#kysol

[zesn]

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[dgsfufu]

Guilty Gear Xrd Sign, minor fluff lost in translation

I've fallen into a Guilty Gear rabbit hole lately and I can't help but notice some minor things lost in translation. Being bugged by how no one seems to be pointing it out, I've decided to make a post about it.

3 tidbits about Sol, Ky, and their relationship conversation bits that didn't clear the translation barrier in one piece.

PS. Things get lost in translation all the time since no two languages are completely the same, which is perfectly ok! I will also try not to nitpick too much, no point in it.

Come one come all it's canonical SolKy or KySol food.

1. Overall tone. This portion has a good sprinkling of my opinion so keep it in mind as you read through.

Overall there's a difference in JP Sol and EN Sol in Xrd Sign and to some extent Xrd Rev2. Sol doesn't snark in JP as much, EN plays this up slightly. JP Sol is largely sarcastic and dismissive (lesser extent towards Ky and Sin), mostly similar to EN. I suspect the extra snark is to play up his assholish American traits since he's clearly written to be that way originally, lol.

Ky is well handled in comparison in EN. I don't have much to say about his character. His speech is very much in keigo and overall not too much was added nor taken away.

2. Example of extra snark and... Sol having high blood pressure.

Chapter 2, Struggle A (Link to transcript)

[EN] Sol: Ky, you know what high blood pressure is, right? If this conversation doesn't end, oh, I don't know, RIGHT NOW, mine's gonna give me an aneurysm.

[JP] Sol: Ky, you know I DO have high blood pressure? If this conversation doesn't end in 5 minutes I'm going to drop dead from being pissed off.

In JP, this line is phrased as カイ、テメェは俺が高血圧だと知っているな？, where it implies more that Ky should know Sol actually has hypertension... And while the English has retained it somewhat, the way it's worded makes it sound more like something a person would lie about just to be extra mean.

So I guess Sol has hypertension in canon.

3. Ky cares a great deal about Sol. +Sol doesn't call Ky a kid and does not treat him like one, but rather a familiar stranger in the start of Xrd Sign.

In Chapter 4 Part B (Link to transcript)

[EN] Ky: It is not! Yes, he took away some of what makes you human, but that doesn't mean he altered your mind or your soul.

[EN] Sol: So what?

[EN] Ky: I want to believe that you'll fight for the people of this world.

[EN] Sol: Are we seriously having this conversation?

[EN] Sol: Look, kid. I'm a monster. I'm here to do two things: Destroy That Man, and kill all the other Gears.

This is a slight nitpick because in context Sol isn't talking down to Ky, but putting his view into place juxtaposed to his. The EN isn't wrong to use “kid”, but messes up a potentially important bit -- that Sol does not see Ky as a naive boy anymore.

At no point in JP does he call Ky "boy" 坊や or "kid" 小僧, it seems like Ky has officially graduated from that nickname as of Overture. I've ran through a disgusting amount of lines (not all! so busy and idk how to find the short stories from the artbooks. T_T) and could not find any trace of that nickname in JP anywhere from Xrd onwards. Plus, Sol doesn't talk down to Ky in JP - in fact he seems to regard Ky as a familiar stranger more than anything else.

Sol: Not too different from the Valentines in that sense. Now if you've got it in your head that we're gonna be best pals, rethink that. I've got my own shit to take care of.

The conversation goes on a little, until this part which would make anyone's heart melt a bit.

[EN] Ky: If tomorrow promises to be cold and dark, I cannot stand idly by...even if I know my efforts will come to nothing.

[JP] Ky: If your tomorrow promises to be cold and dark, then I cannot remain a bystander and watch.

In JP Ky explicitly says "your tomorrow". Not everyone's, not humanity's, but Sol's tomorrow. Humanity's tomorrow is important, yes, but right now in this scene, Ky cares a great deal about Sol.

Sol, shocked for a moment, returns this.

[EN] Sol: ...The self-righteous apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

[JP] Sol: .... Jeez. Both the father and his son...

I think the localized result is more viable, since you can't really chuck a line like mine into a localized game. It's awkward English. But I do think it's kind of a missed opportunity when Sol says it softly and doesn't rag on their sense of justice, but rather their attachment towards him that he can't shake off.

This softness appears later in the convo as well however.

[EN] Ky: I don't expect the world to change tomorrow, but I do hope that, today, perhaps my words will reach you.

