#tetsuki kaiza

[jacksgreysays]

Untitled (2022-11-16)

“I’m so sorry,” she says with a slanted, rueful grin. She is genuine but unhesitating, righteous and thus ultimately remorseless. With a swift, almost slicing hand movement, she summons an invisible force to strike at your knees and you crumple to the ground. You look up in time to see her make another gesture, fingers curling into a loose fist, before everything goes dark.

When you wake up you are on the front porch of your neighbor’s house and six days have passed.

—

“I am a daughter of Izanagi, unfortunately.” She rolls her eyes, exasperated, at herself or her statement, it’s hard to tell. “I mean, if you believe the myths, everyone with Japanese heritage is a child of Izanagi, but I do mean mine literally.”

You’re not sure what expression is on your face, only that it makes her crinkle her own in response.

“It’s not that impressive. Sure, there’s the whole, you know, access to divine powers that seems cool, but it also comes with the stipulation that should dear old dad ever give in to his millennia long ennui I’ll probably have to be the one to take him out. And trust me,” she grumbles, “killing gods is extremely tedious.”

—

You’re more concerned about the loss of time than any possible injuries—you’re eager to go home and check your journal—but your neighbors are kind and well-connected enough to have a doctor make a house call on short notice. You tried putting them at ease, assurances that you feel fine and just want to go home. You even put a hint of teenage whining into your tone, annoying enough to send you on your way, but they are insistent and for all that your parents are barely around they did raise you to be somewhat polite.

And any further protests might raise the question of where your parents are anyway which is a topic you’d much rather not bring up more than you’d like to not continue imposing on your neighbors.

Mysterious strange doctor it is.

Except… when she arrives: her expression is flat, she’s older, and it’s not an exact match, but--

“You!”

—maybe she’s not so much a stranger after all.

—

“It’s going to suck at first,” she says, reaching a hand out to help you off the ground.

You’re panting, trying to catch your breath after what should have been an absolutely brutal spar.. The gouges in the earth around you tell a story of extreme force and speed that you would have assumed only construction or industrial machinery capable of. But, no, that was you.

All of her hits landed, of course, which is why you’re the one on the ground, but they were no less powerful. And yet… you felt the blows—you know you did—they hurt during the spar and still do. But they are aches and bruises instead of broken bones or fully liquified flesh which is what should happen to human bodies under force like that.

“It’s going to take time to get used to everything,” she continues as you finally take the offered hand and let her pull you to your feet. “You’re still you, but… more. You’ll have to be careful and you’ll have to practice. And then—”

“Let me guess: it gets better?” you interrupt, because that’s what all the adults say. Not that she’s an adult—she can’t be more than a year or two older than you, even if she’s been patronizing this whole time.

She doesn’t laugh. She doesn’t even seem annoyed that you interrupted.

If anything, she seems sad.

—

The doctor puts her bag down before holding both hands in front of her, nonthreatening. Her expression still doesn’t change, as if rushing to make a house call in the middle of the night and then immediately having to deal with an accusatory teenager were absolutely normal and even boring.

“You!” you say, because you don’t know what else to say. “You’re—you!” You’d feel embarrassed any other time, stuttering and incomprehensible, but once you’ve recognized the similarities you can’t unsee them.

“Is something the matter?” your neighbor says, looking between you and the doctor. You’re not sure who he’s asking. After a moment’s assessment, he moves to stand in the middle, his back to you, protective of you even though he was the one to call her and surely must trust her.

“I’m Doctor Ellen Kaiza,” she says, looking you in the eyes. “I was called here to check on a patient. If you are uncomfortable in leaving your care to me, I understand and I can leave. If you would like for me to examine you, I can do so. It’s your choice if you would like company, but if you don’t I am bound by doctor patient confidentiality and will enforce it.” Her tone, like her expression, does not change at all.

She does not know you. You do not know her.

You have never met her before.

—

There’s a burning warehouse and sirens of every types flashing and sounding through the night. The both of you are watching this safely from a few rooftops away, thankfully upwind of the smoke, after her hurried flight snatched you from the fiery jaws of death. Or the fiery jaws of your own mistakes.

“So, what have we learned?” she asks, after setting you down on your feet.

“Don’t start fires when you’re in a possible meth lab?”

You can feel her glaring at the side of your head, but you’d much rather watch the spectacle you had a hand in creating.

The silence kicks you, unimpressed.

“Don’t take cover behind pressurized vats of flammable chemicals?”

The silence is impatient and practically shoves you over, demanding your lunch money.

“… don’t provoke the highly armed and extremely paranoid criminals when we’re on a recon mission,” you sigh, thoroughly chastised.

She turns away to watch the fire department try to put out the flames while the survivors are split between the police and the EMTs. The silence gives you an awkward clap on the shoulder.

“How badly did I mess this up?” you ask in a desperately casual voice, because you work best with clear and constructive feedback and if she’s going to yell at you, you’d rather get it over now while you’re still in an adrenaline high.

She hums considering. “We’ll have to wait until the fire goes out and hope the pissing match between the cops and fire department delays them long enough for us to get in, get the relic, and get out.”

This time you turn to her, blinking in shock. The moisture in your eyes is only because you’ve been staring at the burning warehouse for too long.

She rolls her eyes, “You didn’t fuck up that badly. Relics are divine, they’re extremely difficult to destroy. Ideally, we would have gotten it without any collateral damage, but this isn’t too bad.”

This time the silence is on your side, an elbow nudging her in the ribs even as she looks away from your crying face.

“Don’t worry, we’ll make a hero out of you yet.”

—

“So you’ve met Tetsuki,” the doctor says in your neighbor’s guest bedroom where she’s set up a makeshift exam room. You had to reassure your neighbor twice that you were completely fine with the doctor despite your less than stellar initial reaction, and three times that you would prefer to see her by yourself.

You nod, awkwardly shuffling back and forth on your feet.

“Sit down,” she says, stethoscope already in her ears. “You can ask questions while I examine you.”

“Deal,” you agree quickly, because you’re pretty sure you’re not going to be able to out negotiate her.

On her instructions you take in a deep breath, hold it, and exhale after she reminds you about human limitations.

“So you know her, then. You… I mean, you look...”

The doctor nods, still blank faced. “By blood, she’s a… distant cousin. A niece of sorts. By ichor, hm… Her divine father and my divine mother were said to have created humanity.” Finally the doctor makes an expression: she rolls her eyes and the similarity between her and her niece are even more obvious. “But every pantheon claims to have created humanity, and I highly doubt that’s true.”

As fascinating as lore is, you have a more important question to ask.

“I’m missing six days,” you admit finally because a normal human would assume head trauma, but a divine scion would know better. “Do you know where she is?”

—

“I’m so sorry,” she says with a slanted, rueful grin.

You check behind you to make sure that she isn’t talking to someone else, but it’s only the two of you in the skatepark. It’s too cold for even the most dedicated skaters, but the emptiness and silence of your house almost physically shoved you out the door.

“Sorry for what?” you ask because you do not know her, you’ve never met her before.

She is genuine but unhesitating, righteous and thus ultimately remorseless. With a swift, almost slicing hand movement, she summons an invisible force to strike at your knees and you crumple to the ground. You look up in time to see her make another gesture, fingers curling into a loose fist.

Before everything goes dark, you hear her say, “For making a Hero out of you.”

~

A/N: Whaaaaaaat is this? Not at all what I wanted to write, but for some godforsaken (lol) reason this flowed so easily?

Anyway, I’ve been making a lot of Scion: Hero (the White Wolf RPG game in which players are half blood children of gods) character sheets for an outside project and reading a lot of Batfam fic (Tim Drake-centric, because he is my blorbo) and I guess my brain shook this out.

So an AU all around in which both of my Kaiza OCs and Tim Drake are divine scions. Tetsuki is a daughter of Izanagi (Japanese father god of the sky) while Ellen is a daughter of Izanami (Japanese mother god of death/the underworld) which makes their mortal relationship all the more hilarious what with their divine parents being legendary exes lol. I like the idea of Tim being a scion of Loki because within the RPG that gives him access to Illusion abilities including “Stolen Face” for those good trickster alternate identities.

Anyway, this doesn’t HAVE to be Tim Drake. Just as the kind and well-connected neighbors don’t have to be the Batfam. ;D

[jacksgreysays]

luceo non uro - I shine, not burn + A Softer World 1008, Combined it gives Clockwise-vibes.

Just once I’d like to fall in love with someone who will ruin things before I do. (I already had too many turns.)

-

A/N: AHHH!!! Thanks for the prompt! :D Also, ahhhhh counterclockwise!! When I first read your prompt, I only saw the latin phrase and light/shining/burning has never really been Leanne’s motif, but the softer world 1008 is exactly Leanne! So then the question is, who is the other person who does have the light/shining/burning motif?

My go to girl Tetsuki Kaiza.

But here’s the thing: she does have the light/shining/burning motif, although it’s generally more lightning than fire. And they were vigilante teammates! So, like, that should be an immediate, locked-in answer. But, I don’t know, they just were never romantic in my head. In the completely opposite way of how Joy and Leanne were a surprise to me, I cannot get these Leanne and Tetsuki to be romantic even though there’s all sorts of factors which should suggest they could be.

To be fair, it’s mostly Tetsuki’s fault—for all that she’s my go to for “OC in X fandom,” she’s very judgmental and obstinate and slightly misanthropic besides. It doesn’t help that canonically (or as canonically as an original fiction I haven’t fully written down) they meet as teenage vigilantes in Testuki’s “first life” and she has none of the wisdom that either in-universe experience or multiverse traveling would give her. Leanne is rightfully indignant and put off by Tetsuki’s initial lack of respect and that’s something that haunts their relationship even when time and dimensions may soften things through nostalgia.

Though now that I mention it, maybe that’s the way to go…

Leanne’s journey is essentially a mortal unknowingly turning into a god—that her domain is time just confuses things further—but, at some point (in time ;P) she’ll achieve control over her abilities. In contrast I throw Tetsuki around whatever fandom has taken my fancy and legitimize (in as much as fanfiction can/needs to be legitimized) by saying she is stuck reincarnating through the multiverse and makes a deal with the Space Time Witch from CLAMP’s xxxHolic, trading an unknown amount of time as an agent of fate in order to get back home.

So we have a Time God and an Agent of Destiny/The Multiverse.

And in a way, if we mess around with the verb tenses—which we can because it involves Leanne who is a Time God—it almost has a sort of… “Hey, our first impressions of each other were bad, but let’s try again; not forgetting or disregarding our past, but building something taking it into account… also we are both incredibly powerful people who have seen A Lot and it’s kind of nice to interact with someone who knew me before everything went to shit.”

… now that I’ve said all that, I can’t really justify doing a different take and, anyway, I don’t know who else fits the parameters so well besides Tetsuki. So here we go?

—

Leanne visits rivers when she can, when she’s available and when they exist. She makes do with artificial rivers if she has to, though the concrete walls and precise lines don’t work quite as much as natural ones.

It’s probably the most normal thing about her, nowadays. Humans have been soothed by proximity to bodies of water since humans existed and she, at the very least, began her own existence as a human.

Though lately her propensity for rivers has more to do with philosophy than nature. Obvious metaphors running through her mind. The flow of time and the inability to step in the same river twice, how she can never go back home even with her abilities under control. But even still there is a continuity, a consistency, something that can be relied upon even as everything, including itself, changes.

Also, the negative ions are nice.

She followed a water molecule once, from a river to the ocean through the full water cycle, just to see if she could. She followed it for a full decade and confused a great many people for focusing on them seemingly for no reason until, as all things, it passed. Then when it made its way to an entirely different river, she stopped, struck by a sudden, immediate futility.

