#and porsche would have met a very different kinn if it had only been. what - a few months earlier?

[fromperdition4]

Kinn’s Startle Response

Okay, so we all know that waking Kinn up from a deep sleep is a bad idea, right? Porsche shows us this very clearly in episodes 5 and 6, where he suddenly had/would have had a gun pointed right in his face:

But, this isn’t the only times we see Kinn startled awake - first, later in episode 6, he’s woken by Porsche in the early morning:

And this is probably the most relaxed we’d seen Kinn, up to this point in the show - he isn’t scared, he doesn’t go into murder mode, he just looks over at Porsche with new affection.

I think this moment makes it clear that Kinn’s previous startle response is tied directly to his levels of anxiety/stress. He’d just spent a day away from being a mafia boss - learning to fish, joking around, bathing with Porsche - and he’d also just made his first apology to Porsche. He’s finally unburdened, so his subconscious is no longer on high alert.

And this extends to episode 11, when Tay and Time sneak in to surprise Kinn and Porsche on a sleepy morning in bed:

Kinn (and Porsche)’s first response is to open his eyes to look at what’s disturbing them, then after he realizes it’s just his asshole friends he kicks at them. It’s no more violent a response than any other guy with his friends, and that’s because his mind is settled - he’s relaxing in bed with his love, with his family’s approval and no more Tawan/mole to deal with. Life is good!

Besides being adorably awkward (poor Porsche 😂), I think this scene also gives us some extra insight into Kinn��s startle response - it seems like it was a recent development for him, maybe even after he took over for his dad (when I imagine the death threats ramped up). That’s because of Tay and Time, who we know have been Kinn’s friends for a while (since at least his relationship with Tawan) and are close enough to him that they’re let into his suite without being announced:

If Kinn’s startle response had always been to be instantly ready to murder someone, his best friends would have surely learned to avoid doing it a long time ago. Instead, I think we’re seeing that Porsche has brought Kinn back to his actual default state - a peaceful mind, and arms ready to snuggle

[yujeong]

So, there's this fic I want to write for months now about the first time Pete says "I love you" to Vegas and it made me want to make a post about it as well. I truly believe saying that phrase is a huge deal to Pete and I want to explain why.

Starting with the fact that I loved, loved, LOVED that in the show, he never said it. Not directly, anyway. He didn't shoot Vegas when he had the chance, he shot Vegas when it was necessary to save him, he told him he was right there, he told him he was hungry, he told him he's following his heart. All of those things are different ways of saying "I love you" but it's not the phrase itself. And that's important because it truly showcases the core aspects of Pete's character.

Pete isn't like Vegas. Both of them are very emotional but the way they express their emotions is almost the complete opposite. Vegas is letting them get out of control, spilling out of him, while Pete is keeping them deeply locked up inside him until they eventually explode and he can't contain them anymore. Both of them at first are unwilling to recognise how they feel about the other, the changes that are happening inside of them but Vegas comes to the realization quicker than Pete and tells him so. All of this is why Vegas saying the phrase out loud in contrast to Pete never saying it makes perfect sense in the narrative.

I truly believe that Pete has this feeling in his chest which he isn't even sure what it's called or even if it's what most people would call it but it's so strong for Vegas that he knows he can't live without it so he decided to chase after it. There's this incredible fic by LuckyDiceKirby called "even the clearest water" that has an exchange between Vegas and Pete, in which Vegas asks him if Pete loves him and Pete replies with this:

"I don’t know. How could I know what that feels like? I’m not that kind of person. You make my teeth ache. You make the world bright, like it’s real. It hurts. It’s hurt since I met you, but that means I can never forget I’m alive."

I cannot tell you what I even felt when I read that. It was a mix of pure awe and enlightenment, because it was what I had been thinking after watching the show but was unable to put into words.

Now, as I was writing this post, a thought popped into my head related to this and I want to express it. I think the fandom unanimously agrees that Vegas has the capacity for kindness and softness due to Macau, the wonderful, perfect, sweet little gremlin angel of my heart. Macau is the reason Vegas even knows what love is, otherwise starved for it because no one else in his life gives it to him in any way, share or form until Pete comes along.

This got me thinking: who does Pete have in his life to show him what love and affection is?

