#because i feel like it might be common in lots of repressed societies too | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

elia-de-silentio · 3 years

Text

The overarching themes of Vanitas no Carte: Identity

The Case Study of Vanitas is a very good, too little known manga (I hope the anime changes something), with some central themes than are exposed in different ways through different characters. In this meta, I want to explore one that was brought to my attention pretty recently: here a little examination on the various ways to face one's own identity in The Case Study of Vanitas.

The Stable Identity( Noè)

Let's start off with the positives, shall we? Noè has probably the most secure personal identity of all the bunch.

And this is pretty amazing, considering everything he went through. He has no memory of his birth family, but gets adopted by some nice people - who die shortly afterwards. Right at their graves, he is kidnapped by slaves, in an accident that left him injured. Then he is bought by someone who actually treats him nicely and is a good mentor for him, he finds many friends his age - and then one of them, the one he was closest to, turns out to be a cursebearer, kills all of the others and then tries to kill him; he is saved by the mentor, who beheads the friend right in front of him. The most immediate emotion is relief for being alive, and he will always feel terrible for that. Then, he has to witness his surviving friend try to cope very badly with her mourning by repressing her identity and try to substitute it with that of her dead twin. That's a lot.

And Noé reacted to all of this by becoming a confident person, kind and attentive to others, but not to the point of being a pushover. I'm not saying he walked away unscathed from the events of his childhood: he regrets the way he handled things with Louis, the way he didn't understand him, and has developed quite the savior complex as a result.

What I'm saying is that he is probably one of the very few well-adjusted people in the psychiatric ward that is Vanitas no Carte. He is still questioning himself, but in a normal way for a nineteen-years-old that has just left a sheltered environment for the big wide world. He is aware of some of his strenghts (his naivete) and is realizing others (putting unfair expectations on other people, underestimating other people due to racial biases); but most importantly, when he realizes these mistakes, he doesn't run away from them or obsess over them believing they make him a horrible person: he recognizes them, apologizes to the wronged person if necessary, and works on improving them.

This isn't to say he's completely happy-go-lucky with no regrets; he feels guilty about being relieved that he lived while Louis died, and he has a lot of uncertainties regarding his identity as an Archiviste and the impact his powers can have on other people. But he managed not to tie his entire identity to that guilt; and as for the second point, Teacher helped him rationalise that and figure out a conduit that didn't undermine him and at the same time showed respect for others. Noè went through several traumas, but received one thing most of the cast didn't: guidance and support from his environment. Whatever Teacher's actual motives are, he shaped a well-balanced person.

The Group Identity (The dhamps, appearently 99% of vampirekind)

"Us dhams are only loyal to each other!" This is what Dante says in one of the first chapters, giving us the first clues to their status as outcasts.

The war between humans and vampires ended up with each deciding to keep to themselves, but dhampires are the living exception to that silent agreement. So, both societies decide to reject them, and they can't find a place in the world unless they stick to others of their own kind. This common history of traumatic experiences of abandonment and subsequent resentment of both human and vampire society for it goes on to create a very strong group identity: the only ones they give a damn about are those like them, everyone else is a potential enemy and is only good to be exploited.

Then, we have the vampire culture. I mean ... it might be because insofar we have met almost exclusively aristocrats obsessed with their respectability ... but they have a lot of prejudices.

You're born under a uncommon moon? You're a pariah. You're mixed race? You're a pariah. Your parents committed a crime? You're a pariah, and are used as a tool. You're born as part of a set of twins? Either you or your sibling are killed at birth, because of something that is SAID, not even a certified element of vampire biology. You're stuck with a curse? You're executed, no attempts to heal you.

Their society seems to run on an ideal model of person which depends on factors outside the individual's control, and whoever doesn't fit this description and deviates from the group in any shape or form gets ridiculously fierce punishment. They make the freaking Church look good by comparison, at least their repressive and racist side is composed of extremists instead of everymen.

The Clan Identity (Chloé, and partially Noé again)

Chloé identifies with a group of people too; but it's not a race, it's a family. The D'Apchier family, the nobles who are responsible for Gevaudan. Her father made sure she had this idea in her right from the start, and she interiorized it.

And this had mixed results: while on the one hand she was chained to self-loathing by the guilt of having accidentally caused the massacre of the family and was only saved by Jeanne and Jean-Jacques reclaiming her as part of theirs, on the other she was able to resist to Naenia because of the love and responsibility she felt towards the people of Gevaudan. Chloé is, at this point, the only curse-bearer who managed to trick and attempted to fight directly against Charlatan.

Then there is Noé in relation to his Archiviste identity. He seems to think of it mainly in negative terms, very conscious of the living invasion of privacy it turns him into ... and nothing else. We have never seen him wonder about who his birth parents were, ask himself why he doesn't remember anything, why was the clan exterminated, or how he feels about being a survivor, one of the only ones if not outright the only. He sees his heritage as a burden,and hasn't thought of it in any different term. I wonder how a change in perspective could impact the above 'stable identity'.

The Someone Else's Identity (Vanitas, Dominique)

I already dedicated a whole post to this trait they share, so I'll be short: both Vanitas and Dominique hate themselves and try to become something worthy by taking elements of people they admire: Louis for Dominique, a combination of his birth father and Luna for Vanitas.

The Object Identity (Jeanne)

The very first thing Jeanne was said in her whole life was that she was an object. A vessel for something (or someone?) else, who mustn't have feelings or desires of her own. Encouraging, isn't it?

Luckily, this wasn't all she got in life. Soon afterwards, she was adopted by Eric and Louise, who loved her a lot, received kindness by Ruthven, met Chloé who became an older sister to her. Unluckily, all of this was taken away from her in the most cruel way possible.

She couldn't make any sense of her parents's betrayal and death, and the way her life suddenly changed; she rationalised it by telling herself that it was her fault, if she had been just the good object everyone told her to be nothing would have happened. So she accepts the Object Identity: she is a tool, so she doesn't feel, she exists only to obey orders, and as long as she is nobody else will ever suffer. It gets even worse after she fails to kill Chloè: she couldn't fulfill her duties, and both her and her big sis suffered for it. This mindset traps her in a world of pain, but also prevents her from facing the fact that she is subject to a senseless injustice, one she has no control over.

Vanitas managed to help her with that. He validated her feelings, and showed her that nobody had to die if she had them, solving the situation with Chloé and Jean-Jacques. This gave her a nice confidence boost, returning her to the cheerful attitude she had as a young girl; the consequences of this change remain to be seen.

The Unknown Identity (Luna)

This one is interesting because Luna themselves is pretty explicit about it. They see themselves as something 'other', who is outside commonly used categorization; starting with 'male or female' (and here I am left wondering if they had specific sexual characteristics but didn't feel like they 'fit', or were intersex and nonbinary, or had an entirely different biology from both vampires and humans).

Luna doesn't like this condition: they said they tried to figure out what they were, to understand themselves, and they regret doing so now. Why? Maybe they didn't find any answer and were left perpetually unsatisfied, or they found an answer, and they found it to be awful?

Still, this indicates Luna has never been particularly happy with themselves, and this found no resolution. And then they died. Nice, uh?

Well, I think this was all. There are other characters I would like to know more about in regard to this, like Ruthven, Marquis Machina, and Mikhail, but there is still time.

All in all, I'd say Vanitas no Carte explores the theme of identity pretty throughly; many character arcs are still in progress, and I'm interested about how things will develope especially for Vanitas, Dominique and Jeanne.

Thanks to anyone who bothered to read my ramblings!

#vnc #vanitas no carte #the case study of vanitas #vnc meta #vnc analysis #vnc noe #vnc chloé #vnc vanitas #vnc dominique #vnc jeanne #vnc luna #elia's recaps

263 notes · View notes

sokkagatekeeper · 3 years

Note

As much as I love Zuko as a character, he's way too overrated in the fandom and fanon Zuko is weird to me, wasn't he supposed to be a jerk that tries to be a better person?

while i do try to stand as far from fanon as a concept as i can, i still believe it goes both ways. making zuko too much of an asshole is no better than making him too much of a baby, of which i have talked about before. there are plenty of misconceptions about zuko, so i’m just going to list a couple of fundamental things about his character that will hopefully get all of us in common ground.

zuko comes from a place of privilege despite his empathetic nature, he has a hard time understanding how the suffering of other people looks like from his personal point of view of his personal suffering. he is often insensitive and careless with other people and their suffering because of this. despite this, too, zuko feels for other people tremendously. he has been, to a much lesser degree, directly and visibly harmed by this same system (to! a! much! lesser! degree!!) as the people he himself has harmed because of his imperialism, and him being raised as the underdog, maimed and abused, experiencing ableism and homophobia (yes homophobia) are the reasons why he is able to let go of his imperialistic, nationalist mindset quicker than other kids might.

zuko cries. quite a lot! he does so mostly while angry, sometimes when he’s sad, but he does cry an awful lot. so, that’s something.

zuko is not naturally good or any other bullshit, but in a militaristic society that values what are considered traditionally masculine traits (assertiveness, leadership, cold-thinking and pragmatism, controlling, emotional suppressing) zuko is deeply, loudly feminine in a way that other people can blatantly see and judge him based on it. his arc involves breaking free of this pressure he has on his back to be “more of a man” than his personality allows him to. he overperforms a lot of his aggressiveness – the part of it that isn’t born out of his rage, that is – and he is certainly masculine in a fair amount of aspects, but many of his core traits are (in society and within the show) associated with femininity, such as emotional expressiveness, empathy and compassion, gentleness, kindness. as femininity is perceived as weak, zuko is therefore perceived as weak for displaying these traits from an early age and especially in contrast to azula, who displays many of the traits mentioned above. zuko doesn’t fit at all into the ideal of cold, detached version of masculinity that the fire nation preaches, which is what deteriorated his self-esteem and drove him to overperform his traditionally masculine traits out of desperation such as his commanding stance or getting really good at fighting people, or even as small as being stiff as hell when he wants to show vulnerability or show affection even towards his uncle. he did all of this in order to try and fit better into the mold of the man people told him he should be. but no matter how hard zuko worked to repress that core, fundamental part of him over the course of the series, whether these are qualities he born with, out of the love guidance and support he received from iroh & ursa, or a little bit of both, he is never able to stick to a cold, ruthless, detached mindset – he’s always intentionally and unintentionally working towards being better. these are not by any means indicative of zuko’s “inherent goodness”, but merely that he is gentle and kind because (again) he is a very emotional and empathetic person. that’s about it.

zuko is fundamentally the child prince of a racist imperialist and brainwaished country. he can be tone-deaf. he is very individualistic and determined to prove himself as a real man and he can be pretty myopic because of this. even though he’s kind, he hurt and hurts a lot of people.

zuko is generally more defensive than aggressive, with a few obvious exceptions such as chasing aang all over the world or burning down kyoshi island. his first reaction when he believes he’s being threatened, insulted, diminished, is to get angry. he can only react in a more calm manner if he’s in what he considers to be a safe space, such as with his uncle, and later on the gaang. he’s not going to be patient about being teased by azula or zhao, but he will sit down and learn to take a joke from katara during eip because he knows she’s not doing it to actually harm him or be cruel to him. at times, he sits down and takes iroh’s advice, or at the very least listens to it.

in conclusion, calling zuko soft is not incorrect. calling zuko a jerk is not incorrect. calling zuko only soft or only a jerk is throughoutly incorrect, as zuko is [gasp] a nuanced character. do with this what u will

#asks #anon #zuko #analysis #sorry if i repeat myself too much 😭#anyway #n #atla + gender #real men keep cool in the face of a fire #compassion as a chest wound #zuko's redemption

128 notes · View notes

gaawachan · 3 years

Text

Discord Convo: Yasha, Essek, Culture, Shadowgast Ramblings

Me: Man I wish Essek and Yasha could have - nvm I'll finish that thought later.

