#he was a child sent on a quest to keep his mum from being married to an abusive man

[encrucijada]

hello white woman writer. i would like you to write a medusa retelling that does not include 1) her getting assaulted by poseidon, 2) athena cursing her for getting assaulted, 3) perseus as the villain. you may not use ovid's metamorphoses as a source. good luck

#sorry i just looked at a review of stone blind by natalie haynes and are we seriously disrespecting perseus like that #he was a child sent on a quest to keep his mum from being married to an abusive man #literally keep his name out of your mouth #did we seriously need Another myth where a woman get assaulted by a god?? #PLEASE READ THE THEOGONY. AHE SLEEPS WILLINGLY WITH POSEIDON #pia.txt

[a-fools-jester]

🖤

Platonic Crying and Falling Asleep Together.

This took forever, and it’s long and angsty. Basically, Mrs Hudson and Papa Lestrade comfort a heartbroken Sherlock, who hasn’t left his flat in weeks and hardly eats or sleeps. It’s after the wedding. Unrequited love. Angst. References to depression, a previous teenage love, mental illness and involuntary treatment. Be warned. Sorry this took a while, darling. @savedbyholmes​ I hope you enjoy it. Story under cut.

Sherlock let out a long sigh, a cigarette in his hands as he stared out of the window where the rest of London was also in a state of restless gloom. Rain tapped away on the window, and down below people walked through the streets without a glance at once another yet obviously craved the interaction. He’d seen their types before; the emotionally needy wife who hated her family because she married too soon to the wrong man, the naive and somewhat desperate young lady who was orphaned as a young child and was now in need of a knight in shining armor, the man who spent too much time playing video games or working on the computer to escape the reality of being alone.

They all craved actual valuable human interaction yet often turned away from it willingly with the faulty reasoning of I need someone, not anyone. They had a specific type of person in their mind, and if the person didn’t live up to their standards, the person was dismissed and they would lose contact within months.

That’s how their social lives went, always in a constant cycle of making and losing friends. It all looked so tedious, yet so many people claimed that it was fun and a vital part of being human. Maybe Sherlock didn’t want to be human. He didn’t need friends, or their petty small talk and trivial problems. It was all so dull and boring it made him want to gag.

Mrs Hudson puttered into the kitchen, tutting at the smell of tobacco in the flat. “Oh dear, smoking again, are you?” she said in a slightly disapproving tone as she set a tray of biscuits on the table. “You know, if you miss John you should just call him. I’m sure he’ll want to solve a few cases with you, even with the wife and all.”

“He’s newly married and has a regular day job, Mrs Hudson. Even I know it would be wrong to put him in anything akin to danger now that someone other than myself would be greatly affected,” Sherlock said quickly, still curled up into a ball on his chair as he stared out the window, wrapping his arms around himself tighter and trying to focus on the world outside. “He’s busy.”

“When was the last time you left these rooms?” Another sigh as Mrs Hudson opened the fridge, seeing that it was painfully bare. She was worried. She shouldn’t be worried. Sherlock was fine, absolutely fine, there was nothing to worry about.

A car passed by, almost skidding on the slippery ground as it did. An emergency perhaps. “I don’t know, I don’t like to keep track of unimportant events.”

“It’s been three weeks since you left the flat, to be exact. You sulk in here all day like a ghost and hardly eat and hardly sleep. The only light ever turned on in here is that blasted lamp that makes everything warm and yellow, all because you’ve been spending your days just staring out of that window as if you’re waiting for something!” she snapped, hands on her hips, looking like about 5'5” of motherly concern and anger. “Or maybe, I should say someone.”

“Mrs Hudson, you and I both know that sentiment is of no value to me and-”

“Actually you and I both know you love him.” There was a beat of silence, as if the entire world had stopped to listen into the conversation. Her face softened as she lowered her voice. “I know you do, Sherlock, I was at the wedding. I heard everything you said. It was actually quite heartbreaking, I’d say. Even that handsome detective inspector Greg, almost shed a tear over it.”