At first glance, Pete's environment seems fine and way better than Vegas'. He has people that care about him, he has friends, he has a nice room, his grandma sends him meals that he's allowed to eat in his room. Is this actually true though? Is the main family as kind and sweet and full of affection as it seems?

Well...no, it's not. All of this is superficial. Pete got forgotten the moment Kinn had Porsche in his arms (and bed). No one remembered him except Tankhun, who we could argue also loves Pete superficially and doesn't really view him as a person (I love Tankhun and I say that affectionately. I think post canon he has the potential to change his way of thinking and behaviour towards his bodyguards).

But what about Pete's grandma?, I hear people say. Well, she is the only person Pete says "I love you" to but is this enough to claim that he knows what love is? When he doesn't live with her, doesn't have the ability to physically touch her for comfort whenever he needs to, can't talk to her freely without surveillance? He only gets a glimpse of it and if we also include the fact that he works for the main family for years, he's been deprived of love almost all of his life. No wonder the poor man is confused and doesn't realise what he's feeling for Vegas. He wasn't even a person until the safehouse.

The environments Vegas and Pete grew up in shaped them into who they became and it's evident if you think about it in the way I described above: Vegas' environment is cruel and unforgiving with a speck of actual love in the form of his brother and Pete's is presumably kind but devoid of substance. I'm oversimplifying this of course but I think the core aspects of how he lives in the main family play an important role in Pete's character.

All in all, Pete is a brilliantly written character and I want to thank the writing team and Build for giving him to me. I truly hope that when I manage to write this fic, I'll do his character justice.

[aprilblossomgirl]

Rebellion: Part 2 - Kim

Here's Part 1 about Chay.

=========================

Kim

Now here's the youngest of Theerapanyakul, and he lives away from his mafia family with his Wik persona in the music world he loves. Kim made his first appearance in episode 3, shown to have a conversation with Big about situations back home. But, even away, he seems to care about his family enough to notice something unusual about Porsche hiring and decide to visit his family.

While Kim was at the Theerapanyakul mansion, I felt Korn approached Kim differently. For one, he expressed his surprise to find Kim at his study, and offered a seemingly friendly pat on his arm, a gesture I doubt ever offered towards Kinn or Khun. At the same time, I also sensed he became alert, especially after Kim questioned his decision to hire Porsche, a question which, in the end, was kept hanging. After Kim left, he immediately checked the drawer and his folder. I wonder if he realized Kim had seen it. The way he stared towards the door was a mix of suspicion, discontentment, and maybe wariness. Had there been any situation between them where Korn realized that his youngest could be a threat the most dangerous when he put his nose on something?

Kim then decided to investigate Porsche. This happened after he met Chay, who happened to be Porsche's younger brother, at his university's open house. At first, he might only take Chay as one of his fans, requesting guitar tutoring to help him prepare for the university's entrance exam, which he softly rejected. But after knowing his connection to Porsche, Kim turned to approach him offering the guitar tutoring, not knowing he would be charmed by Chay so early during their first tutoring session.

Now that I think again about it, the first impression of Kim is calm, calculated, and firm. But after meeting Chay at their first tutoring session, I found it odd that Kim could get distracted and slip off words when trying to get Chay to talk about Porsche. In his honest and innocent way, Chay pulled the softness in Kim. When Kim tried to back off, Chay came to find him unpretentiously. And when Chay came to report on his passing the exam, say his thank you, and confess, Kim kissed him on the cheek. Their hug at the moment is everything. But soon, things happened very fast; Kim needed to pull himself out (again).

Kim Rebellion

Kim's rebellion might be presented more subtly than Chay's, which happened overnight. I didn't even think of his isolation as an act of rebellion at first, but looking further into the rebellion stages, it could be. Considering his age (22), Kim's rebellion at this point happened during the adolescent stage called trial independence (18-23), which is one step before young adulthood. But I suppose it started way earlier, although I would assume no earlier than his early teenage stage. When did he decide to move out of the family home?