Then she went back a decade. Not to regain the time lost—for one, that’s not how her abilities work, she still experiences the passage of time; but also, two, she literally has all the time in the world to waste—just to put as definitive an end to her experiment as she is capable of doing. She could have continued following it until it ceased to exist, if she wanted to. Arguably, she could even follow that water molecule again from the start, but what would be the point? To have the same exact journey? Or, worse, change things slightly just to see where it went this time? Why? It was just a water molecule. She would go mad.

She was already going mad.

Hence, rivers.

… maybe she should find a different meditative object.

Except, as she considers that, a door appears on the opposite bank of the river. A free standing, unattached door in the middle of nowhere.

She goes back five minutes. It is still and, somehow, already there.

She goes forward six million years, the river at the bottom of a canyon and the sun a dying red. The radiation in the air hurts her skin, her lungs. Her eyes burn. Across the canyon, the door still stands, ageless.

She goes back six million years and six minutes, because she can, and the door is there also.

Hm, something new.

-

Tetsuki leaves on a mission from The Shopkeeper—an uncertain but hopeful Watanauki-kun—and six months later returns to a different The Shopkeeper, a Yuuko-san who assesses her with thoughtful, narrowed eyes.

“I do not know you,” The Shopkeeper says, eerily immobile, contrasting with her lounging position on unnecessarily decadent furniture and the softly wafting smoke from her pipe.

Tetsuki shrugs.

“I do not know you yet,” Yuuko-san corrects, continuing to not move.

Tetsuki does not bother to shrug again, instead moving away from the Dimensional Door and taking her usual seat:

Not beside Yuuko-san, though there is space on the divan even despite her sprawl. Not across from Yuuko-san, the way a customer would, the low table a false barrier between mortals and magic. But on the left hand, with her back to the kitchen, facing both the Dimensional Door and the more material entrance to The Shop. Not Watanuki’s place, student and steward, but a guard’s position.

“Ah,” Yuuko-san says in understanding, though there had been no confusion before. “Something is wrong with The Shop then.”

“What?” Tetsuki asks, finally alarmed despite Yuuko-san’s continued impassivity. The Shop exists outside of spacetime. How can something be wrong with it? “No,” Tetsuki protests. “We time travel all the time,” she says, pushing through the inanity of the sentence.

Yuuko-san sits up, movements no less eerie than her stillness. “We’ll need an Auditor.”

“What? No. Explain.”

Yuuko-san does not. With one finger tapping at her chin, she ignores Tetsuki and muses, “Auditors are so rare. And it will have to be one who has never interacted with The Shop before. A closed universe perhaps? But they’re usually so mistrusting. How ever will I get a message to them?”

“What. Are. You. Talking. About.” Tetsuki has never empathized with Watanuki-kun more.

Yuuko-san looks to her, a sly grin splitting her face. “A messenger!” she exclaims, clapping her hands, as if Tetsuki had only arrived just now or performed a convenient trick.

Tetsuki grumbles preemptively. “Fine. Where am I going?” She asks, then reconsiders. “… or to when am I going?”

“Neither!” Yuuko-san enthuses. “To whom are you going,” she corrects, “will be an Auditor.”

Tetsuki grumbles more. “Okay, and who is that?”

Yuuko-san’s grin, if possible, stretches wider.

—

It does not matter when Leanne goes, the door is still there. It also does not matter where she goes, although that is not her immediate purview—if speed is distance over time, then time is just distance over speed—traveling does not prevent the door from following her. Or, rather, from already being there when she appears.

If she is at a river, it is on the other bank. If she is in a city, it is across the street. In an uncrossed plain, it remains a consistent distance from her no matter how much time she spends walking towards it. The door is there and it does not want to be approached, but it also wants her attention.

Should she get a cat?

Leanne is considering ranged options when the door opens.

The figure that walks through is familiar in the same way as memories of learning to ride a bike: a balancing act she struggled with reminiscent of scraped elbows and knees, the scent of blood and metal on pavement, and a pretty nasty concussion.

“Thunderbolt?”

Whatever neutral expression had been on Thunderbolt’s face twists into something of furrowed brows and pursed lips. Clearly, Leanne’s fellow former teenage vigilante recognizes her.

“You,” Thunderbolt says, almost an accusation.

“Me,” Leanne responds, a little giddy all the same. “I thought you died. Or, at least, I saw you die… I think?”

“You’re the Auditor?”

“I don’t know what that means,” Leanne admits, because Thunderbolt already has a low opinion of her that to attempt to save face would make things worse. “But how are you alive? And why is your door following me?”

Thunderbolt presses a hand to her face and sighs. This, too, is painfully familiar. “Of course it’s you,” she says into her hand, exasperated enough that the words carry even to Leanne’s ears. She heaves one last sigh before pulling her hand away. Her expression has changed again: brows a little less furrowed, one side of her mouth curled up, maybe. “Of course it’s you,” she repeats.

Confused and delighted, both at the sensation of confusion and seeing someone really real, Leanne smiles back.

—

“Here’s your problem,” Leanne says to Yuuko-san who is, for once, acting like a professional and not a mirage masquerading as a person.

Tetsuki trails after them because she’s not sure what would be worse: leaving Leanne alone with Yuuko-san or leaving Yuuko-san along with Leanne. Although how Leanne of all people knows what is wrong with The Shop when she didn’t even know what The Shop was before Tetsuki escorted her through the Dimensional Door is just one more annoying mystery to throw on the pile.

Seeing her is like being a teenager again. And not in the usual way she is a teenager again—reincarnated into a new world and burdened by a cosmic purpose which reveals itself with patience and strategic application of lightning powers—but irrationally frustrated and looking for a fight.

Leanne looks back at her, mid explanation to Yuuko-san, and smiles when their eyes meet. Tetsuki tries not to instinctually glare in response and probably ends up looking confused or concerned instead given the way her smile widens.

“The Shop is designed to be independent of spacetime, but it still requires a sentient lodestone in order to function,” Leanne is saying, when Tetsuki pays attention. “Obviously it’s supposed to be The Shopkeeper,” Leanne says, with a nod to Yuuko-san who nods back magnanimously, “but it looks like it has its wires crossed, so to speak, and is trying to connect to Thunderbolt instead.”

Yuuko-san blinks, a coy glance sent in Tetsuki’s direction. “Thunderbolt?” she asks.

Leanne, perhaps sensing her mistake, corrects herself. “Oh, uh, I mean. Tetsuki,” she stammers. “We used to be, uh, teammates—”

Tetsuki rolls her eyes. “She knows.”

“Ah, right, sorry.” Leanne says, grimacing at herself before falling silent.

Tetsuki digs within herself for the nonexistent modicum of patience she has for Leanne, has reallocate some from a different well instead. “She’s wondering why you called me by my callsign instead of my name,” she explains, a poor attempt at reassurance.

It works well enough. Or, at least, Leanne is generous enough to let it work, she brightens a bit. “Oh, well, it’s just,” she shrugs, “how I knew you.”

Because they were teammates first and only, not friends. Tetsuki hadn’t let Leanne know her otherwise.

—

The fix is quick, especially for someone who already controls time. The Shop, like Leanne, has a chronological flow internally consistent even as it exists separated from spacetime. However, without its own sentience, it would collapse under the sheer cosmological pressure from the multiverse and cease to exist. Or maybe exist everywhere but no longer be a single entity? That one she’s not too sure of.

Regardless, The Shop is designed with a corresponding Shopkeeper in mind. While Leanne similarly isn’t sure of how succession is meant to go, something got mixed up between Shopkeepers and in an almost instinct to survive, The Shop must have latched onto Thunderbolt as a makeshift lodestone. Which would have been fine by itself. However, there’s a reason why The Shopkeepers are not meant to leave The Shop: with its makeshift lodestone going out and traveling the multiverse, The Shop also fluctuated—a ship using a rowboat as a lighthouse.

Recalibrating The Shop was simple enough, bidding Yuuko-san goodbye and following Thunderbolt back through the Dimensional Door, only to walk right back through the Dimensional Door and meet a flustered Watanuki-kun and an unblinking Doumeki. Connecting The Shop to Watanuki-kun did not require blood or wards or magical script, just a willing soul and determination.

No wonder it latched onto Thunderbolt in its moment of need.

“It was nice to see you again,” Leanne says, a little honest and a lot surprised by it; even teenage torment becomes a fond memory with enough time and other trauma.

Thunderbolt, straightforward as ever, does not lie and say the same. But perhaps in her age, she’s learned some form of manners because instead she says, “It is… good… to know that you…” She struggles to find an end to that sentence.

Leanne, amused, takes pity on her. “… didn’t end up betraying everyone and joining Bastian?”

Thunderbolt glares, a quick twist of her mouth, a wrinkle between her brows. This has always come easy to her whenever Leanne has been around. “You’ve changed,” she says, because that at least does not require a positive opinion.

Leanne smiles. “I’d hope so.”

Thunderbolt’s glare does not let up. Rather, it bores into Leanne’s face, searching. Searching for what? She doesn’t know.

After a small eternity of this, Thunderbolt looks away and sighs. “Maybe next time you can say the same of me,” she says, begrudging and shamed.

Delighted, Leanne smiles wider. “Next time?”

Thunderbolt narrows her eyes. “I said what I said,” she says, before opening the Dimensional Door.

“Until next time then,” Leanne says, stepping through the door. “You know where to find me.”

“And when,” Thunderbolt says, a threat, a promise.

Leanne could not be happier.

—

A/N: This was a little harder than I thought, and not really a romance so much as a pre-romance maybe one day inching its way towards a romance, but it was interesting to mash, essentially, epilogue versions of Leanne and Tetsuki when they only ever knew each other as part of each others’ prologue.

Thanks for your patience, anon, and thank you again for the prompt! :D

Ask Box Advent Calendar 2021

[jacksgreysays]

Untitled Spring(?) Cleaning (2021-12-05)

(loosely related to this post, Strikes But Does Not Roar)

When Izuku drifts towards consciousness he registers the following:

He is on a surface that is neither floor nor bed but somewhere in between.

His left arm and the left side of his face hurts like hell.

He is not wearing any shoes.

Also he has a headache, but that has more to do with sudden voice snapping, “Sereno! Leave him! We have to go! Now!” like cracks of a whip both in urgency and tone.

Something, he assumes a blanket, is dropped on him by a presence closer than the voice that spoke earlier. A hand, warm even through the fabric, adjusts it around Izuku’s body.

Sirens wail in the distance.

“Sereno!” The whip cracks again, closer this time.

“Okay, okay,” a different voice responds, rough and harried but not irritated. Sereno, presumably, appeasing the other even as their presence lingers.

The sirens grow louder, approaching.

A rustle and the warm hand draws away. “I know,” says Sereno. “He just reminds me of—”

“Later,” the first voice says, no longer a cracking whip, but urgent all the same. “We have to go.”

More rustling, then the squeak and groan of an old window being forced open, wood straining against wood. The air grows cold: the blanket appreciated, the warm hand missed.

“We’ll find him later,” the first voice says, an ominous attempt at comfort.

Sirens so close, they must be just outside.

Sereno huffs, a bark of a laugh that Izuku can barely hear. “Maybe he’ll find us first.”

By the time Izuku wakes up properly, emergency responders bursting into what he can vaguely recognize as the closed aikido dojo two blocks from his school, the only evidence anyone else had been there are the open window and an unfamiliar, oversized hoodie draped over him.

—

—

Aybul tries to make the pilgrimage as often as they can, though as the years pass, the journey grows more dangerous. The last time they went to the Temple of the Earth Defiant, they had been lucky enough to join a group of genasi travelers kind enough to lend aid to an old dwarf. In exchange, Aybul had given them some potions—healing, mostly, but a few of flying and gaseous forms, just in case—and traded one of their normal bows for a magically enhanced one.

It’s fine, Aybul used the workshop in the temple to enchant it before leaving it as tribute along with the bandoliers of potions and other magically modified weapons and armors they had brought. Architecture has never been Aybul’s forte, but they tried their best to make repairs to the temple itself and the statues of fallen heroes.