Sherlock stared at his hands, feeling much more like a chided schoolboy than a grown man being yelled at by his landlady. “And what-” he cleared his throat before continuing, “would you suggest I do then? He’s married off with a woman. I can’t- I don’t- What do I do?”

He hadn’t faced her yet, but she walked over to stand beside him- he had turned his chair so he could fully watch London through the window some time ago- and placed a comforting hand on his face. Sherlock leaned into the touch, finding that after three weeks of almost complete silence that could drive even a monk insane, he craved the physical contact. “Why don’t you go out and talk to people? I know it’s hard, always has been hard for you, but it can’t be as bad as this, can it? I haven’t the slightest idea what else to do, Sherlock, I’m worried you’re wasting away in front of me and I can’t do anything but watch.”

The words bring back memories of another time, a different world, a different woman holding his face and weeping as she begged him to be okay. Don’t do this to yourself, can’t you see how much we love you, look at what you’re doing to our family, look at what you’re doing to-

“I’ll… try.” He nodded, trying to shake the memories of his mother out of his mind as he did so. “There’s no need for you to worry. I’m fine.”

Mrs Hudson gave a teary smile as she pulled away. “Of course, dear. I’ll be heading down then. Give me a yell if you need anything.” She left, and Sherlock suddenly felt his limbs weigh heavier with the knowledge that he now had a promise he fully intended to break. He couldn’t go out there with the people. The noise, the crowds, the emotions that he could feel just radiating off them, their stories screaming to be heard with their every breath and every blink. It was too much. All of it was just too much.

The days passed quicker then, and after another week or two, it was Lestrade walking up the steps this time with a grim determination in his step. Sherlock already knew what was coming before he had fully stepped into the room and prepared himself for it. Mrs Hudson hadn’t been able to handle him and now she sent in the second link in the chain, dear old Lestrade who took up the role of the firm but gentle father while Mrs Hudson claimed the role of the heartbroken and perpetually teary mum.

The flat was hauntingly silent when Greg entered, a stillness in the air that made the entire flat feel as it was cut off from the rest of the world, an isolated little bubble untouched by time and mortality. Sherlock’s outline was what Greg’s eyes fell on first, a motionless and lonely figure beside the window, staring out with dull eyes, a blanket thrown over his shoulders. He looked small and fragile in the light; the shadows dancing on his features from the streetlights outside made him look awfully young.

“It’s my life,” Sherlock said after a beat of silence, feeling Greg’s eyes on him, deciding to strike preemptively without turning to look at him. “I can do with it what I want. What I want is to stay in my rooms and take a break from the chaos in everyone else’s lives.”

Greg paused, before his footsteps continued, and finally stopped at the couch where he took a seat on the armrest. “Maybe, but you won’t be the one grieving for the second time if something happens to you.” Sherlock could feel the weight of his gaze, calculating, analyzing. “You could have called me, you know. We’ve been through this a lot of times, I thought you knew by now that when you have a relapse, you can call me. I can help you. We can all help you.”

Maybe I don’t want to be helped, Sherlock wanted to snapped back, suddenly feeling something akin to rage festering in his veins. “I know,” he said instead. His voice sounded monotone, he realized belatedly, but he can’t find it in himself to care how dead inside he sounds. “I’m sorry.”

They all cared so much and it hurt. Sherlock didn’t want them to care, he just wanted to be alone in his suffering, wanted to have all the time in the world to wallow in his pain. After hiding the pain for the better part of a decade he had the right to want to drown in it, to hold onto it as if it were the only thing keeping him alive. It gave him something to focus on. The constant ache in his chest reminded him that he was alive. He was human, and the breaking inside of him meant there was a heart in there somewhere that was able to be shattered.

There were a few minutes of silence. “You’ve lost weight.”

“Yes.”There was no point in denying it when it was clear that he had; his once tight clothes were now a size too big for his thin and awkward frame. The t-shirt he now donned hung off his shoulders as he stared petulantly out of the window, a blanket thrown over his shoulders not because it was cold but just to have something between him and the rest of the world.

A tapping, impatient, filled with the need for breakthrough but the desire to be calm and patient; the self-contradictory psychological state of an officer used to being obeyed immediately and a man of a soft heart who always wanted to be trustworthy and understanding. “How much weight?”

