[split] [I/OOC] Incidental Bits - Ben and Taiga plotbunnies

[Black Aeronaut]

Someone has severely underestimated Ben...

---

"You think this hurts me?  You know nothing about me.  You can't even comprehend what I have felt.  If I could make you feel what I have, I would.  But you will never know how excruciating it feels to have death itself haunt your dreams and waking thoughts, eagerly anticipating the day you're weak enough to succumb to its wiles.

"I am going to utterly destroy you and nothing you do to me will stop it from happening."

[Black Aeronaut]

Heh.  Which reminds me, this may or may not appear somewhere.  Context: Ben finds that he needed to have a little home made for R. Taiga in his apartment.  Thing is... she is very much Aisaka Taiga in many ways, which means that he has to open up her little house, dollhouse style, and clean up after her!

"Jeeze, this is surrealistically like owning a pet.... except that I need to wash her panties.  Dangit, Taiga!  At least put these in the hamper!"
"Oh c'mon!  Don't tell me that you're getting all squeamish over my undies!"
"Of course not.  It's just that at this scale, it's a pain in the ass to pick your underwear out from all the other crap in here."

[Black Aeronaut]

So, saw this tweet with a Hololive character...  Impishly going, "I'm a Zoomer!  Watch!  Can a Boomer do this? ..."

And then you have characters like Ben.  Consumate Gen-Xer (though it's actually a bit of a tossup whether I'm the last of Gen-X or the first of the Millennials, but I associate more closely with Gen-X).

He's smiling, amused but not patronizingly so.  He likes kids like this, ya know?  Really admires their spirit.  He's quietly singing Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start The Fire" while loading cartridges into his Intelligent Device, Rabenschnable, and giving off the vibe of, "You're good kid.  Real good.  Now watch and learn how a pro works..."

(One of the things that I kinda love about the ideas behind Hololive is that it's so very TNB in that you have these fictional characters who are in the "Real World".  And while Hololive doesn't have them actively keeping the universe from imploding or anything like that, they do have these uberpowered characters doing normal people stuff like livestreaming Minecraft.)

[Black Aeronaut]

A couple inspired by me finally finishing Chibiusa's page on the wiki.

Chibiusa smiled as she answered the question, to show she was teasing. "Ben-niisan is my best friend's boyfriend, so I'd better learn to like him. Ne?"

---

"You're the proper young lady that I want to be! How could I not like you?"

As the realization that Chibiusa was fangirling her sunk in, Tomoyo started to panic - not that a proper young lady would show it, of course. She was accustomed to being on the other end of that relationship dynamic and had no idea how to handle the situation now that it was reversed.

For the first one....

Ben:  "Pffft.  Yeah, like as if we didn't get along beforehand."

Hotaru, meanwhile, is blushing so hard you could roast a marshmallow over her. 

For the second one...

Ben:  *Snorts in amusement because, as good of a job Tomoyo is doing in hiding it, he knows a mind screw in-progress when he sees one.*  "Slow down there, Lil' Bunny.  She's new to having fans, especially fans of prestige like you, and she's having a Blue Screen of Death moment.  Give her a minute or two to process that before we try for Control-Alt-Delete."

[Black Aeronaut]

Yeah, Mii is something like 16 years old, I think?

She's either 16 or 17 - we see her in her current school uniform in a one-year flashback when Kuroko is in her final year of elementary school. I decided to give her the younger possible age.

EDIT: And note that neither Mii nor Rob are in any hurry to marry before Mii turns 18. Lindy's opinion will be given due consideration, then rejected.

She's probably been emboldened by Benjamin and his clan diving in head-first.  This will probably be covered in the interview Ben gives later on...

Midchilda is interesting because we get tantalizing hints about the place in the background of shows like StrikerS, Vivid, and Vivid Strike, but never anything really outright stated.  Near as I can figure, Midchilda goes by something like the Nordic System, where socialism is carefully balanced against a capitalist economy.  Things like public gymnasiums, bath houses, saunas, and so-on-and-so-forth are all common features in a community, and serve as social hubs for said communities.

This is definitely present in Midchilda as we see in Vivid, where they have a public gymnasium kitted out for people to practice martial arts.

The honest truth is, however, that it really does take a village to raise a child.

Which we so rarely get in North American cities nowadays, if one doesn't count paid childcare (which few teenage mothers are likely to be able to afford).

Once, within living memory, there was a time when neighborhoods here in the USA were close-knit communities where folks looked out for each other.  Not quite sure what happened to that, but I suspect corporations had a hand in it by treating workers like disposable resources, forcing people to relocate more frequently than this system could support.  What use is it to get to know your neighbor when you or they are just gonna move out in a few months?

[Black Aeronaut]

Rule #1: Keep him exposed to as much bright light as possible. (Natural sunlight is best.)
Rule #2: Make sure he takes a bath every night.
Rule #3: Always make sure he has at least one meal after midnight.

Otherwise....

"Oh Doc~tor Sca~gli~et~tiiiiiiii~iiiiiii! ...C̸͔̊ȯ̸͙m̸̺̂e̷̜̒ ̷͉̒ș̶̾ē̵͓e̵̳̓ ̷͕̿m̸̺̐y̴̟̒ ̷̛͙n̷͓̎e̸͉̋w̶͒͜ ̷̩̎t̶̞͒ö̸̬́y̸͌ͅ!̴̪̚"

I'm amused by this idea that Benjamin is like a reverse-mogwai that can "turn into" a particularly mischievous and maliciously creative gremlin if proper care for him is not being administrated.  (Think somewhat along the lines of The Professor from Fenspace and you won't be far off.)

