♦ THE PARTRIDGE AND THE QUAIL

Hello Hatoful Boyfriend community. I am Kiro. Again!

Last year I made the blog @kazushuu (It’s really crazy that an entire year has passed since then) and initially I didn’t have much thought put into it, and was making stuff up along with the asks… Then my hyperfixation on Hatoful went from 70% to 170% and I developed an entire AU dedicated to rewriting Hatoful Boyfriend. Not in a “I’m gonna fix Hatoful’s plot holes” way but mostly in a “I am lonely and crave self indulgent headcanons” way. But fixing plot holes also.

Thus came the Shrine AU. A timeline whose basis is “Shuu ended up seeing Ryouta and Hiyoko on the street on the day of that terrorist attack, but turned away, and never asked Ryouta for his wish… prompting him to lead a more depressing and remorseful life.” And thus a butterfly effect is caused, and Nageki didn’t die, Kazuaki never died, but! Hitori still developed narcolepsy, and there is a strange inverted mirror-reflection happening between Kazuaki and Hitori. A perfect neutral between the happenings of Holiday Star and MIRROR’s storylines.

–And on April Fools this year I made the blog @hitotohri which has been a shitty little ask blog for Hitori and Tohri as “no homo boyfriends” meanwhile kazushuu was about Shuu and Kazuaki as “yes homo boyfriends”.

And then I decided to start writing… stories that take the story back to the very beginning of the year, before Shuu and Kazuaki become boyfriends. I’ve been uploading chapters here and there, showing the point of views of Shuu, Kazuaki, the students, and some other stuff… Basically I decided to take my shipping game a step higher and write an entire novel dedicated to the partridge and the quail’s love story. There are also some fix-it elements to Anghel’s character and somewhat to Nageki, Kazuaki, and his childhood, even the Ichijou situation. So I hope that even if you’re not a full-on ShuuKazu shipper, you can still enjoy it to some extent. The most niche pairing in Hatoful receives its own ““novel””. Because I am that much of a simp.

So now… I decided to take all this scattered and disorganized mess and combine it into something neater. Behold! …This blog!

This is an askblog for Shuu, Kazuaki, Hitori, and Tohri, from my fanfiction series, which will update along with new chapters of the fanfiction, and you may or may not impact the way the story will flow! Or you can just call Shuu a gay baby and make me draw his reaction.

The more in-depth about page is here, the rules page is here, the muses are here, and the fanfic series itself… is here!

Because yeah, you kind of have to read all the chapters that have been written thus far to be up-to-date with the plot. it’s like an ARG but not mysterious. Please dont fret, there are only 11 chapters so far… 52k words… I mean, you don’t gotta get into the plot if you just want to call Shuu a gay baby. I GUESS.

maybe this’ll be a complete failure and i’ll just retreat onto the old pseudo-askblog pseudo-rp pseudo-send me hatoful art requests format. but hey it’s worth a try.

Also, I renamed the AU from “Shrine” to “BitterSweet” because that certainly fits the story better. But because I’ve used it for so long and it still sounds catchy, I’ll still call these AU hc-based characters “Shrine Shuu” “Shrine Hitori” etc.

Scientists on an expedition to sample a deep-sea trench got a surprise when their traps brought back seven giant crustaceans glimpsed only a handful of times in human history.

The “supergiant” amphipods are more than 20 times larger than their typical crustacean relatives, which are generally less than a half-inch long, and thrive in lakes and oceans around the world. The largest of the seven specimens was about 11 inches long.

The pale, leggy creatures were found 4 miles down in the Kermadec Trench, off the northeast coast of New Zealand, one of the deepest trenches on Earth.

Read the full article here.

Well Shuu Iwamine is certainly... a character. A lot of things have happened to him. So it is difficult to judge and diagnose him with anything, because most if not all of his traits can be explained with “well, he is like this because of his upbringing” or “he is traumatized by like 4 different things”. But I’ve put a lot of hours into analyzing him from a different perspective, enough to develop an entire AU dedicated to digging out the vulnerable parts of Shuu, so please allow me to... explain what I mean...

By the way, I am a huge Hatoful-addict so for the sake of this post, I am applying every piece of media that I’ve found. Every timeline, the manga, the doujins, and the Drama CDs. Ekhem.

1. Special Interests.

Very obviously Shuu is obsessed with research and his interests are only related to scientific work. Especially dissection and biology. He can “recall scientific facts with crystal clear brilliance, but completely forgets whatever he isn’t interested in.” Also a popular headcanon among the fandom is that Shuu has a thing for the sea, because all his names are related to the sea, and Damurushi (his character designer) and Moa have included mysterious sea imagery in some doodles of him.

He is generally low-energy and antisocial so he’s never seen “excitedly info-dumping”, but I’m pretty sure that almost all scenes with him quickly turn into him changing the subject to: dissection and experimentation.

His lack of empathy is also something commonly found in autistic folk... even if it’s a bit of a demeaning stereotype; Shuu is a doctor and a lot of things about him might give the impression that he doesn’t care about the well-being of other people, and simply enjoys working with medicine itself. Shuu appears to be a sadist, or at least because he delights in experimentation, even if it is uncomfortable and/or lethal for his subjects. But there are definite moments where this doesn’t seem so true. He takes his job seriously, he doesn’t half-ass it. Which leads me to...