Sibling: I KNOW. I ALREADY KNOW WHAT YOU'RE GOING TO SAY AND I WISH YASHA HAD BEEN MORE PRESENT IN THE STORY

Me: Stop doing the hive mind thing. it's invasive. i feel violated.

Sibling: I can't help it.

Me: But yeah Essek and Yasha. I find it very interesting because there's actually a lot of crossover in their temperaments, but in terms of physical presentation, they couldn't be more different. They both came from completely different sub-cultures in Xhorhas, and it's like... that temperament among the Rosohna Drow. It makes me think that they learned how to like... Okay hang on this is hard to put into words... Right so from a meta perspective, it reads like Matt took Yasha's basic temperament and applied it to other people of Xhorhas. Like Yasha was a broader expression of typical mannerisms of Xhorhas (except that Yasha was no longer bound by the modesty of the cultures there, and having been exposed to Molly, was freer with her sexuality after it was stifled in the Wastes in her youth). Right? So with that thought in mind, look at Essek. Essek doesn't have the same trauma Yasha has so he doesn't have the same sort of dysfunctions, but when you first meet Yasha, she does display a casual arrogance/confidence about her power, and Essek has the temperament, but what he lacks is the freedom from modesty. He's extremely withdrawn.

Sibling: Are you saying he's going to become an e-boy? Because there's no promises that under that cloak, he isn't already one lmaoooo

Me: Well, I think it's interesting because this is actually one underrated area where I think Caleb would actually be really good for him and vice versa. It also says a lot about the odd intersections of culture in Xhorhas, because in old drow society, sex was uh... you know, let's not go into that.

Sibling: Just all of the nasty tags from AO3

Me: but my point is that it makes sense that the Kryn dynasty would be heavily influenced by and adopt a lot of the mannerisms and cultural relations from the people of Xhorhas because... they would be trying to distance themselves from the violence of their past by integrating stuff from the cultures they colonized. It makes sense that maybe the nomads of the wastes would impact their mannerisms and dynamics, though you can see echos of old drow culture in the dynasty, of course, with the dens and all.

Sibling: They're doing what the pirates from Wind Waker did once they found New Hyrule lol. "Yes, oh yes. We love technology"

Me: Yeah. So anyway, Yasha and Essek would have been interesting to have more interactions with.

Sibling: I mean, both are good characters? They just didn't have a lot of screentime, and it didn't really seem like Ashley was super interested in exploring her past. It doesn't help that Yasha was essentially silent for all major character interactions lol.

Me: They are both socially awkward, with casual confidence in their skills, and somewhat similar mannerisms, but Essek is very modest but manipulative, and Yasha is very upfront/blunt, and both of them have the guilt thing going on. Going back to Essek and Caleb. I think that their immediate positive effects on each other are obvious, but on this topic specifically... Caleb's only ever hesitant with his affection because of his trauma, really. You get the distinct impression that he used to be a lot more touchy feely (just look at his early game dynamic with Nott), and while he is usually very polite, he has no problem with being blunt about his sexuality when he thinks he can get away with it. At the same time, Caleb's history with sex and relationships is really twisted and complicated, so he needs a partner who is respectful of boundaries and willing to check what is going on at any given time. In other words, he needs someone who is not like Molly (no offense to widomauk shippers).

Sibling: I mean, that was the primary problem with Molly. They had no sense of boundaries and that was good for someone like Yasha. Not so much for people with trauma related to lack of boundaries.

Me: (text dump) No, Molly DID have a sense of boundaries; they deliberately crossed them in order to make people uncomfortable. THAT was my biggest problem with Molly. Molly knew exactly what they were doing. Taliesin said as much. It's why I never shipped widomauk, because it’s yet another relationship where casual disregard for Caleb's comfort is present. It's why if I had shipped Caleb with anyone other than Essek, it would have been Fjord or Caduceus (but he's a disinterested ace and I respect that) or Yasha (but she's gay and I respect that) simply because they were clearly the ones who appeared most cognizant of Caleb's social comfort levels and such (so basically widofjord is what I'm saying, lol). This isn’t a widomauk hate thing; it’s just not to my taste because I relate too much to hating having my personal boundaries deliberately treated with disrespect. That's going off on a tangent, though.

Essek, in contrast, needs someone who he can let his hair down with comfortably. Essek seems to only really feel that way around Caleb and Jester. Caleb's the only one Essek really initiates touch with. Caleb's the one who gets Essek to swear for the first time, like Caleb swearing gave Essek permission to do the same just for the hell of it. Caleb and Jester, more than the others, made it clear that he's allowed to be goofy when he's with them. The two of them joking around with Immovable Object (and Caleb openly participating in that clownery with Seeming and such when he and Essek have so much in common) makes Essek feel comfortable with exploring not having a stick up his ass 24/7, which is exactly what a clearly extremely repressed person like Essek could benefit from in a partner, a person who he can relax around and vent with, because he's very obviously never had that before, or at least not consistently. And how did he get to that point?

It's from a thing about Caleb that is extremely underrated. Caleb, be it from his natural personality or that coupled with his training, knows the value of being openly vulnerable. It's very clearly NOT something that Trent specifically taught him. Caleb recognizes that the best way to manipulate people is to be sweet and earnest and awkward and TRUTHFUL about his beliefs and vulnerabilities, but this pays off in ways unintended. Caleb expects it to just be transactional, but people end up genuinely forming bonds with him because of it, and what's more, that he does that with such regularity results in other people responding in kind (which is the goal). Someone as reserved as Essek could only stand to be vulnerable BECAUSE Caleb made HIMSELF vulnerable first. I think the best thing Liam ever did for Shadowgast was make it clear that everything he said to Essek may have been manipulative... but every word of it was also true, because Essek is clever enough to recognize that honesty.

The most underrated line in Essek's growth as a person doesn't even come from Essek, and it doesn't come from Caleb talking to Essek. I think people forget about this, but during the final conversation with the scourger, which Essek was present for... the scourger asks Caleb why he's bothering with her. And Caleb says (paraphrasing) "I think that I hoped if I could see one hint of change from you, I could believe that we aren't both damned." Imagine being Essek and hearing that. It recontextualizes everything about Essek's growth. The rapid change between the boat scene and Aeor isn't just because Essek wants to be a better person. It's because he wants to prove to Caleb that Caleb isn't damned, because no one has ever done that for Caleb. Caleb is so obviously drowning in his past during the Aeor arc. That sort of hope is something he desperately needed. It's one of the few things about the Aeor arc that isn't botched by the rush to end the series; Essek's consistent determination to be a positive influence on Caleb, for Caleb, was gold from start to finish. Remember too that by the time of the boat scene, Caleb had already met with Astrid and had that disheartening conversation. Essek's efforts to become a better person feel like he's trying to almost unknowingly undo the damage that the recent interactions with Astrid and Trent had done to Caleb's psyche.

... tldr, Caleb is going to teach Essek how to be a manslut... in private... jk but not really.

Sibling: I SAID THAT EBOY ESSEK LOL! Ugh... that final epilogue screwing over my favorite MLM ship... It's not canon. They went and made their own school, and lived forever in disguises to keep the scourgers coming after them.

*That was the end of this part of the conversation. On reflection, I ought to have noted that Essek’s modesty might not be so much a cultural thing as it is an “Essek trying to keep people away from him like a prickly porcupine” thing, but you never know. If it is cultural, that may be the result of the dynasty trying to distance themselves to the practices of those who worship Lolth, but I don’t know that Exandria lore has ever said anything about this? And if it is a cultural thing, is it limited to the nobility, like Essek? One could also argue that the cultural practices of Yasha’s people, with the arranged marriages and such, may have influenced the dynasty’s own cultural formation, but I feel like I didn’t make that clear enough? Anyway, that’s why it’s a ramble.

#critical role #critrole #critical role spoilers #critrole spoilers #shadowgast #essek thelyss #yasha nydoorin #caleb widogast

36 notes · View notes

gryphsdeadbones · 4 years

Note

homophobia/biphobia kinda mentioned?

One of my friends was like, watching Freemind and said, deadass, 'so... is he like, repressing gay thoughts? Like, is he bi or something? He gives of a bi mood to me I have no idea why.' And someone else pointed this out too but like... Freemind is a bi in denial. So now all I'm thinking is Freemind saying no homo about a lot of things, mostly out of fear people will think of him as gay(lets be honest this mans was in 2007, fear of seeming or looking gay was huge then.) and Feetman getting mildly infuriated about it.

Freemind genuinely feels that way about someone, like, 'damn too bad this guys dead, he had some muscle...'

Then he'll realize the other two are behind him and just cough and go, 'what?? No homo jeez'

He has internalized homophobia/biphobia, and yeah.

Might make Freeman sad because he remembers when HE went through that.

HE REALLY DOES now that im rewatching fm. he’s afraid of something trivial like earrings ?? out of all things, afraid wearing it would make him look gay

“like a sailor”

then in the same fuckin episode or so he like? he says he wants to be a pirate. “but that counts as sailor too”

for all we know it could mean nothing at all and just grasping at straws, but it is there. It’s like? A sort of direct parallel or so. He sounds repressed as hell with internalized homo/biphobia

and the beautiful thing about aus and stuff is we can kinda do whatever we want, so freemind can be as gay as much as we want. i dont know what ross scotts reasoning for the r slur stuff was, and i dont really care to know; all i vaguely know he’s sorta chill with like. freemind characterizations i guess?? so like either way [does a cool remix on gordon freemind]

that era was just such a bad, bad time. i know it was for me before i discovered my identity. And society / the internet itself was much much more of a cesspool back then, not many had the common sense and etiquette ppl have nowadays.

freemind does have the capacity to grow and change if he were allowed to.

in-universe, feetman would probably be? less harsh? but still firm in letting freemind know when he’s acting up and doing unacceptable outdated behavior. theyre grown ass adults with fucked up problems, but they know how to solve problems. finding solutions is kind of their thing, as scientists.

communication issues could be a thing, but since they all the same person at their core, they’re even More aware. Who better to call you out on your bullshit if not from an outside party who is also kind of yourself?

its just. so important to grow up in the sense of admitting your mistakes, and forgiving yourself of the dumb shit youve done in the past, and constantly strive to be better than the previous hell you’ve been through, and to just think.

