If Only I Were Stronger Still 

The Karakura Gang only knew the Ichigo's Urahara, the guy who bowed in apologies to their friend and is always helping. And the new shinigami generation most know him as Ichigos's mentor. And after two wars and so many rebellions Urahara is respected and look up. The old shinigami generation still confused how that happened. Urahara is the most confused.

I could see that. Urahara has all these teenagers/younger generation of Shinigami hanging out in his shop every day, and whenever one of the Gotei 13 stop by, they just… don’t get it. Like, this is Urahara, practically a sociopath in some ways, with more blood on his hands than most people they know and a tendency for not-strictly-legal experiments, and they don’t understand why Ichigo and co. just don’t seem to get it. Maybe they don’t know. So Rukia and Renji get warned, and they mention it to Ichigo, but from Renji’s experience, all he really knows of Urahara is the guy calling him a freeloader all the time and making him stock shelves and do chores, and it’s annoying but not exactly evil. And yeah, Urahara placed the Hogyoku in Rukia, but the guy apologized, maybe because Ichigo made him, but things turned out fine in the end, and the fact that he listens to Ichigo at all is a sticking point for her. Ichigo makes her want to strangle him sometimes, but he’s got a good eye for people, for who they are on the inside, and he makes them loyal, makes them better, and if Urahara’s willing to follow Ichigo’s lead, then she thinks she can at least trust him not to deliberately throw them into the deep end again.

The others - Ishida, Chad, Inoue - they witnessed Urahara apologizing to Ichigo. And they didn’t know a lot about him, but even they could tell that behind the jokes and sly smiles and collected calm was enough pride that the man wouldn’t bow to just anyone. But the guy knelt and bowed and apologized to Ichigo, tossed his pride aside and let a teenager judge him, the last thing any of them expected him to do, and a man like that probably deserves at least a second chance. Besides, Ichigo forgave him, so it seems kind of pointless for any of them to hold a grudge. Even to Ishida, Urahara’s mostly okay for a Shinigami. At least he’s not Kurotsuchi.

And Ichigo. Ichigo didn’t really expect Urahara to admit he was in the wrong either. He didn’t seem the type. If he did fuck up, he seemed the sort to gloss over it and try to fix it and possibly fuck up some more, but not apologize for any of it, much less put himself out there like he did for Ichigo when he didn’t even expect Ichigo to forgive him. So whatever, Urahara kind of screwed them over a bit, screwed Rukia over a lot, but it’s not like he didn’t help them too, as much as he could, and Ichigo figures so long as he doesn’t do it again, he can let bygones be bygones. And it turns out, Urahara mostly doesn’t do it again. He helps them through war and a fuck-ton of rebellions and invasions and almost-end-of-the-worlds, he never asks for anything in return, and he’s always willing to lend them a hand or teach them something they don’t know. He never sides with the Gotei 13, always with them, and that’s worth more than Ichigo can say. Even Shinji and the others hopped back into the Gotei 13 as soon as they could. Urahara stayed. That’s worth a lot in Ichigo’s books. Yeah, he ignored him just like all the others in those two years Ichigo lost his powers, which was incidentally also partially Urahara’s fault, but he was also the one who came up with a way to restore them, and by that point, Ichigo’s fond enough of him that there’s actually fairly little he wouldn’t forgive the guy for.

He gets hints of Urahara’s past throughout their acquaintance, and the older generation of Shinigami eventually tell him more through Rukia and Renji, but to Ichigo, it’s the present that matters, it’s what Urahara does now that matters, and what he does now is help, no matter what the situation is, no matter the time, and he’s always solidly in their corner, even more than the Visored or Ichigo’s own dad. Urahara’s a friend at this point, and Ichigo is notorious for fighting anyone who fucks with his friends.

