#Idk when I'm going to continue it but I hope I will... | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

hailsatanacab · 8 months

Note

For the prompt ask game!

9. Sleep deprivation and/or 37. Secret Relationship and/or 40. Identity reveal/major secret reveal

(I selected a few so you can chose the one that resonates the most.)

For any DPxDC characters. <3

*emerges from a google docs, covered in blood and panting* i did it... it is done.

thank you for the prompt!! because i love a challenge, or because i can't stop myself, i went and did all of them!! for everyone!! everyone is sleep deprived and everyone is revealing secrets ^^'

Danny/Tim, mentioned Jazz/Jason

(๑•́ ₃ •̀๑) enjoy!! prompt ask game

kid napping

“Red Robin, sound off. Status?”

“All good here, Oracle. Everything okay?”

It’s been a slow night, never a good sign. Pent up energy itches under his skin and he stretches when he stands, preparing for whatever Oracle is going to throw his way. It’s going to be something, he can tell.

“Good.” Relief briefly colours her voice answers, before she becomes serious again, keys clacking away in the background. “There’s been a report from Agent A. It appears that one Timothy Drake has been kidnapped and is being ransomed for five million dollars and a helicopter. I’m tracing the call now.”

“A helicopter, too? Kidnappers these days, used to be they just wanted their money and that would be the end of it… a fucking helicopter, wow.” Red Hood scoffs, and Red Robin can’t help but join in the laughter over the comms.

“Doesn’t exactly sound like these are the brightest tools in the shed now, does it, Hood? Wonder what poor schmuck they’ve got instead.” Nightwing says, slightly out of breath.

The smile slips off Red Robin’s face and clammy, cold dread shivers down his spine. A stone settles in his stomach. He wets his lips and clears his throat. “Oracle, can you pull up the CCTV on my apartment near WE? Any closer to tracing the call?”

“Still on the trace, they’re using a jammer. Agent A is cooperating so they should phone back soon, which will help.” she reports, falling into silence as he finds the video feed.

“You know who it is?”

“I hope not.”

It’s tense, he taps his feet on the rooftop, fingers tightening over his grapple as he fights the urge to fly off the roof and check for himself. It better not be him. Please, dear God, don’t let it not be him.

“What are you thinking, Red Robin?” Batman growls through the comms. Red Robin can hear the wind under his words, whipping fast as he no doubt makes his way over to his position.

“I had a, uh, a friend coming over tonight. From behind, he… he could be mistaken for Tim Drake.”

The jokes fall silent, the comms growing serious as they pick up on his tone.

“Well, fuck.”

“Eloquent as always, Hood.”

“Shut up, bat-brat.”

“You were right, Red Robin, it looks like it was your… friend they caught, instead. About two hours before the call came in. I’m following their van now, I should have the destination soon. In the meantime, it looks like they’re heading towards the docks.”

Red Robin throws himself off the building, shooting his grapple as low as he dares to get the fastest swing he can.

They have Danny.

Worry gnaws at his gut even as gravity pulls it into his throat with another swing.

Danny is… And Red Robin means this in the nicest way possible, but Danny is fragile. They haven’t talked about it, but RR knows that Danny has health problems. Something plaguing him since he was young, that’s landed him in the hospital more than once. A weak heart, far too slow to be normal, possibly chronic fatigue—he’s always so tired, falling asleep anywhere he can.

Sometimes, he doesn’t even need to put his head down. Once, when they had gone to the corner store to get some popcorn to enjoy their movie (which Danny had explicitly and repeatedly promised he wouldn’t snore through this time), Danny had rested his head on Tim’s shoulder while they were waiting and he’d just… gone. On his feet, asleep, just like that.

He’d laughed, when Tim woke him up. Apologised. Said Tim made him feel safe enough to fall asleep just about anywhere and—

Red Robin grits his teeth and corrects his course as Oracle updates them with more precise coordinates.

Tim had carried him home that night, piggy-back for four blocks, but by the end of it, he wasn’t tired at all. And that’s another thing, Danny’s just so light. It’s concerning.