...I got carried away but yes, Gordon Freeman (all 3 of them) very much reads as bisexual with a lot of fuckin issues. I can see him very much struggling with romance, but regardless, he’d treat his partner RIGHT and like. really grow together with whichever character you see he ends up with.

#ask #gordon freemind #gordon freemanverse #shrike writes a thing #i hope it made sense bc i struggle a lot #with wording and articulating with my fucked up brain #in short: i care gordon freeman and it Can Be That Deep #Anonymous

191 notes · View notes

mrsjadecurtiss · 3 years

Note

Hiiiiii I know you've been bombarded with Roose meta questions recently but I'm writing a fic and having an INSANELY tough time writing Roose in a way that feels accurate or true to character. So I decided to consult the expert. What do you think Roose would be like as a husband? Because I keep slanting towards writing him like Stannis: cold, impartial, not affectionate, awkward, and emotionally repressed to the point of breaking his jaw from clenching if his wife were to initiate physical contact. But that doesn't feel right. I know you recently did an ask on whether or not Roose would be physically affectionate, but as a husband in general...idk I can't tell. It seems like he might have abused Bethany Ryswell, but Walda seems to be getting along just fine, sans Ramsay. Do you think he'd be emotionally open at all? Confide in his wife if he knew she was smart? Would he sleep together, or separate? Would he think of her as his property, or physically abuse her? I don't have a solid enough grasp on Roose to answer any of that in a way that makes sense 😭 sorry for how long and contrived this ask is omg. You do gods work on this blog💖

Hi! :)

You mean well, but it is a bit tiring to get asked so many questions to aid your fic writing (with anons i can also not tell how many were sent by the same person) - the sort of meta answers i do sometimes take me hours to write, and you asked a lot of stuff which would demand me to analyze not only several character relations/traits but also stuff about medieval society/westerosi worldbuilding...

I will try to answer some of the questions in a shorter manner:

1. It does not appear that Roose knowingly abuses his wives (as in, he would not treat them badly intentionally). Marriages are made for political alliances, and he knows the importance of keeping the person involved in positive spirits as to not harm this alliance. We see for example how he offers Theon (as Reek) fresh clothing as a show of goodwill because Theon as the heir to the Iron Islands is an important ally, and he berates Ramsay for threatening cruelty to Barbrey. Barbrey also lets Theon know Roose isn't happy with how Ramsay treats Jeyne. His current wife Walda is usually depicted as trusting her husband and having positive feelings towards her marriage.

Ramsay's face darkened. "If I cut off her teats and feed them to my girls, will she abide me then? Will she abide me if I strip off her skin to make myself a pair of boots?" - "Unlikely. And those boots would come dear. They would cost us Barrowton, House Dustin, and the Ryswells." - Reek III, aDwD

[To Theon:] "You must be cold. We'll put you in lambswool, soft and warm. Perhaps a fur-lined cloak. Would you like that? [...] Would you prefer to dress in silk and velvet? There was a time when you were fond of such, I do recall." - Reek III, aDwD

"The bride weeps," Lady Dustin said, as they made their way down, step by careful step. "Our little Lady Arya. [...] Roose is not pleased. Tell your bastard that." - The Turncloak, aDwD

Lady Walda gave a shriek and clutched at her lord husband's arm. - Theon I, aDwD

Roose knows to treat his allies politely, and would thus treat a wife with the standard courtesy worthy of a woman of her status. He would not want to make her despise him, because this could have a bad effect on his alliance with her house.

2. However, this does not mean Bethany or the first wife was happy with him. When he talks about Bethany, he doesn't use her name, calling her only his "second wife"; reflecting that he likely was not close with her and sees her more as property. He is a cold man, closed off and callous, and is not conventionally attractive either (usually described as "plain"), so while he would have acted in a courteous way towards Bethany there was likely little attraction, warmth or friendship between them, and she would have probably not enjoyed spending time with him much. We have too little info to tell anything in-depth about their relationship, but it could have been abusive towards Bethany, or they could have had a relationship more akin to distant coworkers.

3. Walda is depicted as having positive feelings towards him, and he states he is "oddly fond" of her. Walda is funny with an occasional mean streak, which could match with his own mean sense of humour. She is also a little bold and cheeky. Considering that Roose is also good friends with Barbrey, who is bold and headstrong, it appears he finds women with those traits sympathetic/amusing. In a medieval society, women are inherently less powerful; so he can find it charming if they are bold since it does not threaten him the way it would if a man did it. However, the woman needs to know her place, and it seems likely he would not be amused at all if he was personally insulted or the woman tried to rise above her station. If a woman was meek or boring or closed off he would probably just be courteous, but not be very interested in her.

4. He would likely sleep in seperate beds with his wife a lot of the time (this appears common in the asoiaf world, for example Catelyn also has her own bedchambers), though how often exactly that is likely depends on how close he is to her. We have a line implying he spent the night in the same room as Walda as they enter the Great Hall together, though they could have also just linked up before entering.

Roose Bolton entered, pale-eyed and yawning, accompanied by his plump and pregnant wife, Fat Walda. - Theon I, aDwD

5. He appears to counsel with Barbrey frequently in aDwD, so if his wife was a strong/smart ally with a lot of experience that he can respect, i can imagine that he would talk about important stuff with her especially when it comes to organizing the castle (which is a duty the wife traditionally shares). I do not think he would emotionally confide in his wife, both because of his general closed-off personality and because of patriarchal values that would demand a man act stronger than the woman at all times.

If you write from the perspective of the wife, try to read how he interacts with Barbrey, Catelyn and by extension Jaime to see how he interacts both with highborn women and nobles of his status. In my past meta i detail some more of his character traits.

Hope this helped! I think these are all interesting topics to discuss, they are just too many for one ask, so i tried to keep it shorter with the answers. I wish you good success with your fic!

#asoiaf #roose bolton #asoiaf meta #asks #anonymous

56 notes · View notes

linkspooky · 4 years

Text

Toga Himiko’s Normal Life

Himiko looks like the most straight forward case of what pop culutre considers to be a classical sociopath / psychopath in My Hero Acadmia. Shigaraki, Dabi, Hawks were all groomed to become the way they were, but Himiko possessed a natural inclination towards blood and violence from the start. She seesm to be a natural born cold blooded killer, however in this meta I’ll argue that while Toga seems like the flip-side of a normal, good person like Uraraka, she’s actually just a normal girl herself.

1. Character Origins

Volume sixteen of My Hero Academia had an official illustration included as an extra that shows the characters Twice and Himiko drawn together in an illusion to a famous Joker and Harley Quinn illustration.

Now, I’m not going so far as to claim Himiko was based off of Harley Quinn, but one the league of villains and characters like Twice (and ReDestro) have made similiar references to the Joker before that especially with the quote “All it takes is one bad day”. There’s also enough similarities betweeen the two characters, they’re both the only female members of a crime syndicate that is mostly men, and dominated by men. Their backstories mirror each other, they were both relatively sane, normal, girls, until suddenly they cracked one day and became a total inversion of their previous presonality. There are enough similarities that I could use Harley as an example to explain a few of the important ideas present in Toga’s character.

They are also both female characters who are written with love as the central concept of their characters. Harley’s origin as originally depicted in the comic and episode for the Batman the Animated Series “Mad Love” goes as follows: Harleen Quinzell was a psychiatrist working at Arkham. Eventualy she came to sympathize with one of her patients which triggered a transformation in her from well meaning doctor, to love-sick sycophant of the joker who broke him out of prison.

A lot of Batman Villains have origins like this. The most comparable one is Harvey Dent. Proescutors, Doctors, we are told the people who hold these jobs are good and righteous people. Even Harley herself started out as someone who just sympathized with a patient too much. However, somehow they become flipped into the exact opposite versions of themselves. They go mad for lack of a better words. Harvey Dent who was once a symbol of justice, becomes nothing more than a murderer, and Harley Quinn goes from healer to the sidekick of a mad clown willing to destroy everything in the name of love.

The question, asked in both Himiko and Harley’s stories is how can good people flip like this?

Most people have a black and white view of these issues: good people are only capable of good actions, and bad people are capable of bad actions. It’s hard to swallow the fact that any normal person has the capacity to cause so much harm inside of them.

We see similiar remarks in the background of Himiko’s story. Himiko comes from a good upper class family, she went to what was most likely a good school, she was always smiling and surrounded by friends. Everyone who comments on her sudden transformation reacts in a similiar way. “She was aways so cheerful and well-behaved, I still find it hard to believe.” She was always such a good girl, and good people don’t do those things.

Normal people, good people, don’t have the capacity to do bad. That’s what makes the transformations so shocking. Therapists/Doctors are supposed to heal, Prosecutors are supposed to be just. And now we return to our old friend Jung.

The story of Harleen Quinzell and Harley Quinn. The story of Himiko Toga the happy middle school girl and Himiko Toga the serial killer is a tale told over and over again, it’s just usually told with male protagonists instead of female ones. It’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

Robert Louis Stevenson’s The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886) is a late-Victorian variation on ideas first raised in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818). Stevenson’s monster, however, is not artificially created from stitched-together body parts, but rather emerges fully formed from the dark side of the human personality. In the story Dr Jekyll, an admired member of the professional Victorian middle-classes, conducts a series of scientific experiments which unleash from his own psyche the ‘bestial’ and ‘ape-like’ Mr Hyde (ch. 10). Gothic fiction had examined the idea of the sinister alter ego or double before on many occasions but Stevenson’s genius with Jekyll and Hyde was to show the dual nature not only of one man but also of society in general.

“Man is not one, but truly two.”

Robert Louis Stevenson

Both cases are tales are transformation, of the monster coming from within. Himiko transforms from middle school girl into serial killer. Harleen Quinzell transforms into Harley Quinn. Dr. Jekyll becomes Mr. Hyde. We witness a transformation into a monster that seems the antithesis of everything that person was boefre, but was inside of them all along this works because of the jungian idea of the shadow.

The shadow is the unconscious side of personality. The shadow is what exists but what we do not acknowledge. If our behavior during everyday life, choosing to smile, choosing to talk to people, choosing to use our manners is a mask then the shadow is the face beyond the mask. The conscious personality conceals, the shadow reveals. It’s the difference betewen who we are and who we choose to be. The shadow isn’t necessarily negative however. The shadow is just the repressed side of our personalities, it’s what we try to hide.

The shadow plays a role in Harleen’s transformation. While it’s present in Mad Love as well, a recent miniseries ‘Harleen’ really dives into the Jungian symbolism. There’s even several similarities in common with Himiko’s story, for example there’s a scene where Harleen is shown watching the bat man beat up joker and notice how everyone is cheering despite the fact that it’s violent.

