options. Erase all the programming and lock Sapphire away inside her mind forever, unable to come out and interact with the world. This option is as good as killing Sapphire but will allow Sayori full control over her life.

The other option is to integrate their consciousness to function together. Nozomi is horrified to consider this option, noting that it would be the end of Sayori's aspirations for med school.

She gives her signature Sayori smirk and boils it down to a simple statement.

"Ruin my life or destroy hers."

You bring Sayori under penlight hypnosis once again and are given the final option of the story.

Sapphire... I won't leave you behind - Sapphire... I have to let you go.

First off I note that Kyou frames this choice as being about Sapphire and not Sayori. I say that with no judgment or commentary. It's simply a fact of the route.

To erase Sapphire ends the game with an abrupt timeskip. The rooftop club want nothing to do with Kyou and he lives out the rest of his school career in solitude. Sayori manages to recover her lost week and feels confident about her chances for med school.

When Kyou speaks to her on her last day of school she is blunt and angry with him. She says every time she sees him she remembers how close she came to losing everything.

She says trusting him was her mistake and she takes ownership of it...

But Sapphire's life was placed in her hands and he sealed her away forever. Sayori wants Kyou to live with that. She wants him to miss her for the rest of his life.

She says goodbye and Kyou never sees them again.

I can think of few things in life more painful than being revoked access to speak to someone you love. To see them in front of you. To interact with them and to know that you are no longer on the "inside" of their trust. That you know the true names and shapes of the person... the people behind those eyes and know that you no longer have permission to see that. You are no longer allowed to hear their individual voice. It is a pain I would never wish on anyone.

And oh the level of self-loathing in internalizing that you have no right to be upset about it. That you are not owed access or trust. That you have to just live with the knowledge that they would take it all back if they could.

I know what it's like to miss someone for the rest of your life.

...so...

What if we integrate the pair into a single consciousness?

This time Kyou programs the two to have a line of internal communication and the ability to trade the body when they need to.

The timeskip happens again and Kyou has once again gone the final months of school alone. He is not soon to be forgiven for his actions. But as exams end the rooftop club have a date to go to karaoke to celebrate. Sayori is pessimistic about her propositions but did promise to celebrate. She also promised to talk to Kyou.

The rooftop club approach him and invite him to the celebration. As Sayori speaks with him, cold and upset, she is caught in moments of aside where she is caught in an internal argument.

The scene at the karaoke club is so beautiful and shows that not only has Sayori adapted to include her alter self into her life but Nozomi and Hiroko fully accept Sapphire as the 4th member of their group. Hiroko and Sapphire even seem to get along greatly.

Sapphire comes out to Kyou's comfort and delight and explains that Sayori pulled out of her emd school plans and they have to live a completely different life to accomodate their ideology clashes.

Kyou himself being one of them.

Sapphire and Sayori have internal conversations that Nozomi and Hiroko ask to be filled in on and for all it is worth this is handled just as it tends to be in my lived experience. DeMille did a good job of showing what "healthy multiplicity" looks like in a social dynamic and I cannot begin to thank her enough for that.

The whole "split personality" thing in fiction is always used as a source of drama. Internally as the turmoil between two (or more) individuals fighting over the solitary life. Externally as people not always knowing which alter they are speaking with.

I always appreciate when it's shown as just a part of who a person is. That people struggle to keep up with the shifts but are capable of following the changes and being aware that the person they are speaking to contains multitudes and the statement "they are the same person" and "they are different people" are both true at the same time.

In support groups I tend to see a common refrain that "DID is actually boring. It's just traumatized people trying to live their lives." and I agree with it. There's so much less mythology and intrigue in reality. This scene does a good job of showing the mundane reality of a person who has attained dynamic system communication and has people who they trust and share their truth with. The clumsiness and uncertainty of how any of it works and just trying to not stumble or apologize too much.

I often think I don't deserve the way people see me. See us. I've never been able to be what I am lucky enough to receive for others. In support groups and in life I have met other people who have these experiences and I fuck up. A lot. I try to not worry about it because I know I'd forgive the people around me if they messed up. But it takes earnest care and trust to be open with another person and for them to accept you and adapt their behavior to invite you in. It heals my heart to see Nozomi and Hiroko roll with it, even if they don't fully comprehend it.

During the karaoke party Kyou asks Sapphire where they stand, if they have a future or if tonight is a goodbye.

Sapphire takes him outside and admits that she still loves him and as Kyou reaches out to make a connection Sayori steps in and scolds her alter for breaking their agreement.