At this trial independence stage, one is resisting personal authority as opposed to parental authority as they might have during the early adolescence. It goes from rebelling against the parents to rebelling against themselves. This is the period where they know what they should or must do but can't bring themselves to do it, especially under the influence of external forces. Bring this back to Kim; what does he know he should or must do, and why can't he bring himself to do that? Let's say I make one assumption about the scenario: Kim knows that he needs to return to the Theerapanyakul's home, but he can't bring himself to do it; why? What's the external force that holds him not to doing so? And not too surprising, Korn doesn't interfere. Again, because at this stage of rebellion, it's something that generally parents were advised to do. (Maybe this adds to Korn's character as the strategic chess player or mafia leader; he knows how to deal with each of his children?)

Partially, this rebellion theory answers my question of why Kim did what he did, regarding his family and Chay. I'm speculating here:

Keyword on Tankhun's "He's nosy; he must be got it from me." Even if Kim decided to leave the family home, it doesn't mean he didn't care. What if Tankhun's kidnapping affected Kim the same it did Kinn? The difference is that while Kinn was then forced to step up as the heir, Kim chose to follow his rage (by episode 12, we know what he's capable of feeling and showing; that he can be that scary and crazy) and step away, I think, with a mission in mind. I mentioned in my post here that I think Kim picked early on that something's off surrounding Korn's business. If he cared about the kidnapping, he might want to know why that happened and who was involved. And for all we know, he ended up with an extensive case board. He is suspicious of everyone, just like Kinn. That's why he checked about Porsche through Chay and discovered the connection between their parent's accident and the things he's investigating. But it looks like that's still not everything to it.

Kim didn't communicate his feelings to Chay because he was still confused. He's still rebelling against himself: I should do these, but I can't bring myself to; why? He holds this responsibility to act upon everything he comes to know, including realizing his feelings for Chay. But the complexity of their connection behind the scene, besides his mission, added to his confusion. So he delays his appropriate response to Chay. But until when? The club scene in episode 12 showed his wall starting to crumble. He lashed out at Chay in a way he never did before in response to his rebellious act, opposite the softness he always wore whenever he was with Chay. Kim is nosy when it concerns the people he cares about. The fact he'd been nosy when it relates to Chay, both in subtle and crude ways, should say something about how he feels about the boy.

=========================

Remember this line: "Well, I'm scared that if I look at you, I'll cry. I've always felt that I'm an unlucky person. But today, I've realized that all the lucks I have are for being here with you. P'Kim, I love you." This kind of line, you can never say it if you never constantly feel unlucky. The "I love you" here is full of Chay's heart and hope that this must be it. That's why with all those things, the heartbreaks doubled. And Kim knows it.

But if they could overcome their current own inner frustration (for different reasons) and some external confrontation (with their family) heads on, who knows, they would go back and find home (again) in each other.

=========================

+ I think of all the main pairings in KP, Kim and Chay are surprisingly the characters I could relate to the most. The themes of stubbornness, suppressed emotion, rage, isolation, and extreme introversion speak so much for me. I hope I'm not too dramatic in writing my observation.

+ I need to rewatch their scenes (individually, with others, and them together) to complete these two posts, now with very different feels, and they hit me harder it's so damn hurtful my heart aches for them. +

+ This might be my last long post before the series ends; please, episode 13, don't change my mind, lol. +

=========================

Reference.

[concernedlily]

cousins wip 7

pt 1

pt 2

pt 3

pt 4

pt 5

pt 6

The next time he’s at the tower, it’s for inspection by the other families that look to the Theerapanyakuls, and there’s no room for pining; if they think he’s not up to scratch he’s dead.

Maybe not at the meeting. Maybe not even this month, or next month. But eventually, when it suits them, he’ll be dead.

“I’m not going to let them do anything to you,” Kinn says quietly; or maybe just at normal volume, but he’s standing so fucking far away from Porsche, practically plastered to the opposite wall of the anteroom they’re preparing in, he might as well be in space. “I killed two of them for crossing me the last time we met. They’re afraid of me. They won’t touch you.”

“That doesn’t help,” Porsche says and twitches the fall of his jacket over his hips again, although it’s already perfect. He’s in charcoal grey today, a nod to the minor family’s mourning, a linen mix to add a more casual touch compared to Kinn in the grey ombre he’d worn when he kidnapped Porsche from the bar and started all this, a dusty rose shirt underneath that Tankhun had pulled out of his own wardrobe and bullied him into when Porsche had shown up in a black one. “We’re not mourning that much,” Tankhun had sniffed, and the pink looks good on Porsche, fey and dangerous, so he’d agreed.