They never did watch that movie, but it’s a night that Tim can’t help remembering fondly all the same. They’d ended up rewatching some old sitcom that Danny’s seen countless times but Tim’s never really bothered with, Danny drifting off to sleep again and Tim eventually following him, because… sleep is easy with Danny.

It’s the same for him, he thinks. He can’t explain it, but he feels safe enough to sleep with Danny, too.

He needs to be alright.

“So… Is this friend just a friend? Or a friend friend?”

“A friend, Nightwing. Now hurry up.”

He’s not in the mood to play these games, not now. There’s a reason why none of them know about Danny, and this is one of them. His family, as much as he loves them, are just too damn nosey for their own good.

“You know that doesn’t answer my question at all.”

“Then why don’t you ask something intelligible, rather than continue with your childish antics?” Robin snarks, and for once, Red Robin has to agree with him. Or, rather, he’s grateful for the distraction that it gives him.

Tim has secrets. He’s sure that Danny does, too, and so far—aside from the standard background check he always runs on new friends and friend friends alike—he’s done very well to respect them. He just can’t say that his family would do the same.

They can be overwhelming, to say the least, and Tim has tried his best to protect Danny from that.

Only to fail to protect him in every other way that it counts.

“How long have you guys been ‘friends’?”

“Nightwing, save it, please.”

“What’s his name?”

He ignores him.

Red Robin lands on the building first, thank goodness. He wastes no time in finding a skylight that can be pried open fairly quietly, slipping inside without a second thought.

“Wait for backup, Red Robin, that is an order!” Batman says, when he lets them know he’s in.

“Negative, Batman. I’m getting him back.”

“Red Robin!”

He weaves silently through the desks on the second floor of the warehouse, always moving, always keeping a trained eye on the shadows around him.

When he reaches the stairs, he hears voices.

“Looks like three of them, armed. The-the hostage is tied to a chair in the middle of the room, he…” Red Robin takes a steadying breath. The person has a burlap sack over their head is slumped to the side, from where he is, Red Robin can’t see if his chest is moving. There’s blood on the floor. “He needs medical assistance. Another two on the northside entrance.”

The comms explode in admonitions, everyone pleading with him to stay where he is, to wait for help, but fuck that. With a tap, he switches them off and he can finally, just about make out the words of the kidnappers as he creeps down the first few steps.

“—shouldn’t he have woken up by now?”

“I don’t know, man, you’re the one that hit him! Do you think he’s—”

“No! I didn’t even hit him that hard, I swear!” the man cries, holding his hands up in surrender. “I just couldn’t take any more of his stupid jokes!”

If there was any doubt in Red Robin’s mind that they picked up Danny by mistake, it’s gone now. Yeah. If you get Danny, you get his stupid jokes, too.

He creeps closer.

There’s some storage crates between him and Danny, if he can get behind there without being seen then that leaves him in a good position for when whoever’s next in takes out the guys at the front. He can’t do anything without them gone first, not without risking them taking shots inside and endangering Danny.

The man that hit Danny circles round behind him and grabs at his hands.

“What are you even doing, Pat? Who gives a shit, leave him alone.”

“I’m just checking! I just gotta see!”

“Fuck’s sake, guys, who cares? We just gotta get our money, that’s it—”

“And our helicopter!”

“And our—”

“Shit, I can’t find a pulse! Shit, Frank, I killed him, I—”

Jason told him once that when the Pits overtook him, he used to see green. Instead of blacking out, he’d be swimming in that putrid Lazarus colour and he’d slip into that rage and bad things would happen.

He’s heard of people seeing red, too, but really, he thinks that’s more of a literary device.

Tim doesn’t see anything aside from his targets.

A barrage of birdarangs take the guns from the guys at the front, the three around Danny startling badly enough that the guy that kil—that’s behind Danny—stumbles, losing his footing.

Only one of them shoots.

Amateurs.

There’s a round of curses on the comms as the shots come through. Oracle must have turned them back on.

“Fucking hell—Nightwing and I are at the front, Red Robin, don’t worry about them.”

Red Robin’s barely listening.

