#and also gabriel. i like him a lot

[thefigmented]

me when uh uhm. robots and the horrors etc

[emsprovisions]

Maybe this is controversial but has it been long enough to admit I wish Carlos didn’t wear Gabriel’s ring all the time 🫣

[simonsquest]

So like, I could gush about how amazing I think TRfSB is, I love your writing style <3

But I was wondering for some time: Do you have a family name for Gabriel? (Did I miss it somewhere while reading?) Is he single or spoken to? Was he like an apprentice to the Belmont family? I would love to hear a bit more about him!

I adore Simon's and Gabriel's friendship, and how Gabriel is like the mental foundation for the whole Belmont family; without him, some situations would be more rough for everyone involved (I think).

Gosh you’re so kind to me, thank you! Q_Q I’m so honoured and grateful to have your praise!

Gabriel’s family name is Renard! The implication is that he’s a distant relative of the Renard family from the games. His backstory is revealed a bit in chapter 34.

To summarize - Gabriel’s father has a business in raising and selling horses. The Belmonts were one of their clients when Simon was a child (he and Gabriel were both around twelve at the time). Gabriel was apprenticing under his father and met Simon when they sold the Belmonts their horses (Simon’s included, may she rest in peace.)

But it wasn’t just a transactional handoff - the Renards stayed on the estate for a few weeks to teach the Belmonts how to best establish the stables and tend to the horses they were sold.

And Simon, being a lonely child with no siblings nor parents, asked Laurent if Gabriel might be able to stay a bit longer.

Hilariously, Gabriel never wound up leaving, lol, and has taken residence in the Belmont hold with Laurent ever since.

Gabriel is also proficient in combat, and Laurent seized the opportunity for him to train alongside Simon as a sparring partner of similar stature (being around the same age), so it worked out well!

Gabriel’s family is still alive and the implication is that he leaves the Belmont estate to visit them when he can. I haven’t given too much thought to whether or not he has siblings, though.

He’s single - I have some ideas about a significant other for him, but it won’t be explored directly in TRFSB. In one version of the story, I considered pairing him off with Selena’s sister Sofia. But I feel like they're better suited to be acquaintances - they’re both light-hearted teasers with good humour. :) Good folks all around. I wish I had them interact more apart from the sending-off banquet in chapter 26 lol!

I completely agree with you that Gabriel is a pillar for a lot of the mental foundation for the family. He has stepped in to diffuse Laurent, and Laurent has leaned on him over these years, too. Gabriel has helped Simon protect the estate, brought him and Selena together when they couldn’t see the signs themselves. He’s also a great uncle-figure and example for Mathieu. They’d be so lost without him!

I really, really like Gabriel as a character. He’s like the glue that keeps everyone together. And I’m so happy you see him that way, too! ^_^

[corvidaedream]

i keep getting severe gender envy from wrestlers who are smaller guys w long kinda greasy hair and little moustaches and i think i need to work out more so i too can become one

[eyeballplanets]

i think my hot connor design take is that he would not have straight blonde hair and dark skin. like knowing people who are his mix it would make more sense for him to have medium skin and curls. and like i get that a lot of people (this isnt just at fanartists this is also like. professional sequential artists) who focus on simplified styles don't really focus on features and so these broad indicators are used as simple visual shorthand but like. in general whenever i see mixed characters i hate that the options are 'indistinguishable from one parent's race' or 'indistinguishable from the other parent's race.' like. 'mixed with light skin but all not white features' happens. 'mixed with darker skin but more white features' happens and any combo therebetween. you can have the same interracial couple with three babies who don't even look the same race.

[superneightural]

Archangel Gabriel, Trickster, Loki, many names for possibly the funniest guy I know. He can shapeshift not just his form but also his cutie mark if he so chooses to have one! The god Loki is a deer in this world, so Gabe took on some more fawn like traits to add to his prettiest face. Despite still having pony traits, this half-assed disguise still worked for a long period before he eventually got captured.