Kinn had given him an approving nod when they met up to go over the script, but his gaze raking over Porsche had been empty, purely professional. He hasn’t tried to touch Porsche at all today, keeping to what he’d said by the pool, and that’s what Porsche thought he wanted, knows he should have initiated himself, but it’s making him crazy. Even just a fingertip brushing the back of his hand would do, would settle him back into his skin and reassure him he belongs, but Kinn is acting like a fucking stranger.

It’s absurd. He’d taken care of himself and Chay for years and years, he never wanted or needed or had anyone else to rely on, and a few weeks of romance with Kinn and he’s feeling bereft because there’s nobody to hold his hand? 

He straightens up, lifts his chin, and heads out.

The presentation goes well enough. It helps that Porsche isn’t the only new boy: Khun Charoensuk and Khun Rittirong are new too, replacing the men Kinn killed last time in representing their clans at the council of the organisations that look to the Theerapanyakuls. The other five members around the table are wary too, feeling their way around the new balance of power with such a lot of change, and it’s clear that Kinn was right. His shooting of the leaders who tried to rebel against his rule underlies every moment of the discussion, even sharpened by the main family coming out on top after Gun’s attempt at a coup.

Porsche wonders if it will get to a point between them where Porsche will be as worried as the rest about what Kinn might do. Kinn wouldn’t hurt him now, he knows that to his bones, but in a year, five, ten, things will be different. When their relationship is only a distant memory of a brief interlude of devotion and great sex, when maybe Kinn will have another lover and have convinced himself Porsche was only an infatuation, when they’ve settled into being nothing more to one another than what they are around this table - maybe then Porsche will have to be nervous of him, will have to demonstrate his loyalty over and over to feel safe. With <i>Kinn</i>, his Kinn, when all Porsche wants is to worship him on his knees.

Khun Wanchai is the first one to broach what Porsche expects they’re all thinking.

“I’m not questioning your decision, Khun Kinn,” she says carefully. “But a bodyguard from your house to lead the minor family, and one so new… is there a reason behind this choice?”

Porsche will give her this: the insinuation that Porsche got the job on his back is deniably subtle. Unlike her six colleagues, who are smirking and glancing at each other and very possibly only moments from asking for a sample themselves of the hole the Theerapanyakul heir is clearly drunk on.

“It wasn’t Kinn’s choice,” Porsche says earnestly. “Khun Korn offered me the ring. My mother is his sister.”

Kinn glares at him and Porsche smiles back. Oh, did Korn want it to stay secret that he’d faked his death? Did he want nobody to know his family took in a girl child of a family they’d annihilated and when she grew up killed her husband and abandoned her kids until dragging them back to the mafia years later? Too fucking bad.

Khun Wanchai gives Porsche a piercing look and then very obviously decides she’s not going anywhere the fuck near that. It’s the smartest decision anyone has made at this meeting, as far as Porsche can see. She folds her hands in her lap and sits back in her chair.

Khun Narong leans forward. “I’m sorry. You’re saying - you’re a Theerapanyakul? The nephew of the head of the main family?”

“A cousin of the head of the main family,” Kinn says from the head of the table, crisp and lethal. He’s clearly displeased that it makes a difference to them whether Korn elevated Porsche or whether it was his own choice. “<i>I’m</i> the head of the main family. My father is recovering from his recent illness but he was well enough to make the decision personally. As is the main family’s right.”

Everyone glances around one another and once again they all visibly opt not to ask just how shitty the Theerapanyakul doctors are to have announced Korn was dead when he was merely ill.

There’s only one more message Porsche wants to get across. “And I’m not a Theerapanyakul,” he says, makes eye contact with Kinn. “I’m a Kittisawat.”

It’s as much of a statement as he dares make. Appointed by Korn, serving at the grace of Kinn and all these assholes around the table - but he’s not Korn’s puppet, and he’s not a stopgap until he gets assassinated and someone else comes along. Everyone around this table is a dynasty? Fine, so is he, even if he’s just at the beginning.

