I know that feel, more or less. Like, I found this because I was looking for trans magical girl stories, but the fact remains that it took me 24 years to figure out that men like being men.
But still, congratulations on the new gender, I hope it fits better than the old one.
Yah, for me I had already kind of figured it out, but realizing that most men like being it and aren't just meh about it made me far more certain about it then I had been before, even if I don't yet feel confident about being a girl offline yet
Wait... I got the first post of A little vice in triple digits!
Me starting this: I wonder why I'm interested in this story specifically, despite mostly being on the alternate history forums, still cis though
Me reading this: Wow, C is super dense about being trans, like they are envious of trans people but somehow think that's different from being trans, still cis though
Me finishing this: Such a great story, I loved reading about this trans person accepting themselves, still cis though
Me looking back after unrelated gender thoughts: Well, I guess that explains why I was interested in reading this... Chiro was still impressively dense though
Another thing about Chiro's colour being Green that I just realised is she shares it with Tommy from Power Rangers, the original 'Ranger recruited by the villains but went to the good side' (well, the original in the West anyway). Obviously green was picked for its links with envy and air, so the Tommy link was probably a coincidence, but still neat.
Edit: Going back to my 'SVAH was Americanised from Japanese' joke, maybe a la MMPR SVAH was merely the first season of a larger franchise to get translated?
Sooooooo much thanks from all of you, If I knew how to do emojis or anything more expressive on this forum, this is where I would do it, but I am not a girl who's good with tech so you will have to just pretend I did it instead.
Okay, I've needed to psych myself up for this, because 14k words is not a small order to review, and with this being the end to A Little Vice...Well, I can't help being a little sentimental and wanting to find the perfect day to finish the climax in one go.
Alas, "perfect" gets in the way of "done", so I gotta compromise and put my back into starting so I can put my best foot forward and make it much more manageable to finish when I come back for round two.
So, shall we? Episode 29 (17): Truth in the Mirror; A Saint Arrives on a Gentle Breeze, begin!
I wasn't quite sure how I'd managed to beg Superbia to release Avaritia, or how I'd managed to make myself leave instead of doing something pointless and self-destructive once he'd agreed to let em go. But ey would be free. I'd done it. Only, I'd ended up trading one friend's suffering for another's.
We come back to Chiro in the very, weird position that is "Just completed her Heel Face Turn, but in the process succeeded the evil plan, so now she kinda just has to fake still being a villain like she faked being a boy", which is. Sure is.
It would be mean to laugh, but I kinda want to, sorry.
Superbia is fulfilling his end of the bargain because he really super needs to, literally Avaritia is his last soldier left.
It couldn't end like this; I couldn't let it end like this. And yet, I'd picked now to get over myself, to promise to hope, if not believe, that I could become better. And that meant whatever power I'd had was beyond my reach. I couldn't even maintain the illusion of being Chiro. So, once Superbia grudgingly agreed to release Avaritia, I'd turned and fled from him and the captive Inessa as fast as decorum allowed.
Gray Robe found me in the twisting halls between Superbia's throne and my room. They stepped into my path and stared me down until I stopped walking. I shivered and wrapped my too large hands around my too large and too flat chest.
"How curious," they said at last. The voice itself was familiar, though I had not heard them speak before, at least not in person. It was the voice that had spoken to me through a vision and told me to find a child and make of him into a weapon of Sloth. This was the voice that had pushed Superbia's plans past the edge of tolerance. I did not like it.
"This was the voice that had pushed Superbia's plans past the edge of tolerance." Bro. Come on. The choo-choo train you were chugging was NOT any less worse before Gray Robe introduced the latest stratagem.
At least 50% because they were already the brains of the operation before you joined.
It's amazing how much we keep being taunted with "Man it so weird how FAMILIAR this strange cloaked figure is" like I really am equally prepared for the Secret Michael Rebellion Against Heaven Gambit as I am this being just an actual angel plushie Lucifer.
"Who are you anyway?" I snapped back. For all that voice sounded horrible, mine was worse. I had never, prior to becoming Chiro, liked it that much. It had never been deep enough to command respect. It had always been too deep at the same time. But I had been able to drown it out before, to let words stand alone as thoughts more than things I heard. Now I could contrast it to Chiro's brighter tones and the comparison only drove home how awful my actual voice remained. If anything, it sounded even worse than before, with a nasally squeaky quality that did it no favors.
Grey Robe looked me over, paying no attention to my vocal woes; or perhaps they noticed my discomfort and reacting to it was simply beneath them.
Eventually they answered. "You may call me Uriel, if you must refer to me. It is rare to see a Beast reject their power."
This is not the name you'd pick for an ANGEL in REBELLION.
Oh bros the Angelic Saints are gonna have to Attack And Dethrone God huh?
Anyway.
"Who are you anyway?" I snapped back. For all that voice sounded horrible, mine was worse. I had never, prior to becoming Chiro, liked it that much. It had never been deep enough to command respect. It had always been too deep at the same time. But I had been able to drown it out before, to let words stand alone as thoughts more than things I heard. Now I could contrast it to Chiro's brighter tones and the comparison only drove home how awful my actual voice remained. If anything, it sounded even worse than before, with a nasally squeaky quality that did it no favors.
The words were an afterthought, as if actually responding to me at all was secondary to whatever inscrutable satisfaction they'd sought in seeking me out. But the name they gave set off a half dozen alarm bells in my head. Uriel was an angel's name. It was impossible not to connect them with Michael, and yet, it was near impossible to connect whatever was hiding in that robe to a plushie who claimed to be an archangel.
Could the Saints trust Michael if another of her kind was here working with Superbia? I didn't want to say no; just because she probably had some connection to Uriel didn't mean that they were working together. Besides, there were more important things to worry about. The heroes could figure that out on their own once Inessa was safe.
It's AMAZING how much Chiro's Common Sense Powers are just. Like this.
"Oh damn that's an angel??? Like Michael??? Even though I only like half believe Michael is That Michael, it's weird to think they're actually related or assume they're on each other's side even if they were, and it's not like it's MY business, we can just put that off for the next two part special."
It's such a complex. Everything.
This is neither Smart or Stupid, but some secret third thing (way too ready to compartmentalize in a story about "Maybe compartmentalize less").
.
Oh but Uriel's definitely going to be the one who makes Chiro Humanitas because they like to fuck around huh?
"You may go do whatever it is you have to do," Uriel said dismissively. Whatever fey curiosity that had made them approach seemed satiated for the moment.
I should have started plotting or getting help or doing anything at all, for all I remained a bruised and exhausted mess. Instead, without the ability to leave the Forest, I found myself perched on a chair in front of my vanity staring hopelessly into a mirror.
The boy therein was familiar, and yet oddly alien. I'd seen him daily for years; enough of my father and enough of my mother that I had more than enough reason to hate his face. But envy had left some marks on me. My hair retained the bob cut and, more unusually, a pleasant swampy green color. Beyond that, it was hard to say. Was it just the odd color, or were my eyebrows finer than before? Were my eyes just a bit larger, my face ever so slightly rounder? Was it the dark shadows accentuating my cheekbones or were they higher?
I shook my head. Yes, I could see the faintest ghost of Chiro in my face, but most of that probably had more to do with how unfamiliar my real face had become than any gifts from my transformation. All I was doing was deluding myself with the phantom of a mask that I'd agreed I needed to abandon.