“Ten pounds.”

“God, Sherlock,” Greg breathed, and Sherlock knew the look of disappointment-not at him, never at him, at the situation, Greg would always insist- and bitter sadness would be on his face if he decided to turn around. He didn’t. He wasn’t strong enough to look into those sad brown eyes. He wasn’t John. He didn’t have the bravery of a soldier. “If you take this any further, I’m gonna have to tell Mycroft to put you on a 5150. This is beginning to go from unhealthy right into suicidal territory, you realize that, right?”

Another car passed by outside. It was raining again, less of a drizzle and beginning to seem more like a storm. The time of warm days and sun bathing were over it seemed, the weather had begun to shift into constant gloom and rain.

“Sherlock, please-”

“I’m sorry,” Sherlock cut in, tone becoming almost desperate, almost pleading for Greg to stop his arduous quest of trying to save him from himself when he wasn’t willing to be pulled back from the edge yet. “Greg- Greg, I can’t. I’m sorry, I can’t.” He bit his lip, not quite sure he couldn’t do, but he knew that whatever Greg was asking him to do was too much. Greg didn’t understand; the moment his feet hit the ground they’d shatter, the moment he stepped outside he would dissolve and the rain would wash him away.

Greg let out a bone-deep sigh, and Sherlock could hear the words that hung in the air between them, buzzing and crackling, ready to snap and sting, to burn and devour. There were a sea of unsaid words between them, and Sherlock didn’t know how to swim through it.

After a few minutes of silence, Greg finally let out a  defeated sigh, the tension dripping away when he spoke. “Mycroft… he um, told me to give you this,” Greg said, pulling out a bottle from his coat pocket and placing it on the coffee table between him and Sherlock. He watched as Sherlock finally looked in his direction, meeting his eyes for one heartbreaking second where Greg could read everything that flew through the young genius’ mind before they fell to the bottle. “He told me to assure you that it’s your choice whether or not you want to take them. If you do, tell him or me, and I’ll supply you with it. He doesn’t- it’s probably not best that-”

Sherlock understood immediately and nodded. “You think I’ll try to kill myself. Understandable, I suppose, given the… situation. What is it? A mood stabilizer or sedative or…?” he tried not to pay attention to the cracking of his own voice at the word sedative, tried to ignore the way his tongue felt dirty saying it. The word always made the image of dark rooms and broken bones flash through his mind. His time away hadn’t been completely forgotten yet by his mind, and there were still days when he woke up with stop, enough- please, it’s too much, I can’t spilling from his lips before he fully woke up and realized he was no longer a nameless government agent in Serbia or a hostage being held captive by a group of terrorists in Russia.

He was home and he was supposed to be safe; happy even, now that he was free from the clutches of Moriarty’s contacts. He wasn’t supposed to be considered a threat to his own life when he spent two years fighting for his desire to live, to survive. He grit his teeth and forced himself to survive through sheer will

“A fast-working mood stabilizer that’s used to treat bipolar disorder, anxiety, major depressive disorder and autism, from what he told me. It’s a relatively new drug, called… Clonazify?” Greg said as he read the label, and Sherlock nodded, his eyes still staring at the small bottle on the coffee table. “There’s only three in there right now, so you can give it a try, see how it works for you.”

“Alright,” Sherlock responded, slow, soft, and desolate.

A few moments of silence passed, before Greg broke it by standing, not knowing what else he could say. “Well, I’ll be heading out then. I’ll probably see you in three days.”

As he turned to leave, Sherlock finally spoke without having to be asked a question. “Greg?” he asked, and Greg gave a noncommittal hum, turning to face him again- he’d turned his face to the window again, but Greg could make out the moisture glistening in his eyes. “It hurts.”

His stomach lurched as he listened to Sherlock’s words, watching with horror and heartache as Sherlock’s face contorted to one of pure agony; Sherlock must have been holding this in for a long while. Greg stayed silent, listening to Sherlock. “How do you do it? I never thought- I never knew how much it could hurt to- to- to love somebody and- and then have them- have them…” Sherlock trailed off, turning his face to bury it in his hands, shoulders quaking violently.

