#i mean it does make sense to me ok

[lenievi]

I understand that this might not be what others think, but this is where I am now:

humanity evolved, went to space, Spock was born, Spock started Vulcan-Romulan unification

for Spock to be able to do that, The Eugenics wars needed to happen, because the technological progress was important for space travel

now, in the future, some Romulans didn’t like the unification, didn’t like that Kirk stopped the war between the Romulans and the Federation a few times. So time travel they did

nothing too obvious, just blowing up bridges, labs (they might not even be time-travelling Romulans, just current time Romulans who were ordered to go there because a time traveler told the Praetor, or something) [There were no Romulans hindering humanity’s progress in the TOS timeline imho] and hindering the progress

now, Sera, the Romulan, did not like the slow progress. She travelled back in time, to the 1990s, but those times were already changed by other Romulans. 

But the universe wants stuff in order - and those are: the existence of Khan, Eugenics wars, Kirk in charge of the Enterprise at a precise time in history, Spock alive and in a position where he can start Vulcan-Romulan unification (when these don’t exist, Federation and the Romulans enter the war and that isn’t supposed to happen)

in current SNW timeline, there was no Khan born from selective breeding and ruling a part of Earth in the 1990s (and La’an doesn’t exist in the original TOS timeline). Someone stopped that. In 2020s, a boy named Khan exists, who might be genetically engineered as an embryo (and La’an is his descendant).

and the universe will push so that between 2265-70, Kirk is in command of the Enterprise. So Spock stays alive. Whenever something happens to change that, it will be corrected, but it will bring changes. 

snw1 finale was also affected by that. That’s why the old Romulan was missing. That’s why the Romulan fleet was so close. There was an opportunity in that skirmish, and Romulans were right. They could go to war.

TOS happened in the way it happened. It exists, or perhaps it’s a timeline that ceased to exist. We had the privilege to watch it unfold, but it won’t ever happen again, no matter how many prequels we’ll be able to watch. The characters will arrive at the same destination, but the paths might be altered; they will be slightly different people because they went through slightly different experiences.

When Nero and Spock travelled back in time, they already came into a different timeline. Where Khan’s history was different from the one in Space Seed. Nero just changed the course of some characters, but they aligned themselves. They all ended up on the Enterprise, after some pushes.

like idk maybe I’m reaching, but it works really well for me (but I also don’t watch any other Trek shows, only those TOS related. I just like that SNW gave me the ability to see SNW and TOS in this way, and it is a valid reading.

And it could make SNW so much better because they don’t need to line up everything 100% with TOS, just the key factors. I do think one of the showrunners said “storytelling is above canon”  and sure, therefore say that TOS is a different timeline and you can do anything you want. It isn’t that hard. People will then stop arguing and nitpicking, instead of just guessing and having two groups argue.

(kinda funny how my addition to this silly thought post kinda became canon-ish)

(I mean it won’t really change anything in the way I talk about TOS or SNW, but I like the idea. And I might stop nitpicking lol)

[keferon]

“Mistakes on mistakes until” ch 69 spoilers below!

Ahahahahahahah here I go again

Mistakes on mistakes until until I can draw Jazz with my eyes closed

I woke up, checked my phone, woke up for real and decided that whatever plans I had for this day yeah no they can wait a little bit kfkgnfk

Also. Consider listening this while reading. Or don't who am I to tell you what to do~

[ciderjacks]

despite Laios low self esteem making him think that if he’d been eaten, Chilchuck and Marcille wouldn’t have helped Falin,

theres a small part of me that thinks the reason Chilchuck stayed with the party and went back in the dungeon in the first place was because he didn’t want to leave Laios alone. That Laios was moreso the reason he stayed.