He spins, kicking the largest guy in the stomach hard enough so that he doubles over, wheezing. Following through the movement, another kick lands on the side of his head and he’s down.

The second one, Frank, gets his wits about him and raises his gun, spraying wildly. He’s a shit shot, going wide in panic, and Red Robin simply ducks and rushes forward, keeping low. Tackling the guy, he grabs the gun off of him and uses it to smash him across the face, once, twice, three times, before he stops moving.

“Oracle, get police and paramedics on scene, now.” Batman says, the displeasure in his voice evident. “Red Robin, Robin and I are coming in from the top.”

Pat hasn’t even made it up off the floor yet, scrambling backwards, fear plain on his face.

Red Robin stands, breathing heavily, gun still in hand.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I swear I didn’t mean to do it! Please—please, don’t, please!”

Red Robin doesn’t kill.

Well, no, Red Robin doesn’t normally kill.

No, that’s not quite right, either.

Red Robin has killed. Red Robin will more than likely kill again. Red Robin sees no problem with killing.

The gun is up, pointing towards the guy without any real thought about it.

Footsteps rush behind him, the familiar heavy footfalls of Batman and Robin, so he doesn’t bother turning around. The gun follows the guy as he keeps pulling himself backwards, snot and tears mingling down his face.

“Red Robin,” Batman says, softly.

It’s always weird hearing Batman’s voice like that. It’s not the first time, obviously—Batman can’t use his scary intimidating voice on victims or children, after all—but having it used on him is weird.

“Breathe.”

“He’s dead. They killed him.”

If hearing Batman’s voice was weird, Red Robin can’t even recognise his own.

Distantly, he realises he’s dissociating. There’s a tightness in his chest, it’s hard to breathe, a growing buzz drowns out any noise in his ears and he can’t think, he can’t—

A heavy hand squeezes his shoulder, jolting him out of his thoughts. Batman reaches around and gently removes the gun from his grip, and Tim feels the instant loss of it. He should have done it, why hadn’t he done it?

Robin takes care of the last man, his crying cut off by a swift kick to the head. Nightwing and Red Hood join them, zip-tying the men on the floor and starting to drag them back to the entrance of the warehouse one by one.

No one says a word.

Shrugging off Batman’s hand, Tim moves towards the chair.

Shaking, he takes a deep breath and removes the sack. The small part of him that was left hoping it wasn’t him, it couldn’t be him, please dear God let it not be him, shatters.

Even dead, he looks peaceful.

Tim’s seen death. He’s no stranger to it, he’s seen what it can do to a person. There’s some blood coagulating over his eyebrows, but otherwise, he looks peaceful. Is that comforting? That he didn’t suffer?

Danny’s head lolls to the side as the sack comes completely away, his hair flopping over his eyes. Tim’s been on at him to get a haircut lately, he thinks it’ll be nice tidied up a bit, just on the sides. It’ll get rid of that permanent bedhead. Help him with job interviews, he’s got to be thinking about that now that he’s in his last year of college.

It’s about the only thing that’ll hold him back, Tim thinks. Danny’s brilliant. Any employer would be a fool to turn him down because of his shaggy hair, but employers are stupid so it makes sense to put your best foot forward and—

Tim falls to his knees.

Fuck.

He’s dead, he’s really—Danny’s skin is horribly pale, cold to the touch. Gone is his bright, cheerful smile.

“Danny, I’m sorry, I’m so, so sorry, I—”

He stops himself with a deep, shuddering breath. He can’t break down here, he can’t, he can’t, he can’t.

Instead, he tips forward to rest his head in Danny’s lap, arms curling around himself. They were too late. They got here as fast as they could and they were too late.

“Danny, I’m so sorry…” he whispers. “I… I love you, I love you, I’m sorry.”

Dimly, he can feel the others standing around them. Someone crouches down beside him, resting a comforting arm over his back, but he doesn’t turn his head to see who it is. He squeezes his grip on Danny’s legs tighter.

“Come on, baby bird. Let’s—”

They’re interrupted by a huge, honking snore as Danny jerks himself awake.

Tim’s head snaps up, staring at Danny with wide eyes.