“Oh, Sherlock,” Greg breathed, feeling his chest ache as he walked over to hold the crying boy close. It was a bit awkward of a position, Greg had to bend over slightly to properly embrace him, but Sherlock leaned into his touch as if he was a man walking through the Arctic terrain barefoot and Greg had just offered him warmth and shelter. He let Sherlock cry into him, wondering how long Sherlock had been waiting to say the words out loud, how long he’d kept his bleeding heart caged up like a wild, merciless, untameable beast. “That’s right, just let it out. It’s okay to cry, muffin, I’m here, I got you.”

And Sherlock did. He cried like a broken man, his shoulders trembling and his chest heaving with every sob. Greg could do nothing but hold him close and murmur sweet nothings in his ear about always being there, about how it was all going to be alright, about how the pain wouldn’t last forever. It took Sherlock a long while to quiet down, and he just leaned into Greg’s arms, his eyes heavy and his insides feeling vacant and empty, as if he’d been hollowed out.

Some time during the whole thing, they’d ended up on the couch. Greg had moved them there at some point, so that he would be more comfortable holding Sherlock close to him. They stayed silent after that, Sherlock getting a bit of much needed rest in Greg’s arms, feeling warm and secure before he fell asleep. When Sherlock woke up, he was surprised to find that Greg was still there; awkwardly, he extracted himself from the dozing older man’s arms. “Apologies for… that,” Sherlock said when Greg woke, his years working as a cop obviously making him more alert than others.

Greg let out a groan as he halfheartedly stretched, his shoulder popping as he sat up and tried to get blood flowing in his arm again. “No need for apologies. Though, a cup of tea would be much appreciated,” he said with a faint smile, watching as the lanky man went to the kitchen and prepared some tea for two. When Greg looked out the window he saw that it was now about evening, the sky a dark hue of navy blue, almost time for dinner for most ordinary people.

Sherlock returned with two cups in his hands, and passed it over. “So… Greg…”

“Yes?”

Sherlock fidgeted in his seat, the glazed over look of sleep still in his eyes. “Can you tell Mycroft I’m fine? I don’t want him to start a war because he gets distracted during a meeting or something. He tends to worry.”

Greg nodded, “yeah, I’ll tell him. He’s a worrier is what he is. Always nervous about this thing or that. I don’t know how he can be both very anxious about things like doctor appointments and weight management, and also very confident about meeting with different world leaders.”

They talked amicably for a while longer before Greg left, and Sherlock found himself staring at the chair he’d spent the last month or so glued onto, watching the world as he slowly wasted away inside of the haunted walls of 221B Baker Street, too caught up in emotions to do anything but exist. After thinking it over, he decided to pick up his violin, not sure what to play, not sure how to play the song that was playing inside of his mind.

With slightly trembling fingers, he played a shaky and haunting lament that conveyed all of the things he couldn’t say, all of the emotions he didn’t know how to express. As he played the heavy and melancholic tune, his mind began to supply him with memories he didn’t exactly ask for.

10 years old, sitting in the doctor’s office- Dr. Peacey, his name was- and staring at the ground as mummy talked with the man about him. Sitting across from him, Mycroft gave him a look that Sherlock didn’t quite understand, probably understanding more of the medical terms than he did. He didn’t understand what was wrong, he just knew that it hurt. Something hurt. Everything hurt. All he wanted to do was sleep and forget that the world existed around him, and mummy decided to drag him here, to this weird man who kept asking weird questions about how he slept and how he played with the other kids and if he ever heard voices no one else did. He wanted to go home.

13 years old, sitting in a hospital room, an IV connected to his arm as he laid there with his limbs feeling heavy and his mind feeling clouded. Mummy stood outside, weeping into dad’s shoulder, and Sherlock could barely keep his eyes open long enough to see Mummy nod to a doctor. “Now that you’ve done the paperwork, is it alright to put him in our psychiatric ward now?” Sherlock was wheeled into the Pediatric Psychiatric Ward, where everyone was weird and somehow he fit right in. Nobody looked at him funny there. Nobody called him a freak. Another teenager there, a cynical and misanthropic boy with dark hair and dark eyes, had given him a book about being able to read body language and the complex psychology behind every subconscious action or choice a person made. The boy never told Sherlock his name, always hiding behind the pseudonym Richard, but he influenced Sherlock in mastering the art of deduction.  

