#I might do some stories to

[someonewhodrawsstuff]

Beyond: Haha.. Im going to scare the crap out of him

A: *walks out of the bathroom*

Beyond: *creeping on all fours beside the bathroom*

A: *unfazed*

Beyond: *awkwardly stares up at him* uh-...

A: You've done this so many times, I have gotten use of it.

[egophiliac]

bring your son to work day

[noodles-and-tea]

For the twins in time AU, I genuinely wonder what kind of people the young twins grow up into because of Stan’s/Ford’s influence. Especially if it takes years for the portal to get fixed.

(Sorry if it seems like I already sent this question, I don’t know if it got sent the first time I asked)

I haven’t fully fleshed out how Ford grows up in the past but I do have thoughts on Stan presently

[professorcalculusstanaccount]

Update! You decide my next project!

For the House of Glass I have decided to plan out pages for the entire story - normally I script the entire thing and only draw out and release a few snippets.

Pages I've released so far: pt 1, pt 2, pt 3, pt 4

It's a two parter, and part one has 50 pages including the ones I have already posted. Part two is shorter and has more character stuff. So here's the big question -

If you guys don't want to see the full thing I still plan to post specific extracts!

[swampybogg]

[annasofthe11thdimension]

Alright, so this is basically...an art dump for all the pics i drew when i was trying to draft the ending i wanted my Odile looping Au 'Like a Wheel Ever Turning' which...is not even SLIGHTLY how this fic is going to end now, but while figuring that out i still like draw all this and had to do SOMETHING with it.

So figured I'd post it and be like 'hey! fun Odile looping act 5 boss fight vibes not connected to anything else!' since like...that basic IS what they are at this point lol.

The one cool idea i loved that i think is now FIRMLY ditched is the act 5 boss fight starts when Odile uses wish craft to splinter herself into two halves.

The 'old/current' her that is meant to be her coldly logical side, and a younger 'copy' version, which is meant to be the childish irrational side...that is what's stopping her just shutting down the time loop because she can't figure out how to be happy with her friends leaving.

I mean, if you murder the part of you that WANTS the wish to come true, that's basically a 'get out of time loop free card' right? Right! Totally sound logic!

Yes the 'young' version of her firmly believes that she's real, and also also got memories going up to about age 21, and also that she ought to be in Ka Bue not HERE among these french weirdos.

Also yes again, a 'young' Odile is EXACTLY as unhinged about this as you'd expect a 21 year old to be upon finding out that apparently the 'real' her think murdering her is the correct solution to this problem!

The shift of the fight was meant to have the inverse 'colors' shift from one version to the other by the end, wrapping up with the point where the 'original' Odile is forced to have a heart to heart with the personification of her perceived 'worst' qualities.

Pretty sure the vibes for this ending was a lot more focused on the resolution of having deeply complex feeling about EXPRESSING emotion directly to other people. That along with a side helping of how isolating it is to be perceived as a 'real' adult such that you can't be weak enough to ask anyone for help. Because really if you can't even be that then why are you any different then when you were irritating mess of a youth?

Not saying any of that isn't still present in the story, but like...there is a LOT of other stuff going on, and those themes are now linked into many other ones too, and that's not even TOUCHING on how Loop's been...somewhat complicating my redrafting lol.

...Also I might have drawn/plotted this version before i knew about two-hats lol. THAT also is a factor.

Anyway! Still liked all of these enough to want to do SOMETHING with them, and figured this worked, so i could like map out my thoughts on them, even if i never got to write this.

[hellspawnmotel]

remember when I did this?

well I did more

[ruporas]

feast (ID in alt)

[minamill]

Soft Spot bodies

[slavhew]

breaking badifies them. happy pride motng

au elaboration under cut

this is just copypasted from twt i forgot to post yetsterday

I imagine that the Dirkjake dynamic would be down on his luck partyboy and the estranged high school friend that coerced him into a drug dealing operation. For reasons he refuses to elaborate on. Jake doesn't really want to be cooking meth but he needs the cash and sees Dirk as the one stable thing in his life really. Dirk really needs a partner and an in to the business and is most of the brains behind the operation.

Dirk is also doing a fair bit of posturing to keep them both safe but Jake... hooo Jake. Dear whining Jake will become a loose cannon when it counts. The power balance would fluctuate alluringly.

