#i feel like. we should. for dustverse....

[absurdumsid]

Hear me out

Dust as a spy

OK. FIGHTS U WITH BODYGUARD! DUST

plus dusty crumb because I LOVE HIMMMM

Murder! Sans belongs to ask-dusttale Dusty Crumb Dust Sans belongs to kredena-dark

[ru5t]

-climbs in here late with a luke-warm starbucks- ⭐️⭐️⭐️(idk imagine a whole pile of 'em. gimme dustverse thoughts pls and thank!)

Every ⭐️ exchanges for a headcanon about our characters’ (potential or existing) dynamic.

i think you know this already but tech and omens are so sibling coded to me and the most interesting thing about it is how much it isn't shaped like how tech and jack are siblings but it's still sibling coded. and i don't even really know,,, how it happened? i feel like there wasn't a huge amount of buildup i just know that at some point they crossed that invisible line relationships do where they go from being 'person i know' to 'person i care about' and in this case the line got crossed and then also. the nagging. it's relentless. what you said about never pulling punches has been living rent free in my noggin. i'm not sure any of this is properly counts as a HC or if i'm just wharblgarbling about how long we've had characters but they're. brother n sister to me. desert kid and desert kid alike. sand siblings, even. we should get them really drunk at the same and maybe they'll actually talk about Stuff or maybe they'll do something colossally stupid. either way it'll be interesting

anyway actual thought: tech helps out with the lights and sound systems around the club sometimes, when she just drops in the way she does. partly she just likes having things to do with her hands, partly it's the best way she's got of showing her appreciation to the people who tolerate having her around, fixing or improving or (etc.) whatever they've got that she knows how it works. she refuses to let him pay for this in any way (except. yknow. all the times she's crashed or hid out there)

i think tech and wild are kind of like. they mostly see each other whenever they're both at the haven? and almost never cross paths otherwise, unless they deliberating set something up. and the result reminds me kind of like.... you know when you have cousins/relative who, when you're together, you're absolute menaces and besties and inseparable, right, but. you maybe live far away from each other and don't see each other other than when there are family gatherings? almost like that. paths they're on and choices they've made put them in a way they maybe don't get to spend huge amounts of time together (at least in person) but this does not stop them from being sewn at the hip when they do

we were literally just talking about... that the odds of it randomly happening aren't necessarily high but i think tech and boo need to physically fight it out at least one (1) time and i think it will fix them a little bit. like don't get me wrong i think there's a lot of ways they could clear the air but so many of them are such long processes that involve a type of vulnerability that would be pulling teeth levels of grueling with them that i think. if we just let them go really feral for a second and fight it out, my hunch is that this will somehow be less grueling and set them up to figuring each other out in a less bitchy and more empathetic way and at least dial things back if not totally clear the air. alternatively it makes things Worse. but i think it would help.

conversely. i don't know what's going on with ghoul and tech really but i do know we should never ever let them get on the terms to fight-fight cause i think it'd be. bad. for so many reasons.

i'm not sure if this is factually accurate but the concept of tech being (jack/arachnid as a Thing™)'s champion is very funny to me

[hannahchronism]

right yeah so how does phantom’s religious beliefs affect or not affect his friendships is the rosary jut a pretty pocket accessory to his friends or like.?

Ooo good one okay so

For starters, I want to make a note on the rosary thing cause that definitely just seems like an analogy you were using but I still feel like it’s worth pointing out that his particular beliefs align more closely under the blanket term of some kind of protestant Chrisitianity. Maybe not Protestant itself but in any case, not Catholicism. (Cause y’know technically anything not Catholic is protestant but also Protestant is a whole thing itself and it’s…involved.) I should probably get more specific as to more Baptist leaning or something at some point but I argue with myself a lot about how much of the divisions between the nuanced practices (Baptist, Methodist, Non-denominational, etc.) would remain given the setting and BLI probably having a lot to say about squashing all religions, y’know? (So who even knows how much of those distinctions even remain) but essentially that just means it leaves out like. Seven deadly sins aren’t really a thing in most(?) protestant structures, also they’re not big on the saints (unless you’re Baptist and in that case, we can’t hear enough about dang John) and Mary’s not really sanctified either. 

In any case, his particular ‘’brand’’ of Christianity focuses on the new testament and Jesus’s lessons, basically. [[Though that’s…kinda biased because of my own upbringing but I digress. I really just gotta dig some more, expand what I already know and find what fits him best.]] Interesting note - he doesn’t think dustverse is the prophecized apocalypse, but I’d wager there’s at least one Bible-headed zone runner out there who does. That’d be an interesting character.