The pair get into an outloud argument over the situation and the impact Kyou's hypnosis has had on their shared life.

Sayori had to talk to her parents and tell them that her stress had caused a breakdown and she needs to adjust her life goals in order to accomodate her abilities. Sapphire jabs that Sayori would have had a miserable life treading water if intervention had not happened. Sayori notes that being forced to surrender her dreams is not a favor.

The sequence ends with Sapphire saying that she forced Sayori to give up her dreams. Giving up her love of Kyou is a suitable price.

Kyou will always be the one who ruined Sayori's life and saved Sapphire's. Sayori cannot bring herself to hate him but she cannot allow him to be in her life.

In a bittersweet ending, Kyou allows Sayori/Sapphire to return to the karaoke bar and he walks home.

The end.

The route is interesting in that there is real basis for it and yet the dynamics of the route lean more heavily into hyperbole than most need to. Adjusting a person's identity and risking them gaining a dissociative disorder is a very real issue within the hypnosis community.

I recently made a post about the topic which was inspired by my playing this route. I have no desire to out any of the people I have spoken to in the weeks since I posted it but a number of people have approached me to thank me for the post and share their experiences which mirror much of what AW did to me.

Then there's those Disney Deer files that are so imfamous at altering people's personalities and compartmentalizing their thought process that there are major online publications doing exposes on the topic.

DeMille handles the situation both in the present of noting what happens when a person's behavior is shifted by hypnotic conditioning and just how dangerous it is to give birth to alter egos via hypnosis. I feel there is full respect in her depictions and spare for Kyou's behavior being on a spectrum of irredeemable and fucking stupid; the characters treat the scenario with the gravity it deserves. I never felt like anyone betrayed their character's core while arguing on the agency and legitimacy of the alter personality.

I don't know if this is going to be the best storyline for anyone or be relatable to anyone outside of a very narrow window of individual... but as a member of that pinpoint Venn diagram... I appreciate that this story exists.

I think DeMille knocked it out of the park and I cannot wait to see what happens in the grayed out paths when they are written. Even if it hurts to read.

Next time we'll visit Hiroko. Though Turq has already handled the Tickling route if you want to read that now.

Going to take some time to focus on Not Penlight for now though. This took an age to write and edit.

#dawn posting #penlight #hypnosis #hypnokink #DID #watch me post my trauma in public #t4e #sayori is best girl #media myself and i #media essays

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topguncortez · 1 year

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Ghosts || Chapter 3

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♰ synopsis: it's the day of the ball and Bob takes a trip down memory lane. Some familiar faces show up and so do some uninvited ones.

♰ word count: 3.2k

♰ warnings: mentions of character death, mentions of suicide, mentions of murder, unhealthy coping mechanisms, federal tampering, mentions of gun sales, mentions of drug usage, cursing, mentions of unprotected sex

The venue was decorated beautifully, with gold, red, and white sprinkled throughout it. The old Gambino mansion was a safe haven. It sat in the middle of the rolling hills in San Diego, not many knew of its existence unless they were in the mafia world. Even though most of the preparations had been done prior to the ball, Javy was still walking around making sure everything was perfect. He had decided that a masquerade was the best way to do things, knowing that some of the mafia bosses wanted to keep their identities hidden.

Just like Rooster and Bob, Javy was wearing perfectly tailored black tuxes with black matching masks. The suits were actually designs that belonged to Athena that Javy had found buried in her desk when he cleaned it out. Javy had made the decision to give Bob what was supposed to be Jake’s suit. There on his chest sat embroidered red and white roses, making him stand out amongst Javy and Rooster. Everyone was dressed in their best, giving off the Old Hollywood/Great Gatsby vibe that Javy wanted. Bob could care less as the very first thing he did when he walked in was order himself a drink.

“Ah, my favorite brothers-in-law,” Gianni Santiago smirked as he walked in and saw the boys. He was dressed in a maroon, three-piece suit, with a black lace-covered mask on his face. Just like always, a beautiful brunette hung onto his arm as he walked down the marble stairs.

“Gianni, you dirty bastard,” Rooster smiled and hugged him, “Been too long.”

The boys and the Santiagos kept in touch after the funeral. Paulo had been the most distant out of the three boys, burying himself into his new position as head of the family. Narciso had found himself taking over all of his sister’s business from her multiple clubs in Italy to the fashion line she had been working on before coming to the States to marry Jake. Gianni, though still the wild card, had been over to visit Jake and his sister’s graves more than any of them. Rooster and Gianni had made a special friendship, both of them bonding over shared trauma.