A smaller statue, old and weathered down to be nearly unrecognizable, is the last matter they see to in this as with every other pilgrimage.

“Soon you will be eroded to dust, Ambysh,” Aybul says, wiping off moss and as much moisture as they can. They do not repair this statue. Ambysh was never a hero. With a heavy heart, Aybul says goodbye. “Once more I will outlive you, brother.”

—

—

“It’s been a while since we’ve seen Kuroko,” Kazunari says, interrupting the silence of the room the way a tree root erupts beneath a sidewalk: slowly, perhaps annoyingly, but ultimately inevitable. In this room of sunlight and books and warm wooden furniture with bright orange cushions, where Shintaro can work on his paper and Kazunari can read whatever catches his eye, years of comfortable, quiet companionship.

Quiet being the key word.

Kazunari is about to back track—hide behind today’s book and let the silence resettle, a nonverbal apology. Even after all these years he still worries about irritating Shintaro; it’s one thing to tease him for that amused huff and eye roll, but an entirely other thing to make him regret being with Kazunari—but the expression on Shintaro’s face is surprised. And, for some reason, relieved.

Shintaro is entirely focused on him now, which still makes him flush a little. Kazunari straightens up to return the attention and explains himself, “I know we don’t go to every meet up.” What once would have been a teasing smirk to Shintaro, now an inside joke shared. “But he hasn’t been to the last few we’ve been at. Not since…”

Not since Kagami died. In a literal blaze of glory, heroic firefighter that he was. Kazunari remembers the funeral: Kuroko’s already stoic face had been even blanker, hollowed out and flattened. Pale and thin, more of a phantom than ever.

“… maybe we should invite him over!” he says instead. He doesn’t want to think about what it would be like to lose Shintaro, can’t even imagine such a fate.

Shintaro hums, considering, which is how Kazunari knows he has already won. If Shintaro were going to say no, he would have done so already. And for all the friction between his and Kuroko’s personalities, they are actually fond of each other.

“Very well,” Shintaro says, a small smile curling his lips in response to Kazunari’s more boisterous cheer.

—

—

A/N: All of these have larger ideas behind them of fics-I’ll-probably-never-write-but-won’t-leave-me-alone-until-I-write-some-of-it-down, if anyone was curious hit me up?

Also, the Ask Box Advent Calendar 2021 is technically happening if anyone was also interested in that.

[jacksgreysays]

Not a prompt, I'm afraid! Just wanted to say firstly, thank you so much for all the hard work and beautiful writing you bring to the DOS community; I've been reading your fics and blog for years, and it's very awe striking to me how large and brilliant all the creators are in, and you are one of my favorites. Secondly, I wanted to ask if you have seen the Umbrella Academy on Netflix? I'm already tossing over the idea of Shikako in that universe to myself lol

Thanks, anon! I haven't been as active lately (both in the fandom and writing in general) so it means a lot that the stuff I have done is still being appreciated. This is probably weird to say but I do miss the DoS fandom even though it hasn't exactly gone anywhere--or, I guess it's more like I miss the state of mind I was in when I was more active in the DoS fandom? There was something about it where my creativity and productivity were both just in synch creating a fun sort of feedback loop within itself. Now it's like... the desire is there, but I'm slogging through a swamp to drag the ideas out of me. Don't get me wrong, I do still enjoy it, but man do I miss that DoS self-renaissance from before. 

Nonetheless, I'm honored to be counted as one of your favorites, and thank you again for your kind words :D

Re: Umbrella Academy on Netflix, I have seen it and I love it! (Both seasons, since I don't actually know when your ask came in. I think I like season 2 better than season 1, but obviously season 2 would make absolute no sense without season 1 so hooray for both.) And I also have thought about Shikako in that universe. I think with most new universes I encounter my brain automatically tries to put in either Shikako or Tetsuki Kaiza depending on which one fits better or which scenario feel right.

For example, in Boku no Hero Academia, I can't help but feel like Tetsuki would have been age-mates/classmates/friends with Todoroki Touya. It doesn't feel right to have her be the same age as the canon Class 1-A (well, I have a weird idea that kiiinda does that but involves time travel semi-angst so...) Whereas for Shikako, well, I wrote stuff about that. And while I could imagine her as Todoroki Touya's age and it does work, she just fits better the other way.

For Umbrella Academy, Tetsuki Kaiza doesn't really fit. Or, at least, not in a significant way? She has more of a "consultant/outside contractor for The Commission" vibe via the Dimension Witch than anything else. I mean, maaaybe she is one of the strange 43 babies born mysteriously with powers, but even then I don't think she ended up with the Hargreeves.

In contrast, when I think of Shikako in the Umbrella Academy, my brain is immediately like: oh, she's Number Eight.

And, here's the thing, I know within the world the siblings with the lower numbers were perceived to be the better/stronger/favored of Reginald Hargreeves, but like. Obviously not true. I didn't read the comics/graphic novels, so I don't know how accurate this is, but I'm pretty sure the higher the number the more powerful/less tractable the specific person was. And whether Reginald knew that or not is ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

So, like, obviously Shikako who is crazy powerful and knows that's all Reginald wants from her and has withstood far better brainwashing/propaganda (and he's not even good at it) would never even show a peep of power. Out of spite. And solidarity with Vanya. But mostly out of spite. And also, considering Shikako's ride or die for her friends and more so for her brother, you know she would be all about mitigating Reginald's truly terrible parenting/training for her new siblings. And I just think there's a lot of space for her within the Hargreeves family relationships (or the dysfunctional lack thereof) for her to make small but significant changes.

[In contrast, Tetsuki would just be throwing more dysfunctional fuel into the fire. Depending on how much she does or doesn't remember, she would probably fall into the might is right trap and use force to establish herself in the Hargreeves hierarchy. Not because she wants to be Number One, but because she mostly knows the best method for survival is through shows of power. It doesn’t really contribute much to the story to have her as a Hargreeves, tbh, which is why if she were in TUA, she’d be elsewhere]

Shikako as Number Eight not using her powers out of solidarity for Vanya (while also simultaneously training Vanya to get her powers under control), commiserating with Ben about the call from the Horrors/Eldritch being from the Other Side (either because her powers are Void based or the experiences of Gelel/Jashin), snarking/collaborating with Five because he needs someone to push back and not just either ignore him/shut him down.

Is she haunted by ghosts from her former life? Could she help Klaus come to terms with death and the dead way earlier than in canon? Would Allison, seeing the sister solidarity of Vanya and Shikako, try to reach out to join them rather than ignoring them? Do Diego and Luther stop caring so much about ranking when its clear that Shikako doesn't and is all the happier for it?

I dunno, anon, it's a fascinating thought exercise.

[jacksgreysays]

green and red and blue and grey, 1/? (2021-04-24)

“Not bad, kid,” says the man in the grey cloak with intimidating scars across his face. A stranger to the village, one with enough money to have a horse and enough power to travel alone.

The others had been too cautious to approach him, but you’re too hungry and have a younger brother to feed besides. You’ve already given up shame in begging, why not fear as well?

He didn’t give you money—by which you weren’t surprised—but he gave you some bread and three sour apples and a knife. He said there would be more tomorrow, if you returned at dawn, and he would teach you how to use the knife.

You went back to you little brother, gave him half the bread and two apples, and considered the offer.

At dawn, you returned. By noon you had the alderman’s blood on your hands.

“Not bad,” repeats the man in grey.

That will not be the only thing he teaches you.

—

Amongst witches there are… lineages, legacies… titles and knowledge and magic passed down in a continuous line, turning any single witch into something greater than any individual magician could ever hope to be.

Some follow blood, an obvious path, red line down and across and within. Mothers to daughters, brothers and sisters, great aunts and distant cousins and bone marrow transplants. Where the blood flows, the magic follows.

Others are less clear.

—

The book is bound in blue leather: light blue, dark blue, sky and ocean and truths.

After the death of the Blue Witch, it does not open.

It does not open when the Blue Witch’s children attempt it—out of curiosity, or arrogance, or desperation. It does not open when the Blue Witch’s house goes up in flames, when the opportunistic passersby loot the ruins, when it is sold for pennies to merchants to collectors to power hungry usurpers to the would be heroes who struck them down.

It does not open as it passes hands onward, always onward never back, until the truth of it is lost three centuries later sitting in a box in the back of an antique shop.

How pretty, this book of blue and sky and ocean and truth, never mind its pages are full of nonsense.

Do not judge a book by its cover, but perhaps it is fine to let the book do the judging.

The next Blue Witch is an artist just looking to feather their nest.

—

She sighs, gets on her feet, and ignores the stares of the others in the room.

“No,” she says simply, implacable, immovable. “That’s not what will happen.”

“Oh?” asks the dark eyed being, more void than substance. The others watch hungrily, teeth aching in anticipation.

She steps in front of the children, puts herself between predator and prey.

“They will leave, they will live, they will grow.”

“Hm,” considers the dark eyed being, patience flickering.

She bares her own teeth, shakes off the lightning in her fingertips.

“I have Spoken.”

~

A/N: I’m only vaguely aware of what’s going on here, to be honest. I had this title and the sentence about lineages for months (over a year, maybe? D:) and sort of an idea of what I wanted to do with it and then uhhhhhhh forgot. So the rest is using the title and that original sentence as a self prompt

The Grey Witch goes from teacher to student.

The Red Witches are through blood.

The Blue Witch designs their successor.

The Green Witch... I dunno, chooses themselves? Starts from within?

I also am unsure why the sections don’t match the order of the title ¯\_ (ツ)_/¯

Anyway, here’s to slowly getting my writing muscles back into shape.

[jacksgreysays]

Could Should Actually + A softer world 31 or Things you Said 22?

A/N: Are you the same anon who mix and matches other ask box events? Because let me just say, I enjoy the puzzle.

Anyway I went with the things you said 22, but I may also do the a softer world 31 later.

Here’s some Counterclockwise!

~

22) things you said after it was over

it could have gone like this:

"Imagine the glory," Joy exclaims in a breathy sort of voice as if in awe of the very idea. She slings an arm around Leanne's shoulders, drawing her close, comfortable and warm. The couch they're on could easily fit four, but the two of them are squished up against one arm so that the boys and even Alvin in his massive wolf form could fit, too.

"We wouldn't be able to tell anyone," Leanne argues even as she leans in, matching Joy's volume.

"The riches?" Joy tries again, grinning, more playful than earnest.

"Exactly how would we profit off this plan?" Leanne asks in return.

Thwarted, Joy goes for a different tactic. "Imagine... the drama," she says, leaning even closer, conspiratorially.

Leanne hums, considering. When the lack of disagreement becomes more and more apparent, time stretching wider, Joy's grin does the same. She swings her other arm around Leanne, squeezing, jostling, trying to bodily contain the happiness of the moment before nuzzling their faces together. Not quite a kiss, Joy's bared teeth pressed to the skin of Leanne's cheek, but not so far off.

Shrieking with laughter, Leanne doesn't push her away. "That's not fair! You know my weakness!"

"Of course," Joy says, words trapped between them, "I don't need to be fair, I just need you to say yes."

And Leanne, settling into her hold, can do nothing but nod and say yes.

...

Over two decades later, a fifteen year old Leanne follows the rest of her classmates through the art gallery, tired eyes glancing over the displays but not really taking them in. Yesterday was rough--school, training, a newly hatched cluster of giant sea serpents by the docks while trying not to lose too much face in front of her teammates--and she had been grateful for upcoming the field trip though now she regrets not being able to appreciate the art.

She finds a seat and takes it, her legs almost buckling in relief, and stares blindly forward.

"Do you like it?" someone asks next to her. Leanne, surprised but too exhausted to startle, turns to the voice. An older woman, maybe in her forties, brown hair tied back into a bun, sharp clothes. Maybe a staff member of the art gallery? They didn't have a tour guide, did they?