“You were asleep?” Red Robin springs up, several different emotions rapidly flip flopping through him.

“Wha… What?” Danny heaves a yawn, blinking blearily down at him. “Sorry, I’m just… they were shit kidnappers, man, really boring. Honestly, worst abduction yet.”

“You were asleep? I thought you were dead!”

“Not mutually exlusive, you know.” Danny says through another yawn. He rolls his neck around with an almighty crack and glances at everyone. “Didn’t think I’d warrant the whole Bat brigade, though…”

“The kidnappers thought they had Tim Drake.” Batman supplies, while Red Robin tries to work through the emotional whiplash.

“Ah, makes sense… wait.” Danny sits up suddenly, squinting at Red Robin. “Did you say you loved me?”

“No, of course not, why would I—”

“Tim? Is that—are you—are you Red Robin?”

“Everyone, hold the fuck up!” Red Hood shouts from the other side of the warehouse, having finished securing the perps to a streetlight outside. “Double R is dating Danny fucking Nightingale?”

Well, there goes his identity… Oh, who’s he kidding, Danny’s smart. There’s no way he could have salvaged that. This was not how he thought the night was going to go.

“Cranberry, is that you?” Danny twists in his chair, somehow delighted to see Red Hood rescuing him, too. “I thought I smelled you lurking about!”

“Shut it, you little shit. Since when were you dating this dweeb?”

“I’m sorry,” Red Robin pleads, hands in the air to try and slow down the onslaught of information and insults, “you two know each other?”

“Cranberry?” Nightwing echoes, looking as lost as Red Robin feels.

“Yeah, Cranberry—The Cranberries—zombie, zombie, zombie-ie-ie. Obviously. Also he’s wearing a big, fuck off red helmet.”

“Yeah, sure, makes sense.”

It’s about the only thing that does.

“And please don’t call my boyfriend a dweeb, Cranberry. Especially when he just said he loves me for the first time.”

“He only said it because he thought you were dead.”

“I am dead, so it counts.”

“Only half, so I’d say that puts you at a solid ‘like’. Tim’s—and savour this, Tim, because I’m only going to say it once—Tim’s intelligent, so I’m sure he’ll come to his senses soon.”

Danny just throws Red Hood such a shit-eating grin. A level of feral that Tim’s only seen before in Damian.

“That’s what I used to say about Jazz, too.”

Hood scoffs in offence, and to be honest, Tim’s not sure where he should go from here. What the hell is happening, how do they know each other?

“Come on, is anyone going to untie me or am I really meeting your family mafia-style?”

“Do it yourself, Slimer.” Red Hood laughs, crossing his arms.

“Ugh, you suck so much. I’ll fucking slime you, just you wait. Can’t believe Jazz even likes you, I preferred it when she was dating Johnny.”

And then, without Danny doing anything other than muttering obscenities at Red Hood, the ropes fall to the ground. In one swift motion, Danny stands up and stretches himself to his full height of 5’6.

“All of you need to explain, now.” commands Batman, and honestly, Red Robin’s very much on his side of it.

“I can’t believe it… Jason and Timmy are both in secret relationships? That’s… How come no one told me?” Poor Nightwing sounds the most shocked out of all of them. He turns to Damian and clasps onto both of his shoulders. “You’re not secretly dating, are you, D? Please tell me you’re not, please tell me you’re single, please?”

Of course, Robin just clicks his tongue and pushes his hands away. Really, Red Robin doesn’t think that Nightwing’s in any danger of that happening, he’d be surprised if anyone could stand Robin enough to actually date him.

He shakes his head and turns to Danny, who’s staring right back at him, worry clear on his face.

Fuck, he... He's alive. He's really alive.

Tim pulls him into a bone-crushing hug, fingers buried deep in his NASA shirt. Tucking his face into the crook of Danny's shoulder, he laughs wetly with the joy of it. He's alive. He hasn't lost him. He's safe.

“I’m sorry I haven’t told you before now, starshine, but…” Danny breaks the hug and softly pulls away from him to rise on his tiptoes to place a kiss his cheek. The skin burns cold where his lips touch. “I love you, too. Also, you’re gonna wanna sit down. This is going to be a lot.”

