Let’s talk about the Veil
I’m gonna start out by saying this fully theorizing, complete spinfoil, little evidence but big dreams. This post is not going to be about the campaign, I have different post on my blog talking about it if you really want to know. As you might expect, huge spoilers for the campaign. Alright, it’s lore time babey!
Alright so the Veil is super mysterious. As mentioned in the campaign, there is very little we understand about the Veil. Osiris has never seen anything like it, the Neomuni really just use it as a battery. We really only know three things:
The Witness used it to open a portal (of some sort).
In interacts with both the Light and the Darkness.
It powers Neomuna and specifically is integral to the operation of the CloudArk.
That is really not a lot to go on. However, I do think it is actually enough to figure out what is going on. I believe that the Veil acts as a gateway between the Light and Darkness, or more specifically the physical and the metaphysical. Now that is a pretty wild claim but here’s why.
During the campaign, Osiris muses on the nature of Light and Dark. Specifically, he mentions that the Light deals with the physical: causing things to grow, letting us bend the rules of physics, etc. On the other side, the Darkness deals with the metaphysical: dreams and nightmares (Nezarec alert!), feelings of control, emotions, etc. He notes that these two forces are fundamentally incompatible. Frankly, I disagree, I think this is a case of Osiris purposely coming to the incorrect conclusion to have a reveal in Final Shape but that’s a different theory entirely. For now, the important thing to note is that there are a lot of questions around what happens when Light and Dark collide (Strand, Tormentors, Savathun, both “sides” using both powers, etc).
Now let’s look at the Ishtar Collective facility and Neomuna. In the final mission, Nimbus notes that a device we see is a CloudArk prototype. Later we see some wacky chairs that probably were part of that project. I cannot fully remember but I also remember the implication that the Veil is used in part of the upload process to the CloudArk. Here, we see minds crossing into a digital space, disconnected from their physical body. They go from entirely physical to entirely mental.
Okay Witness time. We see the Witness carve a giant triangle into the Traveler and then open a Veil portal, passing beyond it. I am reading this as the Witness has entered the Traveler. I’ll come back to that. But again, the Witness has passed into an unknown space, Darkness goes into a space that is ostensibly defined by the Light. Furthermore, the Radial Mast is specifically identified as a source of Light during the campaign and our ghost (a creation of the Light) is used to channel the Veil’s power with Osiris telling us to get our ghost away from the Veil. Again, the convergence of Light and Dark.
Alright let’s bring it all together. In all of these cases, we see the Veil being used as a sort of translation layer between physical and nonphysical states or more specifically, Light and Dark. I think the Veil allows for Light and Darkness to coexist in a way that is otherwise impossible. This is why Strand is present on Neomuna (our Light powers getting reflected into a metaphysical state), this is why our ghost can be semi-hijacked by the Witness, this is why Neomuni can be uploaded to the CloudArk which really feels a lot like the VexNet, and this is why the Radial Mast / a source of Light (us) was needed for the Witness to interact with the Veil. It plays really nicely on the phrase “beyond the Veil” which, while often used in conjunction with death, actually just refers a mysterious division between worlds. Again, plays really nicely with the ideas I mention here about moving between worlds, and moving between the domains of Light and Dark.
So that begs the questions, what the heck is going on with the Witness and the Traveler? Well take a trip with me into deep theory territory here cause I’m moving from little evidence to zero evidence. In the final cutscene, we see the Witness send its Pyramid ships into the portal before following. We know a couple of things. According to Osiris, the Light deals with the physical. We also know the Pyramid ships respond, at least in part, to our thoughts and desires. What if the inside of the Traveler is a massive space, able to fit in the relatively small Traveler ball Tardis style because of the physics warping nature of the Light like the thought warping nature of the Darkness in the Pyramids? The Witness needs some way to enter that space, but literally cannot because it is such a channeller of the Darkness. So, to get its ships and forces inside, it needs a translation layer. Something that will allow it to enter this space and allow the Darkness and Light to mix. That’s why it needs the Veil, to pass beyond, to actually get to the heart of whatever the Traveler is, whether that’s a Witness-like creature or of something more abstract.
