Prompt 170
Once again on my Ras & Danny being training rivals thanks to time travel bullshit.
Look, Danny knows about the league of Assassins, but he almost dies of laughter when he realizes it’s the modern name of the league of Shadows. He’s an adult now, has been for a while, he’s allowed to find the situation he’s found himself in amusing. Hell, his sparring buddy who is somehow still alive is laughing too.
And no one else knows what’s going on, okay? This random man walked into their secret base, completely ignored the many assassins trying to stop him, and called their illustrious leader a “Little Bitch Man” and they are now fighting?
The fighting is familiar, but why the fuck is Ras cackling and saying things like “Ayreh Feek” back. Practically saying “Fuck you,” while laughing and oh Pit, they’re Bantering this is terrifying, why has Ras not won yet, why has this man not died yet and- bodies aren’t supposed to bend like that what the fuck-
Ras on the other hand, has One friend, who is immortal like him, actually remembers the shit he complains about, is also down for saving endangered animals, and actually knows how to spar! It’s not a proper spar unless someone loses at least a hand that has to be reattached! And honestly, people nowadays should know that the proper greeting to an old friend is to instantly try to kill the other.
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It's kind of fascinating to me that towards the end of P&P, Elizabeth has become protective of Darcy and either a) actively tries to insulate him from Situations or b) wishes that she could and gets stressed that she can't.
Darcy deeply loves her and is very ready to do whatever he can to secure her happiness, but narratively, I think the emphasis at the end is very much more on Elizabeth's protectiveness towards him.
It's like:
When Bingley and Darcy first come back to Hertfordshire, Darcy is very quiet and Elizabeth can barely bring herself to say anything—until Mrs Bennet insults Darcy. Then Elizabeth speaks up.
Mrs Bennet enlists Elizabeth to separate Darcy from Bingley with another insult to Darcy. Elizabeth finds this both convenient and enraging.
That day, Elizabeth decides to privately tell Mrs Bennet about her engagement to Darcy, specifically so that Darcy will be spared Mrs Bennet's first unfiltered response.
Elizabeth fiercely defends Darcy's character and love for her, as well as hers for him, to Mr Bennet. She not only says she loves Darcy but that it upsets her to hear Mr Bennet's criticisms of him.
Elizabeth is both relieved by Mrs Bennet's ecstatic reception of the engagement and a bit disappointed by how completely shallow she's being about it, and 100% sure she made the right call in keeping Darcy away.
Elizabeth defends Darcy against Darcy himself, repeatedly.
There's a period where Elizabeth seems to unwind and laugh, but this passes, especially after Charlotte and Mr Collins show up. Darcy manages to stay calm around Mr Collins (I think this is framed as a significant and admirable achievement for him), but Elizabeth does not like him being in a situation where he has to deal with Mr Collins in the first place.
Elizabeth tries to shield Darcy from being noticed by Mrs Phillips and Mrs Bennet, who do seem to make him pretty excruciatingly uncomfortable.
Ultimately, Elizabeth ends up trying to keep Darcy to herself or to shepherd him around to relatives he can handle more easily, and is so stressed at this point that she just wants to get married and escape to Pemberley.
After their marriage, things are actually great at Pemberley and in their married life, despite the occasional complication.
Lydia writes a congratulatory letter to Elizabeth, asking for Darcy to get Wickham a promotion unless Elizabeth would rather not bring it up with him. Elizabeth really does not want Darcy to have to deal with this and handles it by privately setting aside a Lydia fund out of her personal expenses. (IIRC, it's not clear if Darcy even knows about this.)
Elizabeth also is the driving force behind Darcy's reconciliation with Lady Catherine.
This could read as an unsettling, unbalanced dynamic and a very odd ending point for the arc of a woman like Elizabeth, but in the context of the overall novel, it doesn't feel that way. Or maybe I'd see it more that way if I interpreted Darcy (and for that matter, Elizabeth) + their arcs differently? But as it is, I do think that by this point in the story they are genuinely doing the best they can, independently and for each other, and they've both come a long way. They shine in different contexts and support each other as much as they can in the circumstances that do arise.