#dpxdc #dead tired #anger management #(barely but it's there haha)#dcxdp #hailsatanacrab🦀🦀writes #i'm sorry this has taken a while but also this week has kinda sucked and i'm still pissed off about that #so writing has been a nice little break from that!!!!#i hope you enjoy it!! i'm not fantastic with writing romance/ships so like... hope it's alright haha #also i feel kinda bad about not putting the whole phantom reveal too but like... we get that all that time haha #idk maybe i'll continue it #OH SHIT I FORGOT MY WRITING TAG HOLD ON #must admit - i do like that you can edit the tags now even though the new post maker sucks #anyway!!!!!!! i had this whole bit from danny's pov in the beginning where he just decided to go to sleep but realised that fucking sucked #it was so boring haha #so we got this instead!#hope the emotions came across - i feel like i have a tendency to just go cold and clinical when emotions happen #idk #oh! danny and tim met because danny's a part time barista and when tim ordered his monstrocity of a drink danny just winked and said #'ah the walking dead special coming right up!' and added another three espresso #jason and jazz met before they did though - and none of them knew they were dating the other's family #danny and jason have a bit of a rocky relationship - he's not good enough for jazz!! she deserves way better than some two-bit gangster!!#jason just thinks he's a cute overprotective brother - he really envies their relationship and wishes he could have something like that #he likes to rib danny and tbh danny is really warming up to him too - now that the gross stinky ecto is starting to filter out #(which is thanks to him and jazz - which jason does know about and is extremely grateful for)#(he really does love jazz and is a little bit jealous that tim told danny he loved him first)#(jason goes home that night and dips jazz into a kiss and whispers it into her skin over and over again)#(he loves her he loves her he loves her - and who the fuck is johnny?)#once tim gets over his shock he's doing good! of course he accepts danny there was never any question of that #he meets ellie and then introduces her to kon and the rest of the team and ellie decides she might like to do some superheroing for a bit

344 notes · View notes

unproduciblesmackdown · 2 years

Text

thanks to doing a few rounds of akinator for winston billions at like 5am last night & the 80th question in one round being abt if your character is in love with someone, i turned to look at the camera like “no,” b/c idk whatever News winston knows of in the finale ep involves rian & while he could be keeping a more personal reaction to himself certainly, we aren’t informed about it, and it’s also a case of like, the material really not trying to touch on him Still crushing on her, such as that he may not actually be doing so, & such as that [who knows why they put that in in the first place if it didn’t matter at all]

but like also then just moving back an episode at a time it’s like well episode eleven sure he doesn’t need to have like courtlily pledged himself to rian but it’s pretty bold to just hop up & go get laid w/a stranger b/c while your would’ve been Crush is drawing other ppl’s attention by singing, you’re looking elsewhere like oh hello =) & that goes for episode ten as well like really Something like here we are at this party & everyone desires rian carnally, Except winston apparently does not lmao, that point would’ve made a world of sense if they Had actually been the ones peacing out to find some narrative consistency, but ig like the hell with that, it’s nihilism no narrative times, in fact rian gets to stop being A Character X’D but anyways folks lol like winston’s really just like “hi gamers, remember how we were talking about my interest lately” (& everyone goes “die” about it like sorry guy) when it might otherwise be prime time to try to stick to rian or at least have a moment like the 5x05 soiree & make a vague pass about something. but it’s taylor’s turn for that, for some reason, why is what all they have happen after 6x08 even like, Conducive to their dynamic resolving to a better place much less apparently required for it lmfao; is this particular step of it just about taylor’s sort of own limitations in navigating their own life lol like happiness?? well i can only maybe get that through dating someone & i can only get That through work, maybe time to see if any positive feelings towards rian could be romantic interest, that’s my best shot....wherein at this point maybe winston sure can’t be hanging off of rian’s arm this evening b/c he has to be out of the way so Taylor & Rian Time can take precedence, which is possibly true re: the next two episodes / the last two episodes of the season lol, is he standing w/trading floor guys in the finale b/c they’re besties now or b/c rian needs to be separate b/c it’s more Taylor & Rian time, not goofing around ft winston’s involvement. But it can also be true that he’s more established as buddies w/tuk at least. like how yeah he may be pushed out of the way all three eps but he may also be more Over rian, bopping up at the party like what’s up? wanting me to die? oh okay bye. then next episode he’s arms out, going off & hooking up w/someone, still sitting & talking w/rian but she takes the opportunity to insult him & there’s no effort to remind us of the quant duo in the finale, just whatever taylor & rian have going on (being the only members of tmc) like both watsonian & doylean exclusion of winston lol

