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Soul Eater Not! Chapter 5: Me and My Funes el Memorioso
Sorry for the delay with this recap, but it's been a rough week.
Anywhoo, in this chapter, Me-Me makes an erudite reference to Jorge Luis Borges!
Also, there is punching and stuff.
So we begin a few steps behind where we left off last month, with Tsugumi and Me-Me still trying to quiz Anya's temporary partner about what happened to Anya. "Umm~~ So your partner Anya-san? Did she go home already?"
Earphones!boy says nothing.
"Maybe... Anya-san... already left without us?"
Meanwhile, Anya is confronting a Traitor. "And what, pray tell, are you supposed to be...?"
Creepster has a symbol on his jacket that's an "M" with an arrow and the same symbol in his eyeball. Waitaminute...
Nah, too obvious. If it's a conclusion that Kid would jump to then it's probably wrong.
(ETA: As was pointed out in the comments, Creepster is actually wearing the symbol for Scorpio, which makes sense considering his use of a poisoned stinger coming up in a few pages.)
Anyway, Creepster stares at Anya's skull brooch. "I found one..."
"What an ominous gentleman..." Anya comments.
And then he tries to attack her with a finger-spear.
Anya dodges. "What is the meaning of this?!" she demands to know. "That fighting stance... It is an imitation of 'mantis boxing', is it not?" Anya thoughtfully chews on some ellipses, then concludes, "It appears to be slightly different."
Still narrating to herself, Anya goes on, "It seems as though I have become somehow entangled with this eerie fellow... Well, this is the choice that I made when I fled from my castle and came to Shibusen. If something like this never happened to me then it would be so dreadfully boring." Anya assumes her fighting stance. "This is an excellent opportunity to test the Royal Karate that I studied at home!!" Especially since Tsugumi isn't here - I must rely on my own strength!!
The creepster is unimpressed.
Even though I have never been in a true fight before... Of course there was that incident on my first day at Shibusen, but that isn't at all comparable to a situation like this... To say nothing of the practice sparring that we do in class... Anya realizes that her fist is trembling. My fist is trembling. She forces herself to stop shaking.
Arrrrrrgh, Ohkubo! Show, don't tell! SHOW, DON'T TELL!
That panel of Anya's fist trembling and then her forcing herself to stop would have been much more effective without the added Narration of the Incredibly Obvious.
Just saying.
He made the first move... He struck with clear and purposeful intent. And yet...
And now he's just standing there, not moving. And Anya's heart is thumping in her chest.
I cannot bring myself to make a move against him...
So he makes the next move instead.
His right finger!! As long as I can avoid his right finger that is bearing a weapon's blade... If I can just take one step back and increase the distance between us, then...
He steps on her foot, holding her in place.
He's fighting dirty! Anya raises her arm to protect her face from a slash. No fair!!
Anya falls down. "You coward!!"
Creepster looms over Anya. He points his finger-blade (I have no idea what to call that thing) at her face.
Anya's face drips with nervous sweat.
Finally, however, Anya apparently decides to completely abandon her dignity. "EEEEEEEEEK! SOMEBODY HEEEEEEEELP MEEEEEEEEEEE!"
Aaaaaaand here comes Me-Me, running straight to toward the bad guy!
And then she
She, er...
Well, she appears to be attempting to knock the guy over, but instead she just causes him to slide a few feet away from Anya.
Anya stares up at Me-Me, who is huffing angrily. "Me-Me-san..." She sees Tsugumi struggling to catch up with Me-Me. "And Tsugumi-san, too."
Anya wibbles tearfully.
Me-Me turns toward the gentleman that she ran straight into. "Anya-san, is he somebody that we know?"
"No, we have never met him before..."
"Is that so." Anya rolls up her sleeves and makes a fist. "Then I'll take care of him!!"
"Wait, Me-Me-san!!" Anya protests. "He isn't like our usual opponents! This is no mere practice match...!"
"No problem." Me-Me smiles at Anya. "I'm always spacing out, so I don't really know any reason to be afraid right now!"
Oh, that's reassuring.
For the first time, Creepster looks concerned.
Anya glares daggers at him. "And as for anybody who would dare harm my 'Funes'... No mercy."
Okay, not only is that panel of Anya's face completely awesome, but that line of dialogue is completely awesome because FUCK YEAH AWESOME ARGENTINIAN AUTHOR REFERENCE!!! Funes is the name of the main character in Jorge Luis Borge's short story "Funes the Memorious," and his defining trait is that he suffers from hypermesia, a condition which means that he perceives everything around him in full detail and remembers it all forever.