“We’re delighted to have a cousin to take up the reins. We’ll work as closely together as when my father and my uncle were in charge,” Kinn says smoothly.Nobody points out that his father and uncle working together recently resulted in one trying to kill the other, and the other actually killing him back; mafia rule by fear has a lot going for it, Porsche thinks, when it comes to nobody talking back. 

Porsche is probably the only one who sees how much it pains him to have to claim Porsche as a cousin publicly. Kinn’s gaze meets Porsche’s down the table and Porsche has to look at his hands clasped bloodless-tight on the table in front of him. It’s cleaned to such a high shine he can see himself in it, looking strict and lost.

The five family heads look at each other, then at the two new guys, and Porsche doesn’t know any of it well enough to fully track the unsaid discussion but the endpoint seems to be that he’s in. He’s not accepted, exactly, but he’s getting a chance. 

And then they move on to business talk and Porsche finds out exactly what he’s getting a chance at. 

It’s not a surprise, not really. He’s been in the job a couple of weeks now, he’s got Gear, he’s been talked through the finances more than once by now. But there’s a difference between the practical way Gear talks about it, as a matter of matching people to do the work to the places where work needs doing, and the way the people around this table talk about it, detached and businesslike. 

The talk about the main family is contracts, PR, investments, customers, the channels to get dirty money clean onto the books. 

Porsche’s to do list is very different. Bribery, wetwork, keeping the criminal underworld in line, drugs, arms deals. Porsche would think he’s being hazed, that they’re seeing what he’ll take, but there’s no sense of that from anyone around the table, including Kinn. This is just the minor family’s role. This is what Korn handed to him like it was supposed to be a fucking reward. 

***

“You did well,” Kinn says, when everyone else has left. 

“Thanks,” Porsche says, slumping back into his chair. If things were different he thinks Kinn probably would have wanted to fuck him on this table, get Porsche naked and sweaty against the pristine polish, watch him try to claw at the surface as Kinn thrust deep inside him and end up with his hands in his own hair before he dragged Kinn down to kiss through their orgasms. 

“Porsche,” Kinn says, the soft way when he thinks Porsche is being a little bit unreasonable. Porsche looks up at him startled and his thoughts must show vividly on his face because Kinn’s expression changes in a second from businesslike to hungry, gripping his own thigh like he has to in order not to reach out. “Keep looking at me like that and I’m going to bend you over this table,” Kinn grinds out, half-remonstrating half-pleading with Porsche to give him that chance. “I thought you didn’t want me to touch you any more.” 

Porsche feels his face twist. Maybe Kinn is just predictable, but he thinks it’s more about how in tune they were, how ferociously sexually compatible and connected; Porsche knew Kinn would say that because he’s thinking about it too, the frisson of fucking where they could be found any minute, the melting release of Kinn touching him, taking him wherever he wants and however he wants and all Porsche has to do is let him. 

“It’s never been about what I want,” Porsche starts to argue, but he’s so exhausted by having this same conversation over and over again. Maybe if it felt like bleeding out the poison it would help, but the poison comes from inside him, from the complicated mix of desire and love and revulsion their situation makes him feel; there’s no letting it out and there’s no point both of them making the same identical cuts in themselves to try, shredding themselves and each other over and over again. 

He waves a hand and starts to get up. “Forget it. Is there anything else?”

Kinn gets up and goes to stand over by the window, looking out over the city. “Do we need to put anything in writing?” he says. “We’ll continue to split the profits between the main family and the minor family. Equal, like before.”

Porsche draws his finger down the table, watching his fingerprint smear the shine. “Do you really think I care about the money?”

“No,” Kinn says bitterly. “I know you don’t. But what else do I have left to offer you?”

Porsche doesn’t say anything, thinking, and out of the corner of his eye he sees the moment Kinn registers it. He turns around, looking at Porsche; not with the same hunger as before, the physical: with everything else between them, the way he’d looked at Porsche as they walked up to the helicopter, wanting Porsche to be pleased, wanting Porsche to be pleased with him.

“Name it,” he says softly.

“The minor family really does do the dirty work,” Porsche says, still staring at the table. He makes a circle, gives it eyes and a smile. 

There’s a pause, Porsche refusing to look up at Kinn and see the expression on his face. Kinn says in an emotionless voice, “Do you remember once asking me how I handle it?” 

