OMG Those!B, bless his little black heart….
(Major Spoiler Warnings for “Those Who Stand For Nothing Fall for Anything” fic below, be ye warned):
-my absolute favourite parts of that entire massive fic are when B, L, and Light are all hanging out in the big house together. Maybe that’s just because they’re my three faves and also my OT3, but knowing that Beyond was going to be showing up eventually was the very reason I decided to read the whole thing in the first place, honestly. I saw the beautiful fanart by lyovan of all three of them all together and was like ummmm, yep sign me up
-turning Beyond into a pretentious psychologist and also L’s oldest/most loyal childhood friend, someone who postures himself as the tutting / disapproving “voice of reason” to the ridiculously dysfunctional Lawlight romance, is just a hilarious idea that I am 1000% on board with. I adore all the cruel irony of his situation with L, his pathetic obsessive energy and his unrequited feelings and weird competitive nature with Light. It adds such an interesting past perspective to Those!L’s character to give him this old friend who he wants to maintain a certain appearance in front of and who he relates to in a softer, completely non-sexual way, as well.
- I love how much the stuff with B mirrors so many things about canon while also being completely different from it simultaneously. There were so many times I suddenly realized a sly parallel to canon in that fic and laughed out loud, such as with B allegedly attempting suicide in L’s bed way back in the day as an extremely melodramatic way of getting his attention
@translightyagami and I were talking about this recently, how B isn’t really any better of a person or a more ideal match for L than Light is, and I love so much that this fic doesn’t try to portray him as such. B’s just as shitty and manipulative and flawed in his own way as the other two, and the fact that he and L both kind of selfishly idealize and use each other in different ways for validation and ego boosts is so interesting to think about. I think Those!B needs to put L on a pedestal to feel distinctive for being his closest/truest friend, and L needs B to idolize him and be kept constantly at arm’s length so that he can always see himself through B’s rose-coloured glasses whenever his own self-perception is getting weird and dark
- another fascinating aspect of Those!B is his weird chemistry with Light. I don’t know why, but I adore how hilariously cruel and mean they are to each other 90% of the time and then randomly also attracted to each other in little bursts. Their strange little scene against the bookshelf when L wasn’t home, for example. I think they both kind of loathe each other but also understand each other intimately for their mutual unhealthy hangups on L, so it creates this weird antagonistic kinship between them that surfaces between the passive-aggressive insults every now and then
- I laughed so much every time Those!B did something like sniff L or slice off a lock of Light’s hair with a knife or drug him without his consent. Halfpromise managed to make a B completely devoid of red shinigami eyes and a jam fixation still incredibly creepy and odd in his own very special way