Like there's a more than a Bit that stuck from Chiro, and what was basically accelerated E microdosing from the Envy Seed's incubation, but because Chiro still fundamentally, hates herself, she can't appreciate the process, the Becoming.
She doesn't yet Get that she can just. Be Chiro. If she replaces the tools the endgoal is still good for her.
And besides, I shouldn't have cared about my appearance while Inessa was suffering. Obviously, pretending to be Chiro was a fundamental expression of my power. If I couldn't do that, I couldn't do any of it. But that didn't mean it was okay to focus on something so immaterial while real problems lurked just down the hall and around the corner.
At the same time, it wasn't like I could actually do anything on my own. Perhaps, as early as that morning, I would have been satisfied uselessly throwing myself at Mr. Noir, choosing oblivion instead of enduring my own failings in a way that actually helped anyone. But Inessa had forgiven me. She wanted to work with me, to discover if I could be someone different. It would just be embarrassing to give up after letting her hug me like that.
The way she's just a really good friend and also a ninny. Boundless.
The Sophistic Horror of Chiro knowing she needs to get out of her head for once and do the hero thing but lambasting herself is just continuing to feed the sophism actually.
But Inessa had forgiven me. She wanted to work with me, to discover if I could be someone different. It would just be embarrassing to give up after letting her hug me like that.
So I stared in the mirror and tried to see beyond my reflexive hatred for the boy therein. Were the changes notable? Did it matter? Could I call upon any of Chiro's power without betraying that promise?
"Hiya Chiro," someone said, marching through my door with a breezy familiarity, as if nothing had changed, as if I still wore Inessa's face. It was so like my partner to cheerfully brush aside eir own torture and my obvious turn from sin.
LUPIN IF YOU INTERRUPT CHIRO'S ATTEMPT AT FIGURING HER SHIT OUT FOR THE NTH TIME I SWEAR.
Okay but for real Avaritia as something wrong with her and hm wait "someone."
It's weird that it's "someone" and not "Avaritia."
So I stared in the mirror and tried to see beyond my reflexive hatred for the boy therein. Were the changes notable? Did it matter? Could I call upon any of Chiro's power without betraying that promise?
I turned to face em, a smile coming easily to my face for all that eir presence only made the situation marginally less hopeless. Ey deserved that much and more after what they'd endured.
At least Avaritia looked almost well, if I ignored the hitch in eir step as ey approached and the bags under eir eyes.
Everyday I close my hands around my head and wonder WHEN will the toxic positivity end? Can either of you just let yourselves be sad in front of your loved ones? Please?
"Hiya Chiro," someone said, marching through my door with a breezy familiarity, as if nothing had changed, as if I still wore Inessa's face. It was so like my partner to cheerfully brush aside eir own torture and my obvious turn from sin.
"Sure, it'd take more than getting locked away like that to keep a good dog down, you know?" ey tousled my hair, a gesture made ever so slightly less pleasant by the change in our relative heights.
"It's okay," I told em. "You don't have to pretend that I haven't changed. I know you probably don't want a partner who looks like this instead of like Inessa."
NOT "I'm sorry you went through torture because of me" OR "You don't have to pretend you were fine after your uncle put you in solitary confinement" IT'S THAT???
Chiro's Sophistic Horror Story Of A Life. Every Time.
Like I knew Avaritia was going to correct this misunderstanding but why.
Why would you say it like.
.
DO YOU NOT REALIZE THIS IS CHIRO'S DISGUISE POWERS TURNING OFF???
Is it that??? Are ey that incapable of remembering–Actually Lupin would be the person to completely turn off eir memory of someone's pre-transition appearance, I can believe eir commitment there.
This is so weird though. Why is eir phrasing always this out of pocket.
Ey was lying. I knew exactly how I looked in a mirror. I found myself blushing anyway.
"It's okay, I know I'm back to being an ugly, useless boy again. I don't look cute, I don't look like her anymore. You don't need to pretend to be interested in me if I don't look like her anymore." Even letting go of some things, I still couldn't name her to Avaritia that easily.
Sometimes. Sometimes I stare off into the distance. And acknowledge I am not the target audience for this story. I acknowledge this.
Anyway this is SO interesting as the like. Come down. Of an entire story of Chiro's transition into Beasthood and first taste of girlhood being through the lens of Being Inessa, and the fact Avaritia has not actually been prepared for the like. The Easily Read Implication Of Eir Maxed Out Interest In Chiro Living In Sin With Em coming on most strongly when she's wearing the face of someone she's invested so much. Envy in.
Like I know Avaritia is gonna win this battle I'm just happy ey finally know it was a battle that was happening.
Ey surveyed me once more, then, nodding to emself, grabbed my collar, and pulled me up until we were only inches apart.
Obligingly, I squeaked.
Ey lingered there, eir eyes inches away from mine, something unspeakable crackling in the air between us. Then ey planted a single finger against my lips and shoved me away.
"Hey!" I glared at em. Here I was trying to welcome em back and beg em to help fix this whole thing with Inessa somehow and they took the opportunity to… whatever that was.
"Nope," Avaritia muttered to emself. "Still into it. And, like, if you want to be a guy now, that's cool and all. But you're like an inch or two shorter than when you started and your face looks literally nothing like it did before you took the seed. And you still have boobs."
To punctuate eir remarks, ey jabbed me in the chest, hard. I winced and rubbed the affected area where, okay, perhaps the skin was a little tender. But that didn't make em right!
I respect that Avaritia's "Yeah I'd fuck you if you were a boy. Like you're not but it'd be fine if this was a fluid stage that you were just trying out."
Real One Behavior.
Also it IS making her shorter. I suppose we'll see if Estrogen: Spine Replacement Edition will continue or not!
Resentfully, I turned to look back in the mirror. I couldn't see it. Oh sure, there was maybe a bit of curve around my chest and maybe I was being uncharitable about my face. But the second I so much as breathed that impression fled with it and it was just Charlie looking back at me.
"It's true. You're just a terrible judge of yourself," ey said as if it was settled. "The seed's done good work."
Ideologically I don't believe in thanking the Seeds for anything, but I guess you can scam the forces of evil for HRT?
That's a morally neutral thing maybe???
Anyway I feel like we're getting the easy part out of the way (confirming that Chiro losing the Inessa Kinnie Sinmaxxing has zero impact on her relationship with Lupin) to set up the hard part (girl that wolf is NOT off the koolaid ey are fucking bonkers on that sunk cost fallacy).
"That's not important right now. We can sort out," what was I supposed to call whatever that had been, "whatever this is later!" Besides, it was one thing to fret over my appearance while I waited for help, another entirely to waste time on it after help had arrived.
"I'll admit, I'm a little curious how the whole saving me thing ended up in a new look." Ey spoke with a careful carelessness, a thin veneer of ease over a roiling sea of anxiety.
Oh so you can ACTUALLY read the room once Chiro's brand of stupid turns off, okay.
Honestly it's kinda ridiculous to me that two whole Beasts really cannot for the life of them tell what Uriel noticed like the second Formerly Invidia dropped back into base.
Again, ey deserved an explanation. Besides, I couldn't expect Lupin to help without explaining where I'd messed everything up. So I talked. I left out some of the details of course: exactly what I'd admitted to Inessa, how she'd reached me in the end.
"CASTITAS!" She raised her bow in front of her, spinning it as easily as anyone else might spin a baton. With each rotation it grew larger and larger, the flames extending the shape of the bow far beyond its limits.