Porsche does. Working in the bar for so long left him with a good memory when drunk. He remembers taking Kinn out to the pier, wanting attention and comfort after Mes and somehow knowing despite the difficulties between them at that point that Kinn would give him as much of both as he wanted; he remembers sharing with Kinn about how it was growing up and Kinn talking to him in turn, the first hints of the heart Kinn had opened up to him so freely in the forest; he remembers how tentatively Kinn had leaned in to him, how it had felt to respond, the gentle kisses they’d traded until dawn was creeping into the sky. 

“Do you think I had a choice?” he says, echoing Kinn then. He feels for the ring unconsciously, twisting it on his finger. It still doesn’t feel right, heavy and too solid; serious hand to hand fighters don’t wear rings. It’s easier with a gun in his hand, unlike Kinn Porsche doesn’t shoot with his left alone. 

Kinn doesn’t answer. He stalks back to the table and swipes his half-finished drink from the meeting, although more of the ice will have melted than Kinn prefers. Porsche wonders whether Kinn really believes that his telling Korn no would have been an option. He wonders whether Korn and Gun were ever close, whether Gun was worn down after years of doing the worst stuff while his brother built higher and higher towers into the sky; he wonders whether Kinn gets why Vegas might have hated him. 

“Letting you walk away now would put you at more risk than you’re in as head of the minor family,” Kinn says. He sounds anxious now, the way he had apologising to Porsche over and over when Porsche discovered the truth about his house, about how he’d been manipulated and forced into taking the job with the Theerapanyakuls. 

“I know,” Porsche says. He does; at least he knows that’s part of Kinn’s thinking, if not Korn’s. It was in this room that Kinn choked him, hurting him to save his life. He still remembers viscerally the way he’d felt as his oxygen ran out, the vivid image of Chay as he’d lost consciousness, the terror of not trusting anyone and not understanding what was happening to him even as he’d known why. 

Kinn had done it to keep him safe, he accepted that long ago. He thinks now about keeping Kinn safe, about how long he can keep it as his shining reason for dirtying his soul when he knows he’ll have to watch Kinn falling out of love with him. 

“The main family and the minor family can be closer now,” Kinn says appealingly. “Supporting each other, trading off. The way it should have been.”

“Sure,” Porsche says. He can see Kinn doesn’t even really believe it as he’s saying it. The minor family keeps the main family plausibly clean for the legitimate businesses; Kinn might be able to put on a bespoke suit and oversee a traitor getting a beating and then go straight to a PR launch, but he’s not going to be machine-gunning men down in a drug-filled warehouse. The legitimate businesses rely on having a fall guy for the more criminal side of the enterprise and that can’t change. But he appreciates Kinn trying.

He stands up. “If there’s nothing else?”

If they were still a couple Kinn would have done something to help him celebrate his victory with the other clans, Porsche thinks; taken him out and then kept him in, poured champagne into Porsche’s mouth and licked it off Porsche’s chest while he fucked him.

“No,” Kinn says. “That’s it.”

[luckydragon10]

TKT question (yes I have not stopped thinking about it still). Would Kinn go back and tell his 17 year old self to still remove the seed?

AHHH, bless you. It's been 10,000 years since I had a question for The King's Tree, and I'm delighted to have another. 😍

It took me a second to think about this, but I can answer with utter certainty:

He 100% would not.

Kinn has to take risks in his life — there's simply no way around it. But he's going to be picky about which risks he takes, if given a choice. I think given the life he has, he has to do constant risk assessment, all the time, never ending.

The thing with risk is, you have to weigh whether the potential gain is greater than the potential loss.

By telling his 17-year-old self not to remove the seed, he has no idea what will happen. Everything would go very differently, but in what ways? He has no assurance of a positive outcome. By NOT disrupting the flow of events, he knows he ends up together with Porsche.

The only way he'd tell his 17-year-old self to leave his seed alone would be if he knew beyond a doubt that it would yield a better result than what he currently has.

~~~

Porsche is a different matter. If you gave him the chance to meet himself at the time right after he met Kinn and tell himself to believe in Kinn and get to know him and that everything will work out fine... he'd take the opportunity in a fucking heartbeat.