#long chapter sorry

[albino-whumpee]

Discarded

I went crazy lmao. Anyways you missed this? I hope you did. It’s convoluted? Yes did I still enjoy writing it? Yes. Enjoy!

CW//animal attack, pet whump, implied torture, blood, superhero and villain whump, collars, conditioning, reluctant caretaking, dehumanization. Ask to tag if I missed anything

Taglist:

@boxboysandotherwhump @yet-another-heathen @fanastywhump @j-is-evil-28 @endless-whump @just-a-whumping-racoon-with-wifi @unicornscotty @redstainedsocks @whumper-boi @whatwhumpcomments @bunny222  

The battery isn´t strong enough to feed the machine. Not anymore. 

The battery can barely process what is happening when it´s dumped outside. After almost a year of fighting to live while hooked to the machine, its wrists are numb and bloody. It had crawled around for a long time now, so putting its legs under it when dragged and pushed was something it was no longer accustomed to doing. That was no excuse to try and do better for Master, the battery knew. So it tried its best to walk again until Master kicked it out on the street.

“Get lost” Master spat at it shutting the door behind them. 

Where? The battery had nowhere to run to anymore. Master made sure of that. They had made sure it knew that millions of times. 

The battery had become loyal and would go wherever Master told it to. Sensing Master was mistaken about their order, the battery waited. Kneeling at the door with its head down, it waited for the order on where to go. 

An hour passed by in a blink. 

Then two. 

The battery blinked once, then twice before bracing itself for a beating for knocking on the metal door. It was outside, but the battery was not restrained… had Master forgotten? The battery’s head pounded as it sat back, catching its breath before standing up using the wall as leverage, and then trying to open the door to go back inside.

The world blurred around the edges as it would sometimes after losing food privileges, but the battery pulled through and kept trying to open the door.

It shouldn´t be outside. Its place was next to Master and the machine. But… the battery’s world smudged as a smell of dirty rain flooded its senses, only noticing a moment later it had collapsed on the floor.

The battery was outside because Master had wanted it. There were no shackles around its wrists. It had been released from its duty…

Then, was this…Freedom? No, the battery still had the collar around its neck. It was anything but free.

A test? No, its Master doesn´t play silly games like that. 

The battery pulls the last of its energy to sit on its heels, kneeling, before the closed doors. 

“W-Where should I go now, Master?” It tries in a hoarse voice. It doesn´t mind waiting a few more hours for a reply that doesn´t come. Its life had consisted of endless waiting, after all. 

It´s by the time the day dies into the night, that it realizes Master was long gone from the other side of the door.

The battery’s hair clung to its face as the water poured down on it, dripping tears its body couldn’t make anymore.

The weight of its Master´s words crush it, but what was it but its Master´s battery? 

Its orders were clear.

Limping heavily, it stands up and walks away aimlessly. It had stopped being human a long time ago. It had turned into just a battery for whatever plans its Master had. It was a tool and without a Master, its life had no meaning or direction. A complete waste of space.

A waste of space doesn´t deserve a bed to sleep and rest in, nor does it deserve to eat or have a name. A waste of space doesn´t get to have the collar Master gave it as proof of their ownership. 

The battery decides it's not needed to take off the collar to burn it from where it hangs against its throat. Such considerations are reserved for humans. Using just a little bit of its powers to set it on fire shouldn´t be a problem, but just brushing their fingertips against the lock makes it immediately drop its hands back to its sides. 

No, no. No touching. No using its powers when not hooked to the machine. Merely hours away from Master and it has forgotten already? No. Can´t break Master´s rules even if they don´t want to be its Master anymore. 

But then, now that it’s been discarded, is it allowed to touch? Or is it not allowed? Would it be punished for keeping it? Which is the correct answer? It doesn’t know.

That´s why a battery needs a Master. Because it is no longer a human, it can´t take decisions for itself.

After pondering a little longer, it gives up on coming up with an answer it’s not capable of getting before it crawls into a hall in the wall. 

The place is dirty and so tiny, the battery has to fold its legs and neck to fit. It’s so tight, it can´t help but relax, letting out a purr of contentment at the familiar sensation of containment. At least this is a feeling it knows well. Stored, like in the cage. 

Would Master come for it if it waited there? No, once useless, Master wouldn´t even spare a look. The battery slowly closed its eyes.

Then, would any of Master´s friends take it like they threatened to do before? It was a broken battery now, though. He couldn´t even be useful and use its powers anymore.

No wonder Master had discarded it.

Did a broken battery still have some use to someone?

---

It woke up to the sound of voices and barks.

The sun was still rising, painting the sky a tint of pale pink and orange. The rain from the day before was now just a breeze that froze the battery’s thin body. It was a couple of young men, taking their mean-looking dogs out for a walk on a leash. The battery felt a shiver down its spine at the sight of the shock collar and muzzle the animals wore.

It had tried to curl further into its hole when one of them peaked in.

“Oh? What do we have here?” The guy wearing a red beanie whistled as his friend came to stand next to him.

“What?” The man looked into the hole and found the battery cowering away from the dog’s snout “…is that a person?”

“Seems more like a rat to me” The battery wouldn’t disagree, given how small and contorted it was. “Why don’t you come out and let us have a better look, hm? Or are you hiding something important in there buddy?” The man whipped his arm and grabbed the battery so tight it yelped. The man pulled it out swiftly, making it land right next to one of the dogs. The battery quickly covered itself when the dog’s mouth came close to its face, curling into itself defensively as it heard the young man laugh.

“There’s nothing here,” the other clicked his tongue.

“Maybe it’s on him” the guy with the red beanie replied, pulling on the dog’s leash when it kept insistently wanting to jump on the battery. By its drooling, it figured the muzzle was the only thing keeping it from biting it. “Hey, you,” the man said kicking away the battery’s arms from its face “we won’t give you trouble if you give us what we want so just be…” the man trailed off as his eyes settled over the battery’s neck. “What the fuck? Is that a dog collar?”

The other guy stretched his neck to stare too, but when the battery tried to scurry away from it, the guy stomped on its chest. It looked at it for a moment before snorting into laughter “holy shit, it is!”

The dogs were restlessly barking and pawing at it so hard, its ratty clothes began to tear. The man pulled on the dog’s chain leash before passing it to the other guy so he could inspect the battery’s collar. It was forced up to its knees with a sudden strong tug from the D ring on his collar, choking it slightly as it struggled to put its numb feet below it.

“Woah, it’s even locked,” the man said pulling on the tiny padlock, and then, hooking a finger between the leather and its neck, cutting the battery’s airflow until it whimpered and the man let go with a gritting laugh. Then he grabbed a fistful of its matted hair and forced it up to its feet, only making it fall back to its knees. 

The battery’s head snapped to a side when he slapped it.

“Hey, hey! Do something, man” he slapped it increasingly stronger “Defend yourself, man! Say something! C’mon!” They repeated the process over and over before one burst into laughter. “He won’t even try to stop me!”

Suddenly the slaps turned into hits and fists rained over the battery’s body. It tried to put its hands around its head but the other man kicked its arms off, the force of his kick turning the battery’s body.

Even when they stomped on it, even when they pulled it up only to batter it down, the battery didn’t say a single word.

It was not allowed to speak to anyone else but Master.

Once they got bored of hitting it without getting even a single yelp out of it, they unleashed the dogs.

It was a moment where the battery debated simply letting them maul it or running. Its legs were numbed out from hours of sitting in the same position, but the ache suddenly vanished when it broke into a sprint, the two dogs dashing behind.

Air burnt through its lungs as it poured every single crumb of energy into running. It knocked over containers and trash to stop the dogs, but it was useless, as the dogs easily caught up to snap their teeth barely centimeters away from their ankles.

The battery saw its chance to lose them when it tried to turn on a corner, but the puddles of dirty rainwater were everywhere and so, it drifted, losing its balance before ultimately crashing against the floor.

It only had time to open its eyes before the dogs jumped on it.

—-

Everything hurt even more now.

The battery lay still over a puddle of its blood hours after the dog’s owners had put them back on their leashes and ran off when the battery stopped moving. Even when its arms and legs were little more than rags now, the battery was somehow still alive.

The battery’s shaking hand passed over its neck, wet with drool and dirty puddle water, and found the collar ragged to shreds instead of its neck.

Somehow, Master had saved it, the battery thought to itself hours later, when it could gather enough strength to try and crawl back into a better hiding spot. The oozing blood from its wounds smeared on the ground as it dragged forward.

—

It hadn´t meant to come out of its hiding, but after days inside the hole in the wall throwing up an empty stomach, it was delirious. It hadn´t meant to land on some poor girl´s head when it thought it had seen Master.

Of course, it paddled away when it noticed its mistake. Dropping its head to wait for punishment, fearing deep in its soul the woman would somehow begin hitting it or even worse, unleashed fiery dogs to chase after it again, but the battery didn´t receive anything but a perplexed look.