but also taking it back to episode four like, that felt to me like the clearest instance of like “btw remember winston Likes her” but even then it was like “Or Maybe he does simply really wanna hang out & be friends” and that could be the case lol like they sure are tantalizingly close to friendship for much of all this, and they Do go hang out outside of work due to connecting over a Personal Interest as would sorta be the case in this scenario of like “why don’t you take me camping & i’ll bring my honed spatial algorithm” like i’m not about to say he can’t have been that enthused about anticipating forming a genuine friendship, why wouldn’t he be, & it can be both that & a bit of [also remnants of a crush] motivation....and i mean not like we Know what all they got up to while doing media analysis together in ep ten like. yeah feasible that analysis is all they really got up to, could well be intensive, but it also seems feasible you know, there were interludes about other things, anyone have a meal together and/or unrelated conversation? anyone kiss or hook up? it’s a Hilarious(tm) aspect of like, all winston’s dynamics that there’s never any Real resolution like, even now it’s like well i guess riawin’s not truly completely certainly a non factor / possibility at this juncture, but that’s thanks to the fact that you know, characters aren’t regarding him as serious or important, we never get material wherein say, anyone has a real conversation with him that we get to see, or with anyone else About him, or say, their thoughts / feelings on their own relationship / dynamic with him, so in that way it remains this more Ambiguous Zone where you can fill in blanks / What If about what’s unexplored b/c like, sorry, if i was supposed to automatically sense & accept some Factual Premise that winston is a romantic / sexual nonentity & even too much of a joke to have a friend? first of all i did not, second of all you’re the ones telling us he has crushes & exes & is now just going off getting laid cuz he felt like it & is maybe already regular friends with tuk, so what do you want

but anyways you go “even episode burn rate may not Necessarily have been about winston having a crush vs him being aware of this Quant Duo emphasis that’s Been in place & wanting to get Hanging Out / more personal connection out of it” and really that’s like, the main instance all season of anything plausibly abt winston still having a crush on rian. episode one Introduces Them like remember the quant duo?? they’re a duo. remember how we made sure to have winston show up silently in the finale for a few shots of rian standing right beside him? like yes what of it. and then they go well who knows, but here’s episode two, little quant duo moment again. ep three, Really quant duo moments. ep four, this Maybe [remember winston has a crush] thing that might also just be about him trying to explore / extend this duoship Somehow that’s more ambiguous at least. ep five, god, quant duo, ep six, sure leans on the like “why’s rian want to trip him & take his lunch” thing but also we end on her smiling at him / looking to him like “[all this], am i right??” like. ep seven dear god the quant duo. even ep eight like hey they’re standing together, and then aproposly winston just kind of inexplicably vanishes and the ep becomes this combo of taylor & philip and taylor & rian (subset: rian & wags, apparently) material. and then frankly ep nine kind of counts too because it’s Something that for both quants this is the one episode they simply don’t show up for some reason. ok. then obviously the last quarter of the season moves focus to all that and the quant duo material becomes rian ditching winston after hanging w/him all episode, rian insulting winston, winston going :\ about waving through a window at whatever rian and taylor are up to, like genuinely probably his guess is about as good as anyone’s.