Himiko’s interest in a boy is sparked by watching him get into a fight while everybody else is cheering for him.

The cover page depicts the change between Quinn and Quinnzel as a crumbling mask, which is the exact same imagery used for Himiko.

When she enters Arkham she chooses to depict Harley Quinn’s silhouette in Harleen’s shadow. Once again implying that the transformation is not so sudden and jarring as it seems, that Harley Quinn has always been there and is a part of her psychology the same way Mr. Hyde is inside Dr. Jekyll.

The comic even points it out. Harleen, and also by extension Harvey Dent are people who claim to be “good, righteous people’ and yet both of them end up transforming into murderers. Two-face’s name is literally two-face.

There’s also one particularly Jungian sequence in the middle of the conflict. She dreams (dreams are unconscious and therefore the realm of the shadow in Jung’s theories) about the city of gotham as a place inhabited with citizens who are monsters wearing the faces of human beings.

The idea is consistent throughout that Harleen is not really a ‘good person’ she’s merely repressed. She has had this capacity to be violent inside of her, this selfishness, all of these dark desires carried with her all along but rather than deal with them in any healthy way she repressed them until repressing them is no longer an option. Harvey Dent’s face gets half burned off, Harley’s skinn gets bleached by chemicals, the monsterous features inside of them are now worn on their faces and they have to wear their ugliness on the outside rather than the inside. They are now expressing every single thing they have repressed. However, the suggestion in both stories is that these are not special cases, that Gotham is such a repressed society that everyone is repressing the things they don’t like about themselves in that way. Harley fell in mad love sure, but love was just the reason, just the trigger, the truth is those feelings always lurked inside of her and she had no healthy way of dealing with them before that point.

That is the shadow, it’s everything you repress but it never disappears. If you ignore it, it takes on a life of its own. In some cases, like Harley’s you basically become your own shadow. Harley is the flipped upside down version of Harleen Quinzel, now her inner demons are what are expressed on the surface (desperation to be loved, violence, etc.) while her ‘normal’ self is hidden under a mask of insanity. That’s in fact how she ends the comic, Harley qalking around while Harley is trapped on the other side of the mirror because they have basically traded places. Now Mr. Hyde is walking around, while Dr. Jekyll is hidden personality. But it’s important to remember it’s not something like a split personality, Harleen Quinzell and Harley Quinn were always two sides of the same person. Even when she starts expressing her ‘bad’ traits, the good traits don’t go away. They’re just hidden underneath the surface the way the repressed bad traits used to be. Because you’re not good or bad, you’re not one side or the other. You’re both at the same time. Man is not one, but truly two.

So the complexity in Himiko comes from understanding that she’s BOTH a normal girl, and also a blood crazy yandere psycho.

2. A Normal Girl - Uraraka Ochaco

Uraraka is a pretty standard shonen heroine. She’s a cheerful girl. She’s a supportive friend. She’s the embodiment of what you’d call a good, kind, person and doesn’t seem to be any more complex than that. She lacks say the drive to be a hero that Midoriya does, the superiority complex that Bakugo has, the emotional issues that Todoroki has. She seems to always be agreeable and in a cheerful mood.

If you look just a little bit closer though she always seems to be walking on eggshells when she’s around others. She doesn’t want to join Deku and the others to try to save Bakugo from the heroes because, it might hurt Bakugo’s feelings.

When she loses in the hero tournament, she apologizes to her parents crying not because she feels bad that she lost, but she feels like she failed them. Like it was her job to win and bring money home. However, when Deku comes to check on her in the room she’s already completely hidden her tears.

Going into her backstory we learn that Uraraka is walking on eggshells around everybody due to her own parents, that she’s spent her life trying to be as small of a burden on them as possible because she could see the tired looks on their faces. She’s a child who felt guilty that her parents had to take care of her.

So, for Uraraka her entire life is devoted to making herself seem as small and inconsequential as possible. Other people’s needs will always trump hers. Other people will always have more noble motivations for becoming a hero than she has. Other people’s emotions will always be louder and take priority over hers. Uraraka sees her own emotions and needs as mere trifles that get in the way, and so she always shuts them down. We see Uraraka as a version of Himiko, a high school girl who always appears to be cheerful and well-behaved but is merely repressed.

Uraraka repeats the same unhealthy behavior as Himiko once did. Which is why Uraraka’s first meeting with Himiko goes with Himiko getting such a cold read on her.

It’s helpful to view Himiko as the flipped version of Uraraka. Uraraka hides everything that’s pleasant about her on the inside, and on the outside appears like a perfectly selfless girl. Himiko is someone who hides her good qualities and instead wears the mask of a bloodthirsty psycho on the outside. While Uraraka lives by denying her selfish desires, Himiko always chases after them and is true to them.

Traits that are repressed in Uraraka, are expressed in Himiko. Especially traits that society sees as bad in girls, like selfishness, being emotional, etc..

The way Himiko acts is especially jarring because she seems convinced she’s a normal person. She’s in her own little world, making friends, getting along with other people, it’s just her friendship just happens to involve stabbing.

Himiko appears to be a girl psychotically obsessed with blood and nothing else. A girl who only cares about killing other people and chopping them up to bits. When she expresses the feelings deep inside of herself, literally no one can make heads or tails of what she’s saying, she doesn’t sound like a girl just a bloodthirsty monster.

While Uraraka seems like she has nothing in common with what is essentially a weird serial killer, we learn that the exact behavior that Uraraka’s creation is what led to Himiko’s current state of mind.

The difference between them is not that Uraraka is a person of higher moral character, or a better person, but rather of circumstances between the two of them. It’s not the choices they made but rather things they were born into and couldn’t control. Uraraka has parents that accept her even when she fails and encourage her.

Toga had parents that abused their daughter, and then abandoned her.

Uraraka chose to repress herself, while Toga was forced to become repressed by her parents. While we don’t know for sure if it was physical abuse it’s at least emotional abuse, and it had to be to an extreme extent to make Himiko snap that hard. The same unhealthy behavior but push to extremes gets extreme results.

3. Normal Girl - Himiko Toga

Himiko did not become the way she is because she was lacking empathy or born with uncontrollable urges for bloodlust, but because of the environment around her that always forced her to repress herself. From the knowledge that her parents would never love her for who she really was. Himiko wasn’t born that way she was a response of what was done to her.

People who don’t really know Himiko always judge her this way, that she’s incapable of understanding other people, that she has no empathy for others. She’s almost literally labelled and dismissed as a one dimmensional yandere trope by the people surrounding her.

However, Himiko is in fact always doing the opposite. She’s constantly trying to empathize with others. Her maddened way of talking to both Tsuyu and Uraraka in her character introduction is exactly that, her trying to feel that kind of connection.

Himiko’s fascination for Uraraka is a desire for empathy and understanding. One that you could say even surpasses some characters on the hero’s side, because she’s willing to try to understand the world’s of people who are nothing like her. Himiko’s next most significant action in the manga is to take Camie’s place and go after the kids. While she does fight against them she’s not overly violent, just curious. Deku even reaffirms some of Himiko’s primary traits.

Himiko is always talking a lot and trying to explain her way of thinking to other people, because she wants them to understand her. However, because she’s bad at communicating this tends to come off as babble and a lot of people completely dismiss what she says and don’t attempt to listen.

She expresses two things one a desire to know Deku on a deeper level, immediately asking him very personal, and sometimes very downright invasive question and two she also notices the closeness that Deku and Uraraka have for one another.

Once again this is a repeating theme for the league. Himiko repeats the same desire that Twice has, to become a person who is trusted in the same way.

Once again it’s important to remember that Himiko is just the flipped version of a normal girl. If most people hide their bloodlust and show their good sides, Himiko hides her desire to be trusted and to empathize with other people underneath her bloodthirsty urges she shows on the surface. She positions herself as a femme fatalle, but she’s actually just a girl who’s trying to understand why other people are different then her, and why Deku and Uraraka can have a relationship mutually founded on trust when she can’t.

Himiko’s past was so repressed she never formed real relationships with people. Not only that she assumes that nobody will want the real her, because the moment she flipped and the real her was exposed everybody in her life abandoned her and she had to run away.

After her brush with Deku and Uraraka we see Himiko start to be trusted by her comrades and a marked transformation takes place in her.

We see shades of the old Himiko. A selfish girl who only exists to fulfill her whims. However, we’re shown Himiko is capable of empathizing because not only do Shigaraki’s words get through to her.

Himiko is also for the first time able to reach the emotions of another person. Remember when Himiko tries to explain how she’s feeling, she babbles, and babbles and nobody listens. However that changes and for the first time, not only does Himiko pick up exactly on what’s troubling Twice, she also comforts him the way he needs to be comforted. She tells him that yes it might be his fault that Magne died, but she sees that he’s doing his best to make up for it and she gently encourages him.

Remember how important this is for Twice. The world has never forgiven Jin for his mistakes. He hit the wrong guy on accident, while obeying the law, and lost both his job and his home. He started stealing to make ends meet, and as a result he lost his mind. When he makes a mistake it always blows up in his face but this time, Himiko notices that she’s panicking and comforts him telling him it’s okay he’s made this mistake and he can still work hard to fix it.

Not only that but she notices what the problem was with Jin, she was able to notice the symptoms of his psychotic breakdown and rather than dismiss it as just Twice being crazy was able to help him in real tangible ways by wrapping her hanky around him and covering him up like he asked. Uraraka has a very surface level kindness, she’s kind but only by walking around on eggshells with everyone. Himiko is able to see through people, but uses that to comfort people on a deeper level.

The “Himiko just can’t control herself because of her quirk” narrative is something that Himiko rejects herself. Because that’s not what Himiko wants. Himiko doesn’t want to be special or different from other people.

Himiko sees herself as normal, and what she desires to be understand and be understood by other people. She doesn’t like Curious’ narrative for her because it made her out to be a freak or someone special when Himiko is trying her best to get others to understand her as a normal girl. Himiko can’t repress herself anymore, she can’t become normal the way her parents taught her too so not permanently broken, and forced to always express herself she’s trying some other way.

What she wants isn’t to hurt other people, not really though. Those thoughts just turn violence, because Himiko is herself a person who’s endured a lot of violence. Himiko is basically a child that’s been on her own living on the streets and surviving for years, with all the dangers that entails, and also people who can shoot lasers and punch things really hard chasing after her.

The more she’s isolated and on the run, the more violence she endures, the more violent and unhinged her thoughts become. The more she’s exposed to people who accept her for who she is, the more she’s trusted by those people, the more empathic and sensitive Himiko becomes instead. Himiko’s desire isn’t violence, when she’s pushed to her utter limit she says what she wants is to become a girl like Uraraka who is just loved and trusted by others for who she is.

And I genuinely believe at the core of Himiko’s character this empathic girl exists. Himiko becoming violent and unrepressed doesn’t mean her empathy disappears. The complexity from Himiko is that she’s both the knife wielding psycho and the normal girl who just wants to have friends at the same time. If behind every normal person there’s a monster lurking is true then the opposite is true as well, behind every monster there’s a normal person.