"I'm sorry," Leanne says, reflexively.

A sad sort of smile graces the woman's face, she shakes her head slightly. "Do you like it?" she repeats, gesturing to the painting on the wall in front of them. The one that Leanne had stared at but hadn't really seen. A little ashamed, she focuses.

It's a closeup of two hands, different skin tones and shapes, their fingers intertwined. There are matching rings, softly glinting in the light. Everything about the painting is soft, dreamy, more memory and imagination than photorealism.

Not the most amazing picture, Leanne thinks, but she can certainly see why it would be compelling. "Yes," she answers, finally, simply, though she doesn't know why it matters.

The woman's small smile twitches into something bigger, but no less sad.

Not that it was up for argument, but it's obvious that Leanne's not a very good hero: she doesn't know how to make things better. So she fidgets awkwardly instead.

Now the woman's smile turns into something amused. "I'm glad you like it. It's my favorite," she says before getting to her feet. She reaches a hand toward Leanne, as if to pat her on the shoulder, but pulls back.

"Take care of yourself, Leanne," she says, before walking away, disappearing into the labyrinth of the art gallery.

And because Leanne is not a very good hero, it takes her a few hours to realize that they never exchanged introductions. How did she know her name?

---

it should have gone like this:

"She's a liability," Tetsuki says, scowling at the doctor.

They are in the observation room of the testing chambers, a wide near-indestructible room where Doctor Kaiza's clients can use their meta-human abilities without fear of collateral damage.

Or where would-be vigilantes can train without the public catching on. Not that Henry particularly needs it. He is, despite all the media speculation, entirely baseline human. Most of Starling's tricks are gadgets and whatever he learned from his mentor Firefly.

But it's good to see what his potential teammates are capable of, and so here he is:

Caleb he knows the best, as much raised in the lifestyle as Henry had been. More so, maybe, practically born into it. Zenith, son of Apex.

Tetsuki he's met before, Doctor Kaiza's... niece? Maybe? The actual connection is vague. But he's seen some of the reports of her prior activities and her abilities. Electric manipulation, martial arts training, and a fierce protectiveness for all that she isn't the nicest of people.

Hari he only knows by word of mouth, the lone lion shapeshifter amongst a pack of wolves. Goldenheart, recommended by former hero Silverfang.

Right now, Hari is in lion form, a huge shape easily loping around in the testing chambers, big playful circles around the other figure below. At least, Henry is pretty sure it's playful. Although, considering the nervous posture of Goldenheart's chosen playmate, perhaps she doesn't understand the same.

Leanne Peridot. A civilian as of two weeks ago. Where and how Doctor Kaiza found her is a mystery. Why the doctor thought she'd make a good addition to the team is an even bigger mystery.

No martial arts training, no particular talent with any weapons, practically baseline human. The only thing that makes her stand out is that strange pocket watch and the one minute of time stopping it gives her, but if she can't do anything with that one minute then it's all just a waste. She's back to being a normal civilian out on the field.

"Tetsuki's right," Henry says, watching as Goldenheart bats a huge paw gently at Leanne, watches the green-haired girl fall to the ground, unable to brace herself against even an expected, friendly push. "She's a liability."

He doesn't say it to be mean, he says it to save lives. If she's just another civilian they have to keep an eye out for on the field, then they may as well tie a weight to themselves. They need teammates who can keep up, who can be trusted to handle themselves and more. 

"Then help her," Doctor Kaiza says, "Train her. Give her the tools she needs to survive. The tools all of you had since you were children." Her voice is dispassionate, but her words give her away. "She is behind, yes, but the rest of you have a head start. She has the potential, help her access it."

"Why?" Caleb asks and while Tetsuki lights up in triumph, the doctor turns to him with a look of disappointment on her face. Henry also turns to look at him, confused. For all that Caleb is practically a living tank, he's usually the more diplomatic of them.

"I mean," he continues, "Why her? Why do you care? We're a functional enough team wth just the four of us. We don't need a fifth."

"Certainly not a fifth we need to bring up to our level," Tetsuki adds snidely.

The doctor turns back to the observation window, where Leanne has gotten back to her feet and begun to hesitantly run her hands through Hari's fur. The sound doesn't exactly travel, but from the satisfied closed eyes, Henry thinks perhaps there might be purring.

"Heroism," Doctor Kaiza says, followed by a silence long and drawn out. "It's not about being good at fighting," she says, "it's about saving people.

"And sometimes even the best need help."

...

When Leanne disappears, Henry investigates. Of course he does. That's his teammate. For all that she had a rocky beginning, Leanne proved herself as a hero and Henry isn't disloyal.

Tetsuki, ever the pessimist, thinks she ran. Finally giving in to Bastian, the absolute bastard, and his constant attempts to sway her to his cause. Whatever that cause may be. He's pretty sure Tetsuki only thinks that because two of Bastian's lieutenants are former classmates of hers, supervillains brewing right under her nose.

Caleb, more emotionally in tune, has been the contact for the Peridot family. Collaborating with them on their search, if she may have said anythign to them, left any hints or clues behind.

Unsurprisingly, Doctor Kaiza is calm.

Surprisingly, so is Hari.

"Why aren't you worried? What do you know?" Henry asks, finally, after all avenues of tracking have been exhausted. It would be more intimidating if he didn't have dark bags under his eyes, if Hari weren't capable of turning into a massive lion in the blink of an eye.

"I am worried," Hari says, "but it won't help her." Then the shapeshifter shrugs, "And I know the same as you."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Hm," Hari eyes drift away from his, "You remember the codename she came up with last year? Before you, Caleb, and Tetsuki shot it down."

Henry frowns. "What about it?" He remembers, of course. Leanne had wanted to be called Anachron. Thematically, it made sense, and it was witty enough. But it was a name that had already been used. 

"Leanne isn't like us. She didn't grow up hearing stories about heroes, from heroes. The only context she had for names was us."

"So?"

Hari sighs, meets Henry's eyes, and says, "She was, is, Anachron. You shouldn't be looking for where she is. You should be looking for when."

---

but it actually went like this:

"They sent me through time and cursed me with immortality on top of that, so I'd appreciate it if you would bring me home, time witch." Bastian, the absolute bastard, says across the table from Leanne. A beautiful tea service is set up, delicate finger foods and porcelain, shining silverware gleaming against a rich tablecloth. It is a mockery; as Bastian sips from his teacup, Leanne struggles against the ties keeping her bound to the chair.

"I'm not a time witch," Leanne says, exasperated. At him and herself. Him because this is not the first, or second, or even third time this has happened. Herself because... well... this is not the first, second, or event third time this has happened. A part of her is glad her team is on the way to get her out of this. A far larger, more frustrated part of her hates that she needs her team to get her out of this yet again.

"Sorcerer, warlock, wizard, I don't care what terms you people use nowadays. Time magic, you use it, therefore you are a time witch." Bastian waves away her words, equally dismissive in his tone. He, it seems, is as bored of this conversation as she is.

"I don't use time magic," Leanne protests, because even if just sends them down the same patterns, she doesn't know what else to do but be honest.

"Not well, certainly," Bastian agrees, sort of, "but time witches were rare even in my kingdom. Here, you're apparently the only one, so you'll have to do."

Leanne, insulted and irritated, sighs.

"Is this a problem of payment? Because if its a reward you need, I can cover that. What do you want, money? Fame? Power?" Bastian lists out, resting his chin on one hand, a king in repose.

Leanne shakes her head.

"Something more than that, hm? Or a combination of the three?" Bastian meets her eyes and smirks, a sharp and hungry thing. "I'll make you my queen, time witch. Bring me home and the world could be yours."

Leanne just shakes her head again.

Annoyed, Bastian's face turns into a thunderous scowl. He stands, slamming his hand on the table, the tea set rattling with the force of it.

"You will not refuse me again, time witch," he says, low with rage and barely contained violence.

Having witnessed the scope of his abilities, it is a miracle Leanne's voice doesn't shake when she responds, "Then stop asking."

A reverberating boom sounds, the tea set once more rattling, and Leanne resist the urge to close her eyes in relief. Her team is here to rescue her, but she refuses to take her eyes off Bastian.

He bares his teeth, displeased at her, the situation, but quickly composes himself. "Until next time," he says, and almost laughs at his own play on words.

...

The restraints they've put on her are tight, though thankfully not painful, the chair is far from comfortable, she has a bit of a headache, and the interrogation room is a little cold: it's not the best set of circumstances she's ever found herself in, but they're certainly not the worst.

When the grumpy officer who brought her here returns, he finds her lightly dozing, trying to catch up on the years and years of sleep debt she's accrued. It's not likely to succeed but, again, she's been in worse places.

"Leanne Peridot?" the officer says. It's not really a question, they took her a picture, her fingerprints, and DNA. They should know who she is.

"Yep."

"Also known as Anachron?"

"Sure."

"Also known as the Time Witch?"

"Ye--no, actually," Leanne says, catching herself, "I do not claim that one."

Officer Grumpyface looks up at her, "You don't?"

"No," she says, "Nobody calls me that." Or, at least, not in a way that would make it into her official file.

Grumpyface shrugs, uncaring. "You've done quite a bit of unauthorized time traveling, haven't you?"

Leanne can feel her brow furrow, "Who has authority over time travel?"

Grumpyface looks behind him at the observation window before turning back to her. He doesn't say anything.

Instead, the door to the interrogation room opens, a man in a similar, if far fancier and impressive, uniform to Officer Grumpyface enters the room. Grumpyface stands up at attention, saluting the newcomer.

It's an older face than the one she remembers. No more false boyish sweetness, but a chiseled sort of handsomeness instead. There are a few age lines, some grey in his hair. But considering it's several centuries since they last spoke, Bastian, the absolute bastard, has barely changed.

She sighs, resigned. "Bastian."

"Hello, Time Witch."

~

A/N: Making Leanne miserable since... uh... I don’t know, it’s time travel. :D

For the Could/Should/Actually Fic Ask Box Event!

[jacksgreysays]

Word Prompts (T20): Time

Related to this (but maybe an AU of it?)

~

Fuyumi is the one that opens the envelope.

It's not addressed to her, of course, but given whose names are on it, it's safest with her.

To Todoroki Touya, care of Todoroki Rei.

A decade ago, this envelope would have made sense, although in a somewhat optimistic way. Now, it just makes Fuyumi confused and wistful.

It's a normal envelope, thin, must be just a single sheet of paper inside; but it's when Fuyumi unfolds the letter--if it can even be called such--that the real significance is revealed.

HEY HOTSHOT, WATCH THIS!

It reads, written in a slanted blocky hand, green ink, with an arrow pointing to circle. In that circle, taped down, is a memory card, the kind that would go into a digital camera.

At the bottom, as a signature, is a lightning bolt in the same bright green ink, and a date--a little over a decade ago.

---

"Aw come on, Touya, this'll be fun!" A girl's voice cajoles from behind the camera. It shakes briefly, before steadying, then zooms out to better frame what looks like a UA training room. On screen is a teenage boy, blinding white hair and blue eyes, half-hearted scowl on his face. His face is flushed, not from anger but from embarrassment.

"This is stupid," he mutters, but obligingly stays in place as a girl joins him. Her black hair and grey eyes as somber as his is dazzling, but their matching uniforms make up for it.

"Alright hotshot," the girl says teasingly, nudging Touya with an elbow, "I get it, you're a serious hero. But don't you think your future fans would love to see just how... cool... you are even now?"

She waggles her eyebrow on the pun, shooting a wide grin at the camera as if to get support from a nonexistent audience.

In retaliation, Touya pushes her away, a few steps which the girl easily accedes before returning to his side with a softer, more honest grin.

"That was awful, Tetsuki," he says, but there's a layer of amusement in his tone. He's already convinced, "Maybe you're the one who's going to have all the future fans and now they're disappointed at how lame you are."