it’s also Something Or Other that “rian pwns winston” is a lot more explicit & repeated this season than “is this material based on winston particularly having a crush vs just liking rian more generally / hoping they’re friends?” like ep one she pwns him out of nowhere, prince jumps in too for no reason when he’s supposed to be trying to ingratiate himself to everyone And this is the sole exception we see to that. ep two, why’s she have to go “oh you cannot really surf ever” like why shouldn’t he. ep three, we get winston directly commenting on their dynamic, that rian has and does hurt him & he thinks she’s doing it on purpose (why wouldn’t he, & seems that she is, tf else is going on. and/or else she’s just really unconcerned abt the effect of [hurting him] even if that’s not her main motivation), oh but also people see them as a duo & they’re also operating as one / completely amicable sometimes, such as like 7 sec out from rian pwning him & him going “stop trying to hurt me” & her completely ignoring that. ep four, that she pwns him again but also kind of lets up on it b/c he thought she’d responded positively actually. ep five, for some reason there needs to be an aside from rian about how winston’s not like the vlogger guy or his followers, who aren’t like posited as Respected Parties by anyone anyways, but the only consistency here is foregone conclusion disdain for winston i guess. ep six like he can’t get his phone back lol it’s more indirect like, it’s a Practical Matter for rian & she’s not very concerned about him beyond that, & kind of like “oh right you have your own perspective here, forgot about that smh whatever though” like, not the friendliest, but then suddenly episode seven is like remarkably same wavelength same page Utterly Amicable where go figure, the only particular instance of disdain / dismissiveness towards winston comes from taylor, ep eight no disdain, ep nine they’re both gone, but ep ten & eleven both with giving him shit out of nowhere & for no reason when he’s trying to like, have a conversation, but apparently oh speedrunning personal bonding with taylor with conversations and hugs in there lol like well. discouraging perhaps b/c why wouldn’t it be.....like i totalled up what i’d consider to be like discrete instances of positive (amicable) vs negative (the dislike/disdain realm) moments from rian directed at winston & surprisingly it came out even by my interpretation & count, but it also is like....that shit isn’t weighted lol, distinct instances of rian directing a smile at winston vs going out of her way and verbally insulting him, the smiles have counterparts of shooting him more negative Looks but the verbal insults do not have counterparts of her like complimenting him or hyping him up or anything, so feels a bit uneven still. yet oh also she’s hung out with him outside work for personal reasons, yet oh also she’ll then turn on that shared interest to insult him And the interest he has in it like, violence on an nd wavelength there, that Sharedness of the interest as a point of connection, and for what. taylor’s making a seemingly not not romantic move here that rian rejects but is Still more personally interested in taylor than ever in other ways & sees them as like romantically desirable in theory, & apparently she’s also looking to get some but oops only in the [she’s not operating like She Is A Character Known To Us rather than “yep, this is someone who is a woman, could’ve been fan fave jean anne”] realm, but personal friendly connection with winston???? waste of time, hurt him for it, he doesn’t seem to be making a pass but apparently the abstract Potential of other ppl’s romantic &/or sexual capacities out here is something so motivating & relevant in general otherwise