Also, I am wondering if the reason why nothing we do gets past the Veil is because we are all physical and Light based. Would explain why the Witness converts its ships into smokey wisps to pass through. So perhaps the answer is we have to become heavy on the Darkness side or... think our way through? Not sure about this one tbh XD. Either way, I am sure we will see more about the Veil in the lead up to Final Shape.
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barton being awkward at first or even completely throughout a whole interaction whenever he's trying to comfort people is so in character for him TBH and let me tell y'all why because i think it's important to his character:
he can fake a lot of things. barton can fake being nice to people, he can fake being innocent, and he can even fake having a much stronger sense of morality around people if he wants to — but whenever it comes to empathizing with someone on an emotional level... barton finds himself often struggling with faking it because of the nature of it. and this is due to it being different than whenever he's trying to feign something easily comprehensible like innocence. but empathy is something that's usually viewed as innate in us as humans and has to do with love, which doesn't depend on logic. it's something that comes from within, so it doesn't have clear parameters as to how you should do it, so whenever barton tries to fake it in the event that he's trying to make someone feel better; he'll stumble. and so although barton can cognitively empathize with someone, his efforts to actually put himself in other people's shoes fall flat, as he just can't physically imagine himself being in someone else's position probably more than half the time.
so if your muse were to ever come to him seeming upset, barton would likely not know what to do / how to comfort them, at least for a bit before referencing back on how he's seen other people do it. because i hate to say it (i don't, in reality, but y'all know what i mean LOL) but barton does actively mimic behaviors that he sees people do whenever he feels the absence of a certain emotion. he especially does this whenever he's trying to appear charming to other people, but like i said, he'll also try to use what he's seen his peers do as a guide as for what he should do in regards to empathy. and sometimes he may even seem a bit flustered before he's able to do this because he knows that it is expected of him to be able to empathize with people and can identify it in other people BUT knowing how to approach faking it has always been sort of hard for him even as an adult.
but yeahhh, that's just my own two cents about how barton sometimes break character that he is quote unquote ' normal, ' though he does try to mask this around people who aren't really familiar with him as simply being social awkwardness. however, it is part of a larger thing with him as despite the fact that he can blend in with the population REALLY well and also is pretty good at manipulating others, i suppose you could say that barton is still not an expert at ' constructing empathy ' because whenever someone is visibly hurt in front of him... he is more liable to act like he isn't sure what to do, than to put on an act immediately since he is likely to feel nothing first before anything else. and i realize that that is a rather unsettling thought, but i think that he is a lot more suspectible to doing this with people he doesn't know well / who he isn't particularly close to, as he's got a lot more practice with being falsely empathetic towards friends and/or sometimes even family members.
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Gather ‘round, it is time once again for Tyto’s 3 a.m. fic recs~
I dove into AO3 looking for vampire fic because,,, you know, and among the many quality fics for the new tv series, I stumbled on one that was actually written prior to the show’s debut.
It starts out more or less the same as book canon, with Louis becoming a vampire in the 1790s and Lestat moving into Louis’ estate outside New Orleans. Then it’s revealed that this version of Louis, while light-skinned, is actually mixed race. With all the worst accompanying historical baggage that goes with... that.
The story... diverges from there.
It’s written with intense care in regards to historical context and sensitivity, while still confronting uncomfortable topics. If you want a fic that actually addresses the whole “protagonist of the story owned a goddamn plantation” thing unflinchingly, then this is the fic to read.
Also includes an A+ portrayal of Louis and Lestat’s fraught communication problems, Louis’ unceasing struggle with mental health (and the whump that comes of that), and--believe it or not--a happy ending!
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