“Is that…Are those dog bites?” the woman asked with horror at the half-moons covering the entirety of the battery’s body. Some of them were so swollen and infected they let out a smell the woman had to cover her mouth with both hands to not throw up.

“-ase…” The battery lowered its head until it touched the floor, the coolness of it sending a shiver of bliss through its body “Please…Water…Mas-ah, please…juss…a little…please” it begged, forcing itself to straighten itself and failing so miserably the woman rushed to hold it. Did the world always have that many funny colors? It wondered as its vision swam and it began to only catch glimpses of what happened before it.

It caught the streets, then a door. Then someone was vomiting while it laid down on something so soft it almost cried. Was it a cloud? It certainly felt like one. 

After that, it was red. So red and blurry, the battery was sure it wouldn´t open its eyes again. 

But many times, it did. It opened its eyes to a blurred world that slowly, with each new time it forced its eyelids open, the world became a little clearer. 

It was a very spacious room at the beginning, but then it became clear it was some tiny plastic hovel in someone´s garden. The door leading out to it almost always closed except for the times the woman would come in to check on it. Angrily yelling at it for squirming its way down to the floor before pulling it back on the sofa. 

The battery still found ways to not lay on the furniture but on the floor, where batteries should be. 

The woman had stopped trying to pick it up and had instead pulled the covers and pillows down on the floor. 

It had been adamant at first, squirming itself out of the comfort and warmth of such things meant for humans before the woman had growled at it. 

"Cleaning these every night for you is turning bothersome, ya know? If you´re not gonna get on the couch, I gotta make sure you´re at least a little bit warm. Or what? Are you gonna force me to tuck you up every night as if you were a kid? Don´t even think about it"

The battery was forced into the covers like a burrito many nights after that.

Neither were very happy about that, but the woman watched the battery relax in them after a while. For the battery, containment was no stranger. If this was this woman’s way of keeping it controlled, then what was a battery gonna say? She wasn’t its Master, but it had learnt to not refuse any treatment others gave it.

In a way, the wrapping made it feel like being hooked up to the machine again. It was tight, but not so much it wouldn’t be able to squirm it’s way out of the blanket like with the machine, with its openings specially designed to fit its arms and not let it move away even an inch as it sucked its energy.

The familiarity of the situation made it expect things. If it was contained, would it just be a matter of time before punishments came? It had denied food that was given freely before, but the woman’s simple scolding before she forced its mouth open wouldn’t last long. It would be hooked to a feeding tube soon. It was so sure, that when the woman pulled on her hair and then put a spoon on its hand, the battery didn’t drop it out of disobedience.

It was simply too shocked to hear her say “he” should know how to use a spoon.

A battery was an object others used because they only served one purpose. “He” was not used for the batteries. But the woman kept calling it “him”.

When it dressed its wounds with brand new bandages, when it was helped into a bath because “he” reeked. Even when she gently tried to pull it into the couch, the woman referred to it as “he”. She was gentle but severe when the battery refused to receive human things. Even when she was so frustrated she pulled on her hair, she didn’t see it as something inhuman undeserving of the help she was giving it.

It learnt even her kindness would end one day, when she was talking on the phone with someone when he waited for her to come in on the morning.

“I’ve seen everything in this streets, Marshall. And I mean that! But a man who refuses to take off a dog collar on his neck gotta be the worst of all. He was little more than a corpse when I found him but even when he didn’t try to run away the first chance he got, he refuses to act like a normal human being. Do you think this is more of a mental thing? Like, this boy has been through it, no doubt of that, but just what exactly leaves you acting…like that?” There was some buzzing words “I don’t know, I honestly want you to check on him ASAP. I just can’t shake this feeling that I’ve seen him before,” the battery’s heart throbbed “eh? A picture? Another one?” More buzzing. The battery saw her turn at him for a second before turning away “well, his face a little less swollen now, maybe there’s hope to finding out who I have been taking care of, finally”

The battery’s heart stopped at her words as she continued to talk.

The battery knew why and how it had become it’s master’s battery. The life before that had ended when the collar was put on. It was for the better. After all, the battery’s past life had ended with them when they died on the other side of the room.

The battery couldn’t let her know all of her help was given to that despicable thing that didn’t deserve anything else but being hooked up to a machine until it died. It was its master’s battery to repent, it didn’t deserve the help she had given it in the first place, but she…didn’t deserve to learn it had given so much help to a murderer. Even when it had never meant to kill them.

But that was the battery’s sin. It lifted its hand in the woman’s direction.

The battery never meant to hurt anybody, right?

But the battery couldn’t help it.

It had been so long since it had used its powers like this, but panic overcame it when the woman turned with the phone pointing at it. She couldn’t figure who it was. What it had done.

Their powers were a little too strong for a dumb battery to control. That’s why they had died and that’s why a battery needed a Master and a machine: to be properly used.

The waves of energy flowed like a river though its fingers, lighting up the very tips before the world tensed and wrinkled. As if space and time had become a paper it could fold, the battery’s finger shot a light that pierced the woman’s phone before she could even notice it moving.

“What the fuck?!” The woman screamed as she let the fried phone fall of her hands into the floor. She stared at her phone for a second. The display had melted so, a hole the size of her thumb had appeared. She blinked at it for a second before looking up at the guy in the floor with a hand up in the air, shaking like crazy.

“Don’t” the battery panted before turning its head to vomit blood.

That tiny amount of power wouldn’t have been accepted for the machine. But that was all the battery could use when it was discarded. it thought maybe after a month it could at least use this much, but oh it was so badly mistaken. The battery’s nose and mouth dripped into the floor as it heaved, gasping for air its lungs rejected.

“Y-You did that? That thing you just did, I have seen it before!” The battery whined, knowing he had failed to cover the truth. It had to go now. This woman’s kindness was over. “But- But they said you had died! No way in hell you are-!” The woman’s voice died on his ears as the battery crumbled into a pool of his own blood.

The battery watched in a blurred world how the woman reached for her phone before stumbling into the house beyond the garden.

It had no time to lose now.

Hadn’t it had worse? This little blood would have been any other day before.

Stand up.

The battery obeyed its master’s voice in its head. Sticky blood marking its clumsy attempt of lifting itself and walking out the hut in the garden, the sun blinding its eyes for a second before it walked out. Rushing away as the senses came back to it and it heard the woman screaming as sirens began to ring closer and closer. It broke into a sprint into the forest when there were many voices screaming at him with threats of having weapons and yelling at it to stop running.

Everything hurt so much. The pain was too much to bear.

“Freeze!”

And the battery jumped down into yet another hole. Such was its luck the battery managed to jump into a sewer that spat it out in a beach. The battery, half drowned and covered in feces, crumbled down unconscious in the sand.

-

It woke up at night. Carefully sitting in its knees before looking up at the city before it. How long had it been since it could see it’s hometown like this? The battery’s eyes filled with tears before it gathered the courage to stand up.

Help wouldn’t come for batteries.

Once anyone knew who it was, any help and kindness would end.

It didn’t matter how or why, whoever killed a hero was nothing else but an evil villain. And the battery? In a single minute, in one single hit, it had killed nine. Projecting the scene to the world to show who betrayed them before taking the battery into their base and hooking it up to the real machine.

River, the youngest of the eleven heroes, had died with them that day to be reborn as the Master’s battery when he was abandoned by his own team.

#whump #villain whump #writing #my writing #River the villain #tw blood #tw animal attack #pet whump #tw past torture #reluctant caretaker #sadistic whumpers #long chapter sorry #I’m sure many people will stop reading after this #but I’m glad I have it out of my system #in the end there wasn’t much to this story #that I could narrate #because it was me who wrote it #but anyways #I hope you enjoyed the ride! #scars for redemption

[and-corn]

(pt 5 of this comic)

#finally an update for ya'll! #sorry it's been so long #yes it has two-headed calf vibes but I had to do a stargazing bit I just had to #it really is crazy how I have to relearn how to draw dragons every single time I do a new chapter #my brain just does not retain the anatomy at all like whyyy #dragon comic #dragons #dragon #web comic #webcomic #original comic #comic #comic art #comics #storyboard

[graveyardgremlins]

WIP:

“You have a bat themed computer?! This is somehow worse than my dad naming everything after our family.” “Wait, does he actually do that?” “Yeah, dude. We have the Fenton Bazooka, the Fenton Boo-merang, the Fenton Family Ghost Assault Vehicle, the Fenton Phones, Fenton Rocket, Fenton Skateboard…” “Wait, wait. You own an assault vehicle? A rocket?” “What? You're saying it as if you don't.” “Yeah, but my… He is Batman. Not exactly the poster boy for sanity, you know?” “Well, look at the bright side! You don't have to feel awkward about it anymore. If anyone gets it, it's me.” Jason smiled, a bit dizzy, and guided him. Jason had never brought anyone to the cave before. It felt oddly heavy in his chest. He had to resist the urge to keep turning around to check on Danny. He felt a bit like Orpheus in a way.