This is an idea expressed by Twice again. One of the villains that Hawks dismissed as a bad person, was capable of showing him compassion and gentleness even when he screwed up. Toga was capable of empathy for Twice besides the use he had for others. Toga herself is shown to be capable of more empathy than Hawks, who is one of the most selfless characters in the series, and who is convinced his actions are always done in order to save others.

However we see their treatment of Twice is so drastically different. Hawks treats Twice in a selfish way refusing to listen to what Twice wants, and only ever used Twice as a tool to exploit. Twice himself thinks that now that he’s no longer useful, Himiko won’t be kind to him anymore however we see the opposite.

Twice admits to Toga that he’s the reason that everyone is in danger right now and he completely failed, and he’s not going to come save them. He admits that he’s useless and Twice himself said Toga wouldn’t be kind to him anymore. However in that moment, Himiko ignores the fact that her life is literally in danger and everything is going to hell around her to comfort Twice one final time and tell him the words he needs to hear.

It’s literally the single most empathic moment of the manga, and it’s in direct contrast to Hawks’ behavior. A hero as devoted to saving other people as Hawks, who genuinely likes Twice as a friend doesn’t show him any empathy at all and even stabs him as the back. A psycho like Toga puts her own feelings aside and notices Twice’s feelings, and gives him comfort and thanks him in his final moment because to her Twice has value as a person beyond what his use is. That Himiko is capable of this kindness, but equally capable of her monstrous actions earlier in the series is what makes her human. Her kindness doesn’t make her any less mosntrous, and her monstrous qualities don’t make her kindness go away she’s both at once, rather than either or. That’s where the complexity comes in.

Toga is a very human character precisely because we see her at her most monstrous, and we see that girl slowly relearn how to express the kindness that’s always been inside of her in healthier non-stabby way. A normal girl who learned how to be a monster to protect herself. A monster who is slowly relearning to be a normal girl.

#himiko toga #jin bubaigawara #league of villains #league of villains meta #league of villains friendship #mha meta #my hero academia #my hero academia meta #my hero academia villains

616 notes · View notes

tossawary · 3 years

Note

(LMY anon) Ahh I just saw your character notes for LMY. Thank you, that's very helpful! You're right that it feels insulting to LQQ to make LMY too emotionally intelligent, esp considering we have canonical evidence that she's also a weirdo. Even if it's a non-transmigrator AU, I feel like the only way I can even begin to understand her character is through the lens of a fangirl. The concept of writing RPF for a teacher+an ex-classmate who actually tried to end the world is a new level for me

I don’t even understand or like RPF on the normal level, personally. I mean, RPF fans, you do you! I vaguely comprehend the concept of treating celebrities presented/public personalities as characters, but I’m not personally comfortable with it. So that was one of my biggest obstacles when writing Liu Mingyan, like... this woman is in-a-different-universe-to-me-brained.

This was more or less my thought process, like, how I personally worked out better understanding Liu Mingyan’s situation:

(TL;DR: It’s easier to think of Liu Mingyan as a bard.)

So that was one of my biggest obstacles when writing Liu Mingyan, like... this woman is in-a-different-universe-to-me-brained.

But, at the same time, I don’t get the same squick with fiction surrounding historical figures. I mean, I do sometimes, but the distance of time makes it easier. I’m also fine (most of the time) with stories inspired by a true story. A lot of fiction is based on real events! Authors draw from real life! I don’t really watch Hollywood movies based on modern events and human interest stories which go viral, but they’re definitely a thing and they’re basically RPF. People like Real Person Fiction and Real Person Non-Fiction.

And, like, okay, this world doesn’t have the same overwhelming variety of content that our modern world has. Unclear on whether or not there’s widespread literacy or printing presses, but it sounds like most stories are going to come from storytellers and singers and other performers. Many of these performances are going to draw on historical and recent events, especially because it’s unclear how news might be otherwise spread. Look at what a huge industry just plain gossip is in our modern world! People need to be entertained and singing for your supper is an okay gig.

I need to stop thinking in terms of Modern RPF as I know it on AO3 and start thinking more in terms of bards.* Liu Mingyan is perhaps more like an artist meeting a journalist (or a publicist or a historian) than a modern fanfiction writer. Or like any playwright writing an embellished history for a ruler (except she did it on her own). Is a bard or storyteller hired to write something putting history in a specific light not essentially a historical paid publicist?

Except Liu Mingyan is doing it for her own benefit. And I would still personally call it fanfiction even if in this case it’s a for-profit adaptation.

*(I should probably better research Chinese historical forms of performance and spreading news, but SVSSS allows me to be lazy and hand-wavey about it. Thanks, Airplane.)

So, for me, I’m picturing Liu Mingyan and her friends are just a step to the left of historical reenactment meeting gossip meeting music/poetry/songwriting practice that got really out of hand. Friends can be terrible enablers sometimes, right? Then, bam! Real Person Fiction that people found compelling and spread like wildfire. All of the people involves are celebrities / political figures whose movements matter to the common people, and they don’t have news sites or social media sites for Keepin’ Up with the Cultivators.

I mean, it’s funny to think about it in terms of RPF and fanfiction as we know it, so I absolutely do. I think she’s a bit of a fangirl, yes! I relate to that! (But am I reducing her to “just a Modern BL fangirl” because she’s a woman writing romance and I’m looking at it from a modern fanfic author’s lens and not taking the situational context into account? She’s a BL fangirl with potentially significant societal impact. She’s not out of place in the world she lives in.)

Adaptation is pervasive throughout society and goes beyond fanfiction and fanart as we know it in what we call “Fandom”. Journalism is arguably non-fiction adaptation! Historians adapt the world around them to record it for future generations. Music can be an adaptation of people’s life’s experiences! People put on plays about other people’s stories they’ve witnessed. There are places in the world (our world) were the line between fiction and non-fiction blurs. And truly being objective is impossible when people’s creations are filtered through the lens of their own perspective, whether they’re writing a news article or a novel. So, like, there are types of adaptational fiction that society is willing to slap a “official” label on and this is one of those cases.

I mean, it’s still weird behavior in my eyes! It’s invasive! Liu Mingyan didn’t do this as journalist or a historian; she did this for her own entertainment and maybe for any potential money, and I would still totally call it fanfiction. Shen Yuan is reasonably mortified that someone has made something of his life! And misinformation can be extremely damaging to someone’s personal life and dangerous politically and I don’t know if she took that into account!

But, yeah. Liu Mingyan = on a similar boat to Jaskier from The Witcher. (Who is, I say affectionately, also a weirdo and could be called a fanboy.) Except she’s also a bit more repressed like Liu Qingge. It’s easier for me personally to understand the RPF angle if I attempt to understand the potential for RPF as it exists in her world, not as it exists in mine.

#tossawary svsss #ask tossawary #liu mingyan #svsss

38 notes · View notes

natusvincere · 3 years

Text

Why Can’t We Be Friends || Morgan and Vic

Who: @mor-beck-more-problems and @natusvincere When: Current Timing Where: White Crest National Park Hiking Trail What: Morgan and Vic decide to try a walk in the woods to catch up, but the conversation ventures to topics one of them would rather ignore. Warnings: Mentions of domestic abuse, emotional abuse, and parent death.

This wasn’t something Vic did. But Morgan Beck had somehow developed a knack for getting Vic to do all sorts of things she didn’t do- share feelings and admit that she could possibly care for someone else, for one. Plus, there was still that nagging, gnawing guilt about the way they had ended the last time they met up, and it couldn’t be washed away with just a bit of paint and a pretty picture. So, even though it wasn’t something she did, Vic supposed it was Morgan’s compelling pull on her that was to blame, and definitely not that she was growing weak or vulnerable. She sat on a rock where they’d agreed to meet, a healthy mix of excited and nervous energy buzzing within her. As a familiar car pulled up beside her and she whistled loudly. The clumsy, frantic gait of Winnie could be heard within a moment, only seconds before Vic saw her barreling back toward her, carrying a rather large branch. Winnie jumped up on the rock with her, proud and content, and dropped the branch to give her face a quick lick. “Stupid”, she whispered with a smile, giving her a kiss on the forehead.

She stood up, wringing her hands together as Morgan left her car, but Winnie clearly didn’t share her nerves. As soon as she noticed there was another being present, the dog dashed toward the car, barking a greeting that, to anyone else, probably sounded vicious and intimidating. Vic rolled her eyes. “Winnifred!”, she shouted, whistling sternly shortly after. Winnie, for her part, didn’t seem to care, and she continued to barrel toward the car, barking happily.

Morgan was happy to see Vic again. With everything she had going on, her visits to the gallery were becoming more seldom, and she didn’t get the same connection from Vic when their paths crossed there as she did when they spoke online. And lately, Morgan felt like Vic had something she wanted to tell her. She couldn’t settle on what, the woman had so many secrets and repressed feelings, it could be anything. From the way she spoke, Vic seemed like a woman who had suffered a great deal, and was buckling under the weight of it. As she drove up to the park, Morgan wondered if maybe she was going to try and explain some of her pain, so it wouldn’t be so hard to carry.

As soon as she opened the door, she was pounced by a large, slobbering dog. Morgan tried to pet her, but the creature jumped and barked too excitedly for her to get much in the way of ear scritches. “Hi, Winnie,” she laughed. Reaching into her purse, Morgan took out a little strip of dog jerky, which made Winnie bark even louder, jump high enough to paw at Morgan’s chest. With a big smile, Morgan threw it toward Vic and beamed as the dog ran after it.

“I hope that’s okay,” Morgan called, coming up to the woman. “I know you’ve said how friendly she is, but I smell like three different cats and I figured it doesn’t hurt to make a nice impression. Are we friends enough yet for me to hug you?”

Vic watched Winnie practically trample Morgan, feeling equal parts embarrassed and amused as she watched their interaction. No matter how much she tried, she couldn’t convince Winnie to be a calm, intelligent dog. She insisted on being hyper and simple. It was amazing, in a way, to watch the pure joy that radiated from such a silly creature. Morgan didn’t seem to mind, anway.

She attached Winnie to her leash as the dog ran toward her, too focused on her prize to realize what was going on. She brushed Morgan off, scratching Winnie behind her ears as she spoke. “It’s better to fill her up now than for her to find a rogue squirrel on the way that she’s dying to eat, I suppose. You saved us both a lot of distraction by bringing her that.” It struck her, briefly, that she might have reamed anyone else out for bringing her dog a treat without her permission, but it seemed Morgan had already managed to gain special treatment from Vic in more ways than one.

She bit her lip, but then shrugged and let herself fall into Morgan’s hug, awkwardly but fully embraced in it. “I’m not a hug person”, she admitted, eyeing Morgan carefully as they walked. Nothing seemed to surprise the other woman, and no matter the vitriol she sent her, nothing pushed her away, either. She cleared her throat awkwardly. “Have you… been doing okay?”