So basically Me-Me is saying that she relies on Anya to remember things for her. As she demonstrated a second ago and several times in previous chapters.
(And yes, Me-Me is deliberately calling Anya "my Funes," NOT forgetting or messing up Anya's name. You can tell because when Me-Me usually misremembers somebody's name - as she is about to do twice in a scene coming up a few pages hence - Me-Me says the wrong name without quotation marks or any other special punctuation in her word bubble. In this case, however, "my Funes" is written with quotation marks within Me-Me's word bubble. So that means that Me-Me is intentionally saying that Anya is "her Funes" instead of misremembering Anya's name.)
Meanwhile, Tsugumi is still huffing and puffing along, trying to catch up with the action. "Me... Me-Me-chan... You're too fast..."
Before Me-Me can open up a can of whoop-ass, however, Akane has to pull a Black Star and enter the scene in the most spectacularly up-stagey way possible. "GET BACK!!"
Pulling a Black Star in more than one way, apparently.
Tsugumi is bowled over by the blowback from Akane's attack. "Akane-san...!! Clay-san?"
Awesome punctuation there, Ohkubo. Awesome.
"Man, it's just one thing after another today..." Clay says.
"These girls and we are not trained as Shibusen's combat agents," Akane tells the Creepster. "Fighting us would hardly be an appropriate test of your strength as a Traitor. Wouldn't you rather take your leave now?"
The Creepster grins creepily.
And then I guess he leaves, because in the next panel he is gone!
Tsugumi frets over Anya. "Are you okay, Anya-san?"
"He sure left easily enough," Clay comments.
"We'll walk with you back to the girls' dorm," Akane tells the girls.
Anya shamefully makes ellipses.
"Thank you very much!" Tsugumi tells the guys.
Some time later! Anya is sitting alone, regarding the wound on her arm where the Creepster managed to slash her. Unfortunately, Tsugumi suddenly shows up, sees Anya's arm, and freaks out. "Anya-san!! You were wounded this whole time?!"
"Oh, a scratch like this is hardly something to be concerned about," Anya says, rather unconvincingly.
"You... Look awfully pale and sweaty," Tsugumi comments.
"Shouldn't you go see Jose Mendoza-sensei in the nurse's office?" Me-Me suggests.
"You mean Medusa-sensei."
"You should do something about that cut!" Me-Me insists again, not missing a beat. Or possibly because she's already forgotten that she just suggested seeing the school nurse a second ago.
"I insist that I feel fine..."
"But you've got a fever!!" Tsugumi exclaims, touching Anya's forehead.
And once again, the girls are so loud that they're drawing Kim's attention.
The needle on that man's finger... Anya contemplates the cut on her arm. It may have been soaked in poison...
"Hey noob. Outta my way," Kim says.
"AH!!" Tsugumi exclaims. "The wi... Kim-senpai..."
"Hey blondie, show me that cut," Kim says.
"Excuse me?"
"Hurry up," Kim says, grabbing at Anya's arm instead of waiting for Anya to offer it. "Time is money, you know."
"That hurts..."
Tsugumi flails around uselessly in the background. "Ah.... Um... Please don't be so rough..."
Me-Me hovers nervously behind Kim. "Dom-senpai..."
Kim regards Anya's arm seriously, then looks up at Anya and says, "You have such smooth, beautiful skin."
"EXCUSE ME?!"
Kim puts a band-aid on Anya's cut. "It's just a shallow scratch," she says. "And you probably just got overheated when you came inside after being outdoors."
"Oh my," Anya gasps. "I feel completely fine... Was it all just my imagination...?"
"Kim-senpai..." Tsugumi asks nervously. "How... How much do we owe you...?"
"Nothing," Kim says. "Consider this a freebie." When she notices that Tsugumi still looks nervous, she adds, "Why do you ask? Do you want to pay?"
"No! No thank you!"
Kim leaves and walks back through the dorm. Suddenly, a girl dressed all in black confronts her. "Kim. You did something to that girl just now, didn't you."
"'Scuse me?!" Kim says.
"What did you do to her?"
Kim smirks at the other girl. "Your name's Jacqueline, right? You'd better be careful not to act too cocky just 'cause you're an EAT student." Kim walks right past Jackie, waving at her as she goes. "And the next time that you want to talk to me, you better make an appointment and pay my fee, Miss Stick-Up-Yer-Ass."