Sol... I'll be waiting for you. We'll all be waiting for you. Sin, Dizzy... Once all this is over...come home.

[JP] Ky: I'm not so foolish to think I can change anything overnight. So for now... I hope at least my words will reach you.

Listen, Sol. I'll be waiting for you. Sin and Dizzy too... We will all wait together. Once this is all over, come back to us.

Note again the lack of the world or humanity's tomorrow in the undertone. The meaning is largely retained, and the slight stretch to change "come back to us", to "come home" is valid with the sentiment of a home established back in Overture. I like it. (Also see the OST, Coming Home for the extra emphasis.)

Sol reacts to this with a surprisingly soft laugh.

[EN/JP] Sol: ... You're making me sick. Sure you didn't hit your head or something?

That's the end for now.

I’ve done another Lost In Translation for Revelator/Rev2! Takes a good time to gather materials and put them together lol. There's a sloppily translated bookstart and bookend plot point in that one, and a semi lost foreshadowing for Strive. There’s not much SolKy/KySol on this.

Feel free to take a look!

[aeonouji]

Closer

Needed some more half-complete SolKy… Closer acoustic by Alkatera

“Well, there’s a hotel nearby.” “It better have a damn bar, kid.” “Oh, don’t be such an a child.” It was a moment where bad judgement didn’t mean the end of the world. Ky kissed Sol in a drunken haze. Their car was pretty much dead. And now they were in their hotel peeling each other’s clothes off. Ky pulls off several of Sol’s belts. Sol tears off Ky’s several layers. Layers upon layers peel off until all that’s making contact is their skin. Sol kisses down Ky’s chest stopping right above his hips. Ky drunkenly giggles at Sol’s actions. Rather than have to be at the receiving end, Ky gets up and presses his lips against Sol’s. They readjust so they’re chest to chest and Sol is resting both hands at Ky’s sides. Ky wraps his arms around his neck pulling him in for another kiss. They were both pretty damn shit-faced. Sol goes in for another kiss. His hands fumble around the nightstand for some kind of lube. He couldn’t go in dry. Not with a hot mood like this. He coats two fingers in lube. Ky just pulls him closer. Fuck. He wanted to do this badly. The first finger goes in easily. Ky squirms. He inserts the other immediately after. “Nngh.” “Deal with it, kid.” Sol commands. Ky bites his lip, then he bites at Sol’s neck. He claws at his back as the discomfort turns into pleasure. He hisses in pain. “S-Sol, ah!” Ky gasps out as he moves against his fingers. He pulls him closer. He bites at his shoulder. This kid was gonna get it if he didn’t stop his biting. Fuck this. If Ky was gonna be this way, he might as well speed things up. Ky whimpers at the loss of feeling. Suddenly, he moans. Sol could give less of a damn about condoms right now. He really wanted to fuck Ky senseless.

[aeonouji]

Take Me To Church

Inspired by Ellie Goulding’s cover of Take Me to Church. It’s less gospel more vibes and aesthetic. Something about her voice with the soft rhythm just calms me down…

Summary: From the beginning to now, he’s always got himself buried in the past. Buried in his own goddamn messiah complex. Sol wants to tell him it’s fine to be human. He just can’t muster up the balls.