Morgan laughed her way into a smile as Vic relented and let them embrace. “In that case, I’m even more honored for the privilege. I won’t ask it of you too much, but I really do appreciate it.” She gave her another squeeze for good measure and then let go, settling back onto her feet and putting a little more distance between them as they began their walk. “I gotta say, I appreciate having someone who appreciates the little old school things like just going on a walk. I don’t know too many people like that.” She elbowed Vic, and hoped for the best that it wasn’t too hard.

At the question of how she was doing, Morgan went quiet, unsure of what to say. How was she doing? There was a lot going on, and it felt like she was having to re-evaluate her ethics every week, if not every day. How did any of the so-called principled people she knew handle it? It was no wonder Remmy had left to make things easier for them. “It’s...uh, been sort of a time. But that’s just White Crest for ya. I could really use one of those quiet breaks right now, where the worst thing we have to worry about is fish falling from the sky, honestly.” She shrugged. “But I still have...my art, my job, and...well, I sort of have this literacy side project but that’s a mixed bag at best.” She looked sidelong at Vic. “But how are you? Have you considered, you know, getting out more?”

Vic eyed Morgan as she elbowed her, only able to maintain a serious expression for a moment before she elbowed her back. She quickly shoved her hands into her pockets after the gesture. “Well, most people are assh-”, she stopped, eyeing Morgan again. The other woman kept telling her to open herself up to people, to stop seeing the worst in them. It was such a natural reaction to shove them aside, as so many had done to her. She supposed at some point, it was easier than opening herself up to rejection. She cleared her throat before continuing. “...Most people don’t have time to stop and appreciate the beauty in nature, I guess. Too busy.”

She glanced at her friend, surprised to hear that she hadn’t been having an easy time lately. “Is it… something you’d like to discuss?”, she tried cautiously. “I know you mentioned this is a hard time of year for you.” For whatever reason- Vic didn’t really want to think about why. It caused too many questions about the secrets that Morgan held deep inside. Winnie yanked on the leash, pulling her forward quicker than she expected. She licked her lips before she answered, not too sure on what she’d say before she started. If you consider getting trapped in a nightmare dreamscape with Marley- “I went to the bend last week, if that’s what you mean”, she said sheepishly.

Morgan caught Vic’s thoughtful amendment and smiled, touched and grateful. “Well, in their defense, so much of life these days pulls them away from it. And with everything that hides in the shadows, maybe it’s better for them that they know their limits.” She shook herself out of the middle distance and smiled at Vic again. “But I’m glad we have this in common. It’s nice.”

She thought awhile about how she might go discussing this with Vic. If there were any words that approximated being hunted, or fearing her immortality, the way she ached when she saw aging families and the neighborhood kids graduating kindergarten and pre-k. What human words could she possibly use to explain being pulled away from the very human pieces of the world?

“I’m not sure I know how,” she said at last. “Not because I don’t want to, it’s just...hard to explain and hard to understand. I don’t even understand all of it myself. Why don’t you tell me about The Bend? I see you grinning over there. Did something interesting happen? Or maybe someone?”

“I think they’d be happier if they stopped worrying about what people thought. I wonder if that’s the problem these days”, Vic mused as they walked, shoving her hands into her pockets. “Social media has people so wrapped up in impressing others that most people are just shells of themselves at this point.” What she was saying was bullshit. Even 400 years ago, people were wrapped up in impressing each other. Some of them cared about it more than they did their own children. Social media was as much to blame for society as make-up or magazines were. They were all just extensions of issues that had existed for generations. Morgan’s remark on their commonality shook her out of her thoughts, and she smiled back at her, agreeing with a light nod. It was nice- to share something with someone. Even something as public as nature.

She let her gaze fall forward as they chatted and walked, watching as Winnie made an effort to get a good sniff of every tree they passed, stopping every few moments to look to her for approval. She nodded at Morgan’s explanation, waiting a beat before responding. “I.... understand the feeling of struggling to explain or understand certain emotions around certain events. You’re not alone in that feeling. Not by a long shot.” The worst thing in the world, besides the company being ripped out in front of you, was feeling alone. What was it about being in a room full of people that felt so incredibly isolating?

The corners of her mouth perked up again, despite the situation with Marley having been less than ideal. But the fact that they had found themselves in that situation made her laugh, when she looked back on it, because the universe has a funny way of making those things happen. “I’m not sure you’d believe me if I told you”, she admitted, glancing to her side. “A friend and I ran into each other, and then had a few experiences I’d venture don’t happen in many places outside of White Crest”, she explained.

Morgan couldn’t hide the searching wonder in her eyes as Vic suggested that she might understand the understandable. There was a weight to her words that carried more gravity than anything that came from the humans she’d spoken to. Or maybe after losing so much, Morgan was just that desperate for connection.

The rest of Vic’s words forgotten, she asked, “Do you? Understand? I don’t mean that incredulously. I mean, will you tell me about it? Is that okay? I know you’re a really private person. I don’t want to presume or sound entitled to your history--It’s just, how do you get support for something no one talks about? How do you open up to someone if the words don’t exist to most people? Or if trying would make them see you differently, or stop seeing you at all?” She winced at her clumsy openness. But with the house so empty, with the world so violent and quiet at once, she was growing desperate to fill the empty spaces around her. And maybe that wasn’t fair to Vic, but she couldn’t take her words back now.

Something in the way Morgan’s questions were worded gave Vic pause. She wasn’t sure if it was the desperation behind them or the meticulous way they were arranged, but there was something subtle and hidden there. She looked forward and continued walking, but the atmosphere felt like it was closing in- like water was blocking her ears and everything sounded distant and far away. She cleared her throat; it felt like it echoed through the forest.

“I’m not sure I know what you’re asking”, she said finally.

For a long time, there was silence between them, Vic trying to ignore the intensity of Morgan’s and have a nice, simple, quiet walk, where they didn’t need to talk about feelings and the past. But then she started talking, unsure of exactly why.

“I told you my mother passed when I was very young.” Had she passed? Or was she out there still, running around with the creatures that her father insisted had taken her? “I think my father resented me for it- or he needed someone to blame.” Even just thinking of him made her insides flip with shame and self-hate. She looked down at her hands. “And at first, it bothered me. I wanted to make myself better or worth something, or even a little likable. But nothing… nothing I did was good enough. Ever.” What was she doing? Why was she talking about this? “And then by the time I was no longer a child, I resented him, maybe I resented myself, too, I don’t know. But I wasn’t at all interested in marriage… for obvious reasons, and so I was… stuck with him.” She strategically left out why exactly she was stuck with him. If only 1500s Sweden was like 21st century USA. She could have died as a happy old spinster and not have known the difference.

Why was she sharing this?

“So I guess I mean, I understand having a complicated relationship with a parent.”

Morgan didn’t know how to hide her disappointment, so she turned her face away to look out at the world instead. This wasn’t Vic’s fault. And really, this was something big she was trusting her with. This was a gift. She should be hopeful about this. But she didn’t. She felt foolish and stupid and selfish and tired--stars above, she was so tired and it wasn’t even that late--and trying to correct and re-write her thoughts wasn’t doing the trick.

“I’m sorry,” she said at last. ‘That was cruel, what he did. That was...that just sounds awful.” She sniffled, kept her eyes off in the middle distance as they walked. “That wasn’t what I was referring to, what I was trying to talk to you about but--” She cleared her throat, swallowed thickly. “My mother didn’t want kids. At least that’s what she wrote in her journal a couple of years before she had me. There was this--fuck, I don’t even know how to tell you all about this either--there was a thing. Her mother was very cruel to her. She’d get her things she wanted just to destroy them in front of her, lock her outside the house, and that’s the light stuff. And yeah, the woman had her reasons for being that way. Those were the same reasons my mother didn’t want to even bother with having a baby. But you can’t always get what you want, and I came along anyway. She wasn’t cruel to me in those same ways, though sometimes I wished she would be, so I’d have proof I wasn’t making things up or being too sensitive. And I...I’ve been in and out of therapy for years now, but I still want to get on my knees when something goes wrong or someone leaves and ask what I did wrong, what can I do to make it better, how can I fix it. I want to say I’ll be good. I can be good if you tell me how. I just...become that miserable little girl again. She’s so desperate and she’s never satisfied that she’s done enough, there always has to be something more. It’s exhausting.” She shrugged, letting the subject drop if that’s what Vic wanted. She was too disappointed to follow up with a real question so soon, and maybe she should have thought through this outing more carefully in the first place.

Vic stared ahead, hard and even, as she processed Morgan’s response. That wasn’t what I was referring to. The implication was there without it being said aloud. Morgan had been talking about the giant elephant in the room, her other past… implying that they shared something. Did they, then? Was this the day that she’d find out the thing she’d been fearing most? That Morgan was another vampire, as she expected, and Vic would be forced to turn her into hunters before morning.

Did doing such a thing make her more of a monster than being a vampire did?

“Well then, ...out with it. What were you referring to?” I don’t want to know, I don’t want to know, I don’t want to know.

Vic felt tears rise to her eyes as Morgan talked about her mother and her grandmother, and the scenarios she shared felt so similar to her own, in a way. The cruelty, the disdain, the confusion… what had been the reason they’d all been forced to experience it? Morgan understood the desperate need to please a parent and the longing to be loved and be good enough. Maybe she understood better than anyone else. And again, there was a twinkle of a thought in the back of her mind, one that tried to overtake the one that said Vic would turn her in- maybe this time, it could be different.

“Our stories seem similar”, she commented. At least when it came to their caregivers. “But as an adult, my reactions to people seem to manifest opposite to yours. I don’t care about pleasing the masses, or fixing what they presume I’ve done wrong. In fact, I’d rather let them know outright that they’ll be disappointed to know me, lest I have to handle their disappointment when they try to delve deeper.” Lyra’s singsong voice rang in her ears, saying-‘You claim you don’t care to please them, then in the same breath worry about disappointing them. You’re a walking contradiction, Victoria.’ She let out a shaky scoff and looked to Morgan. “I’m sorry it’s so exhausting. I’m sorry your mother couldn’t have been better for you. You didn’t deserve any of it. And… I think that your kindness still rings through as a testament to the type of person you are, if you don’t mind my saying.”

Morgan ignored the pointed request to explain herself and focused instead on how Vic internalized her fears. It should have been a relief to have someone understand her on any front right now. She only had so many friends left, and she was so busy trying to make sure the new ones really liked her, she didn’t dare dump her problems on them if she could help it. Emotional spirals were supposed to wait until you were at least two months in, right?

“If you’re so invested in the outcome with people you decide it’s predetermined and you try that hard to get ahead of it--that’s a lot of energy. Kind of sounds like you care a lot,” she spoke simply, with no shortage of understanding. “It might be easier if you accepted you’re not as terrible as your father led you to believe and aren’t actually going to disappoint everyone you meet. Let things happen with people without those memories controlling you. You didn’t deserve that either. And you don’t deserve to be trapped and controlled by that for as long as you have.”