To be honest I imagine their dynamic would be much closer to a hypothetical high school au turned drug-dealing and wouldn't be much like Walter and Jesse. Wanna think there would be a happy ending but realistically they'd sink into their worst traits & probably end up in a saw trap by the end of it. I wanna imagine most plot beats still happen... gf dies... "gale" dies... Codependent yaoi and corruption arc flourishes.

I imagine Dirk's wardrobe would start to resemble more and more of Bro's and some of his personality might too. But I also don't think he'd go as far or be as bad as Walter, since here there's a care and concern for Jake as more than a pawn and stand-in (aka the Walter special). Damage would still be done though. The love didn't save anyone etc etc.

Bro and Grandpa would have a dynamic MUCH closer to the s1/2 duo. Devil-may-care stoner and the guy who needs cash FAST and doesn't have time for this shit. I dont think Bro has the tender heart Jesse but he definitely develops some terrible loyalty complex regardless. Honestly have a LOT less idea how their story would go so I'm all ears

[fiona-fififi]

Call me homophobic, but I don't actually think it's great representation to stick a complex, dynamic, newly-realized bisexual character permanently with a flat, boring, underdeveloped love interest just because that was the first guy who showed interest.

[egophiliac]

:) hello! :D hope you have a nice day and absolutely do not think of the possibility of one of the last story cards being of silver! and that his groovy will very probably be crying!!! THERE'S SO MANY CRYING PEOPLE IN STORY CARDS LATELY!!! SPECIALLY LIGHT USERS!! I AM!!! SCARED!!!! bc so far we got Lilia and Sebek in the beginning book 7.... so at the end.... so we're missing story Silver... and Malleus is the one with less cards, so they might add one for him... but... the tears... ego.... THE TEARS!!!! EGOOOO!! (LOVE YOUR ART BTW EVERYTIME I GET A NOTIF FROM YOUR BLOG I RUN HERE TO SEE!)

(thank you! 💚💜💚)

YES I am ALSO like...90-95% convinced that we're going to be getting a story card for Silver once we wrap around back to diasomnia. 👀 especially because the way things are going, Silver will be the only character whose dream we haven't seen -- yet???? -- and that just. y'know. makes me wonder!

although I do think it would be VERY funny if he got a story card and the groovy was just "regular Silver except with one beautiful single crystal tear". this is actually a lot coming from him.

(he used up all his emotion yelling at a baby that one time, there's none left for a proper groovy-level cry.)

[landwriter]

Hi! I hope you feel better soon!

This is a great prompt by @academicblorbo about Hob Gadling being the landlord of the Dead Boys. It has a wonderful fill already by @omgcinnamoncakes but I’d love to see what you come up with for it!

Alternative prompt from me if that doesn’t work for your brain: remember the date between Jenny and Maxine? How about one between Jenny and Esther? Poor Jenny is going to really question her taste in beautiful blonde women 😭

Thank you! I saw ‘landlord’ and ‘decades’ and blacked out. I love Hob having them as tenants. Maybe even before the modern day meeting in Sandman.

The Sandman/Dead Boy Detectives, 2.4k, G Dream/Hob, pre-slash, alternating/outsider POV, found family, a reunion and revelations etc.

---

Hob did not, strictly speaking, have tenants. It was more of a minor haunting. Pun intended.

The small room above the pub and below his flat wasn’t worth charging anyone rent for; when he first bought the building he had put a handsome oak desk in there and some bookshelves before wondering who he was possibly keeping up appearances for. Who was he going to take back upstairs that would stop and say, Wait, can I see your office? So he’d left it as more or less an abandoned room.

When he realized a pair of boys were using it as their clubhouse, he didn’t do anything at first. He saw them quietly coming and going a couple times, disappearing around the corner of the first landing. Brazen things. He meant to call after them, but the shout had died in his throat. He’d been young once. He still remembered the need to get away from it all. It was only when he went to check if they’d been making a mess of the room that he discovered it was still locked.

He’d crouched down and inspected the latch and found no marks at all. Huh, he’d said, and jiggled it again, and been a little more interested in whatever clever way they were getting into it after they disappeared up his stairs. Then he didn’t see them for weeks, and assumed they had gotten bored and stopped.

Until they came back. In the middle of an argument, striding through the pub like they owned it. Hob straightened up as they passed him.

“I cannot believe you broke the mirror.”

“I was in a rush! It’s not my fault you forgot you needed Arcana Incantatum after we arrived at the church. And found the demon.”

“I hardly forgot, I only made the mistake of assuming you would know to pack it by now.”