#dp x dc #dead on main #danny phantom #fanfic #jason todd #danny fenton #dp x dc fanfic #fanfic writing #dead on main ship #tsdloo #I'm sorry for taking so long to post this chapter #I've been struggling with it a little #like trying to rein in a bunch of wild horses #it keeps getting out of my control #and the angst is getting closer and i'm scared lol

[clearancecreedwatersurvival]

Okay serious question why are there so many people complaining about how popular labru is as a ship or that’s it’s a reach with no canon basis when the entirety of chapter 76 exists? Like??????

#come on now this is so good #yes I did just screenshot most of the chapter what of it #caitie speaks #dungeon meshi #labru #dunmeshi liveblog #dungeon meshi manga spoilers #long post #I’m sorry I’m not adding ids to any of these posts I will go back and try to include them once I finish reading for the day

[prismatoxic]

okay, shipping brainrot from my last post aside, i'm still thinking about the shapeshifter arc. the other sites i use don't have inline posting or do but it's clunky, so i guess i'm theorizing here. some of this may seem obvious; bear with me, i'm not trying to be patronizing, just working through things. this will probably be long.

(edit: i've since learned there's canon explanations for all of this. regrettably i don't like them. enjoy my ideas of what would be better maybe? but keep in mind i wrote this before i knew it had been explained anywhere else.)

laios reveals what he knows of shapeshifters, and that they function on memory:

no one ever really suggests in chapters 39 or 40 who thought of which fake except in the case of which ones laios must have thought of, but i want to posit who i think each one came from, and what it means narratively if i'm right. so, mostly a thought experiment/character study that i could be wrong about or that was never meant to be clearly defined in the first place. but maybe fun to think about? (i'm sure other people have done this before too, but i think it'll be fun to write up.)

from the outset, i think it's worth mentioning that chilchuck knows all three laios fakes are, in fact, fakes. two chilchucks say this, but the one on the right is the real one. senshi and marcille immediately corroborate this, though we can't tell which of them it is except that it's not any of the really obvious fakes.

what i think this suggests is that, brought to the surface, the warped perceptions of the rest of the party that chilchuck, senshi, and marcille have can be easily discerned when compared with the real thing. each of these laioses is from one of them, but they immediately figure out none of them are right with the real laios right there in the room. this is important.

as for who's who...

i think it's fair to assume that giant laios is from chilchuck. laios is the tallest member of their party, at six feet; while chilchuck sees marcille and senshi as their correct heights, laios is a giant to him, and his bulky armor doesn't help. that's why, even if this is his perception, it's glaringly obvious that it's wrong as soon as it's made physical. it's the only big one, and easily falls into the camp of "doesn't seem to know much about monsters" that the others also do.

stupid laios is, i think, from marcille. because the giant one is so likely chilchuck's and i don't think senshi sees laios as someone who stupidly wants to eat everything (even if senshi's opinion of him isn't stellar right now, "i have to eat it" wouldn't be paired with being an idiot to senshi), it tracks that marcille would be the one to remember him this way. to someone who doesn't appreciate their monster eating and otherwise thinks he's an idiot just as much as the others do, dumbly muttering about eating things seems like a reasonable portrayal of laios.

feminine laios, then, is from senshi. i think his physical perception of the other party members is the most off-base; this is likely because he's known them for the least amount of time, and his idea of what they look like is based more on their races than anything else. i think the resemblance to falin might not be intentional--someone suggested to me the other day that the dwarf perception of tall-men is probably more feminine in contrast to how Macho dwarfs are. i think that makes sense (if it ever comes up canonically, i haven't seen it yet). laios and falin do just... look like gender-swapped versions of each other, also. so if senshi sees laios as a feminine person, well... that just winds up looking like falin.

so this leaves us with only the real laios. confronted with their perceptions of him, his friends can immediately tell all three are incorrect.

moving on, we eliminate the three most obvious fakes from the rest of the party, starting with marcille:

if we take into account what i just said about senshi, i think this is his. racial stereotypes about elves being what they are, him not knowing the party as well as the other members do... she stands out, and that's why.

now this is where things start to get interesting.

the next two fakes to be eliminated aren't so blatantly incorrect that they can be struck right out at a glance, but it's not hard to notice the flaws when you look closer, and chilchucks A and B are the ones to point it out. chilchuck is naturally observant; most of his fakes seem to emulate this. (the one who addresses the fakes is A, the real one, but B is proving himself able to pick up on the things A notices. this is important.)

notably, chilchuck and senshi assume these must be laios's versions of them.

we can assume this is correct, if we want to. we can take the framing of this as being an intentional reflection of the truth.

or... or... we can look a little deeper. we can wonder if, perhaps, this isn't a reflection of laios, but a reflection of his friends and what they think of him. laios may not immediately notice the problems, but i don't think it's because he doesn't remember these details. i don't think laios sees much of anything in vague terms; he's observant in his own right, but in ways he doesn't really recognize, nor does anyone else. i think he was so focused on their faces and mannerisms that he didn't notice the bigger picture, glossing over something because so many other factors are at play.

senshi and chilchuck think laios doesn't take notice of things, but the vast majority of the shapeshifter arc is about them and marcille not trusting laios's judgement as it is, given how things went recently. is it possible there's more to their assumptions here than what the text explicitly says? i think so!

so then who do these two belong to? marcille, i think.

if we assume dumb laios is hers, then we can also assume her perceptions of the others are kind of broad and vague. she doesn't think poorly of them, necessarily (at least not in as obvious a way as she does with laios, who, i'll remind you, she's currently upset with), but she doesn't commit unimportant details to memory, like chilchuck's neck band or the damage to senshi's helmet.

we've got three more "obvious" fakes to get through, and laios offers another lore tidbit on how the shapeshifters work:

anyway, the first of the next round is marcille again, setting the stage for how these three next fakes are eliminated.

marcille changes her hairstyle all the time, so this isn't a surprise. the last one pictured here winds up being our next fake, as indicated by her grimoire:

so the fake marcille in this section is the one with the most visibly different hair texture (who even draws attention to this), and the spellbook that's woefully incompetent. i think she's from chilchuck.

he's observant, as i said before; even if he didn't commit her hair to memory, he did remember the stuff she's said about how important hair is to magic. maybe that's why the texture is so striking. more importantly, chilchuck isn't wary of magic quite the way senshi is, but he also doesn't understand it. the general tone of the low-quality grimoire also just... sounds like the way he'd frame something like that. (plus, the "how to turn back time" bit is a thing he specifically called her on when she suggested it a few chapters ago.)

so the next fake chilchuck and senshi are revealed via their tools:

i think the chubby-cheeked chilchuck with the simple lockpicks is from senshi, and i think the ordinary-looking senshi with the simple cookware is from chilchuck. the former speaks for itself--senshi sees chilchuck as a child, and knows absolutely nothing about picking locks. as for the fake senshi, chilchuck has a decent mental image of him but knows nothing about cookware.

so now we're down to the final three fakes, and there's only one person left who they could be from: laios. nobody thinks this, not even laios himself, but i want to explore the concept because i think it has extreme merit. the three remaining fakes have some key similarities between them, namely in that they're all close enough interpretations that making a distinction is difficult. they look a tiny bit different, but both the real people and their fakes make plausible cases for why they're the actual person. i want to talk about why i think laios is the one who made that so, and what that means about him.

chapter 39 ends with all his companions--real and fake--doubting his skills. seeing a pattern?

chapter 40 opens with laios determined to regain his friends' trust in him...

...while his friends (and their fakes) talk about how he's liable to like the fakes more, because they're monsters.

this is a needlessly cruel interpretation of laios, but after how things went post-falin-rescue, it's not a surprise. they see him as reckless and single-minded, more interested in the things he's weird about than in the people around him.

laios is really bad at talking about what he's thinking--not because he's hiding it, but because it doesn't occur to him that it's important. meeting the lunatic magician in the paintings is a prime example of this, but he does it a lot. they likely have no idea why he told toshiro about falin and the black magic; to them, laios was being flippant with sensitive information, not worrying about their safety. to laios? he was trying to get help. he trusted toshiro, and his perception of their friendship made him think the information would help them gain an ally who cared about falin as much as they do. he wasn't trying to put falin or marcille in danger--far from it, in fact. but he didn't tell his friends about his thought process. he didn't think it was important to share.