"EMPYREAL," the flames around her stretched into a point, transforming Castitas herself into a gargantuan arrow.
"ARROW!" And she fired herself forward, shooting at me with all the light and heat of a newborn star.
I closed my eyes and savored the oncoming warmth. Finally, it could end. Inessa would be sorry that she'd had to take it this far, but she was so strong.
Avaritia would know that Superbia had set me on this course and finally break away, and I could finally stop trying to cling to the shards of envy, worrying about if something else was possible, or if I could listen to Inessa (or Temperance or Avaritia…) and try to approach myself with a little kindness. It was easier to let it all go, to sink into oblivion clutching at a precious little dream I'd torn to pieces with my own hands.
I expected the flames to hurt. Instead, after the initial harsh impact set me tumbling back, they surrounded me with a gentle warmth. I waited for the end. And yet, the sensation lingered, a crushingly kind human sensation, little different from from an embrace.
Slowly, I opened my eyes.
Inessa Brandt had wrapped her arms around me, Castitas' uniform giving way to her mundane clothing.
"Honestly," she said, "Did you think I would actually kill you?"
That had been the plan, yes.
"Superbia has Avaritia. He's going to hurt em unless I brought him you," I said, one last futile act of defiance. But I'd already lost. The network of roots inside of me had already begun to rebel, pulling away from my veins to sink back into themselves. Vines pulled away from my flesh, the power and the gift going with them.
Inessa just hugged me tighter, "then we'll save em together!" she said with a quiet exhausted confidence. Strange, when it wasn't me she was talking about, that actually made me feel like she could do it.
"Fine," the last of envy's power cracked, my seed burrowed deeper into itself, pulling away with all the strength it had granted me. "You win."
How was I supposed to respond to that? Avaritia had forced me how to face my own desires, to see the things I'd buried away. Ey'd encouraged me at every turn to embrace the strange and terrifying potential in being Chiro. And yet, the envy ey'd had me admit had gotten people hurt, had led to me hurting people. And here I was at the end, barely able to explain what any of it actually meant.
"It's okay," ey faked a grin. "A greedy greedy wolf like me won't let go once ey've sunk eir teeth into someone, you know? So run, run as far as you can and know that it won't stop Avaritia Wolf from finding you when I want."
Then the laughter died, and ey looked at the floor.
"Just," ey said more flatly than I'd ever heard em. "Promise me that, even if you don't come back to me, you'll make it out of this okay."
I took a deep breath to calm my rapidly beating heart. So, my efforts to hide that part hadn't worked after all. It hurt to have that ugliness be seen; it was almost a relief to have em know. At least, for once, I had an answer to that kind of question that someone would want to hear.
"I promise." Even when the words were true, they still felt like a lie. "A part of me wants to go off and martyr myself. But, I think, if I can save her, then, well, I don't want to go back to the way things were, but Inessa talked about going forward instead and…" I didn't believe it was possible, not really. I wasn't the kind of person who could hear a big speech and have a big fight and turn her life around. But, maybe, I owed it to myself to try, even if I didn't believe it would work.
"It doesn't," I said at last. "It gives me what I want, but it's all fake, still too perfect and it'll never let me forget how fake it all is, not by itself. It's not really me if it's not something I choose to do,"
"Well then what does choosing look like?" Avaritia's claw wrapped around my wrist, and ey pulled me oddly close, a familiar smirk buying any hints of sobriety once more.
It's amazing how much this is an argument about forcefemming. I think.
Like "I realize that giving up my agency to someone who make me do everything I want to make up for how powerless I feel is nice but still doesn't actually make up for how powerless I feel, so I'm going to stop" "Okay, what are you going to do with power?" "Shut up" is the vibe the conversation is at and it's like. Multilayered? Multilayered.
"I don't know. Look, I get that this is important, but he has her right now. Can we just work this out later?"
"I can help," ey said, rubbing eir fangs against eir lower lip. "But since I'm just such a greedy, greedy wolf, even my partner needs to pay a price here. So tell me, if it's so important that you take charge and make your own choice, what does that actually look like?"
"I don't know." That phrase was fast becoming a refrain. For all I'd fallen for Inessa's siren song of an offer, I still found myself unable to picture what that would entail.
"Well," ey was grinning now, pulling me close. "Let's start with this. Do you want to be a boy or a girl? Neither?"
I shook my head, "I can't do this right now. I need—"
"You need to convince me if you want my help. You're stuck here, as long as you look like that, Chiro." The name felt like a slap. "Don't get me wrong, you look cute, but it's not the kind of body that screams 'embodiment of all you envy.' That means you're not leaving the Forest, you're not getting the Saints and you're not fighting anyone on your own. So, convince me this is better for my partner."
I CAN'T BELIEVE LUPIN IS GOING "Answer my riddles three!" WHAT A FUCKING WAY TO KEEP YOUR WEIRD DOG DOM THIS RELEVANT EVEN THOUGH YOU HAVE LITERALLY NOT OWNED UP TO A REDEMPTION ARC YET.
Ey're like. Really a cunt about this, but honestly if you've ever wanted to make a glowing recommendation to the side of good now's the time Chiro.
Make a sales pitch that works for you and it might be a sales pitch that gets through Lupin's thick Greedmaxxing skull!
It was unusual of em to be so confrontational. The paternalism wasn't new; Avaritia would do whatever ey felt was best for those ey cared about, regardless of how we felt about it. But ey wasn't the type to talk it out or make eir case. No, Avaritia moved from impulse to impulse, doing what felt best and hoping for forgiveness after the fact. Perhaps ey knew ey couldn't hold on and that was forcing eir hand. Perhaps all the sudden flirting and aggression were just a way to reassure emself after ey'd emerged from eir prison and found the status quo ey'd held onto so greedily shattered around em again.
"I…" What did I want, anyway? I didn't want to go back to being Charlie. It was easier to think in the negatives like that. Actually naming what I did want, instead of letting my envy take it for me? That remained frustratingly hard.
I couldn't become Inessa, not if I wanted to change. Did I want to be her friend again? I loved her like family. I didn't want to hurt her, even if I struggled to escape her shadow. And yet, not only did she eclipse me, she burned so brightly it was hard to look at her. But, at the very least, the thought of trying again didn't trigger any instant panic or revulsion.
What about escape? Could I take Avaritia and run away from all this and everyone? That one was easier to dismiss. I'd promised to try going forward, and running away just felt like a retreat.
Avaritia flicked my forehead.
"Don't think about what's possible; just decide what it is you want."
It's amazing how much Avaritia being forced to like. Stop putting off Actually Engaging With The Matter Straight Up is so much better for the issues, literally just on Rock Lee leg weights when all ey had to say was "Just Say Sin!"
Avaritia wasn't expecting much from me, was ey? Just a little proof that there was an after, that I wouldn't be using this to end everything, or worse, retreat to what I'd been before the seed had shown me what I really was deep down inside.
"I want to try again," I admitted. "With Inessa, that is. I want to apologize to everyone and I want to become the kind of person that can be open with others, that can really genuinely talk with them and then change and grow until I can look in a mirror and see someone I like."
FLIPPING TABLES BECAUSE THIS IS THAT TABLE FLIPPING SHIT.
Ouuuuugh.
This is just. Nice.