Hob raised his eyebrows. The boys disappeared into the back hallway. He followed them as they went upstairs, too preoccupied with their drama to notice Hob. They turned onto the landing, still carrying on. Even as they walked through the door. The locked, closed door.

Hob blinked. Then he drew his keys from his pocket and opened the door. The boys were still inside. One of them was pulling a mirror out of a backpack that was several times too small for it. They didn’t even look up, and Hob wondered how he couldn’t possibly have put it together earlier. He cleared his throat.

“Hello, boys.” That caught their attention. Hob grinned. “Seems we’re neighbours.”

---

Edwin abhorred getting involved with the living. He and Charles got along perfectly well on their own. They were a duo. An intrepid pair. Best mates, like Charles often stressed whenever he was about to ask something particularly ridiculous of Edwin. They were solid together. As solid as two ghost boys could be. The living, though, were messy and unpredictable.

Perhaps the most salient fact at present: Charles invariably became attached to them.

“He’s sad, mate. I can see it in his eyes.”

“You said those exact words in ‘94 about a dog. At least ask Hob himself.”

Before you decide to adopt him too.

Hob Gadling, irritatingly, was unobjectionable on every ground Edwin could think of. He had made no imposition upon them. When he found them, he only asked them their business, and then told them he was usually downstairs, or upstairs, if they needed anything they couldn’t procure themselves. He had an interest in rare and old books, as it happened. In explaining this, he had also hinted at being far older than his looks would suggest, which vexed Edwin twice over. He knew his curiosity would not be slaked until he talked to Hob, but then he would be the one getting involved with the living, and Charles would hardly let him forget it.

“Do you think he’s really immortal? Mate’s far too calm. Last week I saw him stop a fight downstairs by stepping right between these huge blokes. He just said something and smiled and they backed right off.” Charles lit up. “Do you reckon he’d teach me how to do that? Conflict de-escalation, innit? I could show him some moves with the cricket bat, I bet. Oh, do you think he’s a cricket fan?”

It was obviously a hopeless case, and since the Dead Boy Detectives never took on hopeless cases, there was only one course of action that remained. Edwin had long since disabused himself of the notion he needed to breathe. He had no beating heart, yet when he was startled, he would find himself clutching his chest. Now, he exhaled slowly through his nose in an entirely superfluous sigh of resignation. “Well, Charles, shall we go talk to him?”

---

When the millennium came around, Hob found himself celebrating it with his accidental tenants. There was something gloriously satisfying about being able to make a toast to the next one and have it taken seriously. He’d asked them if they had something better to do - spectral trouble to get into et cetera - and they both looked at him with almost identical put-upon and incredulous expressions.

Hob had a terrible suspicion they thought they were taking care of him as much as he thought he was taking care of them.

Edwin, with his insatiable curiosity and, deep underneath it, something Hob thought he recognized from himself: a sharp animal ferocity and a refusal to go until he’s good and done, natural laws be damned. Charles, still brightly, painfully alive for a ghost - who should be alive still, by all rights, but nothing of this life was fair - who joked to cover up hurt in a way Hob knew too, and glowed any time Hob turned so much as a kind word to him.

He wondered what they saw when they looked at him.

The year ticked over, and technology kept working. Charles grinned innocently and said he could probably possess the telly and break it that way if Hob wanted?

Hob’s heart twinged. He knew they weren’t his, not to keep, but it seemed that teenagers didn’t change at all over the centuries, even if the boys were only sort of teenagers in the way Hob was only sort of in his thirties. It didn’t change that they’d been punted from the mortal coil before having a chance to grow up, and figure out the kind of men they were, and make their own choices and fuck up and try to be better than their fathers, and everything everyone deserved. Hob had made more than his share of mistakes. They hadn’t been given the chance to make nearly any at all.

So they made toasts to the new millennium, to the detective agency, to themselves, all stuck out of time in different ways and refusing to move on for different reasons, and Hob allowed himself to think of Robyn and privately pretend that they were his all the same.

---

A week later, Hob was reminded of the other universal traits of teenagers when he mentioned his stranger and both boys began to grill him with terrifying alacrity. Before turning to his dating life, like ravening bloody wolves. When Edwin had asked, in a specifically nineteenth century manner that Hob remembered all too well, if Hob had always been unmarried, he’d nearly put his head in his hands.

“It can be hard for me to associate with the living too, you know. For obvious reasons.”

Charles had turned to Edwin and hissed “See? I told you.”

Right in front of him. Nobody had taught them manners.