(he's autistic but we all know this. moving on)

so, we have laios's plan: the pairs cook together, while he watches for behavioral differences to discern who's who. it doesn't occur to him, or anyone else, that the people he's watching for mistakes are his own perceptions of his friends. and now we get into the meat of why i wanted to write this post.

assuming i'm correct... let's talk about laios's view of his friends, and how he challenges those perceptions.

starting with my favorite, chilchuck:

chilchuck A, of course, is in fact the real one. this is a pretty significant character moment for him too, in my opinion; we know he has difficulty expressing his emotions, and that a lot of his conflicts so far have stemmed from that. the fact that "chilchuck B asked for help with a menial task" is a gotcha moment to him is... telling. not only because it's so obvious to him, but because it's not obvious to any of his companions. he thinks they know this about him, but he's never openly expressed anything to make them think this is an issue he'd have, in addition to having sought help in the past.

his "convictions and pride and all that" seems to them like someone trying to convince them of something, not someone reminding them of facts he assumes they know.

anyway, back to laios. if we accept that chilchuck B is made from his memories, this suggests several things. first of all, chilchuck B is, despite his softer eyes and willingness to ask for help, still a fairly accurate portrayal of chilchuck. he's easily annoyed and he's observant, two traits chilchuck is known for. i think the reason chilchuck B has the kinder eyes and the more gentle disposition is because to laios, those things are indicative of someone being a good person, and he very much thinks chilchuck is a good person.

we know laios isn't especially good at reading people in general. thus, his idea of who his friends are is skewed in broad strokes, but not in the ways they think. he knows who chilchuck is, but he also associates chilchuck with his own ideas of what makes someone "good", which results in a chilchuck who's less rough around the edges. confronted with this--the real chilchuck asking him if he can tell--laios compares the two and thinks, reasonably speaking, the nicer one who trusts him has to be the friend he respects so much.

senshi and marcille also want to accept this chilchuck, likely for similar reasons. they also respect and care for him; they've seen him go through a lot. laios's ideal of him is just that, ideal. in a roundabout way, it's only their deep fondness for who chilchuck really is that makes them want to see him this way.

next up, we have marcille.

the fake, marcille A, is a radical departure from what makes chilchuck B a fake. laios notes that the real marcille is exactly the same as she always is. the reason, then, that marcille A confuses him--and the others--is that after everything they've been through, their perception of her has changed radically.

if we look back to senshi and chilchuck's marcilles, it's readily apparent when they're eliminated that both interpretations hinge on the knowledge that she performs black magic. senshi's tries to use it to prove herself; chilchuck's has a grimoire loudly proclaiming it's what she does. contrast this to marcille A: she doesn't mention black magic at all, and her grimoire looks strikingly similar to the real one.

that's because laios doesn't think her performing black magic changes anything about who she is. her doing so proved her to be just as dedicated to falin as he himself is, and the knowledge that her goals involve it doesn't faze him. (additionally, marcille has been teaching him magic, and falin had tried in the past. though his image of a grimoire is flawed to someone experienced, to anyone else it looks fine.) thus, marcille A isn't a flagrant black magic wielder; she's someone who's been fundamentally changed by what they--and falin--went through.

let's go back to chapter 27:

chilchuck and senshi are appalled, and will continue to be. while they ultimately don't prevent marcille from doing this, and care enough about both her and laios (and in chilchuck's case, falin as well) to be in tentative support, this changes their view of her in a negative way. she's dangerous now, in a way she wasn't before, but she's still marcille--goofy and a little reckless. thus, their views of her, and the illusions that result.

laios's opinion of her changes for the better.

she is, all at once, both competent and loyally dedicated. she will stop at nothing to help falin. whatever goofiness she exhibited before now is gone, replaced by the cold demeanor of someone who is doing something extremely dangerous for reasons that are inherently selfish, but ultimately too important to reject.

thus, we return to marcille A: cold, sharp, dedicated. not reckless or goofy, but methodical and haunted. she may have returned to "normal" since they left the castle town, but laios's opinion of her, and understanding of her love for falin, has been forever changed.

so faced with the real marcille--still silly, still whining, still frequently annoyed with him--he's confused, because that's deeply familiar, but it doesn't line up with what he knows about her now.

the truth, of course, is nuanced--these things are true about marcille, but only under duress; it's similar to how laios becomes a competent leader when the going gets tough. she has this within her, but it's not her default state of being. still, the shapeshifter picks up on the strongest memories laios has of her, this new interpretation of someone he thought he knew.

now then--onto senshi, the punchline of this particular joke about the differences between the copies. i still think it says a lot.

i think this one speaks for itself, though i find chilchuck's agreement interesting. senshi is the newest member of the team; little is known about him. laios happily notes that senshi "always looks cool" while chilchuck says he looks normal (and chilchuck B insults the real one). laios sees senshi this way because he thinks senshi is cool as hell, and this manifests in an idealized version of a face he's not as familiar with as he is with chilchuck and marcille.

this is clearly comedy, but it also speaks to the same desire to see the best in the rest of the party. marcille is the only one who notices likely because her opinion of senshi isn't so romanticized. chilchuck's senshi, of note, wasn't a perfect replica: we don't see much of him after the obvious fakes are hauled off, but he's a little squashed (he's the top one):

which indicates that chilchuck's visual memory of senshi is already flawed. if we compare this to giant laios and the marcille with the unique hair texture, it tells us chilchuck's attention to detail is more specific than the others'; he can remember the hole in the helmet, the importance of hair, but he doesn't quite see the bigger picture. giant laios is also surprisingly... rugged? which i imagine has to do with chilchuck's perception of him as a tall-man. (or maybe how he clearly has trouble seeing laios's face half the time, lmao...)

anyway. laios thinks senshi is super cool and chilchuck has an imperfect idea of what senshi look like as it is. (i wonder if chilchuck is some degree of faceblind? not enough to not recognize someone at all, but can't pinpoint specifics.)

and so, we arrive at the moment of truth.

so let's go over what i'm theorizing here... all the remaining fakes are illusions based on how laios sees his friends. the illusions manage to make mistakes that reveal the truth to him, but i think the reason for that harkens back to what laios said earlier... the illusions are being updated over time.

laios isn't considering any of the things that give the fakes away until this moment. if it had taken a little longer to resolve things, maybe they'd have started course-correcting, but they aren't given the chance. laios makes sure they aren't--he acts very quickly. even as he presents the three pairs with his findings, he's aware that everything will fall apart as soon as he does... and he's banking on that. while the shapeshifter illusions defend themselves from being killed, he gets right to the heart of the matter in the only way he knows how: confronting the actual monster involved.

when all's said and done, laios reveals how he figured it out:

potentially of note, all of these details happened before the red dragon fight. chilchuck fighting a mimic and revealing his history with them, senshi gushing about the dungeon's ecosystem, and marcille being attacked by the undine weren't super recent memories. when laios brought them forth in his mind, he had a delay before the shapeshifter updated its illusions.

well... except with marcille. marcille A actually didn't show her hand so easily; it was the real marcille's carelessness that proved her identity.

but what this suggests is that, when confronted with the realities of marcille versus his idealized version of her, laios had to make a choice: did it make more sense for her to have been radically changed by the revival and subsequent loss of falin, or was the presence of a marcille he knew so well proof of an illusion? she was the one who was the most different, and as such, the contrast was the same one that eliminated all three laioses at the start: with the real thing in the room, the fake became apparent.

so, to reach a conclusion: one again, laios has proven he's not as scatterbrained as his companions think, but this time he did so on a more personal level than usual. to them, he reveals that he knows their quirks enough to define them by such when they're otherwise faced with convincing copies. to us, the readers, if we accept what i've suggested here... he's revealed a lot more. he respects, admires, and idolizes his friends, all out of fondness: he wants to see them in an ideal way, whatever that means for each of them as individuals.

anyway thanks for coming to my TED talk

#dungeon meshi #extensive spoilers for chapters 39 and 40 but also a little bit 27 too #I REALLY LIKE WRITING META SORRY. THIS IS LONG #tox.txt

[iwritenarrativesandstuff]

Chapter 105.5 Thoughts: Control, Manipulation and Partnership

Or, how Chuuya is actually the most qualified character to land a victory over Dostoevsky.

I just want to preface this with: I think Chuuya has woken from the brainwashing. We can't see his eyes, he's holding his hat again, and look at the progression of his face and expression from the last few chapters with him (these are in order btw from left to right).

I'm not completely sure how he did this, but I chalk a lot of it up to sheer stubborn determination on Chuuya's part, mostly because it's funny and he was clearly fighting back before Dazai's speech. However, I find it likely the speech did contain some kind of code - others have pointed out how "Goodbye!" might be a reference to the original author's last unfinished book and we know skk's codenames for things generally are based off their real counterparts' works so, maybe he'd already broken out of it, maybe there was something in there that gave him the final push - who knows at this point honestly? Either way, it means Chuuya had the capacity to break out of the vampire curse on his own and that's incredibly funny to me for many reasons but mostly:

Fyodor: "Bold of you to assume Chuuya's ability can't overcome flooding."

Dazai: "Bold of you to assume Chuuya's personality can't overcome brainwashing."

But really, this highlights something interesting here, both in what Chuuya's role is ultimately intended to be in this arc, and in the way Fyodor and Dazai manipulate and value others in very different ways.

I've said it before but it bears repeating: we already know that Fyodor is an excellent long-term planner, while Dazai is effectively able to counter him because Dazai shifts into thinking like his opponent. They're foil characters for a reason; they're both highly intelligent, manipulative, and willing to play the long game for the sake of winning against their opponent.