[xxplastic-cubexx]

just wanted to make a color ref for Brain Therapist Magneto from 309 but i needed lights too for some reason

bonus The Flats Only Version

[sanasanakun]

People try too hard to make Curly an active participant in Jimmy's abuse. Isn't the whole point that he's passive in everything Jimmy does? Abuse occurs because he actively doesn't do anything? Not to call someone out or be mean, but I saw a post saying Anya's ID being in Curly's locker at the beginning shows that he intended to prevent Anya from filing an HR report and I disagree. I get where that interpretation is coming from, but I think it's a little uncharitable. I don't like being too kind to Curly because he's like...a morally mid dude at best lol But if we're going by the HR report interpretation, I would say it's more likely he requested Anya's ID in order to file an HR report on her behalf. After all, the only way to contact Pony (that we see) is in the cockpit, he's the Captain, and Pony Express sucks bad so I wouldn't put it past them to only allow the Captain to use the communication device thing. As we see before, Curly is the only one able to use tools around the ship that you would think other employees could use (ex. Swansea should be able to use the axe if he's the repair guy. Idk why they'd need an ax but that falls under manual labor which Swansea is designated for as the mechanic/fixer dude. But it has to go through Curly). I never got the vibe that Curly moved to actively protect Jimmy. He just lets things happen without say a word; Jimmy walks all over him, and by extension, the whole crew. I get why people would think that because he gives the whole "Hey Jimmy, we can get through this together, bud" spiel right before the crash. This part interests me a lot because there's so many ways to interpret Curly's intentions there. My interpretation is that Curly is on autopilot mode. The responses seem so stilted in comparison to Jimmy's. Like it's the kind of thing Curly's said before again and again and again when Jimmy's gotten in trouble. However, as others previously pointed out, I don't think Curly ever dealt with Jimmy doing something this irredeemable. He doesn't know how to respond, so he just goes for the default "You've gotten through tough situations before. Work through it one step at a time." Like the response is lame af lol I think he was in shock; he was scared (and just so I can say it one more time: he's super lame).

Anyway, this is way longer than I intended and I've said things a billion people have already stated. But uhhh tldr the whole point of Curly's character is he's passive; he never acts. He just watches. Making him an active participant in the abuse by taking actions to cover for Jimmy (like preventing Anya from filing an HR report) defeats the purpose of his character. He's a bystander.

[skrunksthatwunk]

thinking about how eiji's a pole vaulter and how ash talks about eiji "flying" and how eiji's associated with bird imagery and how eiji's free (unlike ash) and how eiji comes in on a plane and leaves on a plane and how ash cannot fly, ash cannot be free, how nyc is ash's prison, and how ash is the leopard who dies climbing the mountain, unable to live at such elevation, how he was trying to reach the sky and be free but was always stuck to the earth, how he chose to die instead of climbing back down, how he chose to die where he could see the sky and hope and freedom almost like a bird with eiji's letter right in front of him rather than letting everything go wrong and ruin it once again, how eiji's a failed pole vaulter anyway, how a bad fall ruined his career and grounded him (physically and emotionally), how it took flying to america and meeting ash and needing to save him and skip for him to try flying again, how he landed hard and harsh and still the thought of that escape compelled ash to protect eiji at all costs because if he could fly that means something to him, even if he doesn't think he can fly, how eiji is the manifestation of his hope and how when he breaks and asks eiji to stay with him a while he folds himself over his legs and weighs him down and traps him and grounds him, how ash fights like hell to keep eiji alive not because he thinks he can be like him (hopeful, flying, innocent), but because he makes him forget the gravity of his situation, and so he can see eiji fly again. how he wants to see him escape. how eiji is a bird and ash is a wildcat and how ash never once saw eiji as prey. how eiji never saw ash as a predator. how it is eiji's naivete that first endears ash to him, how it is his freedom and flight and removal from darkness and his ability to leave that darkness that really roots eiji in ash's blood as something essential to him keeping on living in this hell of nyc. how it is that distance from the violence and that hope for the future that ash chooses to surround himself in as he dies. how ash dies in a dream because he feels more than anything that he can't fly like eiji, that he can never leave. how his violence is a part of him and will be forever, how it weighs him down. how he wants to enjoy the view from the mountainside rather than looking up from the ground below. as if they can both fly. as if he is with him up there and not grounded. eye-to-eye with what he can't have, seeing eiji's homeland: the sky. how he dies trying to reach the top because he couldn't take retreating and trying again. how ash, tired and tired and tired and convinced it will go on forever if he crawls back down the mountain, chooses to close his life deluged in eiji, in eiji's insistence that they can fly together, in eiji's hope for him and for them, in eiji's beautiful dream. how ash dies without trying to realize that dream. how ash, in dying, destroys it.

