“Oh, is this your first con?” The brunette straightened a little. “I’m Fred!”
Taki brightened, the wisps of mist near her fingers thinning. “It’s either Romana, or Fred.”
That earned her a grin, and Fred’s closer approach. “I’m sorry, I don’t recognize yours….”
Taki actually blushed a little. “Well… what if Gallifrey were anime?”
Fred bounced on her heels. “AUs can be so much fun.”
And I understood most of that, Mutsu thought ruefully, as the argument broke up, everyone who wanted a photo snapped one, and Fred and Taki moved on from talking about what made an alternate universe work to what made some crossovers awesome and what con panels they absolutely couldn’t miss. I’m doomed to a life of SF fandom.
Which was actually kind of funny, given he and his fellow Sekirei were aliens.
It’s a friendly crowd now, but if they knew what we really are, they’d….
They’d what? Mutsu realized. They fought the Chitauri because they were invaders, not just aliens. Invaders trying to kill people. We’re not invaders. Except for Miya, we were all born here. Heck, if Minaka hadn’t played fast and loose with who owned Kamikura Island, we’d technically be Japanese.
People here want to meet friendly aliens. Taki hid most of the odder things we did with her mist, but someone probably saw something. If we told them the truth – some of them might help.
It was a startling thought. And not an entirely comforting one. Half the reason Miya hadn’t made any moves against MBI was that Takehito had had strong feelings about unnecessarily harming humans, and Minaka left humans who weren’t involved in the Plan alone. Mostly. Unless they were Ashikabi. Or related to Ashikabi. Or looked like they might affect an Ashikabi or Sekirei in a way Minaka wouldn’t like.
Crossover Queen's Creative Chaos 
MIGHT help? Even the ones who think you’re a possible threat would be helping, they’d just also be looking out for anybody going all Magneto!
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Yep! As he’ll shortly find out.
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Mutsu brings interesting points here, for example, that for all of his many, many flaws, Minaka didn’t want random (none ashikabi innocent bystanders involved for no reason. If im not mistaken, one of the mandates of the Disciplinary Squad was to disallow Ashikabi to use their sekirei to kill regular humans that didn’t interfere with his Sekirei plan.
So an ashikabi using their superhuman sekirei to take violent revange on ex-girlfriend/ex-boyfriend, or to take over local yakuza or to kill someone that pissed them off/looked at them funny-will likely have a visit from karasuba, and NOT a friendly one.
another point is-how many innocent MBI workers will suffer if their company gets destroyed with extreme and brutal prejudice. OR how much MBI helped, by bringing to the world at large reverse engineered technology and medicine- and there is no doubt, that were a government to hold the ship-all its tech would be classified, militarized for military application, and away from civilian usage and civilian population, and when made public, made for their country first, and maybe only.
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It is a mess, yes.
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and Minaka left humans who weren’t involved in the Plan alone. Mostly. Unless they were Ashikabi. Or related to Ashikabi. Or looked like they might affect an Ashikabi or Sekirei in a way Minaka wouldn’t like.
So basically when he feels like it?
Doesn’t surprise me. Minaka has shown that he is often petty and arbitrary.
. . . oh boy. It is a very good thing that Minato and Yukari don’t take after their parents in certain areas.
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For them to take that aspect, their parents would have had to be around. So, in a way, the world (or at least Kamikura Island) was saved by bad parenting.
…. I can’t believe I just typed that.
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I know right?. . . it’s such an odd thing. Usually someone’s A+ parenting is (one of) the reason (s) the world is in danger, not the reason it is being saved.
(I say one of the reasons simply because I don’t believe that bad parenting is entirely the source of villains and villainous behavior. Bad parenting certainly doesn’t help prevent such things but it’s not the be all end all source.)
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Dr. Minaka, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Bad Parenting.
Hmm…
Dr. Hojo, or or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Black Materia.
Dr. Mercer, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Blacklight.
Dr. Birkin, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love G-Virus.
Dr. Fuyutsuki, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Evangelion.
Dr. Katsurugi, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Second Impact.
Dr. Ikari, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Third Impact.
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“Bad parenting” is actually one of the historical sources of heroism. You have the son who isn’t acknowledged, and who is left for somebody else to raise, who then goes forth and conquers the tyrant. (Although that didn’t work super-well for Oedipus, it worked pretty darned well for Zeus.)
There’s also the Mad Scientist’s Beautiful Daughter who helps the hero instead of her wicked father. (See Medea and Ariadne.)
It’s less usual for the wicked king to be overthrown by a son whom he raised, or a daughter who isn’t doing it out of love for a hero. But sometimes it’s acceptable to do it as vengeance for a dead mother, father, or sibling. (And there’s Clytemnestra and Agamemnon’s fate, because the kids were definitely dissatisfied with their mom and dad’s parenting skills.)
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Well, it WORKED for Oedipus, just some secondary complications screwed it up.
Which, while massively dramatically excessive, does point to the truth that heroes can still get screwed up by the thing they’re fighting….
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I still like someone’s sum-up of “So, Oedipus killed the guy because he cut him off in traffic….”
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Erm… “historical” should be replaced with “ancient mythological”.
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It can happen, trust me. Takami was very wise to know she was not the best parent!
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“So, Oedipus killed the guy because he cut him off in traffic….”
*snickers* Oh, that is SO not fair, getting run down by a cart is *still* deadly today…but still funny.
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*G*
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. . . .Oedipus . . .
Yeah, finding out that you had married and had children with your mother, after killing your father (for a dumb reason), and putting your own eyes isn’t exactly batting a thousand.
. . . . Medea and Ariadne
And betraying their evil fathers to help the men they loved worked just perfectly for those two.
Well Adriadne got to meet and marry Dionysus after Theseus dumped her and ditched her on a desert island.
But Medea . . . . not so much. Of course, Jason didn’t exactly get a happy ending either.
Through, to be fair, a lot of Greek heroes and heroines ended up dying, often horribly, for one reason or another. (There is a reason why in the Percy Jackson series, the main character’s mother named him after Perseus even through Perseus was the son of Zeus and Percy is the son of Poseidon – because Perseus survived not only his adventures but managed not – in most accounts – make some of bone-headed mistake afterward that meant he ended up dying horribly.)
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Wise mother, there. Not dying horribly is definitely a plus!
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Re: Ancient Mythological bad ends. Recall that we still live in a very safe and pleasant time.
Recall also that there is a reason we say that those who live by the sword, die by the sword. Consider Achilles. Even after he choose to go fight at Troy, he made several other decisions which contributed to his death. (Thinking about that, I’ve had make some adjustments to the vague plans I’ve been too lazy put much into fleshing out.)
And I’m recalling an excellent classics lecturer. No man is truly happy until the day he dies, merely fortunate. IIRC, per one authority, the happiest man in Greece died in his seventies, after his own sons died well. All men die, what matters is how you do it.
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A very good thing. I wonder about their grandmother.
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Me too.
I think she’s probably a good person because Yukari and Minato had to learn about being good people somewhere. Yes, part of that is their own temperaments but a trusted role model demonstrating good behaviors and habits always helps. Nature AND nurture.
Through since she is Takami’s mother . . . and considering some of Yukari and Minato’s quirks . . . probably at least a little odd . . .
Still, she managed to raise two good kids who mostly have their heads on straight so she cannot have been too awful a parent.
Hard to say . . .
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