Also he didn’t die in season 13 to me, he is living in Australia with several other supernatural folks whom the plot forgot in the hunter protection program. (Jesse, Anna, Missouri, Henriksen, to name a few others)

[lab-gr0wn-lambs]

Look I'mma be honest every time twd kills off a long-beloved character at this point I'm just

[redrosydiaz]

i am once again thinking of a good omens wicked au, but this time instead of the obvious crowley as elphaba and aziraphale and glinda, im thinking of the OPPOSITE.

im thinking of how AZIRAPHALE fits elphaba's character in that he is an outsider amongst his peers and he's a little bit awkward and he's got so much faith in the almighty/the wizard. he's got "parents" (read: god) who expect so much from him and siblings who are ashamed of him. and he's got dreams! he wants to do big things! he wants to work hand in hand with and make the almighty/the wizard proud!

and im thinking about how CROWLEY fits glindas character in the sense that he's suave and charming and people are drawn to him. he knows how to talk to them and how to get them to do what he wants, and he's the one that teaches aziraphale things about the world (a la popular, like tempting aziraphale into eating meat and drinking wine and all these very human things he never would have thought to do without crowleys influence).

im thinking of how the two of them start out absolutely loathing each other, as mortal enemies, one could say... but how over time and as they bond more and more, as they see different sides of one another, that loathing turns into something else. something just as strong, just as passionate, but softer. gentler. sweeter. it turns into love.

and of course everything gets shattered when upon meeting his idol, aziraphale learns that god isn't what he thought she was. it turns out god is just a pipe dream. all there is is a floating head, the metatron, posing as god. and not at all the great and powerful entity aziraphale believed. and the metatron CANT help aziraphale, can't fix him. and thus the downfall of aziraphale begins.

[vehemourn]

Not even breaking a sweat!

[imthepunchlord]

I don't think anyone was happy with how Gabriel's whole arc was handled, so I am curious what people prefer on what should've been done or could've been done instead.

[quietwingsinthesky]

Prompt: the archangelcule celebrating Jack's birthday 🙏

Lucifer runs himself ragged all week getting the party set up (and despite the fact that he’s done this for Jack every time he needs it since he came back into Michael’s life, it still leaves Michael surprised and wondering what happened to the boy who only knew how to bite the hand that fed when Michael abandoned him, when did he learn to be gentle and reliable, why did Michael waste all this time not seeing him?) to the point that he looks like he might fall asleep in front of the birthday cake before Raphael nudges him with their elbow, and he wakes up to sing.

They sing quietly — loud noises hurt Jack’s ears, one of many little oddities, but they rearrange their lives around his needs: no vacuuming unless he’s out of the house and no yelling from room to room — while Jack looks like he’s about to jump right out of his seat with how much he wants to blow out the candles. Gabriel scoops him up in one arm after, lets Jack’s tiny hand curl around the handle of the (dull!) cake knife while his lays over it to guide him, and helps him to cut pieces for them all himself.

(birthday 3 sentence ficathon! come toss a prompt!)

[pynkhues]

Devastating on many fronts, but also comedy gold on even more.

(The energy of this scene though too makes me think this isn't the first time Louis' brought a man home).

[starshine-selfships]

welcome to the fish club, I may not be kissing him but by god I'm cheering you two on, have fun <3 - @limey-self-inserts

The same night I played my first round of the game with my friends, that fish was in nearly every single dream I had 😭 I don't know what it is about him that got me so bad but he just. made my brain explode so hard that my deep sea autism from middle and high school came back full force + I'm planning to try to speedrun a cosplay for December, my brain is just a fishbowl for the snarkiest little guy on earth and if I ever get that voiceline that's like "aww, the skrunkly!" I think I would pass out, thank you for coming in to offer a thumbs up while I kiss your bestie dkjfkfk

[valentinesparda]

Hey Valentine!! Been thinking about DMC lately and was wondering if you could tell me some stuff about your DMC s/i? :0 perhaps what their relationship with Vergil is like? -[Wayfinderships]

@wayfinderships OH BOY OH BOY IVE BEEN THINKING ABOUT DMC RECENTLY TOO !!!! i miss my half demon husband. it sure has been a whole hot minute since I talked about gabriel in general, and it sure has just hit me that you and most of my current mutuals completely missed my dmc era, so!!