Thing is, I also stand by the idea that personality-wise, they're not similar at all - and that has serious implications for the people they are connected with. The build-up to the prison escape arc really highlights this. Some examples:

Chapter 46: Fyodor believes that all people are sinful and foolish and that his goal is to remove sin. Dazai believes that all people are sinful and foolish but asks what's so wrong with that.

Chapter 64: They decide to have a "super-happy chit-chat" about their problems. Dazai's solution to Fyodor's issue with his lazy subordinates is to get them to think lazing around is a bad thing so they will put in effort of their own. Fyodor's solution to Dazai being unable to woo the waitress is to isolate her from her job, house and family so that she can only rely on Dazai.

Chapter 77: Fyodor believes god is perfection and harmony, and thus that the people capable of change are the superior ones with most control. Dazai believes god is the accidental and illogical and believes it is the ordinary people who fight and live in that uncertainty who create the greatest change.

So, what's happening here? Fyodor's manipulation is shown to be very exacting and direct. He leaves no room for error and regards people on a hierarchy - God above all, himself as a servant of God's will, and the sinful and foolish humans he has little regard for. Dazai's manipulation involves manipulation of the situation, and is often indirect. It involves people coming to the conclusion he intends for them to on their own. And from his later dialogue with Sigma, we see he doesn't regard the world in that same kind of hierarchy.

Now, look at the way Fyodor picks an item and Dazai picks a person when starting the game. Look at the way Fyodor refers to Chuuya respectfully but brainwashes him entirely and mocks Dazai for not being worthy of "using" his ability. Look at the way Dazai is a complete ass to Chuuya but ultimately lets him make his own choices (begging people to take note of that moment in Stormbringer where Dazai cuts himself off to correct his referring to Corruption as Arahabaki's true power to Chuuya's true power).

So, the actual strength Dazai has over Dostoevsky then, is not really his strength at all, it's the strength of others and their choice and willpower to act in the way they believe is best. It's the only means of getting a leg up on Dostoevsky, otherwise they will continue to go around and around in circles forever.

And Chuuya is the best candidate for finally throwing Fyodor off his game.

Firstly, let's just establish something: no matter how mad he is at Dazai, he's not going to side with Fyodor, not willingly. Fyodor threatened the Mafia in the Cannibalism arc by attacking Mori, first of all. I doubt he's forgiven him for that. Secondly, Fyodor embodies everything Chuuya can't stand about Dazai, at the very least, younger Dazai - the manipulation, the lack of consideration and connection with others, the callousness and lack of regard for life.

Well, perhaps he's not quite as irritating. +1 point for Dostoevsky I guess?

But lastly, it is more advantageous for Chuuya at this point to help fight against Fyodor, especially since most of the Mafia has been vampirized by his organization. Helping the Agency stop the terrorist plot will help the Mafia by extension by undoing that. And we know from Stormbringer that no matter how much Chuuya is personally hurt, he considers taking out the threat to his people a higher priority. Always.

(You could make the argument that he was told whatever Teruko told Atsushi and decided to join, but not only do I find this wildly out of character, but if that was the case then there would've been no reason to brainwash him.)

That said, I don't think this was preemptive "Dazai's master plan #3057", and in fact, I stand by the idea that Dazai had no idea Chuuya was going to be in the prison. It is very, very important to me that for the rest of this arc, no matter what Chuuya does, that his actions are his own. Not Fyodor's, not Dazai's, but his. And not just because I hate that he's being controlled right now and that freedom of choice has always been important for Chuuya.

But because it makes narrative sense.

The vampires are a bit silly, yes, but they represent the way Fyodor and Fukuchi think - humanity will commit atrocities. They cannot be trusted to make their own decisions. They want to make a world that is free by... mind-controlling people so their plans work without a hitch. In short, they choose, on behalf of others, to sacrifice human autonomy for peace. So, if we are going to turn this arc around, we need to have characters breaking out of that control and thinking for themselves, in spite of the uncertainty of the outcome.

We already see this with Atsushi in the last chapter! He finally takes initiative and makes that choice to leave the room when he doesn't exactly know what the right thing to do is. And this is also why I don't think Teruko is wholly convinced by the DoA either - she lets him go. She gives him the freedom to choose what he does with that information.

Another one of the focus characters here is Sigma. Sigma is a guy who has no past, whose humanity is questioned, who keeps being used by organizations for his valuable ability, who has no home but desperately wants one... oh wait. Remind you of anyone's younger self? This could go one of two ways: Chuuya fails to assert his autonomy, leaving Sigma to learn from that failure, or, Chuuya succeeds in asserting his autonomy, leaving Sigma to learn from his success.

I think it, by necessity, has to be the latter. Sigma's at a tipping point right now, and I think seeing someone try to assert their freedom only to fail would damage him greatly. And I think it's a waste of Chuuya's character honestly.

Chuuya needs to assert his autonomy in this arc. Not just for thematic reasons but because I can think of no one else who can effectively break the "super-genius stalemate".

I keep hearing "Dazai knows Chuuya" in response to Fyodor calling their bond shallow, and that is absolutely true! But Chuuya also knows Dazai. Incredibly well. Odasaku knew Dazai's soul, but Chuuya knows Dazai's mind, knows his strategies and ways of thinking without even needing words. What's more, Chuuya has thrown off Dazai before and done what he didn't expect him to.

Which is nifty, because Dazai and Fyodor think a lot alike. Chuuya is in a unique position to thwart Dostoevsky because he may actually be able to predict him to a degree. Chuuya can absolutely land a victory against him, and it's excellent because it would be completely unexpected to Fyodor, who apparently thinks Chuuya's strength lies only in what his ability has to offer and not much else.

But listen. This also can't be skk's plan. I need Chuuya to sideline both of them. Both for the sweet, sweet catharsis of putting those two idiot geniuses in their places and also because I need Dazai to have screwed up. He wasn't wrong about people making their own choices in uncertainty. People need to assert their autonomy to create change. Dazai can't be wrong in this regard.

But with going ahead with the trap to drown Fyodor despite also having to drown Chuuya when he promised not to let him get killed... this needs to have been a mistake, otherwise the value of Dazai's emotional speech to him is diminished.

I want Dazai to try to laugh it off. I want him to say he always knew Chuuya would escape and then for Chuuya to deck him because "no, the fuck you didn't".

I really think Dazai hoped Chuuya would make it. Do remember that Chuuya was one of the first reasons young Dazai decided to try giving life a chance. The fact that he flashbacked to all his key memories with Chuuya says a lot. But his survival was no guarantee and it seemed very unlikely.

So, Chuuya is faced with the fact that Dazai nearly sacrificed him to kill Dostoevsky and save his new Agency friends.

And I hope he finally gets mad. I hope he finally expresses hurt on his own behalf for once. I hope they are forced to break their status quo that they have carefully maintained by not talking about anything ever. I hope they are pushed to uncomfortable places and that it is Chuuya who finally spurs this development.

Let Chuuya break the stalemate between Dazai and Dostoevsky. Let him shatter the status quo that him and Dazai have kept going for year after year.

Autonomous action in the face of uncertainty is necessary for change.

#am i assigning too much narrative importance in the main manga to chuuya? perhaps #will i stop? no #unfortunately this meta doesn't include gogol which is an oversight because he absolutely has to play a role as well #i'm just not quite sure what yet. same as chuuya i suppose #either gogol asserts his autonomy or he... fails. yeah. either he gets dostoevsky killed or... he fails. #i just don't know where he fits in with everyone else is the thing #listen though. it is significant that gogol decided not to play his dying role in the doa's plan though. #gogol is the free spirit of the doa and yet he's closer to sigma and bram in terms of how he is more controlled than controller #anyways sorry this is so long. just my two cents on the matter #bsd #bsd spoilers #bsd chapter 105.5 #bsd chuuya #bsd fyodor #bsd dazai #bsd sigma #bsd meta #i don't even know if this makes sense anymore. here. #storyrambles

[giftoflife]

Gift of Life: Chapter 2 - The Test (PART 1/3)

#gift of life au #portal #portal 2 #glados #chell #chelldos #comic update #needles / #(very brief at the beginning but still) #chapter update #sorry for no captions…i still need to do that on the site too #man compared to the last chapter these pages are SO freaken long

[ghost-bxrd]

Static crackles over the phone, Dave choking on cigarette smoke no doubt, “S’cuse me, what?”

Jason doesn’t laugh. It’s not funny.

“I said to shoot the Bats.”

Another staticky sound, “Boss, I- even Robin?”

Jason takes a deep breath, “Yes.”

“But, uh, sir, Robin’s a kid, are you-“

“He’s sixteen,” Jason snaps, “I was fifteen when I die-“ He cuts himself off, breathing deeply.

On the other end of the line, Dave is silent.