Sherlock put the violin down abruptly, not even finishing the note he was on, feeling his hands begin to tremble more violently. He didn’t like where his thoughts were going. With a shaky breath, he took a seat on his chair once again, staring out of the window. He could remember it so clearly now, the restraints, the sedatives, the months he spent trying to get his diagnosis, doctor after doctor, the bottle of pills in his trembling hands as he stared into the mirror, the way his insides burned and tried to expel the unwanted chemicals back out, pain- so much pain, his mum crying time and time again, the way he always felt so angry with everything, the way he always felt angry with himself, the way nothing was okay and everything hurt and suddenly Richard-

“I cannot seriously be thinking about Richard right now,” Sherlock said with a bitter laugh, shaking his head as he balled his hands into fists. A sad realization hit Sherlock: Richard was his first love. John was his current love.

-Richard swept him off of his fucking feet, shattering the darkness and lethargy with his touch and his words. Sherlock fell arse over tit for him, color sweeping over his life once again. One day Richard was there, the next he was… gone. Sherlock asked the staff, asked his parents, asked the doctors but nobody had anything to say about where he’d gone. Nobody told him that Richard was dead.

“Sherlock, love?” Mrs Hudson called as she walked up the stairs, and Sherlock snapped back to reality. He unclenched his fists and took a sip of tea that was lukewarm now that he’d let it sit out. Mrs Hudson looked at him, eyes holding in them a sorrow that Sherlock wished he never experienced for himself. “Oh, Sherlock, you’re awake. Come then, let’s get some food into you. I brought you some chicken and chips, as well as some brownies.”

She set it all down on the table, and Sherlock knew he had to make a choice. He could remain sitting in his chair where he could sink into the pits of darkness lapping at his feet or he could stand and go into the kitchen and eat whatever Mrs Hudson had prepared for him. His knees creaked when he stood, and Mrs Hudson flashed him a bright smile. She was old, Sherlock thought as he looked at the wrinkles on her face. She was too old to be dealing with him and his mood swings, too old to be the one helping him bear the cross he carried.

“Oh, did I ever tell you about this one time in primary? You see, the teacher was…” Mrs Hudson rattled on about her life, and Sherlock listened, nodding and smiling when appropriate. It felt like a machine only doing as he was programmed to do. Something in his chest felt empty, but he couldn’t bring himself to be afraid or concerned about it. There was too much pain and he knew that if he felt all of it, he would come apart under the pressure. After they finished their meals, Mrs Hudson looked at him, then at the bottle of pills on the table. “Do you think you should drink them now? If you’d like to, that is. It’s not my place to assume things.”

It wasn’t usually a question. Most people demanded he take it, forced it on him even as he thrashed and bucked beneath them and their needles. Most people never asked him if he wanted to. Most people never thought much of the silent boy who lurked in the shadows, thinking of him more as a case, as a patient than a person who might have some things to say about his treatment. Mycroft was the only one who listened to him when he was younger and nobody cared what he had to say.

Then Greg came into the picture and took an interest in his life and promised that he’d always be by Sherlock’s side any time that he might be needed. And Mrs Hudson came along and took the role of the caretaker, always placing down a tray of food in front of him like the doting mother she never got to be. They all cared. They all cared so much, too much, and it made no sense why they would damn themselves like that. Yet he appreciated it. As much as he said he detested it, he loved it, he loved the way their touches made him feel safe, loved how their voices could silent the taunting words he’d heard throughout school. They could make the rumbling in his brain go silent, just for a little bit, just enough to push the cloud of darkness away.

Sherlock nodded, “I think now’s a good time to take them, actually. I almost forgot. Thanks for reminding me.” He gave her a smile, and he knew that she understood what he was really saying but was too afraid to speak out loud.

Thank you for not giving up on me.