where’d i even start this post. yeah like going “so where’d winston’s crush on rian end” and maybe it didn’t even make it into this season but really even the duoship was cruising along until ep ten demands rian partly be [Any Woman] suddenly & some Personal Something for taylor which kind of makes sense but idk why it’s not still more of the mentor / mentee business, was this the only way it could progress?? seems like a particularly shaky premise and like, So specific lmao. if that’s the only way to connect to rian Or taylor no wonder winston’s getting nowhere. haha no but really he’s up against the impossible situation where everyone else has negatively judged him & it’s all about the foregone conclusion of [everything about you sucks] (And punishing him for it / treating him worse than any particular individual does other people, certainly) that precludes connection and he can’t just unilaterally put in enough effort in the right ways so that he can create a good relationship b/w him and anyone else, but it Is all unilateral so far as we’ve seen....the tl;dr is like “why’d they do all that then” re: winston textually Liking rian at least in s5 there, but also truly it’s “why’d they do all that then” re: all the obvious emphasis & establishing of rian & winston As A Duo. would hardly be surprising if winston Was shifting more to actively pursuing friendship with tuk, who he interacts with & is interacted with as a friend, and to passively giving up on much of anything with rian, who has to like him at all in some way/s, but where their interactions are mostly on her terms & where she’ll give him shit spontaneously seemingly for her own entertainment, or because he’s like, responded to her / answered a question / provided info / talked abt something relevant to/of interest to them both / agreed with her, & who knows if she’s banked on his Liking her as a reason she’ll never have to like, consciously wonder abt whether she can hurt him enough he won’t be an amicable party towards her / someone she Can talk to at any time, apparently she doesn’t think about consequences (except that also she does, so whatever) & idk doesn’t seem to feel confident in knowing herself or what she wants or what she’s doing so it’s also just feasible idk she doesn’t know what she’s doing with this relationship / isn’t putting a world of Care And Consideration into it, we’ve hardly had a chance to see if winston hanging w/tuk rather than rian or rian & taylor is a pattern that’s been Shifted to rather than that he needed to be out of the way in Serious Finale Zone times & can now go back to mostly being around rian & being as game to talk to her in earnest at any time, seems utterly plausible b/c winston Has to, & Has, put up with anything forever b/c otherwise if the way ppl treated him like, lastingly affected him, he’d lose his panache & personality, or rather, stop expressing it around anyone here. and so far billions hasn’t really let winston have an arc, 5x05 through 5x07 looked the most like one but then after the hiatus it’s like, rian’s desk stuff is gone, her [trademark bi haircut] is grown out, the seeming Hurtling Towards Something just kind of flew out of frame b/c now it’s time to enter into the Rian & Taylor Serious Arc world & never look back......i said tl;dr before but Now tl;dr like what was making it clear winston has a crush about, was it an explanation for him getting over the rivalry immediately. but getting over it so what, they can be friends?? because what is That for, if they don’t get to do that either really, rather winston is determinedly amicable towards her up till now where Maybe he hangs out with tuk when possible as his new default, we can’t know, maybe he’s still just down to suffer forever b/c he does apparently have to do that, taylor hasn’t really given him anything since 5x05 (except the Back Pat the full season later) & he’ll still wear his tmc tee in ep one & doesn’t individually bring up any grievances w/them all season, even if we don’t know whether he’s less hyped about them at the end of the season at all, seems as matter of fact as ever like yep he’s taylor’s quant & he’s here for them, but, is he especially enthused abt anything here....yes, in 6x05, but nothing came of it. will anything come of Quant Duoship overall or was it just something else for rian to do before becoming taylor’s other bestie or something and only employee, will anything come of winston and tuk getting along completely successfully, will anything come of winston material and the fact that he’s actually a person any of these other characters could connect with. tl;dr winston

#pondering your billions fave is a full time job....''will any of this ever result in anything'' continual refrain #dynamics go all over the place in billions but they never really get started w/winston #when other people are friends it's not about one person seeing the other as primarily a joke #rian's only had thorough exchanges with winston offscreen....#if wags or taylor happens to wander onto your crisis go ahead and have a conversation that matters #winston's clearly seeking out conversations casual or otherwise all the time & what of it. he couldn't have anything to say #even when in ep ten it's bookended like rian ''ugh idc abt your interest'' then ''ugh idc abt your interest like yes i'm also interested in #the same Interest but i do not care abt Your interest'' & all their apparent thorough enthused discussions are unseen like oh ok #no idea what to make of the Duoship. has it been a joke. is it even relevant to rian or will being something to taylor be her full time job #like it is lmao but not like they weren't already doing that. and who can even guess abt winston and tuk #possible that even if they're not both punched harder as ''the punching bags are hanging out together'' in universe that like #just the handling by the material is like ah it's silly inconsequential jokes time with the joke guys #not like that apparently can't encompass ''winston earnestly hypes tuk up & everyone loves it & then he goes & gets some'' i'll take it #if billions has never thought / been willing to give winston arcs idk why start now #winston billions #i'll still be strung along hoping for it because if nothing else winston earnestly hopes for xyz so i'm hopign for it too lol #this character sure is [recurring] at all b/c of the Execution Of The Writing vs what was written in the first place....#potentially where plenty of the [winston is autistic] and [winston has genuine feelings] resides. lol. give him an arc ffs...

3 notes · View notes