Continuation (sort of) of this writing prompt
So Sunspot is on your couch under your heating pad while Elliot fusses over him like this is totally normal.
You made tea. The baby’s asleep and your husband won’t be home for a while yet- you called him already but he said “Is he staying for dinner?” like this was all totally normal.
So.
Sunspot. On your couch. Totally normal.
“I’m late for club,” Sunspot rasps unhelpfully when you shove tea under his nose, careful not to slosh it onto the bandages wrapped around his neck. “I need to go home and rest.”
“You have a concussion,” you didn’t mean to use Mom Voice but, alas. Mom Voice it is. “You’re sitting here, awake and drinking tea, while we figure out what to do with you.”
“Yes ma’am,” Sunspot says, surrendering to Mom voice.
“My teacher Mr. Right wouldn’t criticize you so much if he knew you saved my life,” Elliot tells Sunspot, sitting crosslegged by the couch helping you peel potatoes for dinner. A dinner Sunspot- AKA Eliot’s teacher Mr. Holman Right- will apparently be staying for.
“I think he would,” you grumble, and Sunspot laughs wetly from the couch.
“It’s cool that a super hero is here,” Elliot says speculatively, testing out if you’ll go on one of your usual anti-heroics tangents.
“Better here than anywhere else,” you agree sourly. “After this stunt you’re both grounded.”
Elliot complains, something about doing the right thing, something about villains ganging up on you.
You only tune back in when he mentions Sistern and Jumbro.
“What were they doing with you?” You dart a glance over at Sunspot, who is suspiciously quiet.
“They attacked the comic shop. Said it was for nerds.” Elliot looks away. “I know we’re not supposed to talk about it but-” he cuts himself off with a sharp look at Sunspot.
Sunspot already knows you’re Barracuda. You had this conversation the first day you met in plainclothes at Elliot’s school.
“Sunspot and I used to work together,” you tell your son, whose eyes light up with annoying amounts of hero worship. “He made the right decision bringing you here.”
“Used to? What, you retiring already?” Sunspot’s concussion is making him giddy. It’d worry you but he’s also heckling you, so he’s probably fine.
“Elliot go set the table. We’ll eat when your father gets home. You can play videogames once the table is set.” You point to the kitchen, but Elliot’s already moving. The most motivated teenager ever now that videogames are on the table.
With Elliot out of the room you sit on a chair across the coffee table from Sunspot laid out on your couch.
“Why are my former colleagues going after kids?” You drink your tea and watch Sunspot rub his eyes tiredly.
“No villains like you anymore, Barracuda.” He shrugs helplessly, “the era of villains is pretty much ending. I’m a glorified status symbol for the city. Sistern and Jumbro are not long for this world.” He quirks a sad smile. “They want their boss back. Your shoes are too big to fill you know.”
“Sounds almost like you miss me,” you tease.
“I do.” He says it so candidly that it makes your heart clench. “These new villains want to harm the world because the world hurt them. You are a class act.” He shakes his head. “You wanted to topple the world to make it better for yourself. Kids these days just want to watch the world burn.”
“That why you became a teacher?” You push the plate of saltines at Sunspot insistently. He takes one and nibbles it obediently.
“If I can save even one kid from becoming another Jumbro, I will feel accomplished.” He smiles wryly, “and if that makes you want to blow up another statue of me I really wouldn’t mind it.”
“I appreciate you saving Elliot. Not that I’m surprised you did it of course.” You cross your legs. “The hero commission should give you some backup instead of a commemorative statue.”
“Nah they’d rather pay cops to shoot kids.” Sunspot lies back and closes his eyes.
“Eyes open, Sunny Boy.” You snap your fingers twice and his eyes flutter open. “Concussion watch.”
He sits up by force of will, listing to the side a little before righting himself.
“I never liked that you called me Sunny Boy you know...”
“That, Sunny Boy, is why I called you Sunny Boy.”
He shakes his head. “Sunspot. It refers to-”
“The spot on your face?” You raise your eyebrows and he seems surprised you mentioned it. In thirty years of beating the hell out of each other you’ve never once talked about it.
“So you can see it,” he mused.
“Of course I can see it. A birthmark in the shape of the sun on your shoulder? Kind of hard to miss.” Heroes. Honestly. You wave a hand dismissively. “Not sure how you lived a normal life with something like that.”
He smiles wryly. “I cover it at school.”
“I know. That was a joke, Sunny.”
“I like that it’s a birthmark.” He smiles at you, all tired eyes and barely healing wounds. You patched him up earlier but you itch to clean him up again. It’s an almost maternal thought- which is a little gross honestly. Mom-mode is hard to turn off. “Seemed weird to me you never wanted to acknowledge the ‘spot’ part.”
“I’m a woman, Sunny.” You gesture to yourself in case he missed that fact over thirty-plus years. “If you think I’m going to comment on an aspect of someone’s appearance that they can’t change, I’m no better than those douchebros or corporate leeches trying to set human interaction and empathy back decades.”