“How are things?” Gianni asked.

“As to be expected, I’m sure Paulo has told you all about it,” Javy explained and Gianni rolled his eyes.

“Yeah. That fucker has a bigger dick up his ass than my old man ever had. I think it's because of her death. . . He still blames himself.” Gianni looked down at his maroon-colored loafers, “Anyway, where are the drinks and the bitches?” Gianni smirked at Bob. A bright smile crawled its way onto Bob’s face. He walked over and threw his arm around Gianni, walking away and talking about possibly visiting the club if the ball sucks.

The three of them found a spot in the corner of the large ballroom, near the bar, and decided to stay there as they drank expensive whiskey and caught up on the last year or so of their lives. Bob watched as Javy walked around the room, greeting the mafia Kings and their families as they entered. Bob knew that eventually, he would have to make his own rounds, so he decided to cut it easy with the alcohol consumption. He was only half listening to the conversation between Gianni and Rooster when he felt Gianni nudge him.

“Who invited the Moss King?” Gianni said and pointed to the striking emerald green outfits, pale skin, and red hair of the members of the O’Phalen family. Each of their faces were covered in intricate green masks, all different from the other.

Rooster clenched his jaw and brought his drink to his lips, “Coyote’s bright idea.”

Gianni laughed, “Can’t believe they left their little fog-covered island. Bastards,” Giannia spat, downing the rest of his drink, “Each and every one of them.”

“I’ll drink to that,” Rooster raised his glass to Gianni’s.

But Bob paid them no attention, his blue eyes focused on the beautiful woman with coppery red hair. Her dress hugged her curves perfectly as she walked down the grand staircase, arm in arm with who could only be Cillian O’Phalen. Confidence radiated off the woman as she looked at Bob, her green eyes boring into him. It was as if he were in a trance, and memories he had tried to suppress started to surface.

— — —

Cambridge, six years ago. . .

By the time Bradley was finished grumbling to Bob about how he didn’t hate Britney Spears, per se, but his mood had been ruined, and the song had changed. Rooster might’ve stood by Bob’s side for an additional five seconds before a new girl walked up to get his attention. He glanced back at his friend, who he was supposed to be protecting, making sure that Bob was okay with it. Bob knew that Rooster had surveyed the area before they even left their dorm room to make sure it was safe. Bob hated it, but he knew it was part of the job.

“Go enjoy yourself,” Bob said, waving him off, “It was one song and that girl ran off.” Rooster clapped Bob on the back before following some fake blonde back into the crowd.

Bob smiled, watching as the crowd swallowed up Rooster and the girl. After a few more minutes of leaning against the wall, he decided it was time to catch some fresh air and take a smoke break. It was a habit he wasn’t proud of, and if Emile saw him doing it she would be disappointed in him. But it was a habit he had picked up while being on lockdown with his dad and stepmother. He needed something to calm the nerves, and bumming a cigarette off his big brother, Jake seemed to do the trick.

He kept his head down as he moved through the house, going towards the kitchen and out the backdoor. Sliding the back door open, he felt the cool rush of fresh air as he stepped out. Finally, his body started to cool down and his ears rang from the loud noise of the house. Bob reached into his back pocket, pulling out the beat-up carton of Marlboro reds and his zippo lighter. He placed the cancer stick in his mouth and shielded the flame of the lighter as he brought it up to his mouth.

“Those things will kill ya’”

“AH!” Bob jumped and dropped both the lighter and the cigarette. He snapped his head over to the sound of the mystery voice, finding that redhead from earlier. You smiled at him as he placed a hand on his racing heart, “You scared the hell outta me.”

“Sorry,” You shrugged, walking up to him. He watched as you bent down and grabbed his zippo, holding it between your thumb and pointer finger, “But those things will kill you.”

“So can falling books,” Bob said, taking the lighter out of your possession. You gave him a tight-lipped smile and took a step back from him. “Sorry,” He sighed, running a hand through his hair, “That was rude.”

“It’s okay,” You said, lifting your hands in defense, “I ruined your smoke break. I should be apologizing. I’m just gonna go back-”

“Wait,” Bob said, grabbing your wrist to stop you from turning back towards the loud noise, “I’m. . . Ro-Robby,” Bob cringed at using the awful nickname that Jake called him.

“Robby?” You asked, tilting your head slightly. Bob had decided at that moment, you looked the cutest you ever had looked, “Okay,” You smiled, “I’m Y/N, but people call me ‘Clover’.”