Thank you for being you and making my life just a little bit more bearable.

Thank you for not ever leaving me when I needed you.

#johnlock #johnlock ficlet #papa lestrade #mama hudson

[tumblunni]

Random list of still WIP npc charries I need to make for this game, yo

* Mayor Grandma The Ultimate

Not actually anyone’s grandma but like... Everyone’s Grandma. That whole ‘village elder as a goddamn force of nature’ kind of character. She’s the Big Good. She’s this tiny unassuming gran who had a history as a legendary hero and is now the super amazing mayor who can solve goddamn anything and defeat any threat against the village and just... HOLDS US ALL WITH HER GRUMPY LOVE I’m imagining her like the protagonist’s gran in The Wee Free Men, or Granny Weatherwax from other discworld books, or the grandma from Summer Wars, or the grandma from Jade Cocoon 1 who even turned out to be literally the deity of badass grandmas who came down into mortal form to slap the shit out of some fools. (The “grim midwife of life and death” is a really fucking badass title)

Anyway she isn’t actually technically the ‘mayor’, she’s just like.. village elder under old country rules, but Regis is the duke that was sent down to Officially be ruler of this province. Officially. It’s just that absolutely everyone knows that the duke is just a figurehead and Ancient Powerful Gran Of The Old Ways is the real power behind this well-oiled machine of a town. Even Regis knows, lol! The previous duke was a total asshole that got served a slice of humble pie by gran and they were fighting at every turn, but now Regis and Mortimer are the Comparatively Less Stuck Up Noblefolks and the town is better off for it. Still, even if Regis isn’t evil like his brother, he’s still a bit foppish and occasionally stupid about what it actually takes to run a town. So they do come into conflict sometimes, but mostly its like BFFs quarrelling instead of the old Shephard Grandma Brings The Wrath of The Heavens Upon Rich Man No Matter How Many Rich Man Guards He Has, Seriously We Found One Of Them Upside Down On Top Of The Roof How Did That Even Happen

And then also i think that she might have a larger role in Blair’s plot cos Blair is kinda like the new Village Hero In Training. But she’s INTENSELY reluctant about it! Not cos she doesn’t like being buff as fuck and punching through walls, but because she doesn’t think she could ever be better than supergran. Cos like.. “yeah I’ve got the muscles but I don’t have the brains, how could I ever cope without you?” She gets really fucking sad at the very idea that supergran might be retiring, and like.. might die someday. So it’s someone who’s clearly qualified for the role repeatedly rejecting it and bringing up more and more perfectionist excuses why she isn’t ready yet, just because she cares so much for her mentor figure and wishes she could fight the tide of time. And that’s how Blair became the Miss Perfect rival type character, and why she’s so humble and oblivious of her own strengths. Also I think this same plot would have links to mortimer and sorrel too, because there was An Event that happened 15 years ago that was what caused mayorgran to start feeling as if she’d hit her limits and the town needs a new Hero. Apparantly ~something~ happened that was like.. the one time mayorgran ever found a problem she couldn’t solve. And also at that time mortimer and sorrel used to be childhood friends, since they’re cousins, but suddenly sorrel’s mum fell in status amoung the noble family and there was a huge upheaval of the town’s status quo. What exactly is this mystery...?

ALSO! she must have a big hat i just want her to have a really big hat (mayorgran, not sorrel, she’s fine with her medium hat)

* Sorrel’s mum

(and Regis’s sister and Morty’s aunt. It IS cousins when someone’s the son of your mum’s sibling, right? I can’t remember all the rules for first removed and stuff...)

Generic Mom. She’s just so NICE! Isn’t she nice? Don’t you agree? For some reason she had a falling out with Duke Regis in the past, and now she lives in comparative poverty and like.. no press statement has ever been released on WHY this happened, and everyone’s become rather distrustful of Regis because of it. What exactly is going on?

I kinda wanted to leave it vague at just this, cos you can’t exactly talk about her at all without spoiers. So yeah the next paragraph is gonna not reveal exactly what happened in that backstory, but it’ll talk about this character’s personality and what it.. actually is, I guess..??