"If they're my fan, they already know what they're getting into," Tetsuki dismisses with a wink towards the nonexistent audience, "And between the two of us, you're the one who's going to be top five. Maybe you've become so badass that you're intimidating! This will show how fun you are, get in touch with the people!"

"We haven't even graduated yet and you're trying to fix my PR?"

Tetsuki waves a hand nonchalantly. "I'm just giving your future agency options! They can edit this later, I'm sure. Come on, come on! I only have this room booked for an hour," she says, shaking Touya's shoulder before darting to one end of the training room, the right side of the screen.

He yelps in protest, "An hour?!" but follows her lead and goes to the left, forming a mirror image.

Tetsuki smiles, shifts into a ready stance, and activates what must be her quirk--green lightning sparking along her body, "Ready?"

In return, Touya's arms ignite with blue flames, and for the first time since the video started he smiles, wild and bright, "Set..."

"GO!" They both yell, before springing toward each other. Twin trails of light streaking behind them, bold and happy and free.

---

Fuyumi doesn't cry. She's endured far worse than an unexpected glimpse of a past long gone, light and sweet before it all burned away.

But she takes care with the memory card, gentle as she re-tapes it to the note, and despite their shaking her fingers remain light and dextrous as she returns it to the envelope.

She'll bring it to Mother on her next visit, for safekeeping. After all, until Touya returns, it's meant to be in her care.

Maybe then they'll all watch it together, Mother, Fuyumi, and all her brothers.

---

Kaiza Tetsuki. Quirk: Electrical Manipulation. Hero name, Thunderbolt.

UA student, Class 1-A.

Second place freshman during Sports Festival.

Missing in action during internship with Endeavor's agency.

Investigation inconclusive.

(notable contact: Todoroki Touya)

Todoroki Touya. Quirk: Hell Flame. Hero name, Hotshot.

UA student, Class 1-A

First place freshman during Sports Festival.

Injured in incident during internship with Endeavor's agency, last seen one month after said incident. Suspected willing departure.

Investigation inconclusive.

(notable contact: Kaiza Tetsuki)

~

A/N: I'm trying to get back in the habit of writing again. I know, I know, I've been trying to get back into it for a while, but I've clearly lost my mental discipline that I used to have. I mean, not having the inspiration is one thing when I'm trying to write a specific ficlet but not writing at all is just me being lazy :/

Anyway, I was considering titling this "Viridescent: Or, Tetsuki and Touya's Time-Capsule Tape" but that was too silly.

Anyway, the reason why I'm thinking it's an AU of the linked "related" Viridescent is because maybe Tetsuki died during that internship and in order to cover either Touya's/his own ass, Endeavor CREMATED HER BODY TO HIDE THE EVIDENCE?

I mean, it could just be she disappeared (whether willingly or not?) and Touya went a little nuts and blamed Endeavor which ruined their already pretty bad relationship so he ran away and became Dabi. And then THAT snowballed into Endeavor increasing pressure on Shouta which ruined HIS life and put pressure on Rei which just... feedback loop of awful.

edit: tweaked because Touya/Dabi has white hair which I should’ve figured given the disaster that is ANY WHITE HAIRED ANIME BOY

[jacksgreysays]

Incidental Equilibrium, 1/? (2020-06-18)

Incidental Equilibrium

In which Ringo is proactive, Zakuro is stubborn, and Tetsuki needs a little help with some legal matters. 

The whole friendship thing? That kind of just happens.

(Or, the Counterpoise and Externality mashup that literally nobody asked for)

~

1) on the matter of becoming genin

It could have gone like this:

The Uzumaki twins attempt the Academy's graduation exam two years before their age mates. Naruto is ambitious, Konran is anxious, and neither of them get what they want.

That's because the Uzumaki twins do not pass the exam. They do not graduate:

She does. He doesn't.

Konran gets put on a team with two boys practically slated for the corps and a jounin who has to be literally dragged into the role of sensei. Ringo and Zakuro are known for not getting along with strangers, but this time they're willing to take the risk. Somehow, perhaps out of spite, the newly formed Team Five actually passes Riichi-sensei's ludicrous test and make him face the consequences.

They are, if not happy, then paving their way toward it.

Naruto gets sent back to the Academy, placed in the class who are slated to graduate next year. Nobody knows him, but they already don't like him--the rumors and Yanagi-sensei's cold demeanor the only information they have to work with. He meets Tetsuki who, even though kindness doesn't come naturally to her, takes a chance and helps him graduate.

They get put on a team with Komadori, a neutral classmate which is the best they can get really, under the command of a displeased Kakashi-sensei.

Like the formation of Team Two, their happiness, if it exists, is temporary.

Ringo and Zakuro help Konran find herself despite everything working against them all. Naruto and Tetsuki learn enough from each other before their divergent destinies tear them apart.

... But becoming genin is only the start.

---

It should have gone like this:

There are no Uzumaki twins. (Perhaps that night of the Kyuubi it was otherwise. Or perhaps a few years later, even, until an ambassador from Cloud saw an unprotected child with bright red hair. Or perhaps it was always as such.) Regardless, there is only Naruto.

Ambitious, he attempts the Academy's graduation exam two years before his age mates and fails.

Ringo and Zakuro, assigned a third teammate they're incapable of cooperating with, also fail their jounin sensei's test. They go to the corps as expected and must learn to become content.

Naruto is placed in Yanagi-sensei's class where nobody knows him or likes him. That stays true the entire year. When it comes time for the graduation exam, he fails again.

Maybe he would have passed with a little help from a classmate, even one ill-suited for kindness, but none take that chance. (And if Yanagi-sensei vaguely remembers a missing student, an orphan who held her own even against clan kids until her mysterious disappearance years ago, well. Orphans disappear in Konoha all the time.)

Naruto is placed in Iruka-sensei's class where destiny finally sinks its teeth into him and doesn't let him go.

Sometimes he's happy, he thinks. He must be.

---

But it actually went like this:

On a random morning a few months before graduation, Ringo's parents talk over breakfast about his future.

"Your cousin Suzuka is due for a promotion soon," Ringo's mom says while he blearily chews on egg and rice. He's not the best after just waking up, true, but he has time still before he needs to train the weakness out of himself.

"She could have an apprentice" she continues, as if he answered verbally. "I can ask her next time I'm on shift with her."

"Would be better than wasting time by going through the corps' prerequisite classes," his dad says, "Honestly, why they don't allow exemptions or testing out of those--so inefficient."

Ringo's dad is of the opinion that simply being part of the Nohara clan means they are naturally better at being medics than outsiders: as if medical knowledge and jutsu were akin to other clans' blood limits or secret techniques.

Maybe they're a little better at memorization and chakra control, but Ringo thinks his advantage has more to do with being raised by and amongst an entire clan of medics than anything he was born with--wait a second...

"Ask Suzuka what?" Ringo asks, belatedly, quickly shaking awareness into his head.

"Ask her to take you as an apprentice, of course," Ringo's mom answers easily, "I won't have you squandering your time in the Medic Corps or, heaven forbid, the Genin Corps."

Ringo blinks, uncomprehending. "I could end up on a jounin led team," he says, mildly.

His parents' response are less mild: his mom's light smile immedately twisting into a harsh frown, while his dad's hands clench into fists.

"No, no, no," his mom says, almost horrified at the idea.

"They'll try to put you on a team with That Man," his dad says, warningly. "It's what happened to your older cousins."

"They failed purposefully, of course. They know better than to trust their safety--much less their education!-- to That Man. But still," Ringo's mom closes her eyes, as if pained by the very thought, "Why the Hokage even tries to put a heartless creature like that in charge of young shinobi--and at the expense of our clan! Oh, no, Ringo, I couldn't lose you, too."

Then she reaches out for his hand, for comfort, and he tries to do his best.

Ringo's not stupid. He knows who That Man is: Comrade Killer Kakashi Hatake. Aunt Rin's murderer.

He doesn't think the Hokage would allow an actual psychopath to teach children, genin though they may be, so Kakashi Hatake can't still be a comrade killer. But he knows better than to bring it up in front of his parents.

It's not a battle he will win and honestly, not one he particularly wants to win. He doesn't want to be on a team lead by the man who killed his aunt--whether murder or manslaughter--and bore no consequences. If anything, and here his mom might have a point, the Hokage's continuous attempt to make a Nohara one of his students has prevented Ringo's cousins from following any career path but the Medic Corps or, apparently if the timing is right, an apprenticeship from another cousin.

But that's not what Ringo wants for himself. If he enters the Medic Corps, or apprentices under cousin Suzuka, then he won't be able to be on a team with Zakuro.

Maybe a compromise is in order.

...

On a random morning a few months before graduation, Zakuro tries to sneak out of the house only to be caught.

"Zakuro," says Uncle Shinku behind him, and Zakuro tries his best to hold in the annoyed sigh that desperately wants to escape. Last time he didn't, Uncle Shinku lectured him for thirty minutes about how disrespectful and ungrateful he was.

He turns around, "Yeah?"

Uncle Shinku glares. Well, that's just his default face, but it gets more glare-y. "Yes, Uncle," he says flatly, pointedly.

Zakuro holds in another annoyed sigh, "Yes, Uncle Shinku."

The man hums. Zakuro has no idea if that's approval or not.

"You will be graduating from the Academy soon," Uncle Shinku says, which is... true? Obvious? Not something Zakuro knows how to respond to.

He nods. "Yes, Uncle Shinku," he says, because maybe if he just repeats himself, the conversation (does this count?) will be over faster.

"I will not have you shaming us..."

Which is, wow. Thanks for the vote of confidence.

"Our arrangement with the Kurama clan still holds, for all that their heiress remains... reclusive. I will not have you embarrassing the Yuuhi clan," Uncle Shinku continues.

Great. Cool. This is why Zakuro needs to work on his stealth.

"When you join the Genin Corps, I will turn you into a shinobi worthy of our name, unlike your mother."

He sees an opening. "Thank you, Uncle," Zakuro says swiftly, bowing deep enough so as to hide his scowl. "I will go train so as to improve myself! Please excuse me!" Then, without waiting for a dismissal, Zakuro leaves.

If Uncle Shinku responds, he can't hear it. Not over the angry rush of blood pounding in his ears. He meets eyes with cousin Kurenai, her equally red eyes wide with a complicated mix of relief and guilt.

Why is she even here? She has an apartment. If Zakuro could live away from his asshole of an uncle, he would never set a single foot inside this house.

"Zakuro," she says, quietly, "I wanted to--"

Meanly, he interrupts with a loud, "Good morning cousin!" He spitefully enjoys the twist of annoyance on her face before bolting for the Academy.

It's early still but it's not here and that's all that matters.

If he's lucky, maybe Ringo will be there, too.

...

On a random morning a few months before the end of her fifth Academic year, Tetsuki sits alone in a room in T&I.

She's been here since yesterday afternoon, so by this point any adrenaline and fear have long since been replaced by bitter exhaustion.

And anyway, this is not her first time in T&I, so the novelty has worn off.

Although, at least, the room is nicer. Last time it really felt like an interrogation room: stark walls, hard chair, cold lighting. This time, they've put her in something almost comfortable. There's still an obvious viewing window, though it has a tasteful decorative frame, and she could almost fall asleep in the cushioned seat she's in.

Almost.

She hasn't slept since they brought her here and, ostensibly, she's alone right now. But still, she resists. She can sense at least two other people watching her from the observation room on the other side of that fake mirror--three, maybe. There's two distinct rectangles of body temperature metal standing about a meter apart. Forehead protectors, if she's interpreting it correctly, each with a matching pouch of kunai and assorted weaponry. And while she can't sense a third one, the door knob in that room opened and shut nearly thirty minutes ago with neither of the other two leaving.

So someone who doesn't carry metal on them, maybe? Unless it was just someone delivering a message... better to err on the side of caution.

She sits, exhausted eyes half-lidded, and waits for her fate to be decided.