— — —

“Clover,” Galen said, touching your elbow gently. You blinked out of your blank stare at the flute of champagne in your hand and looked up at your dad, “There are some people I want you to meet. Are you with me?”

You nodded your head, “Yes, da.”

You couldn’t be distracted. Even though the biggest distraction of your life stood on the opposite end of the room, sending daggers your way. You had hoped and prayed to any God that was listening for Bob to stay on the other side of the room. You weren’t sure if he had realized it was you, yet. You had never told him about your family, or even given him your last name. Everybody knew who the O’Phalens are. They were the largest producer of automatic rifles, selling to militaries and government agencies all over the world. . . at least, that’s what Google said.

You, however, knew what Google tried its best to hide. You knew that your father sold more than just guns to militaries. He also had a hand in the largest drug trade in the world, being able to conceal pounds of cocaine and heroin inside the gun creates. But besides the drugs, O’Phalen Armors kept its nose clean, staying out of the darker trades that some of the mafia bosses were into.

Galen smiled as he lead you to a table in the far corner of the room. You recognized some of the people that were gathered in the ballroom. Fritz Avalon, Hondo Coleman, Halo Basset, and Yale Lee, were just a few of the familiar faces you sent smiles and small waves to as you were ushered through the crowd. The one man you knew all too well, was tucked in the back corner, which was unusual for him. But since the death of his daughter, Rafael Santiago didn’t like to make many public appearances.

“Galen.”

“Rafa,” The two men greeted each other. You hadn’t seen Rafael in nearly a decade, but he looked like the shell of the man he once was. He was skinny and frail and looked as if a gust of wind could blow him over. He wore a white mask that reminded you a lot of “The Phantom of the Opera”, which was somewhat fitting for the retired mafia leader.

“This one. . . must be your, how do you say? Iníon?”

You smiled at Rafael and nodded, “An-mhaith, very good, Mr. Santiago.” The man gave you a quick nod of his head, and sat back down in his chair.

“That boy of yours, Rafa, he’s a real big talker,” Galen said, taking a seat across from Rafael.

“That’s one thing Paulo lacks, his communication. Gianni, on the other hand, you can never get him to shut up,” Rafael let out a small laugh, “Perfect for your daughter, here.”

You snapped your head towards your father, who had a tight-lipped smile on his face, “Yes. I think it would be an excellent arrangement between our two children. Tighten up the bond and tie up the loose ends the Seresin boy couldn’t do.”

It was as if the air had been sucked right out of the room, as the words your father had spoken resonated in your ears. You made your father promise years ago that he would never swear you to anyone. You had no desire to be married. No desire to be a nameless housewife like so many of the mafia women were. They were spineless, defenseless, and spent most of their time wine-drunk and getting Botox fillers in their faces.

You blocked out the conversation between your father and Rafael, instead, you looked around the ballroom, watching as couples danced on the floor to the string band that was playing. You had to give it to the Seresins, they knew how to throw one hell of a party.

— — —

The drink in Bob’s hand had become warm. The condensation of the melted ice was leaving a nice ring on the expensive white tablecloths Javy insisted on getting. Bob was starting to wonder as he looked around the grand ballroom at the Gambino Mansion, how much was all this going to cost him? The family wasn’t oozing with money, they never had and probably never will be, but this whole thing looked like it was going to cost thousands.

“Refill,” Bradley said, sitting down next to Bob.

Bob gave him a tight-lipped smile, “Thanks.”

Rooster nodded and looked out at the sea of people around them. It was impressive that the mafia bosses had decided to show up to the ball. Bob had done his part of walking around, shaking hands, and talking business, and now, he just wanted to go to his office and drink. He lost track of how many of the old bastards had started their conversation with: “You know my daughter. . .” There was not a single part of Bob that wanted some arranged marriage after what happened the last time that was attempted.

“Ask your question,” Rooster said, pulling Bob out of his thoughts. Bob turned his head, eyebrows furrowed, “You have a question, and you know that I somehow know the answer.”

Bob scoffed, “I’m not really sure that you do.”

“Try me.”

With a sigh, Bob sat back in his chair, his legs spread, “Clover. . . she wasn’t just some girl at MIT, was she?”

“No,” Bradley frowned, “But I can’t give you more than that.”

“Then who will,” Bob muttered, standing up from the table.