But what had she been referring to? How did she step around that ache without making it seem like she didn’t trust Vic? At least, not in a specific way. “What I was talking about was uh...sort of related to my accident. It’s hard to explain to some people and it’s not something I’m good with handling misunderstandings about. I know I just told you how chronically desperate I am for approval and positive attention, and how you should just wait and see with people instead of assuming the worst, but when it comes to my...it’s just really personal and it’s hard enough talking about it honestly without managing other people not believing me or running away or thinking it’s cool or something else besides what it really was. It destroyed my life and almost everything I wanted to do with it. Whatever self-acceptance spin I put on what came after, that’s always going to be true.” Morgan shook her head ruefully. She was tired of losing people. She was tired of having to outpace her own mistakes. She was tired of feeling alone. “I need to know you’ll believe me no matter how batshit it sounds before I talk to you about it. And if you’re not sure, that’s okay, I get it, we don't have to get into it. And most times I do a good job of not letting it bother me, but lately….” Lately her life was falling apart faster than a TV movie and the thought of forever was looking a lot more terrifying.

Vic felt herself roll her eyes at Morgan’s claim, much like a petulant child who was being scolded but didn’t want to admit she was wrong. “It sounds lovely when you word it that way, but I’m not sure it’s all that simple”, she responded. There had been times when she’d tried to let her guard down, to be herself without the walls and the anger and the judgement. But something always happened that snapped her back to it- sometimes she didn’t even realize what triggered the switch at all, just that she couldn’t turn it back off. It was like the first time she tried gardening with Morgan- she couldn’t even remember what set her off. “I suppose I’m not sure I know how to not be controlled by it.” It sounded like an excuse; something she might call someone else weak for.

She knew Morgan had been having a hard time lately because of the anniversary of some accident. Her fingers brushed behind her right ear on their own accord, ghosting by the scar from the bite that still kept her pinned to this earth. Was the accident she kept referring to just a coverup for something much more sinister? Morgan’s neck didn’t hold any scars- she’d looked countless times when she had the chance, but maybe she covered them up the same way Vic did.

The more Morgan spoke, the more panic fluttered around Vic, and both her words and the trees closed in on the two of them at a threatening pace. Vic felt her breathing pick up, and her chest felt heavier with each step they took. She couldn’t take it anymore- she had to get out. Or at least had to know what the fuck this big secret was.

In one motion, she grabbed her dagger from its hiding place and then used her forearm to push against Morgan’s chest, forcing her back against a tree. Their faces were mere inches apart, and from this distance, Morgan’s lack of a heartbeat was even more abundantly clear. “Tell me what you are”, she said through gritted teeth, her voice hushed and raspy. Tears threatened to spill from her eyes, and her chest was still heaving with heavy breaths. Why couldn’t Morgan have been a nice, normal human or something non-threatening, like one of those annoying fae? Why did life have to continue to be so cruel and unfair? “Come on, Morgan. You’ve been dancing around it for weeks. I’m not an idiot.” She was meant to sound threatening and cold, but the waver in her voice betrayed her. “You want to get into it, let’s get into it. What. Are. You?” With every word, the dagger danced closer to Morgan’s neck. Still no sign of a scar. Winnie appeared next to them, sitting obediently after taking a moment to lick at Morgan’s fingers.

She didn’t want to tell the hunters about Morgan, but the thought of letting a vampire roam around made her stomach twist and turn the same way it used to when she disappointed her father.

The thought of Morgan dying because of her made that feeling even worse.

Morgan never saw Vic’s turn coming. But then, when did she ever? Her back hit the tree and before she could beg for her life, there was a blade against her chest and Vic’s eyes were burning into hers, overflowing with fear and hatred. Morgan stared at her, stupidly silent as every hope she’d been collecting between them shattered. Her hands went up to Vic’s arm on instinct but she didn’t go through any of the disarming drills she’d learned between Remmy and Mina. She was so tired, and a little blade like that probably wouldn’t be the end of her, and so what if Vic cut her up into so many pieces? What else would change that hadn’t already?

“Why? Don’t you already know?” She whimpered. She wanted to come back with some harsh reply, but she could only break down into more tears. All she wanted was to rest and be loved, just a little, and she had thought that Vic was safe enough to try.

“You came prepared, so you must have been thinking about hurting me before,” she sobbed quietly. “Do you want to? Will that make you feel better?” It would be so easy to let her, and crawling to her empty home in pieces would at least be a change of pace. But Mina would worry, and Deirdre was coming home someday, and she would only be hurting them if she gave up. Slowly, her look of devastation hardened. “Come on. You’ve got to be a real piece of shit hunter if you can’t tell what I am from this close.”

Please don’t cry. Vic’s eyes flashed to Morgan’s, watching as her tears flowed freely. It was her fault she was crying. She looked up to the tree tops above them to stop her own from spilling over. “Would I be asking if I already knew?”, she asked, momentarily bewildered. “Just fucking tell me”, she demanded harshly. “I need to hear you say it”.

With Morgan’s sobbing accusations, Vic felt her head tilt, and her efforts to hold the tears back became useless. “We didn’t have to do this. We didn’t have to talk about it. We could have left well enough alone.” Her words, like her thoughts, were racing and nonsensical. The pressure she had on Morgan’s chest relaxed slightly, though her knuckles were still stark white as they held the dagger. “You’re assuming I want this to happen?”, she asked, eyebrows furrowed as she looked between the dagger and Morgan.

“I’m not a hunter”, she spat, almost offended at the accusation. Hunters were useful, but oafish and had one track minds. “I’m a… I’m not a hunter…. We’re not fucking talking about me. What the fuck are you?” There had to be only one reason why she was delaying sharing, right? Why she was so nervous to share in the first place. Because she was one of them, vicious and plotting and too awful and dangerous to be trusted. But she trusted Morgan when she didn’t think about what she might be. Her stomach felt sick the more her mind fought with itself.

Morgan’s face melted again, hurt with a new kind of betrayal. If she wasn’t a hunter then why was any of this happening? Why was she hurting her? Why was she leaning on their ‘no choice’ bullshit? She twisted Vic’s hand around with a swift snap and snatched the knife free by the blade as she pushed her away. Morgan ran the sharp side of the blade across her palm, good and deep and squeezed out a line of black blood to show before the skin sewed itself clean.

“How’s this for undead 101?” She asked, holding out the evidence. “No, I’ll do you one better.” She ripped off the leather cuff over her wrist and showed Vic the scar in the shape of Remmy’s mouth that she always hid. “And for the record, yes, Victoria! You wanted this to happen! You chose to keep talking to me, you got me out here, you brought a fucking knife just to hurt me!” She threw the knife as far away as she could from both of them. “What do any of those choices say? You’re not some pawn, and you’re not some hunter with a fucked up code to lean on so they can sleep at night!” She approached her again, fearless and still crying. “Tell me how I’m not some thing you wanted to play with and decided to break when you were done. Explain it, because I don’t understand this any other way.”

Vic was taken aback at the sudden shift of power, stumbling back toward the bath that they’d been walking in. Winnie barked and ran toward her, but Vic was too focused on the display in front of her to notice. She was confused, at first, by what she was seeing, but the black blood and instant healing were definitely not symptoms of the very thing she was fearing most. They were symptoms of something else all together.

A new kind of pit danced around in her stomach.

The scar was different than hers… the teeth weren’t right for it to be a vampire bite. “Zombie”, she whispered, finally letting her eyes find Morgan’s again. She’d made this mistake more than once before- the lack of heartbeat usually set her on a fast track of destruction. But it didn’t always mean vampire, and Vic had no interest in ridding the world of anything but the blood suckers. Victoria. “Don’t call me that!”, she yelled, and her voice seemed to shriek and echo through the trees, taunting her for the loss of control. A vision of Lyra, ethereal but disappointed, flashed behind Morgan. More tears came with the accusations, and she shook her head in both apology and defiance, her nostrils flaring as she explained. “I bring a knife everywhere!”, she yelled back, gesturing toward where her dagger was thrown for emphasis. “I bring one to the gallery, and to the park, and even the fucking vet. Do you not know how dangerous this town is?”

She licked her lips, staring Morgan down as she approached her. She felt like she was jumping out of her skin under Morgan’s gaze, and she didn’t know how to answer her questions. “I told you I’m a shit person”, is all she offered at first.

But then, after a long beat of silence, she looked down to the ground below them, letting out a shaky breath. “I assumed you were a vampire”, she said suddenly, as if that would explain everything easily. But when she looked back up, Morgan seemed to be waiting for more. “I didn’t- I never wanted to… I just thought we were going on a fucking walk, Morgan. And ever since we’ve met there was that nag in the back of my mind that you were one of them, and your implications only doubled down my suspicions, but I didn’t want you to have to die so I ignored it. But then you were about to admit something to me, and my mind jumped right to the worst possible thing, and so I panicked. And because I didn’t want you to die, I had to know then. Because you’re too good to die.” There had to be some irony there, clearly, since Morgan was apparently already dead. “I did not bring you out here to kill you. I’m not a killer. I’m not like them.”

Morgan listened to Vic, waiting for the part where all of this made sense. She waited some more. “Why does it matter what I became after I died?” She asked quietly. “I would still be me. I’d be able to feel more, but I wouldn’t be someone different. Why would being a vampire mean I have to die…?” She took a step closer to Vic and looked up into her eyes, pleading for clarity. “You haven’t explained anything, Vic. How is what you’re doing any different from them? And why do you feel like you have to? No one has to kill people for how they were made.”

Vic stood, stoic and confused, as she tried to process Morgan’s questions. How could she not see the difference here? “B-because they’re…” They. We. “...vampires are monsters, Morgan. They destroy lives and families and they need to be stopped.” The implication that she was the same as them hit her like a ton of bricks, and she physically backed away from Morgan, desperate to run away from any comparison. “I’m not like them. I’m not! Everything I’ve done has been to make sure I don’t end up like them.” She felt her breathing pick up again, and noticed Winnie pacing back and forth at her side, nervous energy building up between the two of them. “I tell hunters who they are to get rid of them, and make the world better, because I am not like them!” A sense of dread washed over her as feelings she didn’t want to acknowledge filled her up inside.

There was nothing she could do, really, to escape what she was. She could turn all the vampires on earth into hunters and she’d still be one of them. She’d still be a monster.

A sob escaped her and she turned away from Morgan, both her hands rising to rest on her forehead. “They took my mother!” Or she ran off with them intentionally, desperate to get away from her husband and unlovable daughter. “And I was ready to be gone. I was so close, I was ready, Morgan.” She was saying too much now, sharing privileged information that no one else knew, but it was out before she could stop it.