“He’s not a kid,” the words burn in his throat, “You don’t get to be a kid in those colors, Dave. Just fucking do as I say.”

— Sneak peek of chpt xii of What You’re Longing For (you claim to abhor)

#another #sneak peek #because I miscalculated the update time for this chapter #sorry :((( #yeah #I really think you guys will like the last chapter tho #:) #more angst lol #jason todd #batfamily #dick grayson #batfam #robin #what you’re longing for you claim to abhor #bruce wayne #tim drake #red hood #ghost talks #batman

[rox-of-iu]

my old blorbos are back in my brain

heart pirates my absolute beloved. shame theyre chillin somewhere in the ocean lol (do not mention the pre-time skip hats of penguin and shachi I'm still attached even tho its already been a million years since then)

anyway every time i remember that Law and Kid are assigned german and Scottish by Oda i gain one hundred years

#one piece #trafalgar law #heart pirates #penguin #shachi #kidlaw #weary sigh- i am never getting out of this place #OP has been in my brain since -checks watch- like 2016 I think? and there is no escape #like every few months this stupidass anime/manga just grabs my brain again for a month or so hdjkhkd #its terminal #anyway as a long time enjoyer of heart pirates-crys-hjdsfhkdhfk #i come back after a long time and this is the status update i get??? anyway fly high polar tang o7 #btw if theres any mistakes in the german bits I'm sorry i did study german for a few years as my third language of choice but #im not super confident in it so hdsjfhk sorry #but the first bit with vergo is partly a reference to a meme that i saw some time ago and that completely took me out #and should translate i think into 'yea yea whatever. you wanker' and 'sorry. you(formal) wanker' #hajsdhkd #and the one with kid hopefully says 'oh yeah mirrors can be scary' #oh well and thats about it cheers #id say read one piece but actually dont its at 1088 chapters now #and just the catching up that i did in the past few days absolutely took me out lmao #but hey this is prolly my oldest going-on fandom that i still feel the need to come back from time to time lol o7

[sophsicle]

kyd chapter 28 sneak

#i love them your honour #sorry i will stop posting snippets #but this chapter has so many moving parts #it's taking so long #and i am IMPATIENT #my arm is now also in a brace which is #not helping things #but we persist #soph rambles #kyd #fic: kill your darlings

[cherruni]

im going insane. anyways here are the boys and a mengyao from @neonghostcat’s fic ! once again i am asking you to read it 🫶

#svsss #scum villain’s self saving system #shen yuan #liu qingge #liushen #new chapter made me want to chew wood btw #(the mengyao design was from another artist please check their bestiary it’s so cool) #i was going to draw the kabedon scene for reals but i saw this ref and i thought it would be funnier ajskdkdkd #also i know sy was probably not making puppy eyes but listen my heart told me otherwise #also uh im sorry for not uploading for so long. i’m suffering

[petite-phthora]

Shouldn’t have digital evidence when you have a family of hackers

[DP x DC fic]

[Love at first... murder? - part 14]

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Part 1

Ao3

---

Text in italics and in-between ' means it is said in sign language

'For example.'

If an entire scene is written in italics, that means that that scene is a flashback.

---

When Jason glances at where Danny and Ellie were, he sees nothing. He’s too relieved to really care much about how they got out of here so quickly.

He’ll ask Danny about it later.

Probably…

“Red Hood.”

“Bitch.” Is his response.

Jason is slightly disappointed, but entirely unsurprised, by the lack of reaction he gets.

“Who were they?”

“What were those civilians doing on the roof?”

“Where did they even go?”

“Just some informants for a case I’ve been working on.” Jason says, not giving anything about them away.

“Which case?”

“Did they attack you?”

“Yeah, who took a bite out of your arm? And more importantly, how did you taste?”

“Steph, I don’t think now’s the time—”

‘Medical assistance?’

Jason follows the Bats’ gazes towards his injured arm. He resists the urge to hide it and instead crosses his arms, trying to play it off.

“No, this is from… a cat.”

“A cat?”

“Yes. A stray cat. Bit me.”

“Tch. It’s obvious Todd is incompetent when it comes to caring for animals. For it to attack you like that you must have done quite poorly. What did you do to it?” Damien glares at him in an accusatory way.

“I didn’t do shit, Demon Brat. I was just scanning the street when it bit me outta nowhere.”

“Well, excuse me if I don’t believe you, Todd. You clearly must have cornered, threatened, or hurt it in some way for it to react—"

“Yeah, yeah.” Jason cuts him off and rolls his eyes, even though none of them can see it through the helmet. The energy is there.

“Animals hate me, and I can’t take care of them for shit. Now, can we move on to why you’re all here on my turf?” Jason stares them all down.

Before anyone else can speak up, Dick starts talking.

“Can’t an elder brother just visit his younger sibling every once in a while?” Dick asks with a totally innocent grin.

“No.”

Dick shrugs. “Worth a shot.”

“While we originally came here to interrogate you about your involvement in the disappearance of the Joker, these imbeciles wanted to use the encounter as a way to simultaneously confront you about your new… beloved” Damian says, gesturing towards the others sounding completely done and unimpressed.

‘Got them flowers?’

“So how was the dinner? And the observatory? Do they like the stars? What’s their name? Hobbies? Age? Appearance? Interests?”

“Are they hot?”

“Seeing as you picked up a bouquet of sweet peas in costume, and didn’t take a detour to your apartment or safehouse before your location started glitching, I have to ask. Are you dating a civilian as Red Hood?” Babs speaks up over the comms.

Tim stays suspiciously silent, not asking any questions. Jason cuts them all off.

“Where the hell did you even get this information from?”

“Tim snitched.”

“Drake mentioned it.”

“Tim.”

“Timmy told us.”

“Red Robin informed us about your outing.”

“I hacked some cams to see you pick up the flowers, but Tim was the one to say you were on a date at the time.”

Tim raises his finger and opens his mouth as if he’s about to speak up and defend himself. He then stops, seemingly considering something before dropping his hand back down and just shrugging.

“If you didn’t want anyone to know you shouldn’t have gone out as Red Hood when getting the flowers and taking them out to dinner.

“Besides, I tried to respect your privacy and redirect everyone somewhere else to keep them off your back. But they interrogated me, and I’m sorry.” He says, not sounding sorry at all. “It just… slipped out.”

“You didn’t try that hard—"

Tim shushes Steph and cuts her off.

“Besides! Babs also stalked you! Through the cameras! And, I didn’t say that much. I just told them you were on a date.”

Jason glares at them all through the visor of his helmet. Meanwhile, Dick crosses his arms and pouts.

“Yeah, Timbers—” “No real names.” “— wouldn’t tell us anything! He used his lack of sleep against us.”

---

“So Timmy, I need you to tell me everything. Pretty please?”

Tim raises his finger and opens his mouth as if he’s about to speak up. Then his eyes roll into the back of his head and he starts falling backward.

Dick yelps and manages to catch him before he falls onto the ground and hits his head.

“Damn it, Tim!” He whines. “Passing out like that should not have been the power move that it is.”

“He can fall asleep after this?!” Steph’s incredulous voice pipes up.

Dick’s gaze moves from Tim over to where Steph was previously half-dying due to Tim’s monstrosity of a drink. She’s standing by now, clutching the mug in a death grip. She’s twitching every now and again, her foot tapping the floor rapidly.

“Ehm, Steph? You okay?”

“Mhmm, think I’m having a stroke”

“Oh, that’s not good—”

Dick cuts himself off as Steph starts to stumble. He moves closer to catch her in case she falls as well, but luckily she manages to save herself from falling, clumsily moving to sit down on the floor instead.

Once seated, she lets her back hit the floor. She also lets go of the mug, letting it spill onto and roll around the floor of the cave.

“Y’know, I think I’m just gonna stay here for a bit. Maybe do some stalactite gazing. It’s riveting stuff, I tell you!”

Dick lets out a small sigh and nods a little.

“You do you, boo”

He gets a thumbs-up in response.

---

“Why are you actually here?” He cuts them off, already done with their bullshit. “Don’t start the bullshit about the ‘date’ again. Either talk business or leave.”

He privately notes the lack of green in his vision.

They all glance at each other before Batman steps forward and speaks up.

“What is your involvement in the disappearance of the Joker.”

“I don’t have anything to do with the Joker’s disappearance” Jason vehemently denies, arms still crossed.

“Are you sure about that?” Babs’ voice pipes up over the comms.

A hologram forms above Batman’s gauntlet computer. The hologram shows a picture of Jason in his Red Hood costume without his helmet grinning at the camera. He’s holding up the camera selfie style and seems to be in one of the alleys of Crime Alley.

The most intriguing part of the picture is the figure next to Jason on the ground. There, in clear view, lies the dead body of the Joker. His head seems to be caved in in a way that shows he most likely died on impact, hit by something that had a lot of force.

Jason pauses at the sight of one of his most precious keepsakes.

“Of course you hacked my phone” He scoffs, clearly unhappy.