It’s soft breathing that wakes him up. It’s not his own. It’s ragged and nervous. Each breath shaking more than the last. Muffled by their hands. Sol is up but refuses to find the source of the breathing. That’s because it was -past tense- curled against him. In this too damn plush bed, is the ever godly young king Kiske in an upright sitting position and Sol. He can feel him shift. He can hear him murmur. The short gasping of phrases to calm himself. He turns to face Ky. His blue eyes are bright against the dimmed lights. Ky must have had a nightmare. And in his haste, he must have turned on a light. “Oh, did I wake you?” He forces a smile on his face. It’s the same smile he has on when he’s happy. Sol can’t be sure if he should be pissed that Ky could so easily force a usually genuine smile or feel bad for him. He grunts in disagreement. “Been up for a while.” He lies. Sol moves to rest his head in Ky’s lap. Ky tenses and relaxes. His breaths aren’t labored anymore. Ky tucks a strand of hair behind his ear. The usually tied up hair is resting on his shoulders. In the dim light, Sol can make out some of the features on his face. His long lashes frame crystal blue eyes. Skin as perfect as porcelain. And just as pale. They sit in the silence. Sol closes his eyes. He’s comfortable like this. “I’m sorry for waking you.” Ky says abruptly. He grunts again. Ky strokes his hair. It’s a stupid gesture. He thinks. It’s not like he was a kid who needed comforting. The roles should be reversed then. He takes the hand stroking his hair and kisses his wrist. It’s not so much kissing as it is pressing his lips to a delicate wrist. “Sol?” Ky tilts his head not used to the affection. There’s the quiet of crickets outside. Their chirping more loud than it actually was. His voice is soft and comfortable. His tone is that of a scared child. Ky’s always been like this. Especially after a nightmare. “What was it this time?” He asks. Ky’s reluctant to answer. His gaze averted away from him. His eyebrows furrowed and lips pursed into a thin line. He doesn’t respond. Sol sits up. He wasn’t good at shit like this. He wasn’t talkative by any means. He doesn’t turn to looks at Ky. Rather, Ky rests his head against Sol’s back. The weight on his back wasn’t all that appreciated. “Am I a good king?” “Kid-” “Humor me Sol.” He sighs. He wasn’t one for pillow talk. Ky gets off his back. Sol goes to fall back on the pillows. Ky rests against his chest. They stay like that for a moment. The silence is more than enough to give him time to think. “Good is good and bad is bad.” He responds.

HAHA CAN’T THINK OF A WAY TO DO THE STORY PYRAMID. NOT COMPLETE.

[general-loki]

衣装 | P子

[anuhesut]

Reversal

Someone mentioned that she couldn't imagine a KySol. So here's a visual. :v I'm still thinking what to do with it...

[persisting]

He knew he'd missed the formation and headcount, but he couldn't for the life of him imagine why Kiske had come himself to look for him, when there were so many dozens of important and decorated men and women willing to run and jump and fetch at the slightest flicker of an eyelash from him.

He didn't feel like fielding the kid's ruffled feathers just now. He smoothed the case with his thumb again, trying vainly to wipe away age old scratches in the cracked plastic. There were others scattered around, most of them ground into dust and splintery pieces by the march of time, of hundreds of years of weather and trespassing feet. The building itself had been free-standing at some point, but some massive impact had knocked it onto its side. There was ancient crusted blackness slashed across the rubble here and there; it was clear enough what had happened.

"You were missed, during the count," said Kiske from behind him. "Beauregard informed me that he'd seen you returning to the field after the fighting was over, otherwise there would be a search party out right now." As Sol had predicted, he sounded irritated, perhaps a little more than he might usually have been. Kiske in his office and before a battle was a very different person than Kiske after a battle, he was beginning to learn. 

"What exactly are you doing?"

Sol opened the jewel case carefully. The disc inside was split neatly in two, the white phoenix bisected, the heraldry lions eternally separated. 

"Oh, oh, people of Earth," he said, unable to coax the words in song but finding them almost in prayer instead. "Listen to the warning, the prophet he said -- for soon the cold of night will fall, summoned by your own hand."

When he looked up Kiske was staring at him, faintly tense, for once with nothing to say, and for once Sol was glad of it. 

"He told of death as a done white haze, taking the lost and the unloved babe. Late, too late, all the wretches run -- these kinds of beasts now counting their days."

"What?" Kiske whispered. He looked a bit pale. Sol smiled at him, and tossed the broken disc back into the ancient rubble. 

"Don't tell me you don't know the story of Noah and the ark," he said, and stood up, the heavy and much loathed armory sword banging against his hip in its sheath. 

"Well, yes, but--"

"So am I grooming horses or cleaning latrines when we get back, or what?" 

Kiske lowered the hand he'd half outstretched. "You," he said, and turned his head away to cough into his fist briefly, trying to clear the unexpected roughness away. "You... no. I only came to tell you that if you have some reason to not be present during formation count, I would appreciate being informed beforehand."

Sol turned around and gave him an exaggerated, sarcastic salute, which put some of the anger back into the boy's face. "If you go missing without explanation," Kiske added, a little extra poison at the tip of his blade, "We won't have time to send a search party."

"Fine. I don't really need one anyway." 

He picked his way out of the rubble and back into the snowdrifts, his boots already soaked through and steaming in great puffs of white. The sword banged into his thigh with bruising force and he fought the urge to rip it from his belt and throw it as hard as he could into the city's wreckage, just to see how far it would go. 