“Manners, Charles,” replied Edwin loftily. “We will, of course, respect your privacy. A man is entitled to his secrets.”

“You’ll go upstairs and rifle through my personal things, is what you’ll do,” said Hob.

Charles coughed to hide his laugh. Edwin flushed and looked away. Hob snorted, and told them about Eleanor and Robyn. Properly. It was a strange relief. He’d told the story wrong for plausibility’s sake so many times he had been worried he’d forget the truth of it one day.

They had listened, and been remarkably quiet until Charles piped up and offered to set him up with a ‘really fit’ ghost. Hob had roundly shut that down. Woefully, not all explanations were satisfying enough. Charles cornered him again the next morning while he was cleaning the bar.

“No, mate, I still don’t get it.” Hob was about to say he no more wanted to be with someone who couldn’t feel pleasure from his touch than someone who would grow old and be taken from him while he stayed the same, when Charles went on, bafflingly, to ask, “Why don’t you meet your mysterious friend more often than once a century?”

Hob sighed. “Adults are often busy, Charles.” Nevermind that he had begun to wonder the same since the eighteenth century. He’d always just assumed time passed differently for his stranger.

Charles just laughed and perched himself on the bar top. “Ooh, low blow. We’re busy too, you know. Plenty of cases to solve.”

“Really,” said Hob. “You’re busy. Right now.”

Charles waggled his eyebrows.

“Charles, I am not a case,” said Hob, sternly as possible. “I’m not even a ghost. He’s not a ghost. No ghosts.”

“We could investigate. Maybe ghosts are involved. What even is he? Why every hundred years? Is it some sort of Persephone situation?”

Hob bit his lip against shouting I don’t know! I don’t know anything about him! Instead, he tried to smile, and felt it come out as a wince instead. “He’s very private.”

Charles scowled. “Yeah, obviously. You don’t even know his name. He can’t be that good of a friend if he’s too busy to see you more than once a century.”

Hob couldn’t see the expression on his own face, but he saw Charles’ shocked reaction well enough. It was so long ago for him, and still Hob knew at once what Charles saw now: that first time you manage to visibly hurt a grown-up’s feelings, people who seemed too old and too stern to actually feel pain, when you’d been going around kicking at them like a new foal, just to stretch your legs.

“Sorry,” said Charles, instant regret chasing his surprise. He was a good kid.

“It’s alright,” said Hob. He meant it. He looked down at the shining bartop. His hands were restless with the urge to light a cigarette. He gave in. It wasn’t like Charles would be dying of lung cancer any time soon if he decided to follow Hob’s example. “I don’t think he would say he’s very good at being a friend either. Truth is, I’d love to see him more often. But we had an awful fight the last time we met. If he forgives me, I’ll have to ask.”

“Mates always make up,” said Charles earnestly. He was such a good kid.

“I suppose they do.” Charles still looked sorry, and Hob clapped him on the shoulder. “Hey. Thanks for looking out for me, Charles.”

Charles beamed at him. “Always. We’ve got your back, me and Edwin.”

---

Charles couldn’t bloody believe it. Hob’s friend was here. There was nobody else it could be. He and Edwin were watching from a nearby table, pretending to be absorbed in their own conversation. Neither man noticed them. They were too busy looking at each other.

He couldn’t imagine spending more than a century apart from Edwin. The way Hob had talked about him and his stranger over the years, it sometimes seemed like they were best mates too, no matter how little they saw each other. He was dead sure that’s what had Hob looking so gutted when he thought nobody was looking. He had known they would make up, though. Maybe now Hob would be happier.

“Charles, we really ought not eavesdrop,” hissed Edwin. Right as he scooted his chair closer, the cheeky hypocrite. Hob and his friend were talking too quietly to properly hear, their heads bent together. Lots to catch up on, Charles reckoned. A hundred years. He couldn’t stop thinking about the number. It seemed impossible. Funny, he couldn’t imagine that long away from Edwin, but he could imagine spending that long being best mates. There was nobody he’d rather hide from Death with.

Hob’s face was doing something strange as his long-lost friend talked. Then Hob moved and grasped him by the shoulders, so tight that his knuckles stood out in relief. The man said something in low tones and Hob shook his head, and then pulled him in for a hug. The man stiffened and then relaxed, and his arms came up around Hob’s.

Their cheeks both looked wet.

Charles swallowed and it felt suddenly a little like he was choking. He should look away, only he couldn’t.

“They must be great friends,” said Edwin softly.

