Actually Obsessed With The Trojans (specifically Jeremy) Calling Out The Weird Ass Language Jean And

nathaniel, neil, nathaniel, neil. andrew flips the two names around in his head like tossing a coin. heads or tails, the coin always comes up abram. nathaniel and neil are two sides of the same coin; forged in a dark basement, in musty hotel rooms, on the exy court. both hate sweets, love to run, to talk back any chance they get.

some days, the coin lands on nathaniel. jack makes one too many comments at practice and neil - no, nathaniel - has him on the ground, raquet to his neck in an instant. he can't hear what the strikers are saying but through the grate of the helment, andrew sees nathaniel's smile.

others, it lands on neil. andrew finds neil and matt splayed out on the couch, three movies deep into a "pop culture lesson". neil motions for andrew to sit and absently cards his fingers through the blond's hair. matt hides his grin in his sleeve.

but abram; he runs to andrew after each winning game to tap sticks, he sits each friday in columbia, talking about escape routes for an alien invasion, he keeps ice cream in the freezer and cigarettes in his backpocket.

heads or tails, doe or minyard, doe or minyard.

doe was made and unmade in california. 13 homes, 13 film reels constantly playing in the back of his mind, each scene driving the cuts deeper and deeper. andrew doe learns the danger of wanting and vows to keep everyone out.

minyard went to juvie for his brother. he crashed the car to keep him safe. he spent years on medication that sent him up up up to protect his cousin. minyard guards himself with knives sharper than his glare; he protects those that are his and fuck anyone else.

heads or tails, the coin starts to come up drew.

it starts small; quick grins in columbia at neil; shared dinners with aaron that don't end in a fight; something like excitment in his stomach before an exy game. when neil is hanging out with the upperclassman, he stays.

heads or tails; the coin lands on growth

Kevin would not - could not - defend himself against Riko. Years of abuse and torture beat into him that he was to obey Riko.

But when Riko goes for Neil, Kevin tries to stop him. He catches Riko's arm, he lays a hand on him, he goes against him. Because protecting Neil, who at the time was just some random nobody Kevin was trying to mentor, was more important than his fear of Riko.

Neil kissed his survival instincts goodbye when he defended Kevin against Riko on TV, but Kevin also fought against his survival instincts to protect Neil from Riko just a few minutes later.

🌀”I have a bit of an attitude problem” 🌀5/6 Foxhole Court overlays.

Featuring the scene from chapter 13 with the Kathy Ferdinand show and Riko meeting!

Inspired by this quote:

“Ah, forgive my bad manners,” Kathy said to Neil. “I didn’t forget you over there, I just got distracted. Let’s get the pair of you introduced, though I’m not sure either one of you needs an introduction by now. Riko, Neil. Neil, Riko. Kevin’s past and present or should I say past and future?”

[…]

“I will ask you only once to tone down the animosity”

“I can’t,” Neil said. “I have a bit of an attitude problem.”

Only one overlay left to go! Though I must admit I think this is one of my favourites, especially with Andrew in the front row!

reading the sunshine court truly made me realize just how unbelievably fucking insane the foxes were as a team/family unit.

like wdym your coach is your star players father and didn’t know? wdym multiple people on your team have killed people??? how do multiple people on your team have mafia connections??

usc could hardly believe the ravens intentionally injured jean while the foxes were used to the ravens regularly using vandalism, kidnapping, torture, psychological warfare, and murder against their team

usc talks out their interpersonal team problems while the foxes blackmail eachother into joint therapy until they break a bros before hoes pact

the trojans have no-touch jerseys for practice while the foxes were getting punched, stabbed, choked, and suffering major bodily harm at the hands of another teammate at any given moment in the series

jeremy makes sure jean doesn’t meet the team all at once to not overwhelm him while andrew has a habit of quite literally breaking in the new members in columbia

the trojans tiptoed around and almost didn’t believe kevin’s hand injury while one of neil’s first conversations w the man is yelling “fuck you cripple, you’re a dead weight has been” in french in front of half the team

jeremy avoids cops while neil forces fbi agents to wait for him to finish eating, proceeds to blatantly lie to their faces, and then fucks off

usc would’ve thrown the semi finals match if jean hadn’t survived but seth fucking DIED and kevin and neil were only worried about how it’d affect the line up

jeremy gets furious when he finds out about grayson while neil fucking orders a hit out on him right in front of jean on a napkin over lunch

i was surprised by how hard the trojans were taking things until i remembered the foxes were just grade a crazy

Andrew and Neil definitely cuddle, BUT i am a firm believer of two things, 1) their go-to is just Andrew lying on top of Neil like a weighted blanket (never the other way around though) and 2) andrew never like wraps his arms around neil to the point of holding him in place/restricting his movement or even putting them in positions that could make that a possibility even on accident

I said this in another post, but it bears repeating:

Neil is to crime what Andrew is to Exy. Supernaturally talented and unstoppable if he wanted, but due to his general lack of interest nerfs himself.

Everyone should be grateful Neil finds crime boring and uninteresting compared to Exy cause he would have been the Kevin Day of crime, surpassing his father and mother. Nora confirmed in the EC that if the Moriyamas had messed with Andrew, Neil would have carefully and competently dismantled their empire and watched all of them burn. He was practically lab created and stress tested his whole life to fight, outlive, and outsmart criminal masterminds.

My headcannon is Ichirou is secretly relieved that Nathaniel just wants to play stick ball.

Rarely see it, but I enjoy fics where Agent Browning becomes an unwilling Pseudo Uncle beside Stuart as Neil's Actual Uncle. Like, Neil wants to do something that'll put the FBI on his case? Calls Agent Browning first, provides a heads up. Gonna marry Andrew? Gotta call Agent Browning so he can hyphenate his last name "for his Starbucks order". Allison wants to dye his hair? Gotta call Agent Browning first hold up

Imagine Andrew hears from Wymack and Abby that Bee is having a bad day. He's graduated so she's not his therapist anymore but they keep in contact. He suddenly posts up on campus with gourmet hot cocoa, breaks into her office when he knows she has a break, says not a single word, throws himself across the couch-

but Bee is already smiling (it's so small, she really was having a bad day) and so, as far as he's concerned, Mission Accomplished

I will say that at the heart of Jeremy and Neil's stiff attitudes towards the other is that they are worried about Jean. Jeremy sees Neil show up at a bad time and take Jean out and brings him back an even bigger mess, so of course he would be a little put off. And when Neil showed up, he saw Jean all beat up and immediately asked Jean in French if the Trojans did this to him. It will all probably be cleared up, maybe, but i love that they are so protective of Jean. 🥺

Ill never forgive the aftg fandom for saying aftg is poorly written but loveable. it is so fucking well written. The characters are all interesting individually and as group dynamics. The plot is unexpected but always makes sense. Theres so many incredible 1 liners said. Theres humour. Theres heartfelt love. Theres angst. You can cry and you can laugh and you can get invested. Nora made characters with actual fucking personalities instead of just catalysts for neil's story. She did this so well she was able to take 2 minor characters and give them an entire sequel.