There was no point in waiting. There was no point in trying to play by any rules. All that remained for him in places like this were reminders of a sensible world, an accessible one -- a world as gone and forgotten now as any other number of ancient civilizations swallowed by the seas and sands of their old gods. 

Only one relic left.

/I'm just going to fucking confront Undersn and threaten to set his beard on fire until he tells me where it is./

"Was that poetry?" 

Kiske's blond head appeared beside him, even as he walked with his longest strides. The boy had no trouble keeping up. The cold had put pink into his cheeks, and he huffed slightly. His eyes were bright and curious. Sol glanced at him in sidelong disbelief. 

"No," he said, gruffly. "It was music." 

"Oh," said Kiske.

For a moment the only sound was the crunch of their boots in the snow.

"I enjoy music very much," said Kiske, a little more softly. When Sol glanced up again he was looking away with an air of faint embarrassment. "It's very difficult to come by, in reproduced forms. You must have been very lucky, to have such access."

Sol was no longer feeling like the triumphant victor of a debate. He was feeling a little more like an asshole. 

"Yeah," he said, and leaned over to elbow Kiske lightly. The boy looked at him, startled by such intimacy, and Sol grinned. "If I find anymore, I'll share it with you, all right?"

Kiske lifted his eyebrows a little. "I suppose," he said, "That such a task would be worth skipping a formation for." He smiled in return, an expression that lit his face and brightened his eyes and erased the hard and worried tension in his jaw and his forehead, and for the first time Sol realized with unguarded vulnerability that there was more to the boy's beauty than his physicality, more to the strange sun-lightness of him than the pale of his hair and skin. There was something in the boy's very essence that seduced the heart and pulled at the soul, and perhaps all these worshipful lackies and trusting old men weren't entirely off base.

"I'll find you something you'll like, Sir," Sol said, and while it had been worth it before to bait and look for the flicker of storm, it was strangely worth it now too, to see that sunlight again in the boy's grateful smile.

[persisting]

hey does anybody else here like war stories and sexual tension between messianic teenagers and the massive ancient war machines who love them (really though here's a small guilty gear war-era thing i wrote for a friend.)

"Why?" Ky said, passing him the bowl of cold water he'd acquired from the platoon's supplies. Sol took it between his palms, rubbing the rough ceramic slowly in a circle. The cold leeched into his skin for a moment, little pinpricks of ice, and then his own internal heat flared up and replaced it, and the bowl grew hot between his fingers. Ky watched him as steam rose up off the water, and then turned to grab a towel, folding it across his hands as he offered them out to Sol again. 

"It's something politicians do," Sol said, passing the bowl back. Ky set it on the table with the graceful precision that accompanied all of his movements, not spilling a drop or scalding himself even a little. The light of the lanterns put an orange-red glow into his dusty pale hair as he bent his head. "You know, walking around, shaking hands -- kissing babies."

"That isn't what this was," Ky said. He was unbuttoning his coat and shrugging it off without even looking to see if Sol was watching, which meant that this was the arena of conversation and ordinary soldier-in-the-field ablutions, rather than something more untoward. When he pulled off his undershirt Sol saw the four deep claw marks across his ribs, red and still scabbing at their deepest points, and he remembered how much worse that might have been, had Ky not been Ky. There was new bruising down his sternum as well, discoloration across his flat stomach, and Sol knew it went all the way down to his thigh. He'd seen the impact of the fall.  "This wasn't something I wanted," Ky was saying, and Sol straightened, lipping the unlit cigarette clenched between his teeth. The boy was frowning now, watching the ripple of the water as he dipped his cloth into the bowl and began to wash the grime from his shoulders and underarms. "It just happens, sometimes."

Sol laughed. "Just happens," he repeated. "Look, my German's not great, but those people were calling you Jesus goddamn Christ, Ky." 

"I'm fairly certain that 'goddamn' isn't a part of any of Our Lord's titles," Ky said, unruffled by the obscenity, or by the blasphemy. Exposure to disease, he'd once told Sol, did wonders for making one immune. "In any case, they were wrong."

"It sure made them happy to see you."

Ky gave him an uncomfortable glance, once hand pressed against his own neck, the cloth dripping warm water down his chest. His skin gleamed golden in the light. "That may be," he said, "But I make no claims of... of inappropriate sanctity. I tried to discourage them, but Major Geund was translating, and..."