Last time she was here, she thought no one would care if she disappeared. No one to miss her or notice--certainly no one to speak up if they did--just one of many Konoha orphans who mysteriously vanish.

This time, she knows it to be true.

She knows why she's here, this time around--or, at least, she can make an educated enough guess. Yesterday, Yanagi-sensei and Hinoura-sensei had distributed elemental chakra paper wearing nonconductive gloves. Gleefully, everyone in class grabbed at their papers, eager to find out their elemental nature in hopes that this would lead to lessons in ninjutsu.

Tetsuki didn't have particularly high hopes--such things hardly led to anything as exciting as her classmates would hope, probably just more lectures--but she certainly hadn't expected it to go this badly.

For the most part, everyone's paper reacted in an expected way. A lot of ash from the fire natured people, some crumbled to pieces or soaked through entirely--earth and water respectively. She thinks she saw one or two slice in half; wind natured, which is rare but highly appreciated in Land of Fire.

Hers crinkled.

She thought maybe that just meant she didn't have an elemental nature, there were some classmates whose papers did nothing--Neji Hyuuga for example, but everyone knows that Hyuuga chakra is weird--it wasn't too out there.

That was, perhaps, too optimistic.

Lightning natured chakra isn't unheard of Konoha. That alone would not have gotten her here, surely.

But that combined with her previous visit--where she was interrogated on whether or not she knew Cloud nin and if the light haired, dark skinned boy she used as her henge model was a real person that she knew--probably doesn't look that good.

Her paper crinkled, Yanagi-sensei dismissed everyone for lunch, and Hinoura-sensei brought shinobi wearing the T&I uniform to take her away.

They took her blood, put her in this room, had a sweetly smiling old lady ask her a bunch of questions, and then left her here.

The door to her room opens up. The person that enters is not someone she recognizes.

He's in his fifties maybe, quite old for a shinobi which he must be considering he's in this room and not a prisoner. She's not much of a danger to anyone, given she's only an Academy student, but they wouldn't bring a civilian in. Not that she would have a chance--for him to have survived to his age, he must be quite skilled.

He stares at her and says nothing, so she stays silent as well.

"You are Tetsuki, yes? Of the... Ryokushoku orphanage?" He asks almost hesitantly.

She doesn't know why, he clearly has access to her file. And it's not like a hesitant old man will get them any other answers than the sweetly smiling old lady did.

She nods in response.

"I'm Kunugi Mokume, conservator of the Utsugi clan holdings," he introduces himself. She nods again, because she doesn't know what else to say. "The Utsugi clan has been largely believed to be wiped out during the Night of the Kyuubi. Clearly, that is not the case," he says with a small smile.

She doesn't smile back.

Perhaps chagrined, perhaps not, Kunugi Mokume continues, "Unfortunately, we're under something of a quandary and a deadline on top of that: The decade of reservation is nearly up before the Utsugi clan holdings reverts to Konoha's possession. You are the sole heir but, unfortunately, due to your legal status as a minor your guardian would be the one to receive your inheritance."

Her guardian being the Ryokushoku orphanage, which just goes back to Konoha. Unless...

"Given the news of your possible inheritance, any applications for your adoption would be denied at this time. For your protection," he says.

Sure. Okay then.

"So I started with nothing and I will continue to have nothing," Tetsuki says with a nonchalant shrug.

Kunugi Mokume flinches. She doesn't know why. It's the truth. What is a clan name if there is no family to go with it? And anyway, she has long since abandoned the hope of having one.

"There is one possibility," he says, as if this were some kind of planning session and not just some stranger telling her nonsense after she's spent hours in Konoha's T&I, "If you become a legal adult before this October, you can inherit without any issue."

"Ah, of course. I'll just age a few years right now then," she snipes because she's tired and angry and something in her hates this man more than she's ever hated anything in her life for giving her this hollow, useless hope.

Weirdly enough, that makes Kunugi Mokume smile. "When you become a genin, you become a legal adult in the eyes of Konoha."

Tetsuki stares at him in confusion. "I'm only in my fifth year at the Academy," she says slowly, which, given how frequently her teachers have ratted her out to T&I as a potential spy is frankly a miracle.

He looks back at her, equally confused. "It's been a while since I've been at the Academy," he admits. 

That's fair. He's old. And she knows during wartime the length of Academy schooling is shorter.

"I have another year before my class is up for graduation," she explains. "It won't be in time for this October." She doesn't know why she's bothering, this is all nonsense.

"Maybe your class won't be ready," he argues, "but you could be. If you take the upcoming graduation exam and pass..."

He doesn't need to say any more, but he does anyway. "You have nothing, right? So what do you have to lose?"

~

A/N: I saw this post and I don't know why my brain responded by immediately smashing together two (arguably three? if you include (In)difference) still incomplete concepts as a response but I guess I wanted it enough to write the above.

I may continue this? I don't know.

[jacksgreysays]

Viridescent: Or, Tetsuki Goes Under New Management, (2020-04-27)

Related to this, but not required reading

~

Tetsuki is sent on a mission to yet another dimension with yet another group of people who she could help, but only if they pay an equivalent price in whatever the Shopkeeper has sent her to retrieve. It's a standard mission, all told, fairly straightforward for all that she's dealing in mercenary work exchanged for what should be intangible concepts. It doesn't even take that long. Only six days--not the shortest she's ever been on, that had been only six hours, and far from the longest--before she's ready to return to the Shop 

(Then again, what with the different dimensions and all, six days for her does not guarantee six days at the Shop.)

So she returns--with a bottled curse and a beloved keychain weighted with cherished childhood memories she had Assessed to be the equivalent exchange--and is only mildly surprised that on the other side of the Dimension Doors is an entirely different Shopkeeper than the one she left behind.

For a moment, Watanuki-kun doesn't look it. Startled and staring--as bewildered as the teenager she first met, tempered with a yearning grief--but that is quickly and carefully shuttered beneath the neutral guise of the Shopkeeper.

"Ah, you've inherited..." she says mildly, giving him time to compose himself, "... my condolences for your loss."

He nods his head, but doesn't say thank you, because he knows words have power, especially his own, now. But perhaps his education was not so thorough, because then he asks, "My loss, but not yours, senpai?"

Tetsuki blinks, but only because her eyes require it. "You're the Shopkeeper, I am no longer your senpai," she corrects, "And your loss, yes, not mine. Don't get me wrong, I liked Yuuko-san, but to me she was my employer, the Shopkeeper first and foremost and, well..." she does not gesture around her, because that would be unnecessary. 

"The Shopkeeper is dead. Long live the Shopkeeper."

Watanuki-kun's face doesn't even twitch, stays placid even under the wave of emotional turmoil she can feel off him. Good, he's a fast learner.

Now, the real question is, "Did you also inherit the title of Dimension Witch?"

---

The longest mission Tetsuki had ever been sent on lasted for six years: a grueling, grudging thing which was largely set in, of all places, Scotland.

The client was foolish, mismanaging his resources, and somehow both frustratingly vague and tediously inefficient with his Wish, besides. She even offered suggestions that she Assessed would suit the situation: it certainly wouldn't be the first time she bodyguarded someone from a villain obsessed with immortality or, alternatively, assassinate said villain.

(Yes, even including the whole magical soul container bit. Although, to be fair, most liches only bothered with the single phylactery.)

But Dumbledore only wanted her to observe and teach and no more.

And so for six years Tetsuki was Professor Babbling's apprentice and teaching assistant. Almost literally as far away from the important events of the mission as she could get while still being in the same castle. She never even had the Chosen One in any of her classes! 

She did get close in her third year, when the staff were deciding how to schedule around Professor Lupin's lycanthropy. Briefly they considered having her substitute for him--he would assign reading or have open study, so she didn't really need to be a master in the subject--except then Professor Snape swooped in, eager for his opportunity to sabotage, and made the matter unnecessarily complicated: she ended up covering the first and second year classes for both Defense and Potions so that Snape could go and torment the upper years.

Though at least Dumbledore paid his share of the price for the utter waste of her time, expensive as it was. Truly, it would have cost less if he had chosen to put a hit out on Voldemort. As if she didn't know how to extract a soul shard from a living vessel without harming said vessel--and that even before she learned magic.

At the end of six years, she returned to the Shop, having never spoken to either Harry James Potter or Tom Marvolo Riddle, but getting their payments, nonetheless.

And Yuuko-san--for who, it seemed, only six weeks had passed--raised an eyebrow, smirked, and asked, "Did you have fun?"

Tetsuki, irritated, refused to answer.

At least she was able to actually learn Ancient Runes, for all that it seemed less effective and more volatile than the various fuinjutsu, ofuda, and mahoujin she had picked up over her existence. Then again, that seemed to be the way of that particular dimension:

A whole lot of adversity for an unequal amount of payoff.

---

The first few missions Watanuki-kun sent her on were largely... local... as far as other dimensions went. Only dimensions he or either of the Mokona Modoki had already been to. Which, to be fair wasn't exactly a small list--Soel's journeys nearly too numerous to count. But it was a far cry from the literal infinity Tetsuki was used to.

"I've seen eight versions of the same person in the past ten missions, and six of them Wished for romantic help," she complains as she steps through the Dimension Doors, a clumsily made but charmingly heartfelt necklace in hand. She passes it on to Moro, to be placed in the store room, and takes a place at the table where Watanuki-kun is beginning to serve tea for three. Him, her, and a Doumeki-kun.

(She can never be sure which Doumeki it is--and it's not just her being unsure of the flow of time. They all physically look and magically feel identical--so it's best to just refer to them the same way)

"If I have to do one more mission involving playing messenger or clearing up misunderstandings for star crossed lovers, I'm going on strike," she says, once Watanuki-kun has taken his seat. The corner of this particular Doumeki-kun's mouth twitches up, even as he hides it by taking a drink--so not the most stoic of Doumeki, but certainly not the least either.

Watanuki-kun glances sharply at her, the Shopkeeper recognizing the wording of a transaction, informal as it was. "Is that--" he stops, hesitant, then reconsiders, "Does it feel equivalent to you?"

Tetsuki takes a moment to drink her own tea and Assess, the ability vital to her missions, something she had purchased from Yuuko-san at the very beginning of her employment at the Shop.

Truthfully, it would be more useful to Watanuki-kun now. He still struggles sometimes to make equivalent exchanges--generally skewing too much in the favor of his clients, and ending up paying the remaining price. But it's something he'll develop naturally as he gains experience as the Shopkeeper--to deprive him of that growth would be equally harmful.

"Well, it's not the most specific contract, though that works in our favor," Tetsuki begins, patient in her explanation. She understands why Yuuko-san was as hands off as she was, but it certainly hasn't helped the new Shopkeeper embrace his role, "Your Premonition ability isn't quite at the level it needs to be to know what the missions you send me on entail and so it's not as if you can screen which missions I do or don't go on at this time. It would be harsh to punish you for something you aren't doing purposefully. Luckily, I didn't say how long the strike would be for, nor did I define what concessions I would want to end said strike."

She shrugs, "I may just take a nap and request a specific dish for dinner, and if you cook it then we can either consider the exchange complete or renew the contract entirely."

Watanuki-kun splutters, "That's it?" he asks, more apprentice than employer. This particular Doumeki-kun barely bats an eye at this behavior, so either he's one of the earlier Doumeki or he is actually one of the more stoic ones.

"Sometimes specificity helps--it guides you in the right direction and prevents imbalance--but too much and it can make the prices too steep or inhibit the exchange entirely," Tetsuki shrugs again, "A lenient interpretation will serve you well until you are able to Assess for yourself."

~

A/N: I was briefly considering the idea that Tetsuki unknowingly inherited the title of Dimension Witch while Watanuki only got the Shopkeeper, but I didn’t like locking her in this limbo when, ostensibly, she started working for Yuuko because she Wished to go home (although, which home is the part where a lack of specificity will bite her in the ass). In a way, her training Watanuki to be an effective Dimension Witch/Shopkeeper is kind of her last mission before she finally completes her payment for her Wish.