Aaaaaaand I'm going to stop writing now. This feels like a good point to stop.
This is either a hump for higher highs or lower lows that will precede the highs, all good turning points are like that, I'm just gonna stop typing, bye.
Inessa and Chiro prepared their whole lives to thrive in a magical girl anime, only for the universe to pull out the rug from under them and stick them in a JRPG.
Everyday I close my hands around my head and wonder WHEN will the toxic positivity end? Can either of you just let yourselves be sad in front of your loved ones? Please?
But then Superbia would have to do his evil plans all alone. And he's not a bad guy, you know? He's trying to be good. It's those saints that are the problem.
"Why? I mean, don't get me wrong, the whole futch thing doesn't really feel like it's you the way your last face did, but you still look good."
On one hand, "paternalism" is not just "parental behavior by someone who is male". The implications of "paternal behavior" and "maternal behavior" are very different, and "paternalim" is those implications boiled down to their essence, applicable to everything from individual guardians to geopolitical entities. Expressing love via control, via "doing what's best for you," is very paternalistic; acting like a good parent while male is not.
On the other hand, Chiro does have daddy issues.
Anyway it's good to have a straight up conversation via confrontation but also I think you should punch em.
Honestly I think it's a good sign that eir more focused on correcting "don't worry, I'm still interested in you and won't abandon you" than talking about the evil plot stuff. Avaritia is modelling somewhat healthy relationship dynamics! It is a sign eir priorities are messed up, but I guess Greed encompasses a bit of holding onto people.
I mean the penultimate chapter had the Nanoha-level "magical girl and dark magical girl beat the shit out of each other while explaining their feelings", you can't just do that two chapters in a row.
It was such a tiny dream. And yet, merely putting it into words felt harder than climbing a mountain. But it was a good kind of draining, a step in the right direction. Sadly, for all my newfound resolve had completely short-circuited my otherwise convenient superpowers, it still didn't give me anything resembling the faith that I wouldn't simply revert to Invidia at the first setback.
"That's great. It's good to hear that, with sin or without it, you're not just running away. But—" Whatever playfully cruel impulse had pushed Avaritia into asking these questions in the first place reared its head in the sudden narrowing of eir eyes as ey grabbed tightly onto my shoulder.
"The important part! What does that person in the mirror look like in the end?"
God but ey really are like "Do NOT. Undo your transition goals."
Literally the sin stuff comes second (Exhibit A for why Lupin is not beating the redemption arc allegations), just desperately needs Chiro to say that she's a transgirl, it would make em go insane if none of this managed to beat that through her thick skull.
I flinched. I should have seen that coming. I started to speak, to admit I'd have to take some steps back if I wanted to go forward. And yet, If I was just imagining, is that what I would actually choose?
I wanted to be the girl I'd spent weeks pretending to be. I ached for her smile, for the cute ways she looked in a skirt, for the way people seemed to instinctively like having her around. And yet, the idea of her burned me up inside. She was a fabrication in the purest sense, a distorted reflection or Inessa. She was the sweetest poison to me.
I couldn't be her again. But did that mean I wanted to go back to being a boy instead?
Wait I've said this before, I know when I'm being set up.
It's funny, Chiro just straight up has to navigate how much she gets to take things (the girl things) from being made into an Inessa clone, genuinely do not know if becoming Invidia made the ability to conceptualize this worse or not.
My dad had always told me how men were supposed to be stoic and strong and powerful and everything, and for all those sounded good on paper, none of that appealed. Similarly, none of the men I knew were people I could envy on any level. The thought of becoming my father filled me with nothing but disgust. So did the thought of resembling Mr. Noir in any way whatsoever. I thought of the boys at school that I had barely talked to in four years, I thought of my teachers, good and bad. No, none of them inspired me.
Inessa's dad? That was a little different. He was kind and gentle in a way that I admired. I respected him, and yet… the thought of becoming like him didn't spark any want in me. I admired him, but I didn't envy him, at least, not beyond a few disaggregated traits.
Thank god Mr. Brandt is Chiro's positive male role model where she has literally no other, extremely important for "Oh I don't just find men (like me) inherently contemptible, I just don't want to be one."
Also Chiro embracing that she hates her fucking dad let's gooooooo.
And that was the root of it. I envied Inessa, Temperance, and Ida. But I couldn't think of a single man I really envied. No, the bitter longing in my heart pointed in a different direction.
I wondered what it would be like, to look in the mirror and see a person I wanted to be. It wouldn't be Charlie; that much was obvious. But it couldn't be Invidia either. She was a daydream run wild. I tried to imagine what it would be like to be me, but changed in ways that Lupin seemed to see in me.
Like it's an important step even though Avaritia is fighting for something more Concrete, like, this isn't a question with an end result you can turn on/off with a switch, it's a path of self-discovery, it's taking a journey and becoming someone who can be satisfied looking in the mirror, whatever form that ends up being.
Becoming Invidia made a decisive statement of what Chiro thought she would be better looking as, but that was just, Inessa's recolor, which would mean always being trapped in the shadow of what Inessa made her feel, rather than being "Herself", in whatever sense that became so.
A lot of what comes with Beasthood seems to be, the temptation of certainty, knowing what you are (a loathsome sinner who is reviled yet powerful) rather than traversing the confusion of learning to like yourself and act as you believe a human being should.
"I don't know," I said at last, not entirely sure if I was telling the truth.
Avaritia chewed on eir lip for a moment, then shrugged. "Weellll, you can always just drown yourself in envy until your seed finishes whatever remodeling it's been doing in the background."
I put my hands on my hips and glared at em, "You know I can't do that!"
Avaritia sagged, eir ears drooping for a moment, before ey smiled even more brightly, trying to convince me that that had been a joke, not a request.
"Well," ey said with enthusiasm far too explosive to be genuine. "Let's figure out how to save Inessa."
The change in topic nearly gave me whiplash, and I fought down the urge to provide comforts that wouldn't be true. When I thought about that person I was slowly imagining into existence, I wanted them to be close to Avaritia as much as I wanted to regain my old friends. But, as much as I wanted to reassure em, ey were right; saving Inessa had to come first.
"Can you tell Temperance and Ida what happened?" I asked. I couldn't leave the Forest on my own at the moment, but Avaritia could. "I don't think either of us are in any condition to fight Superbia and," and Avaritia wouldn't cut the last threads tying emself to the man who'd saved em. Ey would not deny eir sin, would not betray its demand that ey hold onto a love long since rotted, even if that same sin drove em to help me as well.
"And what'll you do while I'm away getting help?" Was I mistaken, or was the question a little too innocent? Had my reassurances about the future felt as implausible to em as they had to me?
"I'll look around and try to see if I can distract him. He's not going to come after us or anything, and having a sense of what's happening could make it easier to rescue her."
"Just be careful, okay?" Avaritia said, hiding worlds of emotion behind the almost perfunctory gesture of care.
"One more thing before I go," ey said, tossing me something small, dark and green. My seed stirred resentfully in my chest at this new presence; it knew its own. I held it up to my face, basking in the way it practically sang to me.
Ey stuck eir tongue out mischievously. "Welllll, you know, Avaritia is obviously the greatest thief among the Beasts. And I might have been a little tiny bit upset, so I might have maybe-sorta stolen one or two of the new seeds after Superbia let me go."
I swallowed.
"What? How?" Hadn't Uriel had those? It seemed improbable that Avaritia would have known to grab one or more.