For his part, Urahara doesn’t know when his shop became central station for the spiritually aware population of Karakura. The place is a lot busier these days, he gets Ichigo and his friends doing their homework at his dining table, Abarai-san comes down once in a while and grumbles his way through “budgeting all his shit properly”, and Rukia tags along and regularly buys Chappy merchandise from him even though he knows there are perfectly good stores in Seireitei that sell the same things.

Ichigo most of all comes over for tea, often (Ichigo makes the tea too). Sometimes he stays for dinner, and Urahara finds himself enjoying his company. They don’t even talk about Shinigami issues most of the time, and they don’t run out of conversation.

(Eventually, when they’re in Seireitei and some random Shinigami - old enough to remember the rumours of what Urahara Kisuke was infamous for - makes a snide comment and sneers and trashtalks him to his buddies, well, Urahara doesn’t care. He’s heard worse, and it’s not entirely an undeserved reputation. But Ichigo takes exception, because who the fuck does this guy think he is, acting like he has the right to judge one of Ichigo’s people when he’s willing to bet the asshole has never exchanged a single word with Urahara? The bastard keeps talking, and between one blink and the next, Ichigo’s punted him through a wall, Eleventh Division style, hard enough that he’ll be in the Fourth for a while. Inoue blinks after the guy and very pointedly doesn’t offer to heal him, Ishida sniffs disdainfully and mutters contemptuously about Shinigami, and Chad flashes his arm at one of the idiots who looks like they want to try taking them on. He changes his mind quickly.

They proceed to drag an utterly bemused Urahara out of there. Later, he finds out Rukia and Renji managed to get the group demoted as well. It’s a novel experience for him, having people defend him, even when he doesn’t need it.)

lusan and the crane wives???

What the red means

I think something I never really stopped to think too much about in One Piece is the sounds.

I grew up surrounded by nature. I grew up listening to the sounds the woods by my house made, the fields of crops down the road, of the river and creeks at my grandparents, and storms rolling over miles of empty plains in the fall.

I could tell you everything you need to know about those things. I didn't fear the dark because I knew it well. I could run those trails in the dead of night and I could have walked the land around my home blindfolded. I knew every branch that scraped, every bird nest full of singing life, every hole waiting for an ankle, every thorn tree that dropped terrible gifts to the earth. I knew it all.

Now I'm learning the sounds of the city. And everything is so loud. You forgot how quiet the world is when it's just you, and our world is full of loud things. Trains, cars, planes, electricity humming, pipes creaking, etc.

I believe I've made mentions of it before in my posts but I'm just really interested in how the One Piece world sounds.

Do the waves make different sounds than our own? Do sea kings sound more like tigers or gorillas when they roar? Are storms still ear shattering when they call out with thunder? Does the wind howl in your ear, or does it sing?

What does it sound like when Marco flies with massive wings right next to you? Does it sound like a regular bird but magnificent? Or does it pop your ears like a plane? Does he make different noises because of his devil fruit? Are his vocal cords different than someone else's?

What about when Buggy separates? The human body makes a variety of sound when it's sperated in different ways, does he sound like thighs stuck together with sweat in the summer or an injury like the loss of a limb? Does it pop like part of a toy, or maybe a click like a lock and key? Does it make a sound like pulling meat apart?

Does Luffy squeak when he moves all the time? Does he sounds like new shoes on marble or the high pitched screech of bare skin on gym floors?

Did Ace make the wooshing sound of dry wood or maybe the soft pops of low embers? Was he more like a forest fire taking off or a candle flickering in the window?

Does Kidd sound like a a car crash? Like metal bending and reforming itself into something messy and new? Does he clang like dropped silverware or is it heavy like metal gates closing? Maybe he sounds like the hammer of a blacksmith on burning metal?

Does Chopper have a way of talking that's distinctive? Like an accent or a lisp? Surely there would be something that would remind people that vocal cords change with each species and suddenly being able to make the noises of the human language would be a learning curve?