SO...

...

...

A kind of over the top cloyingly “nice” person who really isn’t. A bit of Umbridge and a bit of an overbearing soccer mom. Like.. at first you’ll be wondering ‘why is Sorrel so self hatey when her mom is so nice to her’ but then it becomes clear that’s not what’s really happening. Mom only supports when you act how she wants you to, its a classic ‘living through your children’ situation where she pushes her kid way too far to achieve some goals they never wanted in the first place. And she’s a bit of a moral crusader, like she’s just.. SO convinced that she is ‘nice’, and that if she just acts ‘polite’ and ‘mumsy’ and cute and harmless and follows all the feminine stereotypes it balances out any horribly not nice things she does. Because she’s ‘not that kind of person’. Anything she does is good because she’s good, yknow? And anything Sorrel does is bad if it shows any sort of personality outside of what her mum has so kindly picked out for her, I mean why would you be so selfish, seriously! She kinda always lives like that, seething with resentment and selfish desire and looking for excuses she can use to paint someone as Bad so she is Justified in feeling superior to them and/or ruining their life. And her Nice facade covers up a lot of rather bigoted attitudes she holds, in addition to all the abusiveness. Ones that can be far more insidious cos she delivers them in such a Nice way and appeals to Logic and Compromise and oh but You Know, Everyone Knows, Isn’t It Just Natural And Biological, look at them getting Emotional. She’s very much the archetypical horrid nobleman that we were all so grateful that Regis wasn’t. Except she’s also way more devious and able to hide it beneath a relateable facade, so she can get these stupid naive townsfolk to do stuff that only makes life harder for themselves for the sake of like.. mythical trickle-down benefits that don’t actually exist. And oh, Sorrel, you know you could pass so well for a good Narcian lady if you dyed your hair, you know? Not like Regis’s filthy child. (She says, even though she also married a foreigner, just one from a majority white country...)

Basically she’s just gonna be a detestable monster, and the only pure evil person in the plot. And even more evil because she does such a good job hiding it, and has been able to spread her toxic influence to so many victims undetected for so long. Cos seriously, the story starts off with her being treated as a martyr and people clamouring to replace Regis with her, and it’s just gonna be So Damn Uncomfortable in retrospect when you do a second playthrough and see even Sorrel’s friends completely oblivious to her mum’s evilness. (″Friends? Honey, you don’t HAVE friends. Well, who do you need except little old me?”)

Also I was thinking randomly as a subplot there could be a thing that her mum was in charge of the town library once, and her planned renovations fell through and now the town doesn’t have a library at all, just this big abandoned building and The Enduring Shame. It’d be a good example of how she handles things, cos this is an Enduring Shame for Sorrel and not her. from Sorrel’s perspective she thinks that her mother trusted her with a big responsibility and she fucked it up and thus deserves the scorn. But really her mum just threw a sinking ship at her so she could take the blame, and then was all like “OH THE POOR GIRL IT WAS JUST TOO MUCH RESPONSIBILITY, PLEASE DON’T BLAME HER”. Spreading all these negative rumours to encourage Sorrel to never try and be independant ever again, but in a sneaky reverse psychology way so she could still look like a loving mother. But anyway this is how Sorrel ended up running a Secret Underground Library, her one form of rebellion against her mother’s control. She rescued as many books as she could when the library went under, and now she keeps them all crammed in her room and tries to spread them around without leaving any threads back to her. Cos she knows that her mum is super trusted, and that even good people can’t be trusted to keep secrets from her, and nobody would believe her if she tried to explain why it needs to be secret. So instead she just plays it off as if she’s just another person receiving books from the ghost library, and she’s totally searching for an answer to this mystery too, honest! It’d be a sign that you reached high friendship level with her when she’s like.. able to believe that you’d believe her if she told you her mum abuses her. And the first step of that is ‘hey remember that library we were questing for? its literally under my bed.’ Welcomes you to the secret trapdoor book heaven and you have a strangely romantic evening going OOOOMG FIRST EDITION TOLKEINS (or whatever the equivelant is in this universe XD) But it probably still takes her a while after that to open up about exactly why the library has to be secret, and to come to terms with the fact that she really doesn’t deserve how her mother treats her. So I’d definately give you an opportunity here to Fuck Up Massively by telling the mum about the library, yup. Gotta torment the player every now and again! XD ...but I mean if you’re reading this you know all the spoilrs so you’ll be fine, lol

* Quincy’s grandma (or possibly grand aunt?)