"This is the source of everything, a fruit of the First Tree! The seeds from a single one of these fruits has given us our status as Beasts."
"And a second could make us even stronger," Avaritia said, grinning, "There was some risk; the Deep Forest isn't safe and if the Saints had worked with some of its guards…" I wondered if that was a genuine worry, or a detail worked in to make it sound like I'd contributed. I hadn't even distracted Temperance. "But now that we have this, we can each take another seed to empower our sins even further. The Saints won't stand a chance against us now!"
Superbia tutted condescendingly, "That is one use that certain minds might choose for such a treasure; but there are far greater purposes to which this fruit can be spent," he grinned at the look of shock on Avaritia's face. "Our companion," he gestured to Gray Robe, "will modify the seeds and identify a fitting host for each. Unqualified to become true beasts, they will transform into a beacon for their sin. Each seed will spread its roots, awakening Resinners all around it given enough time. Feeding that much sin to the First Tree at once will do far more to advance our objectives than merely consuming the seeds for immediate power."
"You mean turn… everyone in the city into a Resinner at once?!" I couldn't stop myself from asking, horror breaking through my voice.
Avaritia glanced at me warningly as Superbia snorted, "Only those receptive to the Abyssal Forest's wisdom, but the number will be far more than we need to accomplish our goals."
I didn't know what to say to that. This was insane. It was one thing to release one person's sins, to help them bare their hearts to the world. It was another entirely to release thousands of monsters across the city at once. There was no way the Saints could keep up. People, a lot of people, would suffer.
"Okay," Avaritia said, sounding more than a little bitter at the twist, "if that's what you think is best."
"Just be careful; that'll make you stronger. But, it could be a strain to use it normally. If you're already on the outs with your seed, and if you're trying to…" Ey stalled, unwilling to admit the part they hadn't asked about my future. That imaginary me was not Invidia. "It might do something unpredictable," ey finished awkwardly.
"The fruit is where those seeds we used came from?" I wondered out loud.
Avaritia poked me in the ribs, "Yes, but don't interrupt. Anyway, the other children of the forest were worried about those who started to explore. They decided that it was bad to use the Tree's gifts, that the Beasts were monsters who needed to be stopped, that the First Tree was wrong to let them become Beasts in the first place; so they stole a branch from the First Tree and carved it into weapons that they could use to get rid of the Beasts."
Avaritia paused dramatically and looked to me, expectations clear in eir eyes.
You know I think we're finally going to get an answer on how diverged the Saints and Beasts' powers are in. Application.
How different is a "Branch" from a Seed, anyway?
"Just be careful; that'll make you stronger. But, it could be a strain to use it normally. If you're already on the outs with your seed, and if you're trying to…" Ey stalled, unwilling to admit the part they hadn't asked about my future. That imaginary me was not Invidia.
Suddenly, holding the seed felt a lot more worrisome. Carefully, but quickly as I could, I shoved it in a convenient purse, one of a few Avaritia had procured for Chiro.
Then I put over my shoulder and tried not to wince. As Chiro, I had felt cute carrying it around. I had liked it. And now, it was wrong, like the strap was too small, too tight, too awkwardly placed relative to my waist and my gangly arms.
I didn't have the courage to look at myself in the mirror again and verify how off it was on the current me. Instead, I smiled at Avaritia, nodded, and made my way to the door. I didn't want to say goodbye. I wanted to ask em to join me in the uncertain future.
"What are you going to do after you find them?" I asked instead.
"You know me; I'll figure it out, partner." Whatever vulnerabilities Avaritia had exposed during our conversation were hidden once more as easily as that.
Then I shook my head clear, buried all apologies and thanks in a corner of my heart and gave em my best smile as ey raised a hand to tear through the fabric of the world.
"Oh!" ey said, letting it fall to eir side. "There is one more thing before I go, if we're going to settle the bill."
I started to speak, only to find Avaritia's lips pressed against mine. Ey pulled me closer, pressing emself against me. Before I could even work myself around to process what was happening, Avaritia was already pulling away, eir teeth tugging at my lower lip for a moment as ey did.
Avaritia flashed me a particularly lupine grin and, before I could ask for an explanation or comment on it at all, eir claws tore a rift in the air and ey were gone.
I SEE THAT YOU WAIT UNTIL THE BREAKUP TO HAVE THE FIRST KISS. CHRONICALLY DIVORCED DOG.
This is actually really interesting in the sense that even though you could compare it to the previously stated "Avaritia is less willing to stay passive and live and let live now that ey are on the brink of losing this", there's a certain impression that Lupin basically didn't think ey could do this with Chiro because of how painfully vulnerable she was? And now that Chiro has found the strength to make this decision, it's less taking advantage of her?
Which is just Dramatically ironic given that Chiro never would have fulfilled that qualification for as long as she was Invidia.
Slowly, I raised my hand to touch my lips, feeling the phantom of an event I was half-sure I'd hallucinated. What had that been about? Was that a friendship thing? A particularly silly way of reassuring me that I was still cute even if I couldn't be Invidia? A goodbye?
I slapped my cheeks twice and shook my head clear. I would ask em later, after I'd apologized for leaving, after I told em what eir partnership had meant. I owed em far more than that. In a way, that was a relief; one more anchor to keep my worst impulses at bay.
I waited a few minutes, then cautiously slipped out of my room. As much as I'd have liked to wallow in the coils of familiar self-pity, the wheels for Inessa's rescue had been set in motion. The time for staring in mirrors and hating what I saw had passed.
I couldn't save Inessa. I couldn't go get help. But, I had made sure help would arrive and that meant I had no excuses not to do whatever else I could.
Huddling and terrified, I made my way through the Forest's bizarre architecture. At every turn, I stopped and looked around, half-sure Uriel would appear to reclaim the stolen seed. Soon, though, I stood outside the throne room.
The muffled sounds of a grandstanding Superbia echoed through the large doors, and I let out a breath I didn't know I'd been holding. If he was bragging or trying to talk her over to his side, that might mean he hadn't started doing anything worse.
Carefully, I set my purse down next to the doors. There was a risk to that, but the risk that Superbia would sense the seed on me was far greater. And I wouldn't need it for what came next.
Time for that Gaslight Gatekeep Girlboss razzle dazzle (Chiro does not actually have these three things but she does have a lot of avoidant tendencies she can point in Superbia's direction).
Anyway this would be incredibly anticlimax, but I can't help imagining that Chiro leaving the Seed in her purse unattended will just let it sprout inside and grow legs to run off like a purse goblin.
Superbia stood there, facing away from me and blocking my sight of Inessa as I approached. I should have paid some attention to his words, but my heart was hammering too loudly in my head as I slowly circled around to get a clear view of the girl who'd tried to save me.
Castitas didn't look much worse for wear, for all that she was bound hand and feet in manacles of light and suspended off the ground. And yet, even beaten and bound, wearing an angry snarl that seemed entirely off on her, she was radiant. Her eyes sparkled with determination and her wings stretched behind her, having returned to their original almost cartoonish pure white. Even like this, she was beautiful enough to send my seed into a frenzy, putting out hair-thin roots until I tore my eyes away from hers. As I did, I saw the briefest flash of recognition on her face.
Did she blame me? A part of me craved it. If she blamed me, she might actually finish what I'd promised not to let happen. And yet, luxuriating in that guilt wouldn't save anyone. It wouldn't make things right. It wouldn't let me change.