[mohntilyet]

i’m having illario dellamorte thoughts. what if instead of knowingly betraying lucanis he did it like, unknowingly. idk how this would work but i’m intrigued by what it gives us. illario ‘i accidentally caused my cousin’s death & can never tell anyone’ dellamorte. genuinely grieving. blaming himself. does he take advantage of the year before lucanis comes back?? does caterina still ignore him the whole time?? how different is the canon plotline once rook shows up with lucanis post-rescue…..

anyways i would love your thoughts!!

95% of what i do with illario operates on the idea that he is frighteningly competent so you can see why the way the crows plotline plays out in the game might frustrate me. it’s also this reason why i don’t actually think too much about “illario got lucanis killed, but didn’t mean to do it”, because i like the idea that everything illario does in his life is planned to the second and that he’s too well trained to mess up this badly, if that makes sense. with that being said. 5% of my brain power does sometimes go towards “and what if he just sucked actually” and it was a theory i enjoyed before the game even released. so i have in fact been thinking about this anyway LOL . maybe he tries to honeypot zara, accidentally actually reveals lucanis’ next assassination job, and zara gets rid of him as a ‘gift’. illario is horrified and that gets even worse when lucanis’ body shows up, and he assumes this must be because he spurned zara by leaving her and not having the guts to seize power.

i think we could make his inferiority complex worse. illario’s worst fear confirmed: he is as worthless as his grandmother believes he is, botching something so badly that he accidentally sentences his cousin to death when what he wanted was lucanis just… out of the way for a bit (maybe while he kills caterina. LOL. i still think his resentment of caterina trumps his jealousy for lucanis though those two things are very intertwined its hard for him to differentiate them). so incapable that he got the only person who actually supports him killed, and now he’s dreading the idea of becoming first talon. he doesn’t want first talon without lucanis backing him, and now the only person left is caterina which is suffocating and makes him even unhappier. at least he hadn’t lived through her alone, and now through consequences of his own decisions, illario has no choice but to.

i think that would affect his plans for talon because of how horribly he’d fucked up, and tries to mask it because if he suddenly actually doesn’t want to be talon that would be a red flag for everyone. lucanis coming back would delight him (talon is within his sights again if lucanis comes back!) and freak him out. i think the plotline would actually be pretty similar because of this freak out, so he still shows up to zara’s fight to cover his tracks. lucanis can never know, caterina can never know, because what little faith they have in him will be lost. like he committed fratricide and didn’t even MEAN to😭 ...corpse whispering still happens, and zara is like “ohhh that coward. he can never finish what he started, can he?” + “elaborate.” + “i gave him what he most wanted in the world and instead of being grateful, he ran away.” so lucanis finds out about what happened but feels a mix of “illario, you idiot” + pity because turns out he didn’t even mean for it to happen, and keeps his secret for now, otherwise he’d probably have to kill him.

i also think not meaning to kill lucanis would sour his feelings towards the venatori, who are a reminder of how badly he failed, so the alliance wouldn’t happen. this does mean if the story goes on as it does in canon, he has to take desperate measures another way and kidnap caterina for some other reason but i can’t think of why….. maybe a thing where illario is like “ok. lucanis is distracted by the elven gods. this time i just have to kill nonna for real and then nothing is in my way” and recruits disgraced houses or houses that don’t like caterina to do so? not sure tbh but i don’t believe caterina made it so far without making enemies lol. this would happen post bloodbath + corpse whispering— lucanis leaves his cousin unchecked because while he knows illario didn’t mean for him to die, he has no idea how far he would go to have caterina dead. teia could find out about this and send word to foil the kidnapping and assassination attempt