Meanwhile, back with our heroines! "Anya-san, you made us really worried, leaving the class without us."
Anya glares at Tsugumi. "And do you suppose it is fair for you to always be abandoning me while you cavort exclusively with Me-Me-san?"
Tsugumi falls all over herself to apologize. "ANYA-SAN!! I'm so so sorry about what happened during class today! Truly sorry!!"
Meanwhile, Me-Me is having a LIGHTBULB MOMENT. "Anya-san!" She writes Next time is Anya-san's turn on her arm and shows it to Anya. "This way even *I* won't forget!"
Tsugumi writes on her arm and shows it to Anya. "Me too."
Anya smiles when she sees that Tsugumi has written Next is Anya-chan's turn on her arm.
But then, the next day at class...
Unfortunately, we didn't realize that as soon as we took a shower the writing would be gone...
"Bird-brain!" Anya accuses a very confused-looking Me-Me.
"Heeeeey, Anya," Sid says, pushing Earphones!boy toward her.
And thus the chapter ends, with Tsugumi's narration not showing up AT ALL until the very last panel of the very last page. I wonder if we're going to get any more narration at all next month. Maybe this is Ohkubo's way of phasing it out?
Or maybe he's just inconsistent with every aspect of his writing.
Well, I guess we'll find out for certain next month!
Also, eff Tsugumi/Anya or Tsugumi/Me-Me, I'm totally shipping Anya/Me-Me now. When Me-Me called Anya "my Funes" I just wibbled uncontrollably. D'awwwwwwwww. And there have been more and more Anya/Me-Me moments in recent chapters, so much ♥ for that.
Anywhoo, in this chapter, Me-Me makes an erudite reference to Jorge Luis Borges!
Also, there is punching and stuff.
So we begin a few steps behind where we left off last month, with Tsugumi and Me-Me still trying to quiz Anya's temporary partner about what happened to Anya. "Umm~~ So your partner Anya-san? Did she go home already?"
Earphones!boy says nothing.
"Maybe... Anya-san... already left without us?"
Meanwhile, Anya is confronting a Traitor. "And what, pray tell, are you supposed to be...?"
Creepster has a symbol on his jacket that's an "M" with an arrow and the same symbol in his eyeball. Waitaminute...
Nah, too obvious. If it's a conclusion that Kid would jump to then it's probably wrong.
(ETA: As was pointed out in the comments, Creepster is actually wearing the symbol for Scorpio, which makes sense considering his use of a poisoned stinger coming up in a few pages.)
Anyway, Creepster stares at Anya's skull brooch. "I found one..."
"What an ominous gentleman..." Anya comments.
And then he tries to attack her with a finger-spear.
Anya dodges. "What is the meaning of this?!" she demands to know. "That fighting stance... It is an imitation of 'mantis boxing', is it not?" Anya thoughtfully chews on some ellipses, then concludes, "It appears to be slightly different."
Still narrating to herself, Anya goes on, "It seems as though I have become somehow entangled with this eerie fellow... Well, this is the choice that I made when I fled from my castle and came to Shibusen. If something like this never happened to me then it would be so dreadfully boring." Anya assumes her fighting stance. "This is an excellent opportunity to test the Royal Karate that I studied at home!!" Especially since Tsugumi isn't here - I must rely on my own strength!!
The creepster is unimpressed.
Even though I have never been in a true fight before... Of course there was that incident on my first day at Shibusen, but that isn't at all comparable to a situation like this... To say nothing of the practice sparring that we do in class... Anya realizes that her fist is trembling. My fist is trembling. She forces herself to stop shaking.
Arrrrrrgh, Ohkubo! Show, don't tell! SHOW, DON'T TELL!
That panel of Anya's fist trembling and then her forcing herself to stop would have been much more effective without the added Narration of the Incredibly Obvious.
Just saying.
He made the first move... He struck with clear and purposeful intent. And yet...
And now he's just standing there, not moving. And Anya's heart is thumping in her chest.
I cannot bring myself to make a move against him...
So he makes the next move instead.
His right finger!! As long as I can avoid his right finger that is bearing a weapon's blade... If I can just take one step back and increase the distance between us, then...
He steps on her foot, holding her in place.
He's fighting dirty! Anya raises her arm to protect her face from a slash. No fair!!
Anya falls down. "You coward!!"
Creepster looms over Anya. He points his finger-blade (I have no idea what to call that thing) at her face.