"And he doesn't disagree," Sol finished for him. He'd seen the way Major Geund looked at High Commander Kiske, all right. "Well, fine. As long as it gives them hope, right?"

The boy didn't respond to that, and for a while the only sound in the tent was the flicker and spit of the lantern wicks, and the quiet splashing and dripping of Ky's bathing. It had been a wildly successful campaign -- a victory of human life and few casualties after three days worth of hunting and being hunted by strange new Gears they'd never seen before, things with long, powerful hind legs equipped with gleaming talons, and roaring, raging mouths shaped like the beak of a squid, others the size of elephants, with grasping, simian-like hands and gaping hippopotamus mouths. The liberated city had poured forth from its previously sealed gates, and the only word on the lips of the celebrating citizens, the only name they raised alongside that of God, had been "Kiske." 

He'd watched Ky walk among them, gleaming white and pale on the muddy, bloodstained cobblestones, the late afternoon sunlight touching his hair and raising a halo of gold in reflection. He'd watched as the boy laid his hand on the tops of bowed heads, as men and women wept and clutched at the hem of his tattered cloak, as he'd leaned down to kiss the cheek of an old woman too weak to stand and meet him, and she clutched her chest over her heart and wailed aloud. He'd watched as they'd mobbed him, clustering so close and with such urgent desperation that Ky's officers had been needed to push them back, lest the boy be trampled to death. 

Messias, Messias, they'd cried. Heilig Messias. And the last remaining bell in the city's central church had rung, endlessly, and still echoed in Sol's head now.

"Yes," said Ky, holding his cloth loosely between both hands, head bowed. "I suppose the outcome is what's important." He held out his sword arm in front of his face, turning it over. There was a deep cut on the underside, grubby from lack of attention, and he began to clean it himself, wincing a little at the sting. "Morale is an army's most valuable weapon."

"It's not," Sol said. He plucked the cigarette from his lips and put it away, back into his pack with a care to rival Ky's own. "Its leader is."

The boy looked up at him, and there was such an anguish on his face in that moment that Sol blinked and leaned back, feeling almost physically propelled. 

"Do you think so?" Ky asked him, voice soft. His fingers gripped the edge of the water basin. His knuckles were white. "I don't feel that way at all. A leader is only the sum of his people, Sol. A leader is only the will of his people given shape and form." His expression had twisted -- disbelieving, and oddly betrayed. "He should be what he is needed to be when he is needed to be it. Nothing more and nothing less."

"Kid," Sol said, and the boy's head lifted in a jerking motion, like a defiant young horse preparing to prance away from a bridle. Sol lifted his hands a little, shaking his head. 

"I didn't mean anything by it," he said.

For a long moment Ky looked at him, head held imperiously high, and Sol could see the thunderstorm passing through his eyes.

"I didn't ask to be called such things," he said at last. His voice shook faintly with the righteousness of his conviction. "I will be it if they ask me to be, but I did not seek it for myself."

"Shit," Sol said, "You think I don't know that?"

The unstudied relaxing of Ky's indignant shoulder position told him he'd discovered at least part of the problem, though the rest remained elusive, as Ky turned away from him again. 

"I'm tired," he said. There was a young and plaintive note to the words, as though he were hoping Sol wouldn't make him beg, as though he were hoping that Sol would understand that he was exhausting to deal with, and not entirely in ways that had to do with petty bickering and disobedient battlefield behavior. "I will speak with you in the morning." He sat down on his cot, dropping his cloth on the table next to the basin, and picked up his journal from the ground next to it. He held it between his hands without opening it, looking pointedly at the worn leather cover. 

Thoroughly dismissed and knowing better than to resist, especially when his presence in Ky's personal space was by such a tremulous invitation in the first place, Sol got up. His knees clicked in protest at the movement. He lifted the tent flap, but something made him turn back before he went back out into the humid night. 

"I say," he said, unable to keep the reproach out of his own voice, "If you were really as Godly as everyone thinks, you'd be a hell of a lot less disagreeable, Kid."

Ky looked up again, and he tipped his head slightly to one side, considering Sol with that discomforting and natural superiority that swept away all memory of his age or his more vulnerable moments, and left behind only the really uncomfortable feeling of being looked at patiently from a very ornate pulpit. There was a smile glimmering on his lips.

"Go /away/, Sol Badguy," he said, without rancor. 

Sol went.