He weaved his way through the bodies as he walked towards the doors at the other end of the ballroom. Bob needed to clear his head, and the night air felt refreshing as he walked out onto the beautiful patio. But even out here, there were sharply dressed men and their dates, faces covered with masks. Bob gave them all a simple head nod and continued on walking, going down the cobblestone path to the garden.

The garden was at the center of square hedge rows, perfectly hidden from the outside view. It seemed as though every star in the sky was out as Bob looked up at the moon, which made the white roses planted around shine. Bob kicked the loose stones with his leather boots, slipping the mask off his face. He finally felt like he could breathe out here. He rubbed at his eyes, which felt dry from the contacts that Javy made him wear. Finding a bench, Bob sat down on it, his thighs on either side of the stone, before laying his back down, so he could stare at the stars.

— — —

Cambridge MA, six years ago. . .

“That’s the big dipper, or the Polaris majoris,” You said, as you pointed to the cluster of stars in the sky, “Right there, is the north star, or the freedom star. Hundreds of slaves escaped using the North Star as a guide.”

“It’s beautiful,” Bob said. You turned your head, hoping to see him looking at the stars, but instead, he was looking right at you. You scrunched your nose and looked back towards the sky. He was in awe of your knowledge about the night sky, but he was always pretty much in awe of how smart you are. Bob had grown up being told that he was a gifted student. Had the top test scores in high school, and had colleges across the country giving him offers. Hell, even the dean of students last year said that Bob might be one of the smartest men to walk MIT’s campus. But he truly believed he met his match with you.

“The stars, Robby, the stars!” You said, pointing to the clusters above you.

“Yeah, yeah, the stars,” Bob said, and rolled on top of you, bringing his lips to yours. You squealed and ran your hands up and down his body. You pushed your tongue into his mouth, tasting the faint taste of strawberries and oranges from the picnic you had earlier. His hand gently ghosted down your body, to your thigh. The brush of his hand made goosebumps arise on your skin, as he grabbed under your thigh, to hook it over his hip. You let out a moan as you felt the hard outline of his cock against your core.

“Robby,” You sighed. Bob placed kisses on the underside of your jaw, working his way down to his neck, “Robby. . . not in the middle of campus.”

Bob groaned as he pulled away from you, and rolled back onto his back. You giggled and curled up next to him, placing your head on his chest. You laid a hand on his belly. He grabbed your hand and brought it up to his lips, placing a kiss on your knuckles.

“I love you,” Bob said. You lifted your head and looked into those beautiful ocean eyes, “I never, ever want to leave. I want it to always be just us, against the world.”

You smiled, and pressed a chaste kiss to his lips, “It’ll always be us against the world.”

Bob shook his head, and you frowned slightly. He gripped your hand tightly, trying to come up with the right words to say. His mind was spinning, maybe it was from the fresh air. He had basically been tied to his desk this whole week, studying for midterms.

“Do you ever dream of running away?” Bob asked you. You sat up a bit, “Like really running away. Change your identity and everything. . . do you dream of doing something like that?”

You nodded your head, “I have. That’s partially why I’m here. I ran away.”

“I did too,” Bob said. He sat up and grabbed your hips, moving you so you were straddling his waist. You placed your hands on his chest, as he wrapped his arms around your body, “Please. . . never run away without me. W-where ever you go, I want to go too. Please, don’t leave me.”

Tears welled up in his eyes, and you cupped his face. Gently you brushed your thumb over the swell of his cheek, “I will never, ever leave you. The only thing that can take me away is the reaper, himself.”

“And I would be right behind you.”

— — —

“Lovely night.”

A voice called out to Bob. He opened his eyes, still laying on his back and looking up at the night sky. He stared at the stars for a bit, blinking several times before he sat up, coming face to face with the person he had been searching the entire earth for. Bob turned his body, so both feet were on the ground.

Your pale skin was illuminated by the moonlight as you stood several feet away from him. You fiddled with your green lace mask in your hand. Your hair, which was usually in its unruly curly state, had been straightened and was cascading down your back. The green dress that was on your body, hugged your curves so well that Bob had to push the impure thoughts out of his mind as he stood from the bench.

He wanted to hate you, he had planned out what he was going to say to you the moment he would see you again. He had practiced the angry words he wanted to say to you for just disappearing without a trace. But all that left his mind the moment he was standing within arms reach of you. All he wanted to do was pull you in for a kiss, to hold you in his arms in case this wasn’t real. In case this was all a dream and his mind was just playing another cruel trick on him.

“Y/N. . .”

She turned to face him completely, and smiled, “I knew you’d find me eventually, Robby.”

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