Does Robin sound like skin sliding against skin? Like rubbing your arms when you're cold or the dry sound that comes sometimes when you shake someones hand? Maybe she sounds like the wind in a garden or pulling petals off a flower?

Does Crocodile sound like a sandstorm? Does the sand he controls sound like screaming, like howling? Or maybe it sounds like a mudslide, something powerful and earthly?

Does Doflomingo make the the twang of tight threads being pulled and snapped back into place? Maybe the snap of elastic bands or the zzzz of string being pulled of the roll too quick?

Just so many fun things to consider 💭

Might do one of these about some of the other senses too.

i like phil being near-immortal, and i like techno being near-immortal alongside him, but i think that it works better when their specific brands of immortality are different. u know?

so it goes a little something like this:

The first time they meet, Philza is still young. Not young, you understand, but young enough that he has not yet been cut down to stark and jaded utilitarianism. He sets out on a journey into the nether and feels a tug on his sleeve and looks down to see some wide-eyed little piglin child whose parents are nowhere to be found, and his heart stirs.

So he teaches him: combat and farming and life in the Overworld, all of the knowledge that he’s gained over the years. Raises the boy like a son.

It takes twenty years before war starts building in the neighboring empire. Twenty years before the piglin child — now grown, of course, but still so desperately young — offers his service. Like he wants blood on his hands, like he wants to make somebody pay.

Phil buries him before the war is over.

He’s lost people before, of course. So many people. But it’s been a long time since those people were family. He plants a tree on top of the grave, a tiny sapling behind their home — his home now — and makes a promise to himself to stop getting attached.

The second time they meet, the sapling is fully grown.

The soul that will one day call itself Technoblade comes gasping into the world again, trembling memories of wings and violence that flit around the edges of his consciousness when he’s suspended between sleep and wakefulness, and he grows up a fighter. Bruised knuckles and scars that crisscross his back and shoulders like delicate lace, and when he runs into a man who holds himself with world-weary poise and the same wings that have haunted Techno’s dreams, he feels a jolt down his spine.

“Sorry, mate,” says the man. “You just reminded me of someone I used to know.” “Oh,” says Technoblade.

They get four years together this time before Phil has to plant another sapling.

Techno lives through six lives before Phil’s certain that it’s the same man every time. There’s another voice added to the chorus in each one, another whisper in his ear demanding things of him; at night, his dreams are full of a man with long blond hair and gray-purple wings and cold blue eyes. The memories slip through his fingers like sand whenever he tries to get a solid grasp on them, but the surety with which he holds a sword can only come from years of muscle memory that he’s never practiced.

They say that ‘Technoblade never dies.’ And it’s a lie, but there’s some piece of truth in it: Technoblade dies, and then he comes home again.

There’s a room for him in Phil’s house, kept tidy and waiting in his absence. There’s a journal that Phil keeps, writing down the history of each new lifetime, so that when they find one another Techno will be able to remember. There’s a vault beneath the floorboards that holds bits and pieces of the lives that Techno’s lead, armor and items and memories. There’s a place for him in the world, and Phil keeps it carefully maintained for the next time he finds it.

One lifetime becomes ten lifetimes becomes a thousand lifetimes.

It’s never quite the same, of course. Techno’s a grown man, battered and beaten and bitter but still standing tall; Techno’s a child, tugging on Phil’s sleeve like he did so long ago and asking if they’ve met before; Techno’s already in old age, battle-scarred but determined to track down the man he sees in his dreams. Sometimes they raze empires together, side by side in a blaze of glory. Sometimes they’re content to simply live in one another’s company. Sometimes they don’t meet at all.

Phil’s journal becomes a library, his vault an archive. The valley he lives in goes from open grass to a dense forest of trees that are planted in far-too-orderly rows to be natural.

And for every life that Techno leads, Phil’s always the one to bury him.