Jason turns back to look at the Bats and watches their reactions to the revelation the Joker is most certainly dead. Dick seems to have some sort of weight lifted off of his shoulders. Cass doesn’t give anything away.

Damian is unimpressed, scoffing at the hologram and likely already mentally criticizing the technique. Steph seems to be more relaxed, “Damn, Jason, this totally looks like that one Grant Gustin next to the grave meme,” while Tim seems to be having some kind of world-shattering epiphany.

He then eyes Batman’s tense posture. Jason shifts slightly, getting ready to fight if it comes to it.

“Red Hood. Did you kill the Joker?” Batman grinds out slowly, pinning Jason with a soul-piercing stare. Jason carefully eyes Batman’s tightened fists before locking eyes with him again.

“No,” Jason answers honestly.

Jason and Batman are locked in a stare-down, neither speaking another word. The tense silence goes on for a few seconds before it’s broken by Dick casually putting his arm around Jason’s shoulders in a friendly gesture.

“Welp. Seems like he didn’t do it, B. If he says he didn’t, I believe him.” Dick speaks up.

Jason and Batman both untense a little, the moment broken. Jason lets out a small grumble and shrugs Dick’s arm off his shoulders. Dick lets him with a smile.

“Wait, so you just found his body dead in a ditch somewhere? I called it!” Steph pipes up.

She holds her hand up for a high-five. Cass gives her one.

Jason shrugs nonchalantly “You could say that.”

“You may not have killed him, but it’s clear you’re covering for the actual murderer. Who is it and why are you protecting them?” Batman asks, not letting it go.

“You may not believe me, B, but it was just a freak accident as far as I could tell.”

If you call a meta one-punching the Joker in self-defense a ‘freak accident’.

It’s not like Danny meant to do it. Ergo: accident.

“Nothing more, nothing less. I found him like that. All I did was get rid of the body and wipe some cams. Not that those would have been much helpful if let unwiped anyway.” He shrugs, unconcerned.

“Do you know what caused the files to become corrupted this way? I’ve seen corrupted files before, but this is something else…” Babs says over the comms, tone curious.

“Nah, they were like that even before I wiped them. Might have something to do with whatever took the fucker out. Don’t know though, and I don’t care.I’m just glad the city’s finally rid of that bastard.”

“Amen to that!”

Batman’s glare moves over from Jason to Tim, who meets his gaze headfirst and just gives him an unimpressed stare in return.

“You gotta be honest, B. There’s not really anyone gonna be missing him…”

“Now, if that’s all. I gotta go. I’ve got some work to do, cases to solve, groceries to buy. Y’know, not everyone has the freedom to walk around dressed as furries beating up bad guys 24/7. Some of us have a life.” Jason cuts in.

“And since when are you the one to have a life outside of being a vigilante?”

“Oh, you know, since somewhere around the time my gruesome murder was finally avenged,” Jason says sarcastically.

“Who knew that that would be something that would make it feel like a weight is lifted off of your shoulders and that it would finally bring some peace into your life?

“Let me know if you find the guy who did it, okay? Feel like this was a great service to the community and it deserves a nice reward. Might bake ‘em a cake or something. Maybe some cookies… ” Jason pretends to think.

“Where’s the body?” Batman asks, ignoring Jason’s sarcasm.

“And when are you going to introduce us to your new partner?” Dick chimes in as well.

“Not telling you, and never if I can help it. Now, goodbye.” Jason grinds out before leaving.

Jason turns and runs to the edge of the building, making his way over to the next building and leaving the Bats behind on the roof. As he gets farther away from the other vigilantes, the last thing he hears is Steph speaking up.

“Is it just me or did that conversation involve a lot less… green-eyed rage than I expected?”

Now, it’s time to plan that next date…

---

Taglist:

@i-always-say-yea @uraniumwizard @why-must-i-be-like-this @griffinthing @i23432i @imsotiredfanficlovertm

#dp x dc #dp x dc fic #dpxdc #dcxdp #dc x dp #dp x dc crossover #dead on main #dead on main ship #sorry but danny wont be meeting any of the bats yet #if anything alfred would be the first person that danny meets #it's what jason would want #this was bit of a long chapter but i didnt feel like cutting it in half :p #anyway the next 4 chapters or something are also in the process of being written #so hopefully i can get those out soon #also i might make a masterpost pretty soon #would make things easier :p

[ivoreene]

started reading dungeon meshi..... i love izutsumi..

#meooow #i told myself my favorite wouldnt be the cat girl but shes so silly i love her #all the characters are so love-able i cant believe it took me this long to finally read it i shouldve done it a long time agooooo #30ish more chapters to go .... TToTT #anyway sorry for not posting in a while.... ive been really busy uwaaa #dungeon meshi #dunmeshi #izutsumi #delicious in dungeon #my art

[legend-of-cupcake]

Tsukasa works FOR Sakura

Now this is very likely me just being slow and not connecting the dots until now, but chapter 109 has made me realise that Tsukasa is not the one in charge of the "destroy all yorishiros" plan... It's Sakura.

It's this line here that's made me finally see the light, Tsukasa has to "help Sakura, by destroying the yorishiro." He is not actively desiring the yorishiro to be destroyed, he's just doing his part in the plan. In chapter 106, he wasn't even phased that Nene didn't want to destroy the yorishiro and the only reason he persisted was because it was "his job."

Even way back in chapter 93, Sumire describes Sakura as the one No. 6 serves. Sakura gave him the job of destroying his own yorishiro, not Tsukasa.

Sakura is the one who wants the yorishiros destroyed, she's been trapped inside the school for 100 years and is tired of it. She wants to leave whatever duty is keeping her bound

And she is more than willing to make sacrifices to make her wish come true

Sakura is behind everything, she is the reason that Tsukasa was freed from where he was trapped (very likely Hanako's boundary).

She is also the one altering the rumours.

Tsukasa, as cunning and intelligent as he may be, is probably a bit too impulsive to be the brains behind the entire operation. His intense curiosity for things would likely get in the way, no matter how well he means or how serious he's being.

And again, it's clear Tsukasa is not as invested in destroying the yorishiros as we are initially led to believe. Again, he really doesn't mind that Nene no longer wants to destroy yorishiros anymore

In fact, it's Natsuhiko who worries Nene won't destroy them. Keep in mind Natsuhiko is 100% loyal to Sakura and not necessarily to Tsukasa. If this was Tsukasa's plan, I doubt he would be worrying over whether Nene will keep doing her part as the kannagi

The only reason we even initially thought this was all Tsukasa's doing, was because Sakura painted a picture that she was in a similar situation to Nene.

Sakura gives the impression that she can't go against Tsukasa, that he is her master. But that can't be right, because we know Sakura was the one who appointed the 7 mysteries in the first place. And she was also the one who freed Tsukasa, so how could he be the "master" in this relationship?

I think, Sakura said all this to gain Nene's trust.

Nene, being the modern kannagi, is absolutely vital in the plan to destroy the yorishiros. So having her trust Sakura would help out immensely.

So overall, whether it's the price he's paying for having been freed-- or for some other reason entirely-- it's quite clear to me now that Tsukasa is not the one in charge of the "destroy the 7 mysteries" plan. He's absolutely a major key player, with his cunning and curious mind clearly being an advantage (figured out the fastest and easiest route to stopping time so he could access the clock-keeper's boundary with Nene). But he is doing all of this to help Sakura, it's not for himself.

#tbhk #jshk #toilet bound hanako kun #jibaku shounen hanako kun #tsukasa yugi #sakura nanamine #tbhk theory #it wouldn't surprise me if everyone had already came to this conclusion long before this chapter #I'm just slow sorry lol #Tsukasa is too impulsive and gets distracted too easily to be the mastermind imo #but don't get me wrong he is extremely cunning and smart #only when he's interested tho #plus it really doesnt seem right that Tsukasa is the master of the one who freed him #bit sus there ngl #pls don't roast me too much for being dumb #sorry this post is a bit all over the place

[pharawee]

It's been a week already, so here I am with the third part of my Pit Babe novel commentary.

(You can find the first two parts here and here.)

First things first, though. North is an omega. Do with that information what you will. 🤡

Meanwhile, Charlie and Babe are back at it again (because of course they are) and this time they're not taking any prisoners. Poor Way is on the phone with Babe as Charlie does his best to please~ him. In various ways. Way is very confused. All he wants is for Babe to tell him which car he wants him to buy. You know, if this is Way's villain origin story then I'm not even mad.

Charlie mercifully ends the call before things can get a bit too obvious, only for Babe to pick up the phone again to make an x-rated recording of them going at it like bunnies. Keep this in mind for later.

But anyway. It's finally time for Charlie's initiation into Team X-Hunter - that is, if he manages to pass Alan's test: compete against Pit Babe himself. As if Charlie wasn't nervous enough about it already. Naturally, he loses, and he's really upset about it too - not because he failed the test but because he failed his friends. Aw. But no one really expected him to win against Babe anyway, Alan merely wanted to test his determination, and so he's welcomed as the newest member of the team. Competitive racing really is that easy, I guess.