gabriel is my self insert, and they are a collector of demonic goods, a purveyor of powerful artefacts, and they meet vergil shortly before dmc3 is taking place, mostly because their paths cross through happenstance and they offer up information for him. they're around the same age as the twins at this point during the timeline, the two of them are kind of friends and kind of bickering back and forth, and eventually when Vergil Goes To Hell, they kind of dig themself into a hole of work since they're the apprentice to the actual collector they have been working for

um to make a long story short these are bullet points:

find a particular artefact associated to a general of hell named haures, who has his own little plans and manages to take possession of gabriel gradually over time, for the most part they function like they green goblin talking to his own mask

haures corrupts them and essentially demonizes them so they functionally stop aging / age so slowly that it isn't really noticeable

they are also hearing from haures about mundus and sparda and are doing their own little research, maybe in hopes of coming across that one weird white haired dude they met before

their research brings them to fortuna when nero is a little kid !! will expand upon that when i get back around to dmc4

they cross paths with dante a lot!! and he is their friend somewhat

the whole time they're doing all of this they are like actively dying from haures and have to stay in tip-top shape otherwise he will actually kill them!! but no one else can communicate with haures so he's just kind of their intrusive thoughts

badabadaba dmc5 rolls around and v shows up and suddenly it's like they're 20 again and experiencing feelings

anyways gabriel's relationship with vergil was initially a little fling for the short time that they knew each other when they were younger, and tidbits of that are echoed in meeting v. like gabriel wouldn't admit to it and they think they're doing such a good job of hiding it but everyone they know can SEE how they act

and then suddenly vergil is back!! and they are a dam in the process of breaking!! the two of them proceed to bicker like an old married couple and most of vergil's time spent as v winds up being mental anguish and maturity and confronting his own human emotions, so even though they are continuing on that leftover thread from when they were younger and they didn't spend very much time together, it's like they've known eachother forever. like they do care about eachother, clearly, but they're overall very sweet in their own ways and completely awkward in navigating their relationship and feelings. because they are eachothers first love or something. yucky. I'm not approaching the lady in red topic right now because if I do then I have to do mental gymnastics but it's fine, we'll just loophole it

anyways blah blah gabriel and vergil are like. aggressively embarrassed in how they interact with each other, because they're kind of too similar that it's funny, but they do genuinely like eachother. maybe it's just because they were each other's only friend when they were in their teens and were both being manipulated for someone else's gain lol. and after vergil's stay in hell and subsequent Speedrun of the human existence he calms down a little and lets himself learn to love, not just romantically but like, familially. he gets to learn about the people that he left behind again and the one he's never met before (his son), and that is just. so important to me

so gabriel is kind of the only person initially rooting for him, even if they would rather swallow glass than be vulnerable, but they can also have vergil help them control their corruption and possibly use haures to their advantage because i had it set up where he was yeah, a dumbass trying to usurp the throne, but I wanted to plan a whole plot surrounding him and maybe lore connecting him to sparda, specifically

I know i joke about them bickering and being unable to function as real people but i have a very special place in my heart for vergil, not just favourite character wise but also self ship wise. im personally very hardheaded and dragging my real feelings out of me is like literally pulling teeth, so I've hidden a lot of my affections behind jokes and that kind of is also reflected in how I talk about vergil. but i did eventually open up about it and that's where the handfasting ceremony came from. i finally just accepted that i loved him as a character and ive been trying to unlearn my bad behaviors and learn that it's okay to be vulnerable, and not to hold everything in all the time

i like. rambled but its to avoid having to voice how their relationship is in full detail, so all i really have to say is that it's complicated but also plainly simple how they work together, how they love. they do deeply care about the other, and while it takes some time to let the initial feelings go unsaid, they are at their center both very lonely people who have put their trust into someone that they can see themselves in, who know how the other one feels and expresses feelings, with the addition of v functioning as an a-ha moment for vergil while gabriel has had 30 years to think on the guy they first loved - and proceeded to immediately fall back in love with upon seeing again

[gay-caesar-truther]

Would it be weird to ship Gabriel with a random ass NPC Instead of a compainion or significant character? I'm looking at Alex Richards (the gay doctor at Camp forlorn hope) like... yes... you can fix my boy and he can bring you some peace and joy in return.

[lloydfrontera]

holy shit i completely misgendered raphael i genuinely thought he was a she/her oh my godddd