And there are few things that amuse him more than utterly terrorizing people that deserve it.

[Black Aeronaut]

55-gallon drum, you say?

"Neh, Momo?"

"Hmm?"

"Isn't that Destiny's new spell?"

"Which new spell, Kuro-nee?  She's like dad that way, remember?"

"Of course.  That Red... Rum... thing?"

"....  Oh.  Redrum Machina?  ...We need to run.  Very fast."

"What?  Why?  It's not supposed to be that bad...  is it?"

"Do you ever pay attention to the Device-Net!?  She just burned up ten micrograms on that spell!"

"..... FUCK."

[Black Aeronaut]

55-gallon drum, you say?

"Neh, Momo?"

"Hmm?"

"Isn't that Destiny's new spell?"

"Which new spell, Kuro-nee?  She's like dad that way, remember?"

"Of course.  That Red... Rum... thing?"

"....  Oh.  Redrum Machina?  ...We need to run.  Very fast."

"What?  Why?  It's not supposed to be that bad...  is it?"

"Do you ever pay attention to the Device-Net!?  She just burned up ten micrograms on that spell!"

"..... FUCK."

Just some notes since no one commented on this.

Redrum is a reference the the film, The Shining, in which the word was actually "murder" spelled backwards.  So in a weird sense, the name of this spell can be taken to mean "murder machine".  And even if she's being kinda chuni about it, it very much not an exaggeration.  It creates arachnoid spell construct drones with a penchant for finding warm targets, latching on, and then exploding.

The "ten micrograms" refers to an expenditure of antimatter being annihilated.  Destiny will have a Fermion Inverter and a M-AM Reactor.... but no Deuterium Fusor to fire the Inverter.  This will mean that she makes antimatter at a much slower pace than her father, but the trade-off is that she has a much bigger "fuel bunker" to store it in.  How big?  ....Well, due to her slow rate of replenishment, they haven't seen her hit her maximum fill yet, but conservative estimates put her at 1000 milligrams.  She doesn't often use it, but when she does?  EVERYONE GTFO!

In this case, 10 micrograms is the equivalent to Ben's Level 3 shot - which has a TNT equivalent of 430 kilograms.  And she just dumped all of that energy into a spell called "Murder Machine".  She is most emphatically not fucking around.

Lastly, "Device-Net" is a system inspired by the US Navy's AEGIS system where all sundry Magical Devices are sharing tactical data with each other so others know what's going on around them.  And Destiny's device was kind enough to inform everyone that's listening ("Lookin' at you, there, Kurohime.") that, "By the way, my boss just burned up enough antimatter to level an apartment highrise for a single spell, so maybe you might wanna get clear?"

[Black Aeronaut]

I might have to steal that for the first time Nanoha encounters a Kyubey.  That meme with her ready to rip one apart with glowing red eyes of rage will come later once the little bastard continues to try and sell her it's pitch.

"͠D̀o̶ ͢y̧͞o̧u̢͝ ͠ḩ͠o̵ńe͏s͏t̵ĺ͏y͘͟ ͝͏t͝ḩ͠͞iņk͜͡ ͞I͢ ́g͝͡i̡̨v҉͏ę͝͏ ̶͢͢a͜ ̴f͘͢u̶̷̢c̵͏k͜ ̷ab̛o̵̕ut w̛ha̕͟͠t͜ ̴͟y͡o̧̕u̵̧͝ ͢ţ͞h̸́͡i̕͢n̸҉k̸ ̢͏̧yo̕͝u li̵͞t҉̕͜t̨̧̢l͢e̛͟ ̡͘s͞hi҉t̛̀?"̶̛

Kyouya then looked to Benjamin.  "You have been a bad influence on my sister."

Ben rolled his eyes.  "Three things.  First, this is the only time she's used profanity to my knowledge.  Second, can you honestly blame her in this case?  And third, she's Air Force.  And despite the Navy owning the trope 'Cusses like a Sailor', that doesn't mean they got a monopoly on being foul mouthed."

Shinobu grinned.  "He's got you there, Kyou."

[Black Aeronaut]

Yeah, that was a fun bit that you shared during the chat.  I love it.

Here's a somewhat more serious bit, somewhat in a similar vein...  Possible exchange where Micheru decides to try confronting Benjamin before resorting to using Emotion Restorer-kun...

"There's something you're forgetting here.  I knew of Nanoha Takamachi long before we existed in each other's worlds.  I know what kind of person she is and what she grows up to become.  That is what I am in love with - the person that exists behind that child's eyes, not the child itself.  Sure, back then she was just a fictional character to me.  But now?  Now she is a real person.  A living, breathing person who is absolutely magnificent with the depths of her heart and the power of her charisma.

"And for you to call into question my motives that way?  When I have been nothing but absolutely circumspect in my relations with her and Fate?  I think you have even bigger psychological issues than I do.  Grow the fuck up.  Nanoha is more of an adult than you are right now."

This will have the added effect of placing an even amount guilt on Micheru's shoulders, because she followed Haruka's lead despite this telling off she gets from Ben.