Anya's face drips with nervous sweat.
Finally, however, Anya apparently decides to completely abandon her dignity. "EEEEEEEEEK! SOMEBODY HEEEEEEEELP MEEEEEEEEEEE!"
Aaaaaaand here comes Me-Me, running straight to toward the bad guy!
And then she
She, er...
Well, she appears to be attempting to knock the guy over, but instead she just causes him to slide a few feet away from Anya.
Anya stares up at Me-Me, who is huffing angrily. "Me-Me-san..." She sees Tsugumi struggling to catch up with Me-Me. "And Tsugumi-san, too."
Anya wibbles tearfully.
Me-Me turns toward the gentleman that she ran straight into. "Anya-san, is he somebody that we know?"
"No, we have never met him before..."
"Is that so." Anya rolls up her sleeves and makes a fist. "Then I'll take care of him!!"
"Wait, Me-Me-san!!" Anya protests. "He isn't like our usual opponents! This is no mere practice match...!"
"No problem." Me-Me smiles at Anya. "I'm always spacing out, so I don't really know any reason to be afraid right now!"
Oh, that's reassuring.
For the first time, Creepster looks concerned.
Anya glares daggers at him. "And as for anybody who would dare harm my 'Funes'... No mercy."
Okay, not only is that panel of Anya's face completely awesome, but that line of dialogue is completely awesome because FUCK YEAH AWESOME ARGENTINIAN AUTHOR REFERENCE!!! Funes is the name of the main character in Jorge Luis Borge's short story "Funes the Memorious," and his defining trait is that he suffers from hypermesia, a condition which means that he perceives everything around him in full detail and remembers it all forever.
So basically Me-Me is saying that she relies on Anya to remember things for her. As she demonstrated a second ago and several times in previous chapters.
(And yes, Me-Me is deliberately calling Anya "my Funes," NOT forgetting or messing up Anya's name. You can tell because when Me-Me usually misremembers somebody's name - as she is about to do twice in a scene coming up a few pages hence - Me-Me says the wrong name without quotation marks or any other special punctuation in her word bubble. In this case, however, "my Funes" is written with quotation marks within Me-Me's word bubble. So that means that Me-Me is intentionally saying that Anya is "her Funes" instead of misremembering Anya's name.)
Meanwhile, Tsugumi is still huffing and puffing along, trying to catch up with the action. "Me... Me-Me-chan... You're too fast..."
Before Me-Me can open up a can of whoop-ass, however, Akane has to pull a Black Star and enter the scene in the most spectacularly up-stagey way possible. "GET BACK!!"
Pulling a Black Star in more than one way, apparently.
Tsugumi is bowled over by the blowback from Akane's attack. "Akane-san...!! Clay-san?"
Awesome punctuation there, Ohkubo. Awesome.
"Man, it's just one thing after another today..." Clay says.
"These girls and we are not trained as Shibusen's combat agents," Akane tells the Creepster. "Fighting us would hardly be an appropriate test of your strength as a Traitor. Wouldn't you rather take your leave now?"
The Creepster grins creepily.
And then I guess he leaves, because in the next panel he is gone!
Tsugumi frets over Anya. "Are you okay, Anya-san?"
"He sure left easily enough," Clay comments.
"We'll walk with you back to the girls' dorm," Akane tells the girls.
Anya shamefully makes ellipses.
"Thank you very much!" Tsugumi tells the guys.
Some time later! Anya is sitting alone, regarding the wound on her arm where the Creepster managed to slash her. Unfortunately, Tsugumi suddenly shows up, sees Anya's arm, and freaks out. "Anya-san!! You were wounded this whole time?!"
"Oh, a scratch like this is hardly something to be concerned about," Anya says, rather unconvincingly.
"You... Look awfully pale and sweaty," Tsugumi comments.
"Shouldn't you go see Jose Mendoza-sensei in the nurse's office?" Me-Me suggests.
"You mean Medusa-sensei."
"You should do something about that cut!" Me-Me insists again, not missing a beat. Or possibly because she's already forgotten that she just suggested seeing the school nurse a second ago.
"I insist that I feel fine..."
"But you've got a fever!!" Tsugumi exclaims, touching Anya's forehead.
And once again, the girls are so loud that they're drawing Kim's attention.
The needle on that man's finger... Anya contemplates the cut on her arm. It may have been soaked in poison...
"Hey noob. Outta my way," Kim says.