He laughs, and coughs because his throat was strangled by Jumbro.
You... might have to come out of semi-retirement for a day to set Jumbro on the right path.
You haven’t bitten off a dick since you got married. Harold might be into it, if you explain the situation to him first.
Food for thought.
“You’re smiling.” Sunspot raises his eyebrows. “And you’re showing Barracuda teeth.”
“You remember how they said I used to bite penises off?”
He crosses his legs. “Yes.”
“Did you ever think I really did it?“
“No,” he says, legs still very crossed.
“Liar.” You lean back in your seat. “I was just thinking Jumbro might benefit from losing what tiny dick he has.”
“Please don’t castrate a stupid man for me with your teeth. Feels... wrong somehow.” Sunspot sighs. “You never threatened me with that either, but they said you had a taste for... manflesh.”
You both scoff a laugh at that phrasing.
“If I did bite dicks off- which I am not admitting to- I wouldn’t be interested in doing it to you. You don’t seem to be obsessed with yours so taking it from you might not even do anything.”
You’re lying.
Well, you’re not lying. But the idea of going anywhere near Sunspot in an intimate- or even predatory- way never even crossed your mind.
If you’re honest with yourself-
“It’d be too weird, anyway,” you deflect.
He grimaces. “Wholeheartedly agree.”
The door mercifully opens and closes and Harold gets home. He finds you both sitting across from each other in silence, leans down and pecks you at the whorl of your hair.
“Sunspot. Nice to meet you. Hon, I’m gonna check on the brat, then we can eat. You guys look so awkward it physically hurts me. Work it out before it spoils dinner.”
He then pauses, your perfect crazy husband. He turns to Sunspot and holds out a hand. The two men shake, looking seriously at each other.
“We missed you at our wedding,” Harold says, not letting Sunspot’s hand go. “But obviously you’ve been keeping an eye on Elliot. So. You know. Open invitation to dinner. Always.”
“I thought the wedding invite was a joke,” Sunspot admits.
“Nope,” you and Harold say together.
Harold steps back, nodding to himself. “Alright. Well. Work the awkwardness out, then we’re eating.” He gives your shoulder a squeeze, then heads to the den yelling the countdown to his arrival that makes Elliot save his game in a hurry.
“He’s very nice.” Sunspot sits back down. “Couldn’t picture you marrying someone but... he weirdly makes sense.”
“He found me bloody in a ditch.” You smile fondly. “He asked if I was gonna bite him.”
“Did you?” Sunspot looks more awake now, which is good.
“Only once he asked me to.” You grin, and Sunspot grimaces.
“Gross. It feels like my sister is trying to tell me about her sexcapades.” He hears the words only after he’s said them, eyes going wide. He covers his mouth.
But he’s right. Also it was hilarious.
“Yeah. I’m glad I don’t know anything about your love life either.” You smile, no teeth this time. He smiles back.
“Got any tips? I’m pathetically single.” Sunspot laughs and coughs again.
“We’ll find you a nice... uh. Girl? Man?” You never really thought about Sunspot's orientation, but a man who wears skintight white spandex could go either way.
“Yes,” Sunspot confirms and you snort a laugh.
You stand up and stretch. “Let’s go have dinner. We can work out what you’re going to do about Jumbro and Sistern afterward. I have some fun ideas for you.”
“No,” he says, but it’s not as firm as it should be. He sways when he walks, but he fusses when you gently support him down the hallway.
Somehow, you both make your way to dinner together like this is totally normal.
31 notes
·
View notes
He noticed some commucion one day as he strolled around the plaza looking around for inspiration.
A crowd of some sort had formed around a corner; they were cheering, laughing at something- or someone- that he couldn't really see, due to the amount of people present.
As he approached the cheering citizens, his eyes lit up at what he witnessed.
A pair of men, two brothers he believed, were performing acts of comedy and telling jokes, keeping the audience they had gathered captivated.
They were foreign, he could tell, as the thick accent reverbted in their joyful voices. Their clothes dirty and broken in places, but the glint in their eyes lightning up whatever state their physical form were at the moment.
The man remained astonished: he could smell talent a mile away, and he believed he had just stepped a mine full of gold with these two.
After everyone had scattered, he approached, and while they remained wary, he simply clapped cheerfully.
"Bravo! You boys put on quite the show! I'm really impressed!"
He bowed down, a gleam in his eye: "My name is SMG4, and I'd like to offer you both an opportunity. How would you fine gentlemen like a better stage than the dirty streets of the Mushroom Kingdom?"
Here we go! First prologue of A Corsair Freebooter, aka how the Mario bros met SMG4.
The poor boys were immigrants that performed around the streets for money, and the blue man himself took a bit advantage of it and recruited them for his plays in theater.