Morgan came up slowly to Vic and brushed her fingers over the woman’s. “I’m sorry,” she said gently. “I’m so very sorry. It was monstrous, what they did and how they made you feel. But they were just people being cruel. And you’re just a person too. You’re a person like anyone else and don’t have to be cruel. You can be kind and you can help and give instead of taking.” She tugged on her wrists, asking Vic to let her see her. “It’s okay, Victoria. You’re already a person. You don’t have to prove that to anyone. And you don’t have to hurt other people either.” She looked up at the woman, her wet face all sorrow and compassion. “Will you look at me? Please…?”

Vic’s fingers twitched when Morgan’s brushed against hers, desperate to reach out and clutch them. But hand holds and nice words didn’t fix things like they did in books and movies. They were empty promises, filling voids only temporarily until the person at the other end disappeared. She swallowed a lump in her throat, turning around to Morgan with a reluctant eye roll. She didn’t do this. She didn’t show weakness, but as she locked eyes with Morgan, she observed the same emotions on her face that she felt in her heart, and she realized how much Morgan’s knack for getting the undoable done rang true. “I help people”, she insisted, an unrecognizable gravel to her voice. “I’m not trying to prove anything. I’m trying to do what’s right.” There was a pit, gnawing and growing inside her, that she might have been willing to turn Morgan in if it came down to it. Would she have? Just left her out to dry, after all the patience and kindness Morgan had offered her?

Would it have mattered if Vic truly believed all vampires were monsters?

It was too much to think about, and it made things way more nuanced than she wanted them to be. Vampires were bad and she was good for getting rid of them, that should have been that. And she didn’t know how to feel about it, or even what to say now. After a while, she said, “I’m sorry if I hurt you. I...I’m sorry if I made you feel shitty, for what you are. I’ve met plenty of fine zombies.” And plenty of annoying ones.

Morgan lifted a hand to cup Vic’s face when she finally relented. The look of self-loathing didn’t change from species to species, or even age to age, in her experience. And Vic hated herself so very much, it was a wonder she let Morgan in at all. “You send people who are like you to their deaths, Victoria,” she said sorrowfully. “That’s it, right? You were used so cruelly, and the people who were good to you were taken away, and there was no one to give you love or stop you from using your grief to mutilate yourself. And that is so unfair and I am so sorry…” She brushed the corner of the woman’s eye, which seemed ready to overflow with tears. “You deserved so much better, and I’m sorry it wasn’t given to you.”

For several moments she did her best to hold the woman’s gaze. Then she took her hand and put it over her own neck. “I’ve been hunted three times already, Vic. Do you think it would help people if they succeeded? Do you think you should finish the job for them? Because I’m just a person, like you, and like the people you send to die. I’m not better than you or anyone else. Maybe I’ve made better choices, but that has fuck-all to do with how I was turned. So, which is it? Do we deserve to die or not?”

For a moment, Vic let herself sink into Morgan’s touch. There was a tenderness there that she hadn’t let herself experience in years- maybe even centuries. Morgan’s words, and the gentleness of her tone, danced through her brain. But then she heard them. And suddenly, she stood up straight- stoic and cold once again. “Shut up”, she commanded, taking a step back. Morgan was wrong, wrong wrong wrong, and Vic didn’t want to hear it. “You need to shut the fuck up, Morgan. You don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.” She wasn’t like them, not the hunters or the vampires. She did the right thing by helping the hunters, but she wasn’t a killer. Winnie barked, sensing the shift in Vic’s mood. Why the fuck was she still crying? She pointed her finger at Morgan’s chest, a strangled sob escaping her lips before she spoke. “You think you know everything, don’t you? You think you’ve got it all figured out. Well you don’t. There’s no ‘we’ here.” That part wasn’t true, and she knew it. But her anger was like a blanket that covered the rest of her, dark and weighted and letting nothing else out. At the moment, it felt justified, because Morgan was saying things that could not be true, not if she didn’t want her whole world view to be shattered in an instant. For a while, she stared at her, daring her to continue speaking. “Fuck you”, she spat before she got the chance. Fuck Morgan if she thought she was going to stay there and listen to nonsense like that. She walked past Morgan at double speed back toward the car, letting out a harsh whistle commanding Winnie to follow. As she walked further and further away, she wiped harshly at her eyes, tears still flowing freely from them. She wanted desperately to forget it all, but the pain in her heart already alerted her that again, life wouldn’t be so sweet.

Alone again, Morgan walked around the park until she found the knife she’d thrown aside. Then she sat on the ground, knees pulled up to her chest, and cried. She knew she was right and Vic was scared and guilty more than she was angry, but that didn’t make her world feel any less empty.

#p:morgan #p #p:wcwbf #domestic abuse tw #emotional abuse tw #parent death tw

8 notes · View notes

comicreliefmorlock · 3 years

Text

A Reader’s Guide to Writing: Lesson #2

I... expect to get shot for this.

-sighs and puts on a helmet- Body shots, fine, but I’m trying to avoid taking a headshot for what I’m about to say.

The Constant Reader... does not give a fuck about flat, cardboard-cutout “representation.” We just don’t. In fact, it’s downright insulting to your Readers to assume that labeling your character “insert woke points here” will automatically endear them to us.

(...god I’m going to get in so much trouble for this...)

When I see a book described as “it has two lesbians in it!” or “these characters are transgender!” my immediate and automatic thought is “...okay, but what is the story about? will I give a fuck about these characters?”

And that, right there, is something that can actually carry a weak plot (to a Reader’s mind) or absolutely drag a good plot into “well, I might as well finish reading it.”

Do I give a fuck about your characters?

Now this does not mean your character has to be Wholly Unproblematic or an Adorable Cinnamon Roll, Too Good, Too Pure for This World.

What it means is “do I respond to your character like they’re fleshed out well enough for my brain to read them as a person?”

For Comparison-- Two Characters:

Here’s an example of what is honestly a really well-written character (in a... very... ugh, look, the pervasive racism makes it terrible to read now and I just kind of wince and groan at it and wince even harder knowing how well it was received) because the character has caused Emotion in a Reader.

Scarlett Fucking O’Hara.

I hate her. I’m not even kidding, I just hate this self-absorbed bitch. She drives me nuts. I’d love to yeet her off a literary cliff and watch her drown.

...but I consider her a well-written character because she inspires emotion. I react to her. I legitimately read a page of “Gone With the Wind” (*again, I know, I’m sorry, the book’s slimy feel of ‘but... slavery was good!’ is just... horrific) and I want to grab the nearest heavy object and slam it onto her empty skull. She has obvious flaws--and they’re explicitly spelled out in the text--and those flaws totally fuck up her life. Scarlett doesn’t get what she wants because she is her own worst enemy in a lot of ways. And watching her make decisions based on what She Wants and then dealing with the aftermath feels legitimate. It feels pretty real to watch someone make a decision based on a want only to see them struggle with the result OF that decision. Not to mention the moment of realization that came too late, as let’s be fair, hindsight is 20/20 and a lot of us have had that ‘Ohhhhhhhhhhh...’ moment ourselves.

What Scarlett has a lot of, however, is Emotion. And I don’t mean she has a lot of emotionally wrenching scenes. What I mean is Scarlett is actively driven by or affected by An Emotion at nearly every part of her story, even when that Emotion is just some self-absorbed Glee at how she’s gonna one-up this whole town.

Let me compare my reactions to Miss “I’m So Self-Absorbed I Should Be Taxonomically Classified As A Sponge” O’Hara to a character that I... honestly couldn’t give less than a fuck about, despite having read six whole books she’s the main protagonist of.

Ayla of “Clan of the Cave Bears” Jean Auel fame.

In the first novel, Ayla is... actually kind of interesting. A Homo Sapien child found by Neanderthals and raised in their society, there’s a bit that can be read into just how hard it is to fit into a culture and how sometimes that involves more self-repression than is mentally healthy. And in the second novel, “Valley of the Horses,” all the parts with Ayla before her Male Perfection Love Interest shows up are also fairly interesting.

She’s alone, she’s fighting to survive with only her hard-earned skills to carry her. It’s great!

And then... Jondalar arrives and we see her through His Eyes.

I’m not sure exactly what happened here other than the novels (and Ayla) turn into a constant Display Of How Amazing Ayla Is. Everyone loves her! (And the people that don’t are Obviously Flawed and So Empty Inside.) She can do anything! She invents the needle! Horseback riding! Domesticating dogs! The travois! She’s drop-dead gorgeous, an accomplished healer, wants only to be a Good Wife (it’s a little icky, but considering the time period these books are set in, I give it a pass on that) and is always so confused as to why people seem amazed by her.

She becomes basically a Perfect Woman and to be honest, all her struggles after that just feel like they’re directly tied to how Perfect She Is. Ayla suddenly doesn’t have An Emotion behind her. She’s just a vessel for everyone’s awe that such a “perfect woman” exists. And it just... turns her completely fuckin’ flat.

What I’ve found after doing a LOT of reading is that a Writer should keep one big thing in mind.

(And this goes triple for stories that tote themselves on the representation platform.)

Emotion--the experience of it, the sharing of it, the looking for validation of it--is one of those defining things that make what we’d call the Human Experience.

People who are looking for representation in media are looking for actual representation. For a Person like them on the screen or page. Maybe you don’t know what it’s like to be a teenager struggling with a realization of sexuality, but you can ask people who do. And you can relate YOURSELF to that on some level.

Everyone in the world has had a moment where they’re trying to reconcile something about themselves with what the world expects or with what they expect from themselves. You can take that seed, that memory of sitting in your bedroom and listening to the same song on repeat while thinking wistful thoughts of what life could be like if This Was Different or imagining a future where What You Want is accessible, acceptable and within reach. You can find the Emotion and appeal to it.

I know that the experience of being gay or disabled or neurodivergent or trans or a minority is not universal; everyone has a different life, different experiences, different fears, worries, hopes, dreams.

And I say this in full awareness that someone could very rightly be angry at me for paring off societal issues and cultural problems to make this accessible to writers who may want to write a specific character FIRST and THEN find sensitivity readers to help them refine it*.

There’s a “but” to the whole “different life” thing.

Humans have felt the basic range of emotion across the board, across the world, across time, regardless of where or when or who they are. And a Character that makes you Feel is a character that you can give a fuck about. Pare off the labels and start with the tinest, most concentrated idea of who this person is so you can find their emotions to use in the story. Are they a dreamer? A fighter? A creator? An explorer? What Emotion drives them? Hope? Curiosity? Anger? Sorrow?

Because I personally have seen myself in characters that I have absolutely no surface experience in common with whatsoever, but I responded to the Emotion that drove them because I recognized it. I’d felt it. Maybe what created the Emotion was different (wildly so!) from what created it for me, but I had the Emotion. The character is having the Emotion.

And that makes me give a fuck about the outcome of their story, whether the personality carrying the Emotion makes me want to cut a bitch (fuck you Scarlett) or see them succeed in every aspect of life.

[*You will want sensitivity readers to refine the character because representation should actually represent and not be A Writer Getting Woke Points.]

#A Reader's Guide to Writing #On Writing #Reading is life #Writing is life

35 notes · View notes