"AH!!" Tsugumi exclaims. "The wi... Kim-senpai..."
"Hey blondie, show me that cut," Kim says.
"Excuse me?"
"Hurry up," Kim says, grabbing at Anya's arm instead of waiting for Anya to offer it. "Time is money, you know."
"That hurts..."
Tsugumi flails around uselessly in the background. "Ah.... Um... Please don't be so rough..."
Me-Me hovers nervously behind Kim. "Dom-senpai..."
Kim regards Anya's arm seriously, then looks up at Anya and says, "You have such smooth, beautiful skin."
"EXCUSE ME?!"
Kim puts a band-aid on Anya's cut. "It's just a shallow scratch," she says. "And you probably just got overheated when you came inside after being outdoors."
"Oh my," Anya gasps. "I feel completely fine... Was it all just my imagination...?"
"Kim-senpai..." Tsugumi asks nervously. "How... How much do we owe you...?"
"Nothing," Kim says. "Consider this a freebie." When she notices that Tsugumi still looks nervous, she adds, "Why do you ask? Do you want to pay?"
"No! No thank you!"
Kim leaves and walks back through the dorm. Suddenly, a girl dressed all in black confronts her. "Kim. You did something to that girl just now, didn't you."
"'Scuse me?!" Kim says.
"What did you do to her?"
Kim smirks at the other girl. "Your name's Jacqueline, right? You'd better be careful not to act too cocky just 'cause you're an EAT student." Kim walks right past Jackie, waving at her as she goes. "And the next time that you want to talk to me, you better make an appointment and pay my fee, Miss Stick-Up-Yer-Ass."
Meanwhile, back with our heroines! "Anya-san, you made us really worried, leaving the class without us."
Anya glares at Tsugumi. "And do you suppose it is fair for you to always be abandoning me while you cavort exclusively with Me-Me-san?"
Tsugumi falls all over herself to apologize. "ANYA-SAN!! I'm so so sorry about what happened during class today! Truly sorry!!"
Meanwhile, Me-Me is having a LIGHTBULB MOMENT. "Anya-san!" She writes Next time is Anya-san's turn on her arm and shows it to Anya. "This way even *I* won't forget!"
Tsugumi writes on her arm and shows it to Anya. "Me too."
Anya smiles when she sees that Tsugumi has written Next is Anya-chan's turn on her arm.
But then, the next day at class...
Unfortunately, we didn't realize that as soon as we took a shower the writing would be gone...
"Bird-brain!" Anya accuses a very confused-looking Me-Me.
"Heeeeey, Anya," Sid says, pushing Earphones!boy toward her.
And thus the chapter ends, with Tsugumi's narration not showing up AT ALL until the very last panel of the very last page. I wonder if we're going to get any more narration at all next month. Maybe this is Ohkubo's way of phasing it out?
Or maybe he's just inconsistent with every aspect of his writing.
Well, I guess we'll find out for certain next month!
Also, eff Tsugumi/Anya or Tsugumi/Me-Me, I'm totally shipping Anya/Me-Me now. When Me-Me called Anya "my Funes" I just wibbled uncontrollably. D'awwwwwwwww. And there have been more and more Anya/Me-Me moments in recent chapters, so much ♥ for that.
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I wonder what Kim meant when she told Jackie "you're just and EAT student"? Aren't EAT students higher than NOT students?
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Thanks for the recap btw =D
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All of these cute girl ships, I can't hold them.
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About shippings, I like all the girls, but Anya and Me-Me are my favs, so yes, I ship Anya/Me-Me >D
and Akane/Clay cofcofThank you very much!!!
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I assume that eventually we're going to get some sort of storyline about how Jackie became Kim's loyal friend, so that's definitely something to look forward to!
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For the creepster guy : M + Arrow symbol look like the Scorpio zodiac symbol.
The "finger blade" weapon, it could be seen as a scorpion sting and Anya was poisoned...
Lack of knowledge on Borges, so thanks for the explanation for "Funes".
Kim and Jackie before their friendship/partnership. Glad to see this.
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(Anonymous) 2011-05-22 04:34 pm (UTC)(link)no subject
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(Anonymous) 2011-05-22 11:27 pm (UTC)(link)no subject
(Anonymous) 2011-05-25 01:23 am (UTC)(link)no subject
Nice to see that the double standard has been dropped, at least for this chapter.
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As always, thank you for the recap!!!
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And yes, I love love love having all of this juicy new background about Kim and Jackie.