My unpopular opinion is that in languages with grammatical gender like french, it does make sense for Murderbot to be referred to by whatever pronoun is usually used for robots or constructs. (In french, therefore, grammatical masculine.) Because there are no traditional « it » pronouns in these languages for objects, and while there are neo-pronouns, they are things one must choose for themselves. Do you honestly think MB actually spent time thinking about its pronouns?! No it didn’t. On forms it picks « non-applicable ». When people ask it what pronouns they should use, its honest opinion is « why do you even need to talk about me. Just don’t fucking do that. Don’t think about me either. Just fucking stop perceiving me altogether! »
Thinking about what pronouns to use probably makes it way more uncomfortable than letting people call it what they’ve already been calling it. Making a conscious choice about its identity? And telling other people about it??? No thanks bye, it’s just gonna walk into the ocean now, see you never.
Lbr it probably thinks the only bots that get fancy pronouns are comfort units, and the pronouns are probably shoved into them by humans same as everything else. MB would meet a bot using a neopronoun and it would wish it could barf. Because in a language like french, he/him and she/her, when applied to objects, ARE fulfilling the function of the english « it ». Nobody is saying the table is a woman or related to feminity in any way outside of stand-up comedy; when it comes to objects grammatical gender really has fuckall to do with human gender even if we use the same words. Even animal species names have grammatical gender and everyone gets that there are male and female turtles even if the word « turtle » is a female word, it’s not that confusing.
(I know this is strange when your language has different pronouns for people and for objects, but understand that english uses the same word to indicate if I’m addressing one or many people, and that is confusing to me.)
TL;DR; stop harassing international fans for not getting the correct MB pronoun in english right off the bat. Yes in english calling it « he » or « her » or « them » is upsetting because it’s projecting an identity unto it. But same goes for trying to get a foreign language translation to use a pronoun intended to express or showcase an identity (or even a lack of one!). Murderbot has not thought about it this hard, refuses to think about it this hard -> and that is its only canon accurate gender identity.
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Do I actually think Imogen is going to turn on the party? No. I don't think it’s any more likely to happen than I did Fjord releasing Uk’otoa, or Caleb returning to Trent and the Vollstruckers.
Given the nature of the game, any character turning fully dark is unlikely, seeing as it would take them away from the party for a time or potentially even turn them into an npc, replaced by a new pc. So far the only time we've gotten close to seeing something like it happen was Yasha siding with Obann, which could only happen specifically because Ashley was gone from the table for a long time (it was also the product of mind control, not an active choice to turn dark, and as such still doesn’t really count as a pc turning on the party in my eyes).
But the possibility is there. The seeds planted. Travis has talked about how, after he threw the falchion away, he briefly considered having Fjord leave the party and retun to the coast and Uk’otoa. Liam has mentioned that, early on, Caleb returning to work for Trent was a very real possibilty. It can happen, if the players and narrative are open to it.
And now, canonically, Imogen is desperately and understandably searching for a reason not to have to fight her own mother. She is, however briefly, questioning whether the Ruby Vanguard might have a just cause. Much as she hates it, she also feels the allure of the power Ruidus gives her. Her closest ally is someone who has repeatedly assured she will stand by her no matter what she chooses, even after she voiced the possibility of letting Predathos get out. None of these parts of Imogen are evil, and all of them are understandable and deeply rooted in pain and ostracization, but they could very easily be turned into justification, were she pushed enough.
The seeds are planted. Again, I don’t think it will happen (she seems firmly against the evil plan when reminded of how evil it is), but there’s certainly nothing strange or hateful about engaging with and being interested in the darker possibilities as presented in canon. It isn't character hate to acknowledge that Imogen has the potential to go dark, much as Fjord and Caleb and Yasha. To me, it’s what makes her character interesting. I want to see her clash with the party, whether because she’s desperate to save her own mother or because she’s high off the power of Ruidus and lured in. I want to see Laudna have to choose between the world and her promise to stand by Imogen no matter what. I want to see the fallout, the slow healing and redemption and coming to terms with bad choices. I eat that shit up, and if it doesn’t happen in canon I'll probably go read some fic about it to get my fix.
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bela lugosi's dead
written for the @steddiemicrofic prompt: suck | wc: 480 | T | cw: none | tags: vampire!Steve
Like every good freak worth the nickname, Eddie made a habit of reading Dracula every Halloween.
The first read led to closeted daydreaming about getting abducted by a handsome vampire. Letting himself poke at desires he hadn’t been ready to commit to. With age his fantasies and aesthetics matured, until he was the bloodsucking creature of the night stealing pretty boys away to give in to their secret temptations. So, if he's honest, he’s having a hard time dealing with life and the lemons it’s juggling off to the side of him.
“It isn't fair.”
“Hmm,” Steve, with his red puffer vest and his coordinating Nikes, sat across from him at some point in full view of Eddie’s misery over his annotated copy of Dracula.
“There's an aesthetic you're failing to appreciate and it isn't fair that you-”
“Are we going to do this every time?” He asks around the straw in his mouth, poked into a blood bag labeled ‘Robin:)’ like he’s sipping from a juice box.
“Until you stop dressing like a JCPenney catalog model, or vampires become lame, yeah we probably are, Harrington.”
“Fine,” he sighs, having the decency to pull the blood bag away from his face, “I'm sorry that you had to have five blood transfusions and basically have new, non-vampire blood. No one has ever suffered the way you, Eddie Munson, have.”
“You're being sarcastic, but I have suffered so apology accepted, Stevie.”
“Now you.” Steve prompts, gesturing with the bag in his hands.
“Now me what?”
Steve sits up, a languid move that makes Eddie’s prey brain sit up at attention and his horny boy brain poke its head up too. “Say I'm sorry, Steve, that you had to save the world for the fourth time so a bunch of freaky bat venom metastasized-”
“You absolutely stole that word from Henderson,” breathless, the jab doesn’t carry the weight it could.
“-in your bloodstream and combined with the remains of the experimental Soviet drugs and now," He crawls closer, "you can't eat garlic anymore.”
“That's the hang up for you? Not the blood drinking?”
“I'm Italian, I can’t eat anything anymore. Sure I can supplement the blood with raw meat, but what’s the point if everything is poorly seasoned.” Blood bag all but forgotten in the arm chair, he has Eddie pinned in place looming overtop of him, talking shit about what he’ll never be able to eat again.
The white collar of Steve’s t-shirt is visible beneath the color-block vest, even that isn’t enough to stop his brain from screaming predator on repeat. Supernaturally strong, it doesn’t take more than a hand on the shoulder to push Eddie down horizontal on the couch. He has to feel Eddie’s heart beat, the way it pounds in his chest as Steve noses up the collarbone to his neck. “Really does suck for me, huh baby?”
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