OH WAIT INESSA DOESN'T IMMEDIATELY RECOGNIZE CHIRO BECAUSE SHE'S BEEN GETTING THE TRANSITION JUICE THE WHOLE TIME SINCE SHE BECAME CHIROPTERA DUNNE.
I'm VERY glad that you recognize that you can't just let yourself get flambeed Chiro, but bro we gotta get you that.
Not having suicidal ideation juice.
Anyway Inessa hasn't had the fucking nightmare shit done to her, so you get to merely be subjected to chain lightning and thrown down an elevator shaft Superbia.
I cleared my throat and put on my most fearful expression. It didn't take much acting. For all he hadn't even noticed my existence, Mr. Noir's presence filled the room, a cold radiance that tolerated no light but its own.
"Superbia, sir?" I called quietly. The clock was running; the heroes were on the way. Every minute I spent distracting him from Inessa was a minute of torment she wouldn't have to endure.
He turned his head, the full force of his attention shining down on me like one of those desk lamps they use in interrogations in all the movies.
"Yes?"
He was a hollow shell of a man, beaten and chained and so desperate to prove he was neither that he'd kept his heart in his prison long after his escape instead of doing anything to change the world. Even if I had been the kind of Beast he wanted, I would have never been more to him than a bit of reassurance. For all his power, the Beast of Pride was as pathetic as any of us.
Every day Chiro finds new ways to be inherently terrified and so fucking smarmy about Superbia the ping pong is incredible.
Superbia in Chiroptera's mind:
He was a hollow shell of a man, beaten and chained and so desperate to prove he was neither that he'd kept his heart in his prison long after his escape instead of doing anything to change the world. Even if I had been the kind of Beast he wanted, I would have never been more to him than a bit of reassurance. For all his power, the Beast of Pride was as pathetic as any of us.
It's fascinating how for all Chiro doesn't respect or tolerate Superbia, she's really the character empathizes the most with him, it's just, those are all the things she doesn't like about herself, so this clarity on his issues being probably a step beyond even Avaritia, as people with this really fucking sophistic worldview in response to their suffering, only translates into wanting to beat him over the head with a golf club.
"I—" I let my lip quiver. He needed the world to align with his vice, and he'd use any force he could bring to bear to make it so. He would never accept me as Chiro, as a Beast whose needs would never mirror his own. And yet, I could use that.
"I need your advice, umm, if it's okay to ask."
Inessa stared at me in mute confusion. Superbia frowned as he looked between me and Castitas. Vanity ever loves to assert its superiority, and asking for advice could only play into that. But I disgusted him, while Inessa was a choice prize.
"S-she won't come around fast," I said at last. "B-but, if you let her stew a little, and realize that no one's going to come save her and that you have her trapped, completely under your power, that might wear her down."
Was I laying it on too thick? Mr. Noir was ancient. He had to know something was suspicious, even if he hadn't said anything about my changed appearance.
If he had, he didn't let it show as he silently sized me up.
I tried to fill those words with every ounce of jealousy, every crumb of resentment I still felt for the girl who'd dared to pull me back from the brink. He appreciated sin. More, he would appreciate my own weakness, yet another difference between us. Why not humor it if he was going to humor me at all?
Inessa let out a muffled moan of betrayal and it took everything I had not to break down.
Mr. Noir quirked an eyebrow, then realization struck him and a cruel smile played across his face. With a snap of his fingers, a bubble of searing light encased Inessa's head.
"I will not allow her to see or hear. Now." He gestured for me to continue.
I winced. I'd hoped to draw him away, hoped that by the time he finally came back, Inessa would be safe and gone and I would only have to find some way to follow her rescuers into that impossible future.
But that was not to be. Still, even silence had to be better than whatever Superbia might do to Inessa if he grew impatient.
Chiro's inability to game Superbia's reactions to her benefit even when she's completely fucking playing him is one of those things.
Like it's funny, it lets you show how much Chiro's people skills are actually really useful, but also that her antagonist is just a pest on every level.
"That's…" I flailed. I knew what to say and how to say it, but the words stuck in my throat. For all I understood my script , playing it out for this snake still hurt. At least that humiliation only added to the act.
"Speak," he repeated, cruel amusement slowly losing out to impatience. "Or leave."
If only leaving was so easy.
"During the fight with Castitas, my seed didn't like the idea of, umm, bringing her back. It was angry with me when I grabbed her and…" I gestured to my body.
"I can't use any of my powers either."
Mr. Noir looked me over, if only for the barest moment. Had he ever been different before he lost that ancient war, before time alone with his failures stole that away from him? I didn't want to give him even that much.
"Such things can happen to those poorly suited to the Abyssal Forest's wisdom," he reached his verdict. Condescension was thick in his voice, but his words held a trace of something else. Pity? Compassion? It was hard to say. "Wait, indulge your sin however you choose, and it shall pass in time."
This is a really interesting moment to discuss Superbia's humanity, you know?
Like, Chiro is indulging more in considering who Superbia, no, Mr. Noir used to be, what his isolation cost him, a more genuine consideration for his backstory as Avaritia told it than she's ever credited before this chapter, but in a sense, it's only natural, this is the first time Chiro has actually engaged with Mr. Noir of her own volition since the story began, she has an actionable game plan that relies on intuiting his emotions, and this probably, super digs into her habits with her dad, just with way more freedom on the loathing.
For all he's pretty awful for it, encouraging people to embrace Beasthood is really the only vector for compassion he still has, much as it's increasingly threatening to become Lupin's.
"I," I simpered, "I was hoping we could capitalize on the Saints' confusion over their leader being gone. Is there no way I could recover faster?"
That sparked his interest. Another victory, and a decisive one at that? That would erase all of the failures against the Saints. And yet, he refused to act himself in every instance, hiding in his little burrow instead. If he wanted the Saints defeated, he would need an instrument to act out his will.
There's definitely a Something to the fact Mr. Noir just will not go anywhere or do anything that isn't restricted to the castle as Superbia.
Ah.
I waited a few minutes, then cautiously slipped out of my room. As much as I'd have liked to wallow in the coils of familiar self-pity, the wheels for Inessa's rescue had been set in motion. The time for staring in mirrors and hating what I saw had passed.
"What, precisely, broke your bond with your seed?"
Of course he'd ask that. The thought of letting him see any part of me was crushing. I couldn't tell the whole truth. But, I could stand to give him my most obvious shame. My inability to answer once more showed the unsuitedness of the instruments he was reduced to using, that his failures could be laid at our feet and not his own. Besides, it was becoming for envy to refuse to bare itself to pride.
The amount Chiro fucking obsesses over the dynamic between her and Noir's sins is incredible, with everyone else she just has like, opinions of who they are as people, but no, with Noir she creates this wholeass psyop war between their inherent supernatural natures because she literally wants to be preoccupied with anything but Superbia as a human being.
And yet, eventually he grew bored of watching me squirm.
"I envied her," I said at last. That much was so obvious it was no admission at all. "I wanted to be brave and heroic and purehearted like Castitas."
"And?"
"And I couldn't. No matter what, I could never win. But then, I tricked her; I won anyway, and now…" This was a lie I could tell. Even if I could have let myself give it to him, Mr. Noir would never have believed the truth, that Inessa had pushed me to take a step toward being someone I couldn't yet envision. Mr. Noir would never understand that temptation, would never understand how something so fragile could push back the power of sin.