“Yeah,” he managed to croak. We won’t ever need to have a reunion like this because I’m never going to lose you, mate. I won’t let them take you. It was stuck behind the phantom lump in his phantom throat. His hand, without him telling it to, reached out and grabbed hold of Edwin’s. Edwin squeezed it hard, and Charles knew he didn’t have to make his voice work after all.

Then the man pushed Hob away, but only far enough to grab his face and pull him back again, thumbing over Hob’s cheeks, and beside him, Edwin honest-to-god gasped, and then Charles momentarily forgot how thoughts worked too.

---

It happens thus: in the New Inn, just next door to the White Horse, some 639 years after they first met, Hob Gadling and Dream of the Endless share their first kiss. Neither, if they had bothered to think about it, would have intended to have an audience, but it’s a well-known fact that some kisses cannot wait, and theirs was chief among them, being that it had so much to say, and was so very long overdue.

I missed you, it said, and I came back, it said, and Please don’t go away from me again, and I could not.

And atop them, like blankets, were laid invisible the daydreams of those who saw them, including two long-dead boys, whose dreams were woven from the fresh and unaccounted-for possibilities of Hob kissing his mysterious stranger. Another man, thought Edwin. His best friend, thought Charles. Dream was the only one who could have heeded this, but he did not, because Hob Gadling was holding him tight and daydreaming loudly of this kiss and more, of this today and tonight and tomorrow, ever greedy and ever easily pleased, and Dream could hear nothing at all over their clamouring and comingled joy; the bright gold daydream between the scant space of their bodies that sounded so much like at last.

[thebramblewood]

Helena and Caleb have been busy burying the hatchet and starring in their new hit sitcom. Currently accepting theme song submissions!

Clue card designed by @surely-sims! I thought it would be a cute detail to add. 🥰

Previous / Next

Caleb: Miss Scarlett with the dagger in the lounge.

Helena: Are you sure you’re not just describing your sister on a bad day?

Caleb: Oh, you mean every day?

Helena: Speak of the devil and she shall appear.

[canned audience laughter]

Helena: Regrettably, Miss Scarlett is out of contention. My turn!

-

Helena: Caleb, look! Poor little thing. Where did you come from?

Caleb: More importantly, how is it still alive? Animals don’t have a tendency to thrive around here, wild or domesticated.

Helena: She’s a girl! We should keep her!

Caleb: Lilith would hate it. She might even…

Helena: Lilith will not touch a hair on her body! [in baby voice] I’m going to name you Drusilla.

Caleb: Hold on. Is that a Buffy the Vampire Slayer reference?

Helena: Oh, well, I went down this research rabbit hole after… you know. It may have included a Simflix binge. Is it forbidden media now?

Caleb: Of course not! [sheepish but excited] I actually have the full series box set upstairs. Should we…

Helena: HELL YEAH, WE SHOULD!

Helena: Drusilla, come back! Don’t you want to meet your namesake?

Lilith: Disgusting little goblin. What particularly loathsome circle of hell did you claw your way out of?

[canned audience laughter]

[bindibites]

Its done!!! Bunch of rambles and stuff under the cut :) (its long, but I hope you guys enjoy!!!)

-> General Stuff Petra is built like a rectangle with enough muscle to make you experience regret swifter than you may have ever thought you could.

Rips in her clothes aren't super uncommon and she isn't usually super quick to mend them unless its basically ruining the garments. Carabiner. This woman is GAY. If you don't know the full meaning go look for it :) Easy attachment to weapons and tools, Miss Butter is probably akin to a prized possession everything considered; With as much as she's used having mending was a must, but truth be told she's probably about as kitted out as you'd expect end-game diamond gear to be. That sword is never going anywhere if Petra can help it. Especially after the stint with Stella basically stealing her. She has a lot of scars, from a lot of different sources between smaller bumps and scrapes, explosions, enemies... the Wither Storm. Petra's wither sickness in particular was almost deadly, and the damage it'd done to her body never fully went away. The veins in her arm remained discolored around the scar, and the arm is mildly weaker than it would've been pre-withered though through steady use is basically back to being good as new. Petra's lungs also never fully recovered, a mild chronic cough left in its wake, though gets worse whenever Petra is sick and her body is weak again. Speaking of... -> Wither (Sickness) Wither typically enters the body through a physical wound and spreads through the circulatory system. Affecting the blood, it attacks and weakens the inflicteds organs and continues to be spread further by the heart simply doing its job. Variant Two is caused by contact to the Wither Storm (See: What happened to Gabriel.) The wither storm is not the only way to get sick with wither, but is the worst and long lasting. From weakest to strongest: Wither roses - Wither Skeletons - The Wither - Wither Storm. Injuries from all but the Wither Storm will eventually run their course as it doesn't have a consistent source to keep pulling from; thanks to its use of the command block, this does not apply to the Wither Storm. Wither acts similarly to being poisoned, though it acts slower, its side effects and danger are far worse, and dying cannot be ruled out of possibilities even for the weakest source of it. Untreated wither will kill the inflicted if they become too weak before the body can get it out of its system. -> Relationships Generally Petra is very much a provider, she cares intensely for people she's close to and enjoys doing acts of service for them. Her relationships mean a lot to her, and it tends to lead to her putting all of herself into the people she cares about; sometimes for better or for worse. Lukas and Petra have been friends for awhile, well before either of them knew about Jesse and his friends. While not exactly childhood friends, they've known each other long enough to know each other and certainly act the part.

