#candyspider

I love murcielago! it's as fun as it is unhinged. my only issue is that this makes it difficult to recommend to people

Sure!

Growing up, I was like, the kind of nerdy kid who would do stuff like read a lot of science fiction and write poetry, and then do well enough at school that teachers would occasionally say "what an amazing kid you must be" in an encouraging way. (I was in fact like that, if I were a character in a kids' TV show.) I liked math and science, and although I was never good at sports (and also I'm dyslexic) I liked to think I was good at fighting. (I was like the stereotypical math nerd, but also I was one of the kids who really liked fights and was good at fighting for no reason.) I was actually really good at "being" the nerd kids who fought a lot – I would "go to" fights that I knew would be tough and make me look "cool," and not care much about being hurt.

I never really liked music or theater, but I was good at them too. I also always liked to read, and at some point I learned how to write without feeling like I was going to die, so that I could take some poetry classes and stuff in college. I never really wanted to be "academically smart" and have a "career," but I really enjoyed learning and I learned a lot from classes in college. I was very interested in philosophy and social science, and that stuff always made me feel like "I can do anything" in a certain way, the way I always felt in school. (I was also very interested in religion, for reasons I'm not sure about but probably related to being an odd duck and having that particular set of interests and aversions – that was around the time I was learning about Buddhism and thinking about reincarnation, so there was that going on too.)

I was very into the weird stuff, like Harry Potter, fantasy books, the internet, and so on. I was very aware of being weird, and also very aware of knowing too much about stuff I don't actually care about, and this made me aware of the fact that other people were weird in a different way.

I liked hanging out with friends, but I liked being alone too. I didn't like going to church, but I also didn't mind sitting in a pew and waiting for an hour and a half.

I didn't know what "gender identity" meant for a long time. I thought I liked girls when I was in middle school, but later I started to think I liked guys, although it wasn't really a conscious thing that I did until college or so.

I never wanted to be famous. When people made me "famous" I felt uneasy, because I don't actually like or understand fame. The thing is, I didn't really know what "feeling fame" was, and so I always thought it was about being the kind of person who can do cool stuff and get recognized for doing cool stuff. I didn't really realize that I was feeling like "fame" was about a specific kind of "self-centeredness" (as opposed to the kind of self-centeredness I am now) until I got to college, where I realized that if I wasn't careful, the kinds of things I really wanted (like my own privacy) would get taken away from me. I have never really liked having my privacy taken away, and even now I'm sort of wary of doing things because they'll be "saved" for later.

College was great. I didn't know how to take care of myself well, but I never really got in trouble for anything so I really don't think I would have been better off if I'd gone to school earlier. It was great. I was happy. I learned a lot, and made friends, and got a girlfriend, and had a lot of good times with her. And I got a bunch of good grades. A lot of things are good.

aw, oh man, thank you so much! I’m so glad you like my AU. Aftran is a really interesting and fun character, and I wish she’d had more screentime (page... time?) in the series.

Here’s a sketch I did a while ago but never posted-- I feel like she’d be fascinated by stuff like having her very own set of teeth.

「ＳＡＬＴ－Ｎ－ＰＥＰＡ」 is a wearable stand that manifests as the upper portion of armor resembling a boxer’s training safety gear. More notably, the armor’s “arms” are more like enormous pistons, granting the user tremendous punching strength. 

In addition, any organic being’s emotion in reaction to being punched by the user is multiplied tenfold. Additional punches compound the tenfold multiplication. Anyone facing this stand will quickly lose the ability to reason to a rising tide of anger, embarrassment, or even pure fighting spirit. This effect wears off after about ten minutes-- often more than enough time for even a drawn-out fight.