Superbia Dragon began to pace around me as he finally began to think for real. I, it seemed, was unworthy of keeping his council on this issue. That was fine; the longer he took to think, the better I was doing.
Cannot understate how much Chiro's game plan is encouraging Superbia to make up shit himself. This is like. Bible TV Psychics' go to move.
IMMACULATELY targeted technique.
The way this is leading up to "You don't envy Castitas anymore because you sucker punched her, and now you need someone new to focus your envy on, with me, of course, being the obvious candidate—" is funny to me.
"Realize," he said at last, "that it was not your doing that brought her low. My plan, my methods, gave you the edge."
As angles went, that almost made sense. If I had won, the knowledge that it was only through someone else's plan might have sustained my feelings of inferiority.
"Okay obviously I need to recreate the inferiority complex", like that was the First thing he tried, but it didn't come immediately to him, he had to work for that Point A to Point B.
Incredibly enough, Mr. Noir isn't actually wrong, even, Invidia decisively lost, and only brought Castitas in by accident, he kinda. Correctly calculated the strategy that would get the Abyssal Forest the W.
Sorry Chiro, you got outfoxed by America's Next Top Dragon.
I wondered if that was true. Inessa had promised to help me discover that future me, and I wanted to try. But it simply remained much easier to imagine myself giving up and sinking back into the Forest.
"One way or another," Superbia said, "I will convert her to sin. You may compete however you wish, then. Perhaps even then, she will outshine you."
Perhaps I was fortunate to have lost my claws. Had I still possessed the weapons, I would have thrown everything away and gone for his throat. Even my seed shook in its slumber, razor-thin vines scratching at the walls of my heart in protest.
As it was, I bristled, and nodded, and woodenly marched away at his dismissal, lest I ruin things.
I let the throne room's doors close behind me, then grabbed my purse and made sure that the seed was still there. Only once I was reassured that whatever time I had spared Inessa wouldn't cost me the power to make a difference did I stumble away from the room, angry and sad and desperate in my impatience.
I wondered if I had ever been so impatient for rescue when I was the one being held captive.
Both in the fact that genuinely Chiro is that much more invested now that it's Inessa on the line and also the fact it's just her being pissed off and very leery about her resolve to change being damaged if this goes on any longer.
Okay, that's 6k into the update, a natural stopping point.
I've been having a good time, though I ask myself, at heart, if there will ever be a point Chiro stops making my face slide into my hands and ask why?
There are little notes of a difference when transformed - Lupin wears more femme clothing, Avaritia Wolf has shorts and I think something kinda like a binder going on, so there's probably a little movement towards androgyny, or maybe greed lets you have as many presentations as you want and shift between them.
Chiro: "I mean yeah, but that's normal. Everyone has daddy issues. That's why there's a name for them."
Inessa: "I don't hate my dad."
C: "Well yeah, that's because your dad's cool. That's weird, just in a good way."
Ida: "I don't hate my dad either."
C: "...well, that's not significant. Let's ask Temperance and Avatitia."
Temperance: "No, we're a worse sample."
Avaritia: "We wouldn't have met you if we got along with our parents."
Temperance: "We wouldn't have come to Earth if we got along with our parents."
Avaritia learn to read the fucking room.
BRO. DO YOU REALIZE. THAT ENVY MEANS NOT LIKING YOURSELF.
A: Well yeah, but it's better to embrace your sin instead of just letting it fester inside you. It worked for me!
T: Greed doesn't mean not liking yourself. It means liking things you have. Read the room.
A: What do you know about Invidia?
T: I kidnapped C a few times. And I had him abducted in my shark days.
What the fuck?
WHY ARE YOU GIVING HER ANOTHER OF THOSE DAMN THIIIIIIIIIIINGS!!!
No, she needs to realize that it is possible for people to love her.
Sad. The tongue thing would be easier.
Time for that Gaslight Gatekeep Girlboss razzle dazzle (Chiro does not actually have these three things but she does have a lot of avoidant tendencies she can point in Superbia's direction).
Chiro is Exhibit A that you can gaslight-gatekeep-girlboss yourself.
Anyway this would be incredibly anticlimax, but I can't help imagining that Chiro leaving the Seed in her purse unattended will just let it sprout inside and grow legs to run off like a purse goblin.
Cour 3's villain is the malicious purse goblin, which keeps stealing Avaritia's stuff and Temperance's snacks and Inessa's self-respect.
Anyway Inessa hasn't had the fucking nightmare shit done to her, so you get to merely be subjected to chain lightning and thrown down an elevator shaft Superbia.
Superbia: You fool! As Superbia Dragon, my wings hold me aloft, rendering me immune to any foolish stratagems which revolve around—
Elevator: squish
For all he's pretty awful for it, encouraging people to embrace Beasthood is really the only vector for compassion he still has, much as it's increasingly threatening to become Lupin's.
Avaritia: Well yeah. Telling people to embrace their vices is better than telling them to fake virtues.
Temperance: Telling people to embrace their virtues is better than telling them to fake vice.
Avaritia: Oh yeah? How's that working for Saint Diligentia?
Temperance: ...we're working on it.
In-Fucking-Credible, Superbia actually did land on the way to pop the Envy Button.
Superbia: Well yeah, like five minutes ago.
Temperance: I don't know which of you is denser.
Superbia: ...Who are you and how did you get in here?
Temperance: Okay, now I know.
There are little notes of a difference when transformed - Lupin wears more femme clothing, Avaritia Wolf has shorts and I think something kinda like a binder going on, so there's probably a little movement towards androgyny, or maybe greed lets you have as many presentations as you want and shift between them.
I also thought I remembered something about a binder, but the closest I found with a quick search was C's narration mentioning that eir Beast costume made em look slim (contrasted with Inessa's Saint costume, not eir normal clothes).
Anyways, a binder might indicate that ey didn't get magic HRT, or it might indicate a Circus Parahumans thing. You know, eir gender expression being different based on eir current identity (with any magic HRT ey have not being flexible enough to accommodate that without a binder).
"Well then what does choosing look like?" Avaritia's claw wrapped around my wrist, and ey pulled me oddly close, a familiar smirk buying any hints of sobriety once more.
I've never heard phrasing like this, using "buying" to seemingly mean the opposite. Seems like that smirk is doing anything but obtaining more sobriety? Chasing away, maybe?
It's a joke about the meme of wlw having massive issues recognizing and accepting that no, that girl who's flirting with them and eagerly spending time around them and holding hands with them and cuddling with them probably (not necessarily, mind) isn't doing it for platonic reasons.
The reason for that behavior is... significantly less funny, given the whole homomisic heteronormative cultural expectations we grow up in, but hey.
I've never heard phrasing like this, using "buying" to seemingly mean the opposite. Seems like that smirk is doing anything but obtaining more sobriety? Chasing away, maybe?
I've never heard phrasing like this, using "buying" to seemingly mean the opposite. Seems like that smirk is doing anything but obtaining more sobriety? Chasing away, maybe?
Anyways, a binder might indicate that ey didn't get magic HRT, or it might indicate a Circus Parahumans thing. You know, eir gender expression being different based on eir current identity (with any magic HRT ey have not being flexible enough to accommodate that without a binder).