It seems very them, in terms of their temperament and abilities, that Elizabeth would put all this effort into shielding Darcy, while at the same time, Darcy completely cuts off Lady Catherine for insulting Elizabeth and only ever speaks to her again because Elizabeth wants him to.
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scully and mulder's dynamic visibly changes after the onset of the season of secret sex
i've been thinking about how dd and ga deliberately played season 7 like mulder and scully were sleeping together, and i think there's solid evidence of that in the differences in how scully reacts to mulder appearing to show interest in another woman before and after the season of secret sex begins (i'm using millennium as the before/after divider bc i think that's what dd and ga decided, but this is based on my vague memory of a reddit comment about it which is how i first learned that the season of secret sex was a thing)
so overall there's an undercurrent of insecurity, borne of scully's uncertainty regarding precisely how mulder feels about her and what her place is in the hierarchy of things that are important to him in his life, that exists in the pre-millennium incidents and is glaringly absent post-millennium:
before millennium:
(i'm not gonna include phoebe/fire here bc i don't think scully's awareness of her feelings had yet risen to the point where she'd be truly jealous, i'd characterize her in that ep as largely protective of mulder and unwilling to let him deal with phoebe's games alone. it also helps that he's clearly not happy phoebe is back in his life again, unlike his much more positive reaction to diana)
war of the coprophages- the second scully finds out about bambi, she immediately hops in her car and drives up to miller's grove to join mulder, bc letting him investigate cockroaches alone was fine but god forbid he spend quality time investigating an x-file with an attractive female scientist who isn't herself- that's their thing!!
syzygy- to be fair the planetary alignment situation was exacerbating her- and mulder's- behavior here, but her jealousy of and hostility to detective white were still real, even if she would've been able to rein in her emotions better under normal circumstances.
diana fowley arc- i think this speaks for itself, lol
alpha- this is an interesting period in their relationship: after most of the diana shit is over, but before the tension between them is fully resolved (a process which to me begins with milagro/the unnatural and ends with amor fati, but that would be its own post lol).
other than introducing himself to karin as "fox" (maybe as a way to appeal to her preference for canids lol) and thus implicitly giving her permission to call him by his first name (which she proceeds to do throughout the episode), mulder doesn't seem to show much in the way of attraction to her.
even when he touches her hand to move the mouse, he's more interested in what's on the screen than in paying attention to her:
karin, however, is visibly affected by the contact, a fact which scully immediately notices:
later in the car, they have this convo, the last line of which is so heavily laden with diana subtext it's not even funny:
scully's reaction to karin is similar to her reaction to phoebe in that she's motivated mainly by wanting to protect mulder from his own naive, trusting nature, and from someone she believes is seeking to take advantage of it, rather than being motivated primarily by jealousy and defensiveness. she doesn't really believe that karin is a genuine threat to her relationship with mulder, but with diana still fresh in her memory she can't afford to not be vigilant. hence why she confronts karin alone later:
here scully demonstrates that she somewhat empathizes with karin (mulder is also someone who challenges her, makes her feel fulfilled and happy and alive). karin's response indicates that she has correctly deduced the basis of scully's dislike/distrust of her, and also acknowledges scully is the dominant one as it relates to the territory (mulder) that they are sparring over.
scully looks away at karin's "feminine wiles" comment, revealing the nagging insecurity about her place in mulder's life that diana's arrival exacerbated and that will continue to plague her until amor fati.
after millennium:
rush- when mulder looks back at chastity in the hallway, scully's reaction is to possessively grab mulder's sleeve and pull him away into the interrogation room:
and his response is to laugh and say "what?" like he doesn't know he belongs to her and only her.
keep in mind this happens just before they interrogate tony reed, and right after they finish interrogating him this shit happens:
i already made a post last week about how insanely flirty they are in this episode, but this scene!!
