HAPPY 5TH ANNIVERSARY!!!

Hello!!!!

I'm, I'm so excited to be here after 5 years of FtPverse, and I'm so glad to have had the chance to have worked on it for this long and to have met all of you wonderful readers!!!

I could blab about this for a while but, why type it all up when I can just point you to the video I made in which I blab about how it started / my favorite parts / the future of All that Remains / how much this series means to me.

It's not Q&A like I'd initially wanted it to be, but, whatever!!! It exists, and it's cool, please watch and enjoy it!!



I did this on my webcam and so it's not like the best quality. Youtube has some enhancements options but they only did so much---I couldn't reshoot though because there was no way I'd be able to recapture my excitement in this take! (Also, I literally only had time to do this once, so,,,)


ANYWAY, ENJOY THAT,

AND NOW FOR THE SPECIAL ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATORY CHAPTER!!

read here!!

tumblr tag!!


LIKE!!! Okay, it wasn't even really a question I wouldn't do this for the special anniversary chapter because I've been wanting to write Riku's birthday for a while now and what better time than for the special 5th anniversary chapter, yanno, especially since the entire series has been leading up to this, in a way, leading up to him having a family.

I MEAN!!! I said in the video that having a family (or rather having somewhere he belonged / was loved) wasn't one of Riku's conscious desires but it was what I started this series to achieve, so, it's really great to have gotten here at the 5 year point, after so long, and it's certainly something to celebrate!

This chapter is entirely canon, it's just, out of order. In-universe as they're seeing Yen Sid they're still in May, later May I think, OH NO WAIT, WE'VE MOVED INTO JUNE. They're in June, but we're still a couple plotpoints away from it reaching July for sure.

The plan is I'll leave this up in ATR for a week, then I'll port it over to ASAS until it's time to reintegrate it back into the story.

As for timing notes: Riku's birthday is centered around the Anniversary, and was initially August 9th, BUT!! where I live school generally starts in August (that's not the case elsewhere in the world or even the country, I realize) and so I went "oh, no, he can't show up in August he'll have to start going to school almost immediately I don't want that" and bumped it back a month into July.


And now, for specific chapter related notes!

Iiiiiiiii got rly emotional about Riku/Yuffie parallels that I didn’t even realize existed until,,, as  I was writing htis,,,,,, Yuffie was in a much different set of circumstances than Riku but she does get that whole “I didn’t have a family for a while there” thing and that’s,,,, MMMM,,,,

[realizes Yuffie’s only 16, maybe 17] gooooodddddddd

I was going to clarify here about Yuffie living on the streets vs an orphanage (Leon was in the orphanage for the longest time) but I didn’t like how it was flowing and I figure maybe I’ll,,, bring it up later

In case I forget: either they assumed Yuffie died in whatever killed her parents (a house fire, maybe) or they just plain, didn’t realize a kid had been left behind (she’d already run off?) so whoever ran the orphanage didn’t hunt her down, and being a kid she didn’t think to put herself on the orphanage’s front door, and after that she just, ran from the authorities whenever she got caught stealing so the authorities never had the chance to take her to the orphanage either

RIKU WAS ALSO GOING TO ASK WHEN AERITH FOUND YUFFIE BUT THAT WASN’T FLOWING EITHER. THE ANSWER: WHEN THE WORLD FELL INTO DARKNESS, AERITH SCOOPED UP YUFFIE AFTER CID HAD SCOOPED UP HER AND LEON,  a little similar to how it happened in magik’s universe but probably not 100%, though Yuffie was old enough to probably not try and stick around in Traverse Town, omf, she definitely probably ran off once they were safe and they either hunted her down (possible) or they didn’t see her for a few days until she came slinking back like….. “I’m frikken hungry and you can’t steal anything in this world because there’s like no one here”

I’m gonna get mushy but I don’t give a frik this is the 5th anniversary, what better time is there to be mushy???

Yuffie gives Riku a GBA. I don’t give a frik. Computers exist. Cell phones exist. Joseph already semi-canonically has a N64. Riku can have a GBA.

We function in a sort of “so long as it’s not Kingdom Hearts or Final Fantasy merch, it exists within this universe” way, and obviously he can’t buy the original COM but you bet your bottom he can play tetris and Yoshi’s Island and that Mario bros 3 remake

She doesn’t get him a 3DS bc a) that’s a lot of munny b) techinically ftpverse sits in like, 2011, I’m not sure the 3DS even exists yet???? she could’ve gotten him a regular DS too but again a) munny and b) if she’s looking short notice at a yardsale for one she’s definitely more likely to find a GBA, ALSO SHE HAS HER OWN GBA, SO THERE IS THAT AS WELL, I ALMOST FORGOT

She has her own GBA and a copy of Tetris along with the Super Mario Bros 3 GBA port which she is scaaaaaaarry good at, among other games I’m sure

Also Yuffie’s is accidentally the second most thoughtful of the gifts, with Aerith’s ranking first (and SoKai’s probably at third) because it’s something p useful/enjoyable to Riku

AERITH'S!!! man, I had Aerith's gift planned for the longest time, I was looking into what sort of armor/accessories Roxas would have (answer: almost all of them) and ended up going to the FF wiki and in that realized OH, THER'ES SOMETHING THAT, PROTECTS COMPLETELY AGAINST THUNDER MAGIC, RIKU NEEDS THAT and it wasn't a question from there what would happen next, Aerith was going to get him one.

I may not have translated his surprise and absolute gratitude at that gift into the scene as well as I would've liked, but..... whatever. It is the gift he's most grateful for and he will wear it literally forever from now on. Trust me. He's really glad to have it, just as he's really glad to be here with a family.