The reason I’m alive today is because you taught me how to survive. I’m grateful for that. Maybe I could have lived a life where I inherited the organization. But spending time away from you showed me many more things. An annoying mother hen of a roommate. The taste of cheap Hamburg steak. The warmth that comes sleeping three to a bed. Taking care of a sick child. How to make French toast. An unexpected surprise party. A gold medal from a field day. The view from the top of a Ferris wheel. There were so many things out there that I could hold dear.

What if Sir Arthur Conan Doyle had written about John Watson? Everything is the same, except that we are reading Sherlock Holmes’s observations about his new flatmate Doctor Watson.

Things start out impersonal, intellectual, but fall right off that cold, craggy cliff before the first page is done with. The detective deduces the doctor from top to toes but by the second paragraph he’s forced to admit having a blush surprised out of him by Watson’s unlooked-for wonder and admiration. For accuracy’s sake and perhaps with a pinch of pride, he details everything that Watson had said in his praise, and ends up confessing to the pages how very agreeable it was to be met with applause instead of derision and doubt for once.

Holmes is later pleased to be written about in turn, but disgusted with the overly romantic tone Watson’s tale-telling takes. In a pique, he begins a paper on the man’s latest conquest, intending to show his flatmate how the wrong tone can ruin a story by using a cold, scientific tone to describe a passionate scene. Alas, the great brain meets a puzzle it cannot solve. Try as he will, his prose will not stay unmoved by its subject. Watson’s looks, Watson’s manners, Watson’s honesty and humor and curious mixture of humility and hubris; they poison Sherlock’s pen with admiration, and he throws the papers into the fire in the end, and tells himself it is proximity to the flames that heat his cheeks.

Doctor Watson has regular hours, but illness and injury do not. Holmes watches his flatmate dash away at all hours and in all manner of weather, leather satchel in hand and shoulders set for battle. He amuses himself by deducing the difficulties the doctor has ahead of him and predicting the hour he will return. If he foresees a particularly trying case for his friend, he ensures that Mrs. Hudson will send refreshments up at the proper time, and that he himself will be in the middle of playing one of Watson’s favorite airs to welcome him home. Between cases, Holmes assists by deducing diagnoses from symptoms related to him, and sometimes even accompanies Watson when he admits that an additional set of hands will not be unwelcome.

Their vocations even overlap now and again. Both Watson’s books and Holmes’s notes will at times mention the same names and places, with the doctor stitching up a man’s leg while the detective interrogates the other end of him. Their lives, their work, their stories grow more deeply intertwined as time passes, and what began as a scientific observation ends up as what can only be called a love letter.

This just crossed my head and I am emotional

Sherlock Holmes just got to London, after the Great Hiatus. First place he goes is Pall Mall to visit his brother personally, get the last bits of money he needs and chill after the long travel.

Then he goes to Baker Street, but not to Mrs. Hudson. He walks disguised looking for one of his boys - one of the Irregulars.

He finds someone the Irregulars accepted after his "death" and talks to him, and the boy gets confused once so many names are mentioned. He takes them to the others.

Wiggins, now a teenager or a young adult, is the first one to recognize him even under the disguise and runs to him, crying. "It's mr. Holmes!" he screams, as all of the others do the same.

Now Holmes is literally in the middle of a giant ball of poor stinky boys - but it doesn't matter. What matters is that he came back.

Hoy me duele Lima

Hoy me duele Lima,

y hoy me duele Italia.

Hoy me duele Argentina,

y también Australia.

Hoy me duele las vidas que no llegué a vivir.

Hoy me duelen las mentiras que no llegué a decir.

Hoy me duelen las noches por las que he llorado.

Hoy me duelen las tardes en que me he alegrado.

Hoy me duele Lima, la Lima con esplendor.

Hoy me duele Lima, la Lima con amor.

Hoy me duelen las noches estrelladas.

Hoy me duelen los días y las tardes desoladas.

Hoy me duele Lima, pero la Lima que me ha amado,

no la que nunca estuvo de mi lado.

something of stress dreams

[the song is dancer by novo amor :D]