so ‘murder of crows’ is still about saving caterina, the illario-lucanis fight still happens, but it’s a little more hesitant and lots of “why won’t you just let me kill her? i’m doing this for the both of us”. he’s had to live with being the un-favorite, but never would have thought lucanis would actually pick caterina if it came down to it. with all of his missteps here, i think the final decision (and i think it should be like this in canon anyway) would be to imprison illario or kill him. imprisoning him is just a lot of “i can’t kill illario as much as he couldn’t kill me”, vs killing him as is expected from him as talon, and what he knew he would have to do after finding out about illario's failures. unlike canon, where illario is actually meaning to kill him and can be seen as a 'good crow' despite the sloppiness, here he's like. just bad at everything. the allied traitor houses that went against caterina would also have to be imprisoned or killed. no happy ending at all here, and lucanis still becomes first talon. now that i’ve written it out this is actually probably the worst ending LOL

the above sticks a lot to what is canon to the game (plot points, choices, etc) and i didn’t go very far away from it so it's like canon 3 inches to the left. tho my thoughts on this are not fleshed out* because i think illario works better as an antagonist character that sets things in motion !! not necessarily the villain in a cain-abel story, but a character who opposes lucanis while still not wanting to hurt him. that kind of discipline where he finds a way to get what he wants (first talon) without compromising what he also cares for (family) is so much more fun for me than a man who apparently just loses it and decides to enact a bad plan to get rid of his cousin. if he waited 20+ years to become talon i think he’d be more careful when it came down to it. if i had my way illario would be playing insane 5d chess to rival solas (insert black sails “i once thought that to lead, to be liked was just as good as feared. and that may very well be true. but to be both liked and feared all at once, is an entirely different state of being.”)

[sieglinde-freud]

oh im obsessed with this actually… who ever wrote this one i am kissing u on the forehead and hugging you real tight… inigo is such a loverboy im kkkhhhhhhijnsdnfng

[ruvviks]

// oc deep dive.

tagged by; @aztarion and @devilbrakers, thank you so much!!

tagging; @mojaves, @deadrlngers, @ordinarymaine, @claudiawolf, @adelaidedrubman and YOU!

What common/uncommon fear do they have?

Nathan has a lot of fears stemming from his paranoia. Tangible ones such as getting captured or killed by MOBIUS, his friends walking away from him, or someone following him home; as well as more unrealistic ones, such as somehow ending up back in STEM, or getting stuck in a time loop, or a giant sinkhole all the way to the core of the earth opening up right at his feet.

It also happens often enough that certain actions don’t necessarily scare him, but make him uncomfortable or highly on edge (often with good reason); think of someone locking the door of the room he’s in– especially when it’s just them two– or getting too close without warning. He often fears people he gets too close to will end up treating him like the Administrator did, which is why it takes a while for him to let Sebastian get any closer physically, despite warming up to him relatively fast.

A more uncommon fear he has is waking up one morning and having lost one of his senses or his ability to speak. Aside from the mental erosion that had become a growing issue among Union citizens, MOBIUS observed a similar kind of process in its agents who regularly jumped in and out of STEM for general maintenance and the like– presumably caused by the constant changes in brain activity, which more than often led to exactly what Nathan’s fear mentioned above describes. While he was among the agents who worked both in and outside of STEM on the Union environment, he was lucky enough to never suffer the consequences.

Lastly, he is deadly afraid of Anima. Despite not having shown any other symptom of succumbing to the STEM domination process, Nathan would have started seeing her around sometime before Lily vanished– presumably got her attention after some of his escapades in the secret labs in the Marrow– and he has not been able to sleep soundly in STEM ever since. While his fear of her mostly acts up when he’s in a STEM environment, it definitely translates over to the real world as well; during bad mental health episodes he has auditory hallucinations of her, and she makes regular appearances in his nightmares too.

Do they have any pet peeves?