[jacksgreysays]

Untitled Spring Cleaning (2020-04-15)

I loved you before the moon kissed the seas; before the sun smiled upon the flowers and trees. I loved you before, and I love you now, and I loved you between, still and how.

~

A poorly made cage in the zombie apocalypse where optimistic yet naive survivors keep their infected loved ones in a twisted hope that a cure may one day be found

A rotisserie cube of spam

A mushroom cap under which the epic romance of Thumbellina and Tom Thumb comes to an emotionally satisfying climax

The wall separating me and my emotions and anxieties from the friends who love and support me

Is there a J?

A dead snail

The tunnel that Mario uses to travel through the Mushroom Kingdom

Two adjoined stables of rival horses who are secretly in love with each other but will never admit it

An unimpressed person with a unibrow

The Pokémon Unown

A tiny diorama where you trick babies with their object impermanence

The inside of the rocket where the last of humanity is being jettisoned away from a dying planet

The two sides of the bathroom which is technically unisex but has separate sinks

~

"I hope you appreciate the dilemma I'm in," is the first thing you hear after you're jolted awake, a literal shock of electricity coursing along your nerves, yanking you from sleep.

It's been three days since you were thrown into this cell. It's clean and you've been fed so, all told, it's not exactly the worst thing that could have happened to you. You're still angry you were caught, of course, but you're smart enough to know it could have been worse.

Or, perhaps, that's what is happening now.

~

A/N: Clearing some stuff off my phone notes and desktop stickies.

[jacksgreysays]

a return to the Stardew Valley brainstorm you did with Gui, and I'm wondering if you could poke at it with Tetsuki or otherwise, with this thought in mind: simply _having_ the farm running again can heal the town in subtle ways. Given you don't have those games directly, I also wonder, how would you populate a small town like that? (Also, one of the stories from the game itself has a soldier returning from being a PoW to a now-grown son, and having PTSD, which seems spot-on for Iron Will).

Having gone back through our brainstorms for the Iron Will x Stardew Valley “sequel,” that is totally a viable direction to take it. Especially considering this post in particular, which implies that Gui’s grandfather was a member of the White Lotus.

Because if we look at the examples of White Lotus members in ATLA canon, we have the following: King Bumi, former Admiral Jeong Jeong, Dragon of the West Iroh, Master Waterbender Pakku, Master Swordsman Piandao, and a flower shop owner named Fung.

From first glance, one of these things seems to be not like the others. After all, most of these names have high amounts of influence/wealth/skill. But it could be inferred that someone who can successfully run a flower shop in a desert and have enough connections to get two Fire Nation fugitives into Ba Sing Se would also be someone with high amounts of influence/wealth/skill.

So if Gui’s grandfather was a member of the White Lotus, then it could be assumed that his farm was of great importance in that town. Maybe not popularity, but importance, and bringing in wealth.

Like, if Gui does become Iroh’s tea leaves supplier then you know that farm is going to be like one of those vineyards that people make trips out to in order to do wine tastings or whatever. That town will become a “quaint” tourist spot during peace time, where people who want to learn the science/art of tea go to as part of their whole journey/pilgrimage to learn at the Jasmine Dragon.

I think the matter of soldiers coming home and PTSD is one that will be fairly widespread in this. Obviously, unfortunately, not everyone does get to come back, and those that do are changed. Some of the townspeople may not look all that fondly on Gui, a stranger for all that it was his grandfather’s farm, coming into the town when so many of their loved ones didn’t. Then again, some of the townspeople may be relieved that any people are coming at all and that the farm so important to the town is back in business. They may find his slightly feral, obviously traumatized, but slowly healing friend a charming, humanizing trait. There’s some gossip on whether or not they’re romantically involved, when Gui will ask her to marry him.

If this is Gui’s story, we have to address Gui’s mental health too. Because while he is handling his shit better than Tetsuki, there is no denying that he saw (and did) some pretty horrible shit during his time in the Freedom Fighters (generally a step or two behind Tetsuki or at her behest). I think, instead of escaping the overwork of an oppressive capitalist society, this version of Stardew Valley (Seiro [星露] Valley, if we’re going with a translation) is dealing with the cultural and personal transition to peacetime.

Because part of the reason why Gui’s even at his grandfather’s farm is that he didn’t want to be in his hometown where the emptiness and differences there were so obvious to him. Where he, changed as he was after the war, no longer fit in his hometown, for all that it had changed, too. And so he has to come to terms with the fact that he can’t just run from his own loss and change, he has to work through it no matter where he is.

As for how to populate this town... I mean, an easy option would be to just wiki the names and basic personalities/characteristics of canonical Stardew Valley characters and then translate the meanings of their names into either their Japanese of Chinese equivalents. For example, the name Elliott is from Hebrew and means “Lord is my God” and the name Jinichi uses 神一 the kanji for “god” and “one/first.” Or Emily, which means “industrious,” could be translated to any name using either 勤 or 勉, of which there are a lot according to jisho.org so...

Another option would be to do the “take other characters from another show/game/series/media and have them become the side characters in this story” thing you brought up previously, but since this would focus on Gui who is already an OC secondary character that would probably distract from what is his protagonist story, so I’d probably just go with the above translations of established characters...

[jacksgreysays]

Prompt: Malaise

A/N: This is probably because I’ve been reading so much BNHA fic (though, somewhat ashamedly, I have not consumed any of the canon content yet) but I kind of want to revamp my previous brainstorm (from two years ago?! because it was severely limited by what little I knew which didn’t even have copious amounts of fandom to supplement it). And also, while I don’t know your opinion on BNHA, generic-name-goes-here, I do know you’re fairly fond of Tetsuki, so I hope at least part, if not all, of this fill catches your eye.

~

Viridescent: Or, Tetsuki Has A High School Reunion 

The warning is little more than a twitch of her right hand, barely perceptible even to herself, focused as she is on her mission. She’s heard rumors, barely whispers, twisted and warped in a terrible game of telephone, that the so-called League of Villains use a particular bar as, if not headquarters, then some kind of watering hole and recruitment office.

The night is dark, she is alone, and she is headed into literal enemy territory. And then her hand twitches.

She leaps to the side, back to the brick wall of the alley, and barely manages to dodge bright blue flames. Familiar bright blue flames.

She lets gravity pull her down, ducking under another attack that way, braces her hands against the cool concrete and kicks up, hard, her own weight and momentum adding power to the blow. It catches her attacker in the gut, winds him, pushes him away.

Gives her room to catch her own breath, “Fucking hell, Touya,” she mutters, barely audible over his coughs, “You bastard.”

“I wish,” he responds by rote, even if talking is wasteful of oxygen. “Tetsuki, you look well,” he greets mildly as if he hadn’t just tried to burn her head off mere moments ago.

She eyes him skeptically, “I can’t say the same for you.” She glances at his dyed hair, his piercings, his outfit. She doesn’t look at his scars or the staples all along his body.

He shrugs, “It’s aesthetic,” then, as if to emphasize, he leans against the alley wall across from her. Casual slouch a thin veneer for his true feelings; his hands stuffed into pockets are clenched tightly.

She sighs and settles in, noting and dismissing the cool dampness of the wall at her own back. “It’s tacky,” she says, as if that were the real problem.

He bares his teeth at her, a mocking smile, “You’ve worn worse,” he reminds her, and an involuntary flush crosses her face.

Her first hero costume had been awful, a strange mishmash of a business suit and hakama and a domino mask that hid absolutely nothing and thus was utterly useless and also boots that for some reason had both open toes and heels. Truly a walking fashion disaster. She was lucky it had been destroyed before the public got any pictures.

She clears her throat, “Yes, well, nowadays I’m outfitted differently.”

Touya’s brow raises in surprise. “… how differently?” he asks, tone perfectly even and not at all containing anything like curiosity or shock or even hope.

Tetsuki wants to lie. Wants to not disappoint him. But they’ve both always been honest to a fault. And they’ve done so much disappointing each other, what’s a little more?

“Not that differently,” she says, a solemn shake of her head. She long ago gave up the awful costumes of hero work in the limelight, but there is still some good in undercover work.

His mouth tightens, a frown made more of small regrets than larger betrayal.

“Won’t you help me?” she asks, and if she pitches her voice softer, tries to pull at any sentimentality he has left for their friendship, well. Undercover work requires underhanded tactics.

He doesn’t respond, looks away from her beseeching eyes and open posture. She thinks, for a moment, that she’s overdone it. Finally strained the limits of what they are to each other, what they’re willing to do for each other.

After an achingly long silence he finally meets her eyes and asks, “What’s in it for me?”

“You mean working with me again isn’t enough?” she jokes even as her mind whirls. It’s been years since she understood him–if she ever did. Their paths have clearly diverged for all that she is trying to realign them in this conflicted, duplicitous way. But there’s only been two things that can provide enough leverage to make Touya do anything.

Two people, rather.

She can’t give Touya his mother back, not in any real way that will do anything but hurt everyone involved, but there’s something she can do that requires far less intricate matters of the heart.

It’ll destroy her career. It may very well brand her as the villain she’ll be going undercover as. But she lost so much by hesitating and doing nothing before, at least this way may gain her a part of it back.

“I’ll help you destroy Endeavor: however you want, whenever you want,” she promises, years late.

Touya–no, Dabi, smiles. Crooked and mean and painful as it stretches his face. He holds out a hand, blue flames licking at his palm. “You have yourself a deal.”

And Tetsuki–no, Fuan–lets her own hand spark with green lightning and shakes on it.

~

A/N: Featuring undercover!”villain”!Tetsuki and Dabi-is-Todoroki-Touya. Fuan is literally just Malaise in Japanese to match the fact that Dabi is just Cremation so. The idea is that, they’re always pulling each other back and forth across the morality line and it’s not really set who is going to win (if either of them can even win). And note she said “destroy Endeavor” not “kill Todoroki Enji” so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Ask Box Advent Calendar

[jacksgreysays]

Reforged, B1C01 (2019-10-10)

Book One: Blood

Chapter One: The Girl in the Tree

---

If asked, Gui would say it started like this: in a random forest on the outskirts of a newly established--newly conquered--Fire Nation colony, walking silently in the wake of the loud ruckus that called themselves the Freedom Fighters. At the time, they were little more than a ragtag team of lost boys, running together in the way that boys do, more animal instincts than any sort of real organization. Gui could have done better, honestly, he’d have been quieter and faster and traveled with far less distractions and detours... but given what he had his sights set on, he could’ve done worse.

He walked in their wake and rubbed his thumb along the engravings of his mother’s bracelet on his wrist. The others thought of it--that is, if they had noticed it at all--as a nervous tick, portraying him as shyer, more scared of a person than he thought of himself. Perhaps it was bravado. He didn’t think so. But as he didn’t particularly care to establish dominance in their convoluted baboon bear hierarchy, there was no one to contradict that. And anyway, everyone understood about mementos--if they were lucky to have any--and even Jet sometimes brushed a hand against the grips of his hook swords in remembrance, the weapons still too big for a boy not yet full grown.

No one judged him for wearing his mother’s bracelet, just as no one judged him for joining the Freedom Fighters. Well, maybe his mother might have, but he was reluctant to remove the bracelet and find out. He didn’t even know what would be worse: if he did see her and she warned him off his chosen path of vengeance, or if he didn’t see her at all.

Regardless, it started like this: Gui trailing behind the rest of the Freedom Fighters, thumb pressed along the engraved metal of his mother’s bracelet, and a sudden flare of instincts to look up.

One day--not too far from this moment, in fact--the rest of the Freedom Fighters would be more aware. They’d be less boisterous. They’d be a stronger, more efficient group--less lost boys, more chameleon tiger team--and all the sadder for it. But on this day, only Gui at the tail end of their motley raiding party would think to look up.