she's pouting and giving him big doe eyes and playing with his tie!! at work!! in public!! she feels comfortable staking her territory in such an obvious way (also playful rather than hostile) bc she's not longer insecure about her place in his life!! i can never be normal about this i'm sorry ssdfgksdgsjdkfhkjsdf
first person shooter- when mulder checks out jade blue afterglow as she's leaving, he leans so far over in such an obvious, exaggerated way, almost as if he's deliberately trying to get a rise out of scully, but all she does is raise her eyebrows at him and lean over to block his view (while smirking):
and then he says he's "feeling the great need to blast the crap out of something", an almost direct quote of scully's line from their convo in the autopsy room right before they went down to the station:
and her response is to SMILE at him!!
pre-millennium scully would absolutely not have reacted this way in this situation. just like in rush, the insecurity that previously haunted scully whenever mulder seemed to be close to or interested in another woman is utterly absent here. they're joking and teasing and enjoying each other's company like they've always done, but there's a different dimension to it now. pre-millennium mulder would never have made a show of checking out another woman like that right in front of scully (unless a planetary alignment is affecting his behavior ofc lol), and pre-millennium scully would never have found it amusing.
(side note: people were debating on twitter a while back about whether this scene was ooc for mulder, and tbh i'm not sure what my own opinion is bc to me the whole episode has an air of... unreality? idk but it gives me similar vibes to post-modern prometheus, like maybe it's real or maybe it's just someone telling a story or it's somewhere in between, and it's also got that same unserious feel idk how else to describe it)
anyway, back to my main point, which is: dd and ga are damn good actors in the way they were able to subtly telegraph this shift in mulder and scully's dynamic. one might be able to argue that the insane flirting throughout season 7 isn't by itself evidence of the season of secret sex bc on some level they've always been like that, but to me these specific interactions provide important clues that the nature of their relationship has changed.
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Hello! I hope I won't sour your mood with this ask but I have been thinking a lot about your gay dogs this month especially.
I'll just try to keep the context short but in general I'm someone that has accepted being romantically undesireable. It was hard but in the end I have built my life just around me, my humble family and at this point in time I don't even think I have the time for a partner. And considering that it's the love month and a lot of people are preparing to celebrate it with their SOs I assumed that, actually, this is a thing that I sort of have in common with Machete.
From the miscellaneous lore on your profile I see Machete as someone that also has kind of rejected love. That also has built his life around his job, possibly hobbies, his family or mentors (depending if we're talking about canon or modern au). Who kind of forgot that relationships are a thing and that people bond with others in that way. Well, at least he did until meeting Vasco.
I just love thinking about their awkward beginnings. Machete being 100% sure that Vasco is just joking, maybe even sometimes teasing him (in a friendly banter type way) or just explaining to himself that all that kindness and interest is just him being a very considerate friend. And then we have Vasco that just tries to be subtle, as if he was trying to pass a fawn without it noticing and running away, but also with time gains confidence and tries more risque moves. Vasco being all smug and Machete being flustered when their hands or shoulders or tails brush in passing. And then when both are sure of their feelings we have Machete who has to choose between God and his love. Who, at first, unwillingly accepts that divine wrath will be worth their brief love.
I just love your boys. I swear they are all the love supply one might possibly need
Thank you for such a long and thoughtful message! I don't know why you thought you might accidentally sour my mood, I'm utterly delighted whenever I hear that someone has been pondering my little guys (rotating them in their head, as they say), and when they go through the trouble of sharing their findings and conclusions I'm so happy I could crawl up a wall.
I think you deciphered Machete's inner workings very well, especially those of the original canon version. The concept of love is of course prominent in Christianity, so even as a kid being raised in a religious environment that discouraged overt displays of affection and close personal bonds, Machete wasn't completely alienated from it. But it has always been a nebulous, unperceivable and unattainable thing for him. When he was old enough to lock down his career choice he readily accepted he'd never have romantic relationships, spouse or a family, and I think he must've been too young and socially inexperienced to think of it as a significant loss. Either he consciously blocked out the need for companionship by studying and working like his life depended on it, or he didn't really consider that being genuinely befriended, appreciated and loved as a person instead of a respectable and competent authority figure was even an option for him, at least not until Vasco came along.
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