A stern and super professional businesswoman who has a bit of a quarrel with him over how exactly to balance profit vs like.. morality. She’s not a BAD person, her business isn’t so profit-heavy that its like all the actual atrocities you see in mega corporations nowadays. But she’s very distant from her customer base and also from what it’s even like to be poor. And she doesn’t believe that such minor things to improve the shopping experience would like.. actually change anything. What is ‘brand loyalty’?! What is this principle that if people are able to live more comfortably they’ll be able to spend more money on luxuries?? She used to be less greedygrump once, but she gets more jaded every year and keeps bumping money higher and higher up her priority list, abandoning things that used to seem important. And similarly she’s become super ‘I don’t need anyone, I’m better off being alone’, and developed this strained relationship with her grand-nephew. I think maybe I could add another layer of sad to this, woo! I think she raised Quincy alone after his parents were Giant Assholes and ran off. Probably stole a bunch of the family money, probably left her with a failing business that they’d ruined with all their selfish decisions over the years, and an angry mob out for blood against the brand name. And Quincy was very sickly as a kid, so she had to work a lot, leading to the distant relationship and obsession with profit. But she’s become so obsessed and paranoid of losing her money even after it became less of a death sentence, and she just keeps working super hard even though now she has time to spend with her family. And she gets scared seeing Quincy grow up cos she remembers how his parents turned into absolute monsters when she used to trust them so much. Being distant is better than getting hurt again... and god damn why does he have his mother’s eyes...

So yeah, they’re a bit estranged, and you can potentially help with that, woo! But mostly during the main game you’ll just hear about her cos everyone is like ‘oh, are you from [grauntie’s brand name]? why don’t you have this thing, she always has it’ and Quincy is like ‘no, this is my own store.. we’re a small business.. but umm, we’re cheaper..’ He’s trying to step out from under her shadow and prove that her philosophy is wrong, so maybe he can bring back the loving grauntie that he remembers from his childhood. i think maybe the ending could be that she turns up to inspect his new shop and they have some sort of merchant showdown and like... even if Quincy loses he still ends up proving her wrong because she sees just how much everyone in this town cares about him and how he’s improved various parts of their life by bringing access to these imported goods and just generally being a supportive community member. Maybe there are some things more important than profit...

Oh and also I think she was the one responsible for helping out Blair and Dionne when they were running from their abusive parents, and that’s why the two of them are the most friendly with Quincy at the start of the game. They hadn’t seen each other since they were kids, and Blair is kinda like I Owe You A Blood Debt, Is There Anyone You Need Me To Stab Grauntie looks back on this as a moment of weakness tho, and that’s why she stopped keeping in touch with them, she’s embarassed she used to be so sentimental. Cos like.. she spent so much money helping set up these girls with their own house and she lost out on a business opportunity (it was a property she originally purchased to turn into a franchise store) She can’t stop thinking about how tight the funds were around that time and how if she messed up she could have lost her own kid for the sake of helping some other kids... But then she turns up in town and its like Oh No I Walked Down The Street By Accident *gets buried in blair hugs* And she can’t stop crying seeing how much they grew up, and then they’re all like “we’ve been trying to send you a cut of the cafe profits for the last seven years!” and she’s like “NOOOOO, KEEP IT” *even more embarassed at doing even more irrational sympathetic actions*

Also possibly she could get a crush on mayor grandma cos they are both grumpy badasses of opposite? Strength gran vs wisdom gran!

+++

so yeh i made a bunch of grans/demigrans of various kinds, and now I am thankfully satisfied with this story’s gremp quotient

#test game thing #but should i add more grandpas too?? #regis kinda counts as one even though his role in the plot is as a dad #but i mean you could give him grandkids if you pick his son as your love interest route! :3