That’s how it started: Gui looked up and the girl in the tree looked back.

---

Gui did not believe in fate.

There was no grand plan, no set tapestry woven into the world. Life was a series of circumstances and decisions that people either had to adapt to or submit. It wasn’t fate that Fire Nation soldiers entered Gui’s village two months ago--the war had been creeping ever closer, it was only a matter of time--and it wasn’t fate that Gui’s mother, who ran the local tavern, would be the one to interact with them the most. It wasn’t fate that one especially terrible evening, one soldier in particular got drunk and belligerent and took out his aggression on the nearest non-Fire Nation target.

No, no, no. What happened on that night could not have been fate; just probability and human behavior left unchecked.

Just as what happened afterwards was not fate either: that unit of Fire Nation soldiers moving on to their next conquest, and a grieving Gui deciding to pursue revenge. Gui stumbling upon the Freedom Fighters might have been fate, but more likely a matter of law of large numbers--his story was not a unique one, that squadron hardly seemed shocked at the actions that one of their own had taken, and they were but a dozen out of the Fire Nation military thousands strong. Whether or not Gui succeeded or failed--lived or died--would not be a matter of fate either.

Gui didn’t believe in fate.

But looking up and meeting her eyes, both of them startled but still silent: her finger pressed to her lips in an obvious request for secrecy and his own acquiescing nod in return... maybe there was something there beyond mere human behavior.

---

Gui and the girl in the tree properly meet a few hours later, on the edge of a nearby cliff, the body of a dead Fire Nation soldier on the ground between them.

She wiped her dagger on the fabric of the soldier’s uniform before tucking it away, quick and neat and hidden, before glancing up at Gui, “Did you…?” she trailed off, gesturing vaguely to the body.

Gui, who was still catching his breath from the thankfully interrupted fight, only had enough air and thought processing ability to pant out, “What?”

The girl from the tree rolled her eyes, before crouching down and efficiently looting the body, stripping it of anything useful--a standard Fire Nation sword and knife, a money pouch, rations and a canteen--and some things that were not.

“Ah, that’s my moth- that’s mine,” Gui said as the girl from the tree pulled out an engraved metal bracelet from one of the soldier’s pockets. A bracelet that matched the one on his left wrist. Shrugging, she passed it to him and continued searching, not even batting an eye at his hasty retrieval.

Maybe it was dismissive, considering it was such a monumental moment to him--what was he to expect from a stranger?--but perhaps it was her way of giving him privacy of a sort. He rubbed a thumb along the engravings and slipped it on. Finally, his wrists were balanced.

Finally, after two months, his vengeance was achieved.

… although, given the fact that he wasn’t the one to strike the killing blow, did it count? Frankly, he was pretty satisfied with the bastard being dead and retrieving the bracelet, but maybe that wasn’t how proper revenge worked. Should he have felt more possessive of the kill? Angry that the girl from the tree had stolen it? Then again, he was losing that fight--likely would have died instead--and probably his ancestors would have been more disappointed in him joining them so soon than minor technicalities of who did what in the demise of his mother’s murderer.

“He killed my father,” the girl from the tree said as she stood, looting done. Silhouetted by the setting sun, at the top of the cliff with an entire forest behind her, she looked every bit as solemn and dramatic a true avenger that Gui, too practical and prone to overthinking, could never be. “Seven years ago,” she added, as punctuation, as if to more firmly nail in the fact that her vengeance had seniority and validity. Gui’s ancestors couldn’t have possibly had any problem with technicalities given this kind of reason.

“Him and the rest of that damned Fire Nation squadron,” she continued, possibly more for herself than for Gui, which he may have considered melodramatic, but seven years was a long time.

Then finally, she turned to him, and their eyes locked once more, “I’m going to get all of them,” she said, “Will you help me?”

Or maybe it started like this: with Gui looking her in the eyes, thumbs away from his mother’s bracelets, and for some reason saying yes.

---

“By the way,” Gui said as they walked back to the makeshift camp the Freedom Fighters had set up for the night, “My name is Gui.”

The girl from the tree, from the cliff, from that sunset promise of vengeance, blinked at him and responded simply, “I’m Tetsuki.”

~

A/N: I was unsure what route of Iron Will I want to take with this--that is, “original flavor” or FN!Tetsuki, so I put it in Gui’s perspective to keep it vague. I mean, in the B-sides that is Iron Will as to the canon series, Gui would be the Katara equivalent I guess? :shrugs:

Also, thanks again to @generic-name-goes-here for coming up with a cool title. It’s not at all what the original prompt was, but I like it as a title so much!

[jacksgreysays]

56) things you said but not out loud + 28) things you said in the spur of the moment, Counterclockwise

~

"You were too late," she snarls, breath mixing with the air that Leanne can only but inhale in shaky, quiet sobs. Tetsuki tightens her grip, brings them ever, impossibly, closer, "You were too late," she repeats, rage taking any other words from her mind.

Then, as if suddenly realizing how this might look to the outside--Infighting amongst the city's team of vigilantes! If they can't get their shit together, how can we trust them to protect us? (You lazy fuckers better hope we keep doing so, because you don't even bother to try. You'd die without us, she think sometimes when there's nothing to keep her company but the evening news and a distant, coldblooded aunt)--Tetsuki lets go.

Leanne, of course, off-balance and useless, falls to the ground immediately.

"Get up," Tetsuki says with gritted teeth. She does nothing else.

Prove you're worthy, she doesn't say. Prove you're some smidgeon of capable, she doesn't say. Prove that somewhere within you is a person who could have stopped that explosion, she doesn't say. Prove you're not just some random, powerless, untrained civilian my aunt tricked into being a liability for this death trap of a team, she definitely doesn't say.

Leanne stares up at her, eyes wide, breath still heaving. 

Do something! Fight back! Be someone I can depend on!

"Get up!" Tetsuki barks at her, a sharp crackling thing, lightning sparkling at her fingertips.

Leanne flinches, crawling backwards just a bit until her back bumps against Hari's leonine form, until Caleb grips her--gently, human level strength--by her arm and pulls her up, until Henry, arms crossed and voice stern, says, 

"That's enough."

[jacksgreysays]

Viridescent ficlets (2019-06-15)

"I have been sent by My Lady of Cosmos," says the woman standing on the inner walls of the fortress. She is more silhouette than person, the moon large and full and bright behind her, and Ezio internally admires both the theatrics and strategic practicality of such a position.

That puts him at the disadvantage, but still. He can appreciate an exemplary entrance.

"Prophet," the woman continues, and the use of his goddess given title immediately snaps him back to the moment, "We have a proposal for Desmond Miles."

Of course, what else could it be?

---

Kaiza holds out her hand: reaching but nonthreatening, steady but demure. Much like the way she first arrived at the Institute, standing just outside the boundaries of technological and telepathic security. Not intruding into their space, but standing firmly, patiently, until she was invited to the mansion proper.

Kaiza holds out her hand and waits, as if she could do this for all of infinite time, and Rogue doesn't know how to untangle the twist of anxiety and hope and dread and fear and hunger that bubbles up.

Kaiza holds out her hand, palm up, fingers open, bare. Rogue wonders if her skin is as soft and smooth as it seems, or if maybe there are callouses more perceptible by touch than sight. Her own fingers shake, picking at her gloves, eager, nerves alight as she removes them.

Kaiza holds out her hand, "Everything will be fine," she says. And Rogue knows that Kaiza can't possibly know--whatever her abilities may be, they don't include future-telling--but Rogue wants to believe. She wants.

Kaiza holds out her hand. Rogue takes it between her own.

---

When Watanuki finally gets to the shop--all by himself! No, he didn't need stupid Doumeki at all, it's not his fault that the giant oaf happened to be taking the same route--he finds that Yuuko already has company...

... but not a customer? It's the first time seeing the other woman, so he's not sure how he knows that, but somehow he does.

They don't do anything so rude as to keep talking when he enters, but nor do they fall into a sudden hush--it's as if, upon his entry, the conversation came to a natural conclusion and now he has arrived at the start of the next.

Coincidence, he once would have said. Not that he considers it fate, instead, just Yuuko's machinations at work.

As if hearing his thoughts, Yuuko turns a wide, evil grin his way, and Watanuki automatically scowls. The other woman glances at him and gives a smaller and far less devious smile.

"Is this him?" she asks, a little nonsensically, until she adds on, "Or is it the tall one?"

Upon remembering stupid Doumeki's existence and realizing the oversized lout followed him into the shop--even though Watanuki already told him he wasn't needed!--Watanuki bristles defensively.

"What are you still doing here?" he asks, completely calm and not flailing at all.

Doumeki, because he has no manners and is a bottomless pit, just shrugs. "I'm hungry."

Yuuko, that demon, laughs and claps along, "Oh, yes, me too, Watanuki! Go make zaru soba, it's been so hot lately!"

He angrily pulls on his apron, "And I suppose you'll be wanting tempura to go with it?"

"Of course!" Yuuko says.

"Inarizushi," Doumeki says, that ingrate.

"That doesn't even match!" Watanuki says as he walks into the kitchen, pulling out ingredients and kitchenware as needed.

He doesn't even hear the other woman behind him until she asks, "Is there anything I can do to help?"

Watanuki definitely doesn't flail, startled, but the woman does manage to catch the pan he was holding before it fell to the ground.

"Ah, no, no," he protests politely, "I couldn't possibly ask that of a... guest?"

The woman blinks, a wry smile slipping onto her face as it becomes her turn to politely protest, "No, no, I'm not a guest, Watanuki-kun..." She pauses, for a moment, before explaining, "I suppose I'm your senpai."

~

A/N: ... I think I just want any prompt, tbh. So if anyone’s got a prompt in any of the previous ask box event styles, then feel free to send those in. I likely won’t get to them immediately, but I will hopefully get to them eventually :)

[jacksgreysays]

If it's not too late for the prompts, can I get prompt 8 with Tezuki Kaiza or Leanne?

8) things you said when you were crying

(Counterclockwise)

Maybe Tetsuki comes back, after everything: after dozens and hundreds and endless different lives. She comes back to the start… only to find that what she thought was the start–friends who were Family and Flames–wasn’t the start at all.

When Tetsuki comes back, it’s not to Namimori, it’s to Cadmium City where she’s Tetsuki Kaiza, metahuman vigilante, codenamed Thunderbolt. Cool and aloof and fated to die. A loner who pushed everyone away because to love was to be vulnerable, to be vulnerable was to be weak, and she would never allow that.

But Tetsuki comes back, after everything, and even though it’s not the start that she thought–that she hoped and strived and prayed for–it is, at least, a place where she had unfinished business: sins to atone for and amends to make.

Because Tetsuki comes back. She comes back to find her powers are more than just lightning crackling endlessly at her fingertips, sparking along her nerves. She comes back armed with the variety and vigor to fight a god… or, perhaps, to help a god.

And so Tetsuki comes back to Cadmium City because she has one last mission. And maybe she’ll die trying, but hey–what’s just one more after dozens and hundreds and endless deaths?

Tetsuki comes back to Cadmium City because it’s time for Leanne to come back, too.

—

(Iron Will)

For those few remaining months, on that sun-drenched, soil-rich farm, Tetsuki drank tea.

“Thank you,” she tells Gui, simply, because that’s all she has the courage to say. She doesn’t say, ‘You are my home,’ or 'You kept me sane,’ or 'I don’t know how, but I’ll miss you after I die,’ or even 'I love you.’ She doesn’t say any of those things.

But maybe he hears them anyway, because he nods and smiles, small and sad but sincere.

She does not get a hero’s ending, or a martyr’s ending, or even a criminal’s ending. But she gets an ending, nonetheless.

And in those few remaining months, on that sun-drenched, soil-rich farm, where the cups of tea are endless, Tetsuki knows peace.

~

A/N: Fairly belated tiny things, anon, but thank you for prompting (and with my OCs to boot!)