When people are too passive. Nathan can’t stand it when he’s expected to initiate everything, from conversations to taking action, both in a work context (scheduling meetings, deploying new code) as well as personal context (scheduling to hang out, doing household chores). He also doesn’t like having to constantly ask people to do what they’re supposed to do– though this irritation more than often extends a little too far, to things he is expecting of people but never told them about.

Loud and unexpected noises, especially when done on purpose. Fireworks would be a great example of this, and they piss Nathan off no end. He gets snippy when people raise their voice at him for no reason, or when they keep banging their fist on a surface to get others’ attention.

Getting cut off in traffic. Nathan’s road rage is easily awakened and he can get a little drastic with it. His reflexes are fast enough to brake on time to avoid ending up in someone’s trunk, but will in that same breath speed right back up to crash into them on purpose as revenge for pissing him off.

What are three items you can find in their bedroom?

A large ring binder full of old code snippets, notes from various projects he worked on back at MOBIUS, and all his research ranging from neuroscience all the way to electrical engineering. Nathan is a little old-school in that regard– he’d much rather have all his research physically with him than save it all to some online storage platform and risk losing it like that.

A jigsaw puzzle, made entirely out of different pieces that he’s collected over the years (stolen from others’ puzzles, found in various locations, stolen directly from the store, etc). The full piece would total up to nearly 2000 pieces, though it is still missing a large chunk in the center; the result is an abstract piece containing mostly darker colors, though with various bursts of color scattered around like flowers in a field. Nathan isn’t the artistic type, but the project keeps him busy and he considers it a type of self-expression.

The knife he killed his parents with when he was sixteen years old. He’s not entirely sure why he kept it all those years– perhaps to remind himself what got him to where he is now, or because it’s the only thing he still has from that time of his life. Either way, it’s kept safe in the top drawer of his nightstand, easy enough to reach in case someone breaks into his apartment.

What do they notice first in a person?

First: State of mind, overall mood. How approachable do they look; can he afford to lower his guard or does he need to tread with caution, can he get close without worrying about a knife to the stomach or should he keep his distance? Nathan rarely shows immediate interest in someone’s overall personality, he would rather want to know which of their emotions he’s gonna have to deal with during their interaction(s).

Second: Body language. Ties in with the first thing mentioned– cautiously watching for threats, waiting to see if they make a move to touch (or harm) him so he can step out of their range. But it also extends a little further; Nathan tends to mimic others’ body language in conversation to make himself appear more approachable. If someone gestures a lot, he will do the same.

Third: Their smile, if relevant. Smiling is an eye-catching action to him, since he’s not one to quickly do so himself. It’s attractive to him; if someone smiles at him, you’ll be able to catch him staring.

Fourth: Scars, and other (skin) details. Nathan isn’t one to ask about them, of course– but they’ll catch his attention anyway, for a brief moment, since some of them already tell a story on their own even without words.

Fifth: Nervous tics, if relevant. By this point he’s been in conversation long enough to pick up on the little details– a slight thrill or shakiness to their voice, a thumb running over the side of their index finger, a nose twitch. In some cases it eases his mind, knowing the other person isn’t confident in their conversation either; in other cases it sets off alarms in his mind, and makes him wonder if there’s more going on than what they’re showing or telling him.

On a scale of 1 to 10, how high is their pain tolerance?

Physically: 7. While he doesn’t quite look like it, Nathan can take a hit or two. Most of his injuries happen in STEM– though with the way the technology works, the pain is very much real, and in some cases the scars are lasting even in the real world despite the damage having been sustained in STEM. To an extent, Nathan even enjoys the pain; it’s grounding for him, and keeps him from dissociating. When it gets too much to handle he simply drinks it away.

Mentally: 10. Nathan’s life has been a constant downward spiral; sent to a youth detention center after being wrongfully accused of killing his younger sister, and he was bullied relentlessly there, which continued until long after his release both at school and at home. At MOBIUS, he was required to work shifts in their HQ as well as in the Marrow, in the Union STEM environment– he was required to be mentally strong, or he would have already started suffering from mental erosion by long-term STEM exposure after his first few trips in. It takes a lot to break him (or so he likes to believe).