Petra and Stella didn't always have a strained relationship, in fact when they'd first gotten to know each other things were great. Stella respected Petra's capabilities, found her affinity for exploration and her skill in combat to be amazing. Though over time, it became less admiration and more of manipulation, Petra was an easy source of loot Stella both couldn't and didn't want to get on her own... and who better to turn to than the explorer who loved her. Things did not end on good terms between the two, and ended very bitterly given even after Petra gave her another chance she was subjected to getting tricked into doing work all over again. (S2) Petra has a fond admiration towards Olivia, though believing at most that the girl could use a bit more guts and trust in her own abilities; after all she's done things most of the rest of the group couldn't even with all the time in the world! Really a brains and brawn type situation, and the two often bounce off of each other a bit. Olivia appreciates having the company, and someone who even if she doesn't fully understand whats going on is intent to help get the materials to make it possible if need-be, in return Petra has been able to pick up bits of knowledge, the way redstone works at least in its bare minimum and some of the internals of more machinery in Redstonia. ...While the she might never fully utilize that knowledge, it makes Olivia happy to have someone else in the group be attentive and care about what makes her happy. Petra and Jesse have also been very close, though it did take some time for her to warm up to the way Jesse was so... enthusiastic to even be recognized by her sometimes. Though, through everything the two know they can rely on one another to have each others back. Though neither of them could ever see each other romantically, it's still an undeniable how fundamentally close they'd become. It's definitely more than just a friendship, but neither of them could probably concisely tell you anything about their relationship on a level past "Well, we aren't dating..." Even in light of the others having different responsibilities to tend to, Jesse was still there; The adventures didn't have to end, and they didn't, and Petra wasn't alone because of Jesse's willingness to go with her on whatever excursion she needed to, or wanted to. - If you read all of this ur a real one... three thousand wither storms upon you as thanks 💜

[luminique]

saw a japanese tweet about lighter during his underground fighting days and i am absolutely distraught. don’t treat this as canon though, they only used info in game to help build their own understanding of lighter.

they said that in his ep, he seemed to be someone who was constantly winning. but if you look at his story in the game, he mentioned having losses. a little headcanon that they had was that it wouldn’t be fun/entertaining if he always won his matches. you could put him against anyone and he’d honestly win against them so there were some match fixings and unfair advantages to his opponents to give the audience a ‘real’ show.

another thing that was mentioned was how he told us during the tour de inferno how he could just lower his head and bend his knees a little and he’d get money. this isn’t solid proof of anything but many do think that he may have been forced to provide extra services, considering the fact that he is canonically handsome (claims from bellum and other npcs have complimented him too).

then we learn that he felt like a zombie during his time in those fighting rings. opponent after opponent, his body deeply bruised and wounded, unable to look at his own reflection in their eyes. he had only done it for the money, to compensate for his actual losses in his life but then he was turned into an object for entertainment.

he was just a young man, he also had hope and ambitions. then it was ripped out of him starting with the deaths of his comrades, followed by his exploitation in those matches and the underground fighting rings. even though big daddy had paid off his debts, his ‘mistake’ as a leader didn’t disappear, the scars and marks on his body didn’t disappear, his own habits of self sacrifice and suicidal thoughts didn’t disappear.

we don’t actually know what went down during his days in the ember arena. personally, i would be more than fine if he chooses not to tell us the full details. i just hope that the game story treats him with care and we don’t have to consistently make him relive those days.