2. Absolutely misunderstanding social cues.

This is the reason why everything in Hatoful Boyfriend went wrong. LMAO. Misunderstanding world peace for exterminating an entire species... His strange confused love for Ryuuji...

His creepy smiling, which are portrayed as him being totally evil and sociopathic...

As Souma, he was completely pokerfaced and even more obviously coded as autistic. While Tohri isn’t entirely reasonable and innocent himself, Souma isn’t the nicest to him and he doesn’t try hiding it. Also some of his interactions with Ryuuji are very sweet and implying. Again, it can be explained with “he has never experienced fondness and intimacy prior to meeting him” but please remember that even 13 whole years later, he still is stoic and plain socially awkward.

3. Cynicism. Black and white morality.

Shuu is cynical as hell. Being raised by neglectful and ignorant parents only fueled his worldview, probably. He is morally grey, and that unfortunately led to him growing up in the deeply broken Hawk Party labs that encouraged a lack of ethics. He has no attachment to the Hawks though, as he is willing to betray everything and kill himself (with Hiyoko’s head in his arms) the moment he thinks his life is at its peak. (Because let’s think about it. Why did Shuu even kill himself? Because he is desperately lonely, and would rather kill a person that’s still friendly to him before they can change their mind, and then himself, to die knowing that he’s loved by at least one person. The whole morality of him and Hiyoko is a different topic. Different textpost. Personally I see it less as “he accepts Hiyoko’s pseudo-romantic advances” and more as “he rejects her romantic advances, but feeling unconditionally appreciated is enough to make him go crazy”. Whether Hiyoko had that intention or not is also... up for interpretation...)

4. Possible sensory issues.

It might seem like him being gentlemanly, and he doesn’t seem to mind touching other birds if it means he’ll get to dissect or pluck something out of them. However if it is him who’s being hugged, then he suffers through it. Mirukaku show this, definitely. “Stop clinging to me, you two. It is uncomfortably warm.” He avoids the sun, and avoids crowds of people. The only thing that can make him peek into a crowd of birds is the promise that there is a dead body in there somewhere.

But more importantly: Shuu Iwamine!! Please eat food!!!

Although he’s fluffy and I think Hiyoko does call him a fat bird at some point(s), it’s implied that he’s actually underweight. He rarely eats. It is a chore for him to eat. “I don’t particularly like food.” he says in the Drama CD. Cooking seems to be a hobby, but he doesn’t really like eating himself. At least not consistent and nutritious meals. Sure, you can have very low appetite and still be overweight, as some Hatoful fanartists have drawn, but I see his fluffy bird form as more of a “He is so lanky that he’s cold, and birds naturally fluff up to preserve heat”. I mean, in human form, he is super lanky and looks malnourished, and he wears three layers too...

Also. His clothes. On concept art from the old Hatoful website, Moa made a note about Shuu saying “He doesn't mind if the vest is too stretched out, as he enjoys casual and comfortable clothes. His complexion is bad. He seems to wear a labcoat both at work, and at home.”

... This dude... has been wearing the same sweater vest since 10+ years... and lab coat too, possibly... Is he just sentimental, or is he absolutely attached to old things that he is familiar with? I’d say both.

And considering he is absolutely delighted with dissection and is often drawn by Damu and Moa making a bloody mess with a smile, I think it can be said that he likes the slimy squishy textures of internal organs too. Y-Yikes. But you know.

5. Stimming.

Chuckling. Now hear me out. He does chuckle when he’s being Slimy And Evil, but he also chuckles for seemingly no reason at times. It’s shown in the manga when Yuuya is spying to him and Shuu keeps making laughing noises while performing science by himself... because he’s enjoying himself... You can also theorize that it’s echolalia as well... Obviously it’s intended as a ~creepy effect~ just like his most other traits...

And while on the topic of his extreme attachments, he is without a doubt very obsessed with Ryuuji Kawara. He feels like Ryuuji Kawara is a crucial part of him, and as long as he thinks that he’s fulfilling his last wish, he can live with a smug smile. Hohoho.

6. And now for some more trivial things one-sentence things...

Such bad posture. Hates warmth and the sun. Maybe light as a whole. (Sure this can be related to trauma from bomb explosions, but I imagine both of these things loop into each other.) Savant syndrome; He is an absolute medical prodigy and he would be able to surpass Ryuuji, but it’s feelings that are holding him back, as proven by Sweet Shuu. “He didn’t know how to grow up, so he stayed a chrysalis forever.” Dear god does he take everything literally. He absolutely does not care about anything or anyone except science and related to it. There is a chance that he pretends to not remember Tohri to avoid unnecessary conflict, but if he literally doesn’t remember him, then like, that’s peculiar isn’t it. Response to unpleasant situation; walk away. Extremely shut-in and uncomfortable in crowds.

...So yes. Maybe I’ll keep adding things to this post. By the way, if you are curious about the sources of some of these claims, send me an ask and I’ll do my best to find The Evidence.

My weight is 1g.