Emotionally: 4. Once you get past all the barriers, Nathan is pretty sensitive. He doesn’t deal well with rejection or misunderstanding, and is prone to assuming things are all his fault the second something goes wrong. It’s easy to upset him, though he won’t easily show; but the damage often takes a while to repair.

Do they go into fight or flight mode when under pressure? (Or freeze or fawn?)

Fight, more than often; though it may appear as flight at first, since Nathan’s favored combat approach is stealth and he will always find cover before doing anything rash. In certain cases, however, he would be more likely to freeze; especially anything related to Anima or an enemy type like her, where fighting is out of the question, and he knows that a single wrong move can mean his demise.

It translates to non-combat situations too– often willing to talk to people but his initial response is to get defensive and close himself off, and if not given a moment to regain himself it can lead to either fighting or freezing; biting back with similar ferocity or shutting down altogether, unable to pick up his rational train of thought in the heat of the moment.

It really depends on the type of confrontation, though; taking his own state of mind and who else is involved into consideration. He’s known to fawn when a situation starts feeling a little too familiar– generally surrounding the abuse he suffered from partially his parents, but mostly the Administrator.

What animal represents them best?

Wolf; bordering on dog motif, but cautiously so, requiring infinite patience and understanding to win his trust. Nathan is loyal and guarding to those he cares about, but he values his freedom– his choices and decisions are his and his alone, and anyone who tries to take that away from him will suffer the necessary consequences.

How would a stranger likely describe them?

Curious, above anything else. Distant, reserved; surprisingly well-spoken, almost technical in his interactions with others as if the whole conversation is pre-programmed in his mind. Nathan isn’t necessarily cold towards others, but people would also not be quick to describe him as kind; though there is a certain warmth to the way he speaks and looks at people, despite the fact he very rarely smiles and isn’t one to quickly compliment someone else.

Appearance-wise, people tend to notice the white strands in his black hair first. They’re clustered at the front of his head, and match with the white hairs in his left eyebrow and the white eyelashes in the outer corner of his left eye. Nathan has very pale and rough skin, patchy but dark facial hair covering up most of his acne (/scarring); and part of the skin around his left eyebrow is lacking pigment, though it’s a little hard to see. He has very pale and bright blue eyes, which can be a little unnerving when staring at them for too long. Many people cannot maintain eye contact with him for very long.

Do they have any hobbies?

Nathan’s career is directly intertwined with his hobbies, and he enjoys working on code even long after cutting ties with MOBIUS. Software development, application optimization– his laptop runs on an operating system that he coded entirely himself, and whenever he has some time to spare he can be found tweaking and optimizing it and adding new features.

To no one’s surprise, he’s a gamer. Shooters, roguelikes, survival horror– he does not play all too often as his schedule often doesn’t allow for it, but he generally doesn’t have a hard time playing on higher difficulties and enjoys the challenge. Nathan has tried his hand at game design and development too, but stopped quickly when he found it too similar to developing the Union environment in STEM.

And last, surprisingly, would be writing. Journaling, some sort of attempt at poetry, or articles he would want to send in to some website or appropriate magazine but never does– a lot of Nathan’s writing is for his eyes alone, but it helps as an outlet, it keeps him grounded. For a while after leaving MOBIUS, he worked on writing tech manuals for various employers to earn some extra cash, which also ties directly into his interests.

[ratcandy]

Had a very confirming "i am for certain on the aromantic spectrum" moment today . like i knew this for a while but i sure got it affirmed a bit more

[fffanii]

09.07.24

hello, you have reached the point in which the queue point has passed the date of ii16 coming out. now you will have to listen to me lose my mind and experience the stages of grief in the tags.

alt ver. ↓

[xxplastic-cubexx]

erik will genuinely jump at any chance he can to steal charles' last name and be so catty about it i know this for a fact WHAT is his deal

[Magneto (2011)]

[thetardisisnotourdivision]

I am unreasonably upset about the fact that I've been forced to accept that Gabriel was a Gerald.