One almost-love confession later (Babe can't quite bring himself to say it but he doesn't need to. Charlie knows.) they're back to actually teaching Charlie how to race. Since Babe is still healing from his injuries, he can only (very stylishly) watch from the sidelines as the other members of X-Hunter take over as Charlie's teachers. Today it's North's turn and remember? He's the only omega on the team. Naturally, Babe is jealous. They (dirty-)talk it out. Charlie can now smell Babe's emotions, while Babe has all but lost his heightened senses. Hm.

Later, in the locker room while Charlie is busy racing, Babe comes across Way. Or is it the other way around? It seems like Way really wants to talk to him - or rather, talk him out of being with Charlie. Something's really fishy about the way he phrases things. Manipulate, mansplain, malewife. Or something. But the thing is? For some strange reason it's working, even on someone as headstrong and stubborn as Babe (and the only reason why Babe isn't immediately giving in to Way's weirdly cruel love confession is because his heart is full of Charlie). All these moments when Way and he seemed so flirty and close? Suddenly they've become very, very creepy. Hmm.

Anyway. It's time for Charlie to pay another visit to his mysterious clients and/or family. He never really says (but we now know better). But, oh no! He's left his wallet! Luckily, he's got the world's best not-quite-boyfriend to try and catch up with him before it's too late.

And here's where things go very, very wrong.

(I'm putting the rest of this post under a cut because of major spoilers and a content warning for SA and grooming. Please take care.💜)

Because that's not a taxi Babe sees Charlie getting into. It's one of his "father's" limousines, along with some of his men. Preparing for the worst, Babe follows.

Meanwhile, Charlie is meeting up with his adopted father. Their coversation goes about as expected, with Charlie refusing to return home and bring Babe with him while he's at it, because they've indeed been adopted by the same man. Charming.

This is the moment when Babe barges into the room, thinking that he's here to save Charlie before very quickly realising the truth: that he's been manipulated and played and lied to.

I need you to realise how much of a nightmare this is for Babe. He's spent over a decade running from an adoptive father who wants to trap and abuse him, and now the only person he trusts (and loves, but we don't talk about that) has led him straight back into that trap.

So basically, Babe's sanity is slowly unravelling at the seams. He immediately takes off, with Charlie following him outside and into the rain (because of course it's raining - it's much more dramatic that way). When Charlie attempts to stop him and explain, Babe (understandably) lashes out. He punches Charlie's glasses right off his face, failing to understand why he's the one who's hurting when it's Charlie who should be feeling guilty.

Oh, and then there's this bit:

"I thought you liked racing…" Babe's voice was trembling and soft, completely different from before, "…I thought you loved me."

I barely survived reading this. I'm here for fun omegaverse shenanigans dammit!!

So, yeah, Babe returns home alone, and even though he doesn't want to, he forces himself to remember what happened with his adoptive father, because as it turns out Charlie's betrayal has the most horrifying of implications:

You see, Babe was adopted because he was an alpha with special abilities. But he wasn't the only one, there were other adopted alpha children with special abilities that Babe was never allowed to meet. Eventually, Babe learned about the existence of enigmas who stand above even alphas and are so strong (and thankfully rare) that they can turn any alpha they have sex with into omegas and impregnate them. Children from these unions have a 99% chance to be alphas with special abilities. See where this is going?

Let me spell it out for you - because clearly this isn't wtf-inducing enough: Babe is essentially the main ingredient in his adoptive father's breeding program.

But wait! It gets even worse! 🤡🤡

Babe, alone and at his lowest, deduces that Charlie must the enigma that was sent to lure him back.

And if that's true, then maybe he's already been changed from an alpha into an omega (because his heightened senses are gone, remember?). Maybe he's already pregnant.

And this is what sends Babe completely over the edge (same here, Babe, same here...) because he is positively traumatised by the thought of having children and fulfilling his adoptive father's sick wishes. He doesn't want children. The very thought makes him sick. He values his autonomy above all else. He never even has sex with omegas because he refuses to get anyone pregnant.

Only now he's about to get a pregnancy test because he was stupid enough to fall for a cute, innocent boy with glasses.

Enter Charlie who of course still knows the code to Babe's condo. Babe barricades himself in his bedroom while Charlie tells him his side of the story. How he was adopted by the same man, and how he was quite content with his life until he learned about his father's plan to get one of his other adoptive children pregnant - by force if necessary. Charlie felt sorry for this older adoptive brother but since he only knew his name - Babe - he bid his time until he heard about a racer named Pit Babe. Charlie started hanging out at the races and in turn fell in love with racing (and with Babe).

Fast forward to now, only of course Babe doesn't believe him because he must be the enigma, right?

Nope, turns out Charlie is an alpha after all, only his special ability is stealing other alphas' special abilities.

And his grand plan? To take away what makes Babe special so their adoptive father will no longer be interested in breeding (ugh...) him.

Which leaves us (and Babe) with one problem: Wtf Charlie, you don't just steal people's abilities without their consent - especially not when you claim to love them.

So yeah, their whole relationship is based on lies and manipulation, and Charlie essentially stole Babe's heightened senses by having sex with him.

Babe starts crying, Charlie starts crying, then they start having hatesex (which usually ends all their arguments). This fixes things for about five minutes until Babe starts sobbing for real. He wants Charlie to leave. He can't even stand to look at him.

And so Charlie leaves and moves in with his other adoptive brother, Jeff. We'd already established that Jeff is an omega. However, he's a special omega (because why else would he have been adopted too?).

Jeff can see the future. 🤡🤡🤡

He was incredibly valuable to their adoptive father until he probably realised what that meant for him, so one day Jeff took a stroll outside and let himself get hit by a car, claiming that this had him lose his abilities. Naturally, he was promptly discarded, but he seems to live a comfortable life protected by Charlie. He's exactly as aloof as Pon plays him in the series. I love Jeff, ok?

Meanwhile, Babe's back to his old habits, trying to chase away his thoughts of Charlie by getting it on with other alphas. Only it doesn't work. He blames their scent, of course, but he's clearly still hung up on Charlie. Drunk and miserable, he rediscovers the spicy video of Charlie and him that he recorded on his phone and promptly starts masturbating (as you do). When Charlie calls him, he picks up out of habit. Babe is angry (and horny) and Charlie is sad (and horny) so they have phone sex (and they're still really into calling each other papa and daddy - which, you know, there might be better pet names considering who's their adoptive father but ok).

Babe still doesn't want to see Charlie, and as Charlie later aptly puts it:

"Because I chose the starting point myself without asking him. So now I have to let him choose the ending he is most comfortable with."

Much, much later, the racing season picks back up again. Turns out the whole race track had to shut down for an investigation into Babe's accident. It's Charlie's first race and there's some kind of qualifying for future rounds. But, surprise! Babe will be racing too. He's too stubborn to let Charlie win the title. To the surprise of absolutely no one (except for Charlie who's worried about Babe's barely-healed injuries) Babe easily wins, with Charlie (who's overwhelmed by his new heightened senses) coming in fourth place. Plot twist (but really actually not...): Babe doesn't need to rely on his senses to win because he has years of experience to draw from.

After the race, Charlie follows Babe into the locker room. They talk it out. This somehow involves a blowjob but I'm not judging. Babe still won't forgive Charlie, saying:

"You think I love you more than I love myself?"

Which is an incredibly powerful thing to say and I hope they keep this for the series.

Later that night, Babe meets up with Way because he doesn't want to be alone. Things with him have been awkward since that day in the locker room when Way basically confessed, but for some reason Babe won't hold it against him. Way is right, after all (Hmmm.). Only, Way won't let things be and somehow, without Babe noticing, they're suddenly kissing.

And then Babe goes motionless and still as Way starts undressing him. He's stopped just in time by a very panicky Charlie. When Babe comes to he doesn't know what's going on until Charlie tells him.

Way is their adoptive brother and he can hypnotise alphas.

Because DUN DUN DUN! Way is the enigma.

To be continued. 🤡🤡🤡🤡

#pit babe #pit babe the series #bl meta #pit babe meta #jane watches stuff #this is so long i'm so sorry lmao #but a lot happened in only 5 chapters so #i actually really liked babe and charlie talking it out after the big reveal #they're both such interesting characters and so well written #i started reading this novel out of curiosity but now i'm really invested #not really with the omegaverse part because that's not my cup of tea but

[frobin]

One Piece; Episode 1083 (Chapter 1056)

Kozuki Momonosuke searching for Franky and Robin in the storage room 😏

#One Piece #Frobin #Koziki Momonosuke #Cyborg Franky #Nico Robin #Anime #One Piece Anime #One Piece Manga #Episode 1083 #One Piece 1083 #1083 #Chapter 1056 #1056 #Sorry it took so long #Canon #Oda ships it