(I want to point out that he doesn't straight up become friends with them... he's a bit of an asshole like in the first era in canon, where he mainly focuses on getting famous and popularity through his work...
He'll get there though in terms of friendship, don't worry!)
145 notes
·
View notes
i was having a chuckle to myself last night about Gristol, and how his plans are basically:
Restore Ford Cruller's memory
Find Maligula
???
Profit
but then... of course they are, right? this is Gristol we're talking about. Fatherland Follies drives home again and again that he's still operating on a child's logic, a warped and reductive version of the world that he never bothered to grow out of. both of his memory vaults center on the images of his childhood, this idealized version of the past that he clings to no matter what. and that's still how he remembers Maligula, too - as this saviour figure, who rushes in to help him when he's in trouble.
[ID: Two slides from Gristol's memory vault, Glory to Grulovia! Left: Gristol clings to Maligula's back as she summons waves to sweep away his assailants. Right: Gristol and Maligula waving from a balcony as the people cheer. Gzar Theodore brandishes a dagger in the background.]
like so much else, Maligula represents a return to this idyllic childhood - to the peace and simplicity of his youth, when he was free from worries and responsibilities. in his mind, he doesn't need to make any further plans - once Maligula's back, everything will go back to normal. Maligula will make everything better.
...is what i thought, but then i remembered this line:
[Screenshot source. ID: Gristol, in Truman's body, bows on his hands and knees in front of the newly-awaked Maligula. The caption reads: "Yes, High Priestess! I am here to correct the mistakes made by my father!"]
and that's kind of interesting, right?
to be clear: this happens directly after Maligula sees Helmut-in-Gristol's-body, and recognises him. her line before this is:
"Little Gzesaravich! Have you come to pay for your father's sins?"
my first thought was that Gristol hadn't expected to still be in Truman's body by the time he managed to find Maligula, and this was him trying to placate her and buy some time until he could explain the situation. but watching the cutscene back, that's clearly not what's happening here. Gristol is answering as himself, and his response of throwing himself to his knees before her is, as far as i can tell, genuine.
so what is going on here?
in Fatherland Follies, there's this line in the ride narration that stuck out to me:
"Why didn't the Gzar help Maligula in her time of need? No one knows, but historians agree - it is Gzar Theodore's biggest failure."
other lines mention Gzar Theodore's "mistake", and it's wording Gristol himself echoes in the screencap above. evidently, he believes that his father abandoned Maligula, leaving her to her fate at the hands of the Psychonauts, and it was that mistake that lead to them being driven out of the country - that mistake which he seeks to correct. maybe he even feels like he has a debt to repay to her for his family turning their backs on her all those years ago.
the 'High Priestess' thing, though - that's kinda weird, and threw me for a loop the first time i played the game. it took me until my second playthrough to connect the dots, and remember how the room in the Lady Luctopus - Gristol's room - was full of Delugionist scribblings and symbols.
[Screenshot source. ID: left, the walls of the hidden backroom in Gristol's hotel suite, covered in scrawlings of eyeballs and Maligula's name. Right, the pinboard from the hidden backroom. On its surface are photographs and newspaper clippings connected by pieces of string.]
i mean, look at this stuff! he had a whole conspiracy board and everything!
we learn very little about the Delugionists and their beliefs as a whole during the game, but i think drawing the connection here suggests two important things. one: that Gristol was in deep with this stuff. i don't know how he linked up with them - maybe via old family connections, or just good old-fashioned digging (we know he's skilled at worming his way into peoples' good graces, after all) - but it seems likely that he's begun to internalise their ideas, maybe even warping his own memories of events. and two: the Delugionists themselves are, if you'll pardon the pun, pretty far off the deep end.
like... i understand why PN2 didn't go heavy on the "mass-murderer cult worship" aspect of things, in the end, but man this is such a tantalising glimpse into the wider mythos around Maligula. Gristol is proud and haughty and thinks himself above everyone else; the fact that his first reaction seeing Maligula is to throw himself to the ground at her feet says so much about the way he's come to see her. he's not just trying to bring back Maligula, his childhood bodyguard. he's trying to bring back Maligula, the High Priestess of the deluge, the semi-mythical figure whose supporters believe even death couldn't stop. he doesn't even flinch at the way she confronts him, and maybe it's because he's bought in so completely to this deified figurehead, this idea of Maligula; more a living force of nature than a person. and it all comes back to the same place: an abdication of responsibility, not just to the person who protected him when he was little but to this avatar of floods and destruction. Maligula will make everything better.
i'd write more about my thoughts on the Delugionists but that'd be taking a hard turn into speculation, and this is already kind of long and rambling so i'd better end it here. but what an unexpected and evocative line, right? it's some of the only stuff we have to go off of regarding the Delugionists as a whole, but i think it does such a good job of hinting at the wider story - at teasing another layer to the mythos surrounding Maligula, one whose ripples we see throughout the game but which never quite breaches the surface.
233 notes
·
View notes