For context, in An Inspector Calls, Gerald Croft is engaged to Sheila Birling when he meets a homeless, struggling Eva Smith in a bar, and essentially in return for a home and money he shows her affection (ahem), then gets rid of her once he no longer has a use for her. Now, obviously this isn't a direct translation, but the essentials are - a Gerald is a character who uses another character, in return for something they need, usually masking the fact that they're using them with affection and love.

And against my will I've had to accept that this is exactly what Gabriel does to Nathalie.

Did I want to think he had potential to be better? Did I think he genuinely cared for Nathalie?? Hell, did I just really really want somebody to care about Nathalie???

Probably all of the above but the point is: he's Gerald. And I cannot - I literally can't unsee it now. Their whole dynamic in S3 is like “oh boohoo I'm sorry I wish you didn't have to use the peacock Miraculous and kill yourself over it but uh I need to use your powers” “yeah no that's fine I'm all good”. Which, given the "Gerald" theorem, I'm assuming leads to the fact that what Nathalie needed, above all, was someone to care about her - and Gabriel came along, as Sheila Birling puts it, "like a fairytale prince", and was so caring and gentle and... Yeah. She fell for him. And. Yeah he genuinely did seem to care like twice. But so did Gerald. Gerald actually admits that he did care for Eva, just not the way that she cared for him, and, uh, not enough to not just dispose of her. So he discards her anyway when she stops being useful.

Leading me neatly to my point.

He starts using the peacock Miraculous the second it's fixed, the slimy bastard, HOWEVER. It runs way deeper than that. Assuming I'm right (which I almost DEFINITELY am), then Gabriel only needed Nathalie while she was useful. She didn't stop being useful in season three - she's still scheming for him, helping him with plan after plan. It's only partway through season 5 that she officially servers ties with him, and starts to actively hinder him.

Nathalie stops being useful when she fails as Safari. And I reckon that's when Gabriel and Tomoe decided she had to go.

(It's painfully, I-was-ugly-crying-over-it obvious in Conformation that Gabriel is fully prepared to let Nathalie die - in the original storyboard, her alliance was encouraging her to sleep, and he's very obviously prepared for this moment - I've made a separate post about it that I'll link if I can find it. However, onto the next bit)

With all of this, there's one thing that sticks out to me - Nathalie didn't see any of it until it was already too late. There could be many reasons for this. But you know who would have seen through it? Whose parents were all loving and perfect until she married the wrong man? Emilie. Emilie, who left behind those videos, which on the surface look innocent, but when you look deeper look like a (love confession???????) AHEM a warning. I reckon Emilie noticed what was going on and realised that Nathalie wouldn't see through Gabriel, so she left those videos addressed to Nathalie (not Gabriel, which surely they should have been - they were about him, after all - unless they were there...) as a warning. I don't think the videos were supposed to be about helping Gabriel, I think Emilie was warning Nathalie to get the fuck out of that house, and to take Adrien with her. Because Emilie knew it'd end like this.

Yes I'm still mad ok give me a break.

[vaguely-concerned]

I've landed on some stuff about rye's awful ex-boyfriend: his name was Maxellan Anaxas, the youngest and most woefully superfluous child of the Duke of Cumberland. By the time of his early 20s he’d managed to make enough of a party boy menace of himself back in Cumberland that his family sent him off to Nevarra City to stay with an aunt in the hopes that she'd straighten him out. (it's hard to know whether this was intended as a punishment more for him or for her. Fambly politics!).

wanting to reinvent himself as a hashtag Intellectual upon his arrival at the capital yet blissfully free from any genuine intellectual curiosity or desire to apply himself to gaining any skill of his own, young max hit on the perfect idea: to revive and expand after a brief lull — in his aunt’s name, of course, he is but a humble servant to the family name — the grand tradition of the 'Duchess Games' of the late Duchess Ravria Anaxas (I'm a bit unclear on the timeline here, so for now I'm imagining that this would have been his grandmother or great grandmother and thus aunt’s either mother or grandmother in turn. I feel like she was a more private introverted person and resented the way the tradition had completely ruled the household while she was growing up, and she shut it all down upon ravria’s death half out of spite, even with the way it tanked her own influence. Five fucking minutes of peace and quiet with my cup of tea without some umm actually cumberland scholar infodumping at me PLEASE. Actually looking at it like that I kind of get her lol). 