But to get to, uh, your actual question:

I’m sure it varies from character to character? So I’m gonna talk about a couple examples in a sec, but first/short answer is it’s definitely not a thing that he like, hides or avoids broaching for the sake of comfort. He’s not a high horse type – big on the ‘everybody sins and we’re all equally forgivable by divine grace’ train, actually– and if any friend of his has expressed they’re not interested in his (or any other) religion he doesn’t push it out of respect for your right to free will and autonomy, but he’s not gonna sit by and let you shit talk about it either. He’ll get mad if you’re taking potshots, man. Really basically just don’t dis his beliefs and he’ll keep his opinions about yours to himself as well.

[It probably has at least a little to do with how a thing like being religious and being a rebel to an oppressive regime like BLI intersect. Can’t exactly be a freedom fighter if you’re trying to force something on other people, right?]

This is..easier with some people than others.

Him and Des are on really good terms about having what are, effectively, contradictory religions (she’s big on the Zone Deities™ ), to the point that they’re comfortable discussing doubts about their respective beliefs with each other without feeling like the other will push them into abandoning anything. This could arguably be more to do with how close they are are members of the same group and the pseudo-parents of Dawn than anything about their specific religion(s) but it goes to show that basic respect about the topic goes a long way with Phantom. They’re probably argued about it in the past, but have ended up in a concession of agreeing to disagree, essentially, and since neither one of them uses their differing opinions as a means of saying that the other is inherently evil because of their beliefs, it works out fine for them.

[That might.. be a topic that’s dissolved some in the climate? That extreme Christian ‘convert or you’re the worst’ ideology? I feel like the exclusionary nature probably backed off once it came under actual threat as opposed to the victim complex a lot of Christianity falls under these days.  …Should I meta about Dustverse Christianity? Maybe. I’ll think about it.]

On that note, him and Tox actually got close when they met in city (which I…do not talk enough about nor have planned out as well as I’d like..) because of sharing religion.Tox’s views are a little more what you’d expect of a Christian from our time, probably [I feel like he’s just slightly more apt to remind you you’re going to hell than Phantom is, the shithead] but on the whole they’re very in sync on a lot of things. I imagine religions in general, all of them, have become pretty sparse and/or taboo under BLI, so for them finding another person who shares even the basics of the same belief system was probably an amazing thing, and then finding out that a lot of it is the same probably just furthered them growing really quickly to trust and lean on each other. (I mean, Tox trusted Phantom to get Lith out of the city safely should the worst happen after only knowing him for like… I think it was maybe a month or two? Like I said, timeline’s weak there for me.) But so the point being, for them it’s not even a secondary thing, it’s more or less the cornerstone of their friendship. They probably have a lot of talks about and around it, like a tiny church fellowship of two, sharing the stories they remember and reaffirming each other.

Conversely to both of those relationships, Diana is at best atheistic and at worst vehemently opposed to any mention of or belief in a higher power to which no actual evidence is presentable, and to that degree handles her interactions with Phantom with a chip on her shoulder about it. He tries to ignore it a lot of the time, but needless to say those aforementioned potshots he doesn’t kindly to often come from her. They’re.. kinda not really friends because of it. I mean they’ll tolerate each other and in a scrape could count on the other to watch their back, but it’s very.. professional, there’s a professional air to it. 

Weasel, as you may or may not know, is the resident nightmare about everything at all times and I’m sure he gives Phantom (and Tox. I guarantee he’s called Tox “John the Baptist” at least once) shit about it to varying degrees of awful, but to be honest that’s just because he enjoys stirring shit up and he and Phantom probably get along ..okay when Weasel’s not being a pain. Mostly because Weasel just doesn’t give a genuine shit about religion, and is only harassing him for the amusement factor.

So like. I guess the clearer answer is that it’d be basically impossible for someone to consider his religion an accessory because it’s woven into his life in a way that it’s not just convenience or habit. It’s belief, y’know? Where the structure of his ideologies comes from. So whether the people in his life want to agree with it or disagree with varies, but there’s not really room to ignore it without ignoring him, I don’t think. And not in a here-he-goes-with-that-Jesus-High-Horse-shit way but just.. there. Present. He’s got a faith and he’s not going to pretend he doesn’t for any conceivable reason. Ask him if you want, make no mention of it when he says something, take whatever path to or around or in opposition to it that you want - it doesn’t matter. He’s got what he’s got and you’re not gonna be the one to take it from him.