The intended implication with the slimming mention that eir outfit works a bit like a binder as observed by someone who does not know what that is. As to gender, Avaritia tends to fluctuate a good deal. This didn't really fit in anywhere, but the shift from any/all to ey/em was that, like, ey just got she/hered all the time because, well that's what happens when you're any/all and also ey was out to literally one weird bigot and desperate not to engage with that fact and ey/em pushes em a little bit more obviously out of the cis category.
Which is to say that, at least in my head, ey is much more along the lines of genderfluid, but also Lupin as a persona was more fem and Avaritia is more androgynous and eir casual enough about gender to go along with that. In my head, Avaritia's costume tends to fluctuate in little ways depending on eir mood. But there was never quite a place to fit that into the story.
OTOH, none of that's really text, so take it with a grain of salt.
Ey also probably present a good deal more masc sometimes, but mostly when eir not consciously performing Lupin as an identity and I should probably try to fold a few mentions of that into revisions.
Urk. I avoided this thread (and really, the site) for a while to try to force omakes out, but barely did anything. And did nothing for fanart. I saw some adorable critters on a game, that had variants based on the characters. Damnit.
I'm too sleepy to write more, and don't want to wait anymore, I missed too much stuff on this thread. At least the author only posted one chapter.
Inessa stared worriedly at Elisa until the end of class. The resinner fights had, over time, hit her family really badly. She looked slightly unkempt, and quite tired. Started isolating herself and looked nervous. As the bell rang, she stood and walked towards her, saying,
"Elisa, you can tal-"
"I don't need anything, thanks." She said as she walked past her. Similarly as she had done to the Saints for the last few days.
-
The Saints frantically ran their way down the corridor of the broken down building. Shambling things made out of plants rose at their advance, before being dispatched by Castitas arrows, with any survivors blocked or pushed by Diligentia and Temperantia. They ran into magical wooden gates, which proved resistant to them. The Saints set to tearing them down while holding off the advance of the creatures. Finally, they broke into the chamber, about the same time as the Beasts did. There stood the root cause of this.
A girl, about their age, was in the middle of a circle, assorted laboratory instruments spread around the room on many tables. The center held a tree, its roots, branches and vines extending to the walls. The girl herself, Elisa, was their classmate, and looked quite different than how they had known her. She looked tired, like she had barely slept or truly relaxed in the last few days, her clothes were wrinkly and dirty. Yet, she looked determined and energized.
"Please, Elisa! We can talk this out! We can solve this without anyone getting hurt!" Castitas pleaded.
"No. No more talking or holding back. Your stupid fights took everything from me, killed this town little by little. You Saints have failed time afte time to truly stop the Beasts, letting them destoy my home. My mother only ever wanted to use her research in marine biology to help people. She was gonna revolutionize medicine! And time and time again, you ruined our family's businesses and laboratories. Plush store? Burned down. Sea themed theatre? Decayed by a shadow monster. Hell, we even tried to sell seafood from carts, and you still destroyed. Every. Single. One. Of them!" She got more and more agitated. She barely reacted in time to grow a wall to block Temperantia's attack. She quickly shifted her attention to the tree, chanting to it.
It started expanding and twisting its form, as the greenery around converged, walls forming as needed to block the Saints and Beasts. They felt the power pulsing from it, sweating and feeling their hearts quicken. The mass started forming flippers, one end opening into a mouth while another thinned. It soon took a selachian shape. A recognizable, cute form.
A Blahaj, in fact.
They prepared themselves as the entity got its bearings. It looked around curiously, and moved and stretched its body. The saints charged their magic into their weapons and themselves, while the Beasts felt the power coursing in the roots within their bodies. They wordslessly agreed to a truce, and Elisa's so called guardian roared.
-
Castitas stood panting, looking at the wreckage of the coast, detransforming. Letting the monster drag the fight there had been a mistake, but they had won. She notices movement out of the corner of her eye, and finds Elisa, walking away from a hiding spot. They stare at each other, one shocked and the other mortified. Elisa then looks angry and pained, and runs away, ignoring Inessa's calls.
Next Time!
A dark scheme brews in the White House to perform their own summoning, while the Saints wonder how to make the trip. Michael must hide, as the IRS is on her tail.
Next episode: Showdown in Washington! Mount Rushmore attacks?
A car stopped in front of the school. Tempearance stepped out, saying bye to Michael's... employees? Temperance wasn't quite sure what Michael did, considering a plush couldn't exactly get a job. Either way, Kiryu and Selina were nice, and drove her to school when needed. She gets along well with Arsène, even if his last name brings back memories. Either way, she was glad for their help, like the occasional ride to places when she needs it.
Hiding in a group of students, Lupin watched this, feeling torn. Much as ey felt dejected at being left, ey felt happy Temperance seemed to be living well. Ey turned their gaze, instead paying attention to conversing classmates, eager for more gossip. [Which turned out to be those stupid rumours of the sharky being the daughter of some crime lord, much to eir annoyance. Ey immediately started telling them off.]
"Oh, look. Temperance is being brought to school by her goons again! Scary." Giggled one, watching with interest.
"Not funny. To think I could run into them." Shuddered another
Again with that?
"Knock it off with those rumours of Temperance being the daughter of a crime lord. No way that's true."
-
Temperance walked through the streets, with Michael peeking out of her backpack. Today, she was walking through stores, looking at both the products and the inhabitants of Earth. Occasionally conversing with Michael.
"Quite a fascinating world, isn't it? How are you adapting?" Asked the angel.
"Perfectly. I might not be considered "normal", but I figured out how to live here long ago." The student responded, pausing to look at some gunpla with interest.
"Right. Like that time you spent days looking for themomethers that are put in the mouth? Asking in pharmacy after pharmacy?"
"Look, why would it be on so many shows set in the current day, if it didn't exist?" She huffed, embarrassed.
The angel chuckled at her before returning inside the backpack and going quiet. Mentally taking note of what things Temperance showed interest in. Her birthday was coming soon, after all.
-
The plan was simple. Send Kuze to the store, have him buy the gunpla. He's reliable, nothing would go wrong.
Thus, a young man on his third year of high school, walked into the store, weaving between the customers. He walked aisle by aisle resolutely, as if he'd been handed a life or death mission. Finally, the box was in sight. However, as he walked towards it, he saw another teenager with the same goal. A goth with a shirt with three wolves and a moon on it, eir face, at first smiling, shifting into a glare.
"Hey. This is a gift for my former bestie. Paws off!"
"No way! The boss sent me on a mission to buy a gift for her charge, I won't surrender!"
The other customers started avoiding the two eccentrics.
"I, Lupin Noir, won't have my greed denied by you! As a proud Beas- I mean, bestie, I'll be taking the gunpla!" As ey said this, ey squared up for a fight. Taking an experienced if unrefined fighting stance.
"I won't fail the boss again! This mission is essential!" As he said this, the boy ripped off his coat and shirt, revealing his tattoos and a pipe he took into his hands. However, the tattos we fake, and likewise the pipe was styrofoam. A closer look would show his "cut-off finger", actually just curled and wrapped up.
They charged at each other. They couldn't lose now, they had to get this for those they were, or had been, close to. A little bit of affection they could express, in a meaningful gesture and effort. His pipe clashed against eir arms.
And thus their clash commenced, yet ended unexpectedly. They were both kicked out of the store and banned for a week, and so had to ask their friends for help. Chiro and Kiryu easily got the gunpla, and a box of another model, while apologizing for their friends' antics.