That shit was free real estate for a young man with new ideas and the urge to impress, though. That's right, max created a Salon tm where he befriended a specific set of the other capital nobles, called in some of his old contacts in cumberland, and rapidly surrounded himself with intellectuals, writers and artists of all stripes to act as patron for -- sunbathing in their reflected radiance until he too appeared to have a pleasing tan of intellectual merit. (he was actually pretty damn intelligent in his own right and especially good at deft social maneuvering, obviously, but he was also chased ever on by the snarling hounds of his many and crippling inferiority complexes from being raised as the kid no one had been clamouring for, the ‘oh. Yeah, and max. Of course. If we must’ of the family, and with very little ability to maintain his attention on anything that did not ultimately center on himself or could somehow profit him for any length of time. you know the type. He was is uncomfrotable when we are not about me. He may have been a little bitter that practical consideration meant he had to do all this in his aunt’s name and initially largely with her money.)

the deal he and his aunt eventually struck was that he managed her new growing art collection until it was the envy of the whole city with all the associated prestige and social clout (he had genuinely good taste and a knack for understanding and eventually guiding the market), and in exchange for handling everything public-facing or social for her she quietly sponsored his renewed party boy antics, art commissions and fancy dinner parties for his arteeste friends far beyond what his punishingly reduced allowance from his father would have permitted. (oh no how the family politics turntables, the fuckup family members have teamed up). And once a year it all came together in a series of debates and competitions to prove who was the smartest specialest little boy (gender neutral) in all the land etc. even the mourn watch received gracious invitations to leave their grave tending for a few days and participate. the levels of backbiting, in-fighting, professional envy, intricate rivalries and love affairs with associated duels and near-constant inebriation going on within his circle of influence as some of the greatest minds of a generation mercilessly competed against each other for maxellan anaxas' attention and generosity were, of course, near radioactive at all times, and that's exactly how he liked it.

now please imagine 19 year old rye ingellvar -- gangling, naive and self-conscious, just at the beginning of his transition, having barely ever spoken to anyone outside of the mourn watch before in his life and thought a little odd even among them, talented but too restless to consistently apply it to anything and so starved for any kind of affection after renn's death eight years prior that his subconscious was ready to do fucking Anything to obtain it who needs self-respect I am so lonely I could gnaw myself to the bone without help from any beetle -- dropped straight into this piranha tank of nevarran high society :') he never stood a chance, especially when max immediately sniffed out the possibility of adding a promising young watcher to his own private collection of devotees. ("he collected art for his aunt, and peple for himself," rye tells lucanis many years later, while lucanis vibrates with 'please please PLEASE can I kill him for you, I will pay you to be allowed to kill this man' energy. 'that is very sweet but you’re late to the party, unfortunately — I heard he already went and got himself killed in a duel a couple of years ago over fucking the wrong person’s husband' 'given the proclivities of your people, may I go out there and put him down again?' 'huh. there's a thought. let me think about it. also I love you <3')

I only have the barest outlines in my mind of the professor who served as rye's mage mentor growing up/shathann equivalent in his life, but I feel like rye getting together with max (after an intensely effective charm offensive on max’ part, he was very good at making you feel like the most special person in the room and even meant it this time, probably, at least until he got bored) would be the thing that made that relationship permanently cool after already getting strained as rye grew up and continued to be 'difficult', unfocused and underachieving despite his potential. she meant well and was right to try to warn him because as you can tell the writing was pretty much on the wall from the beginning (and for all her shortcomings in a parental capacity she had loved rye since he was all but a baby and didn't want to see him hurt), but a) in all of human history literally when has well-meaning sensible advice ever gotten through to a young person in the throes of their first big love and b) she was not particularly gentle with her advice.

in hindsight it was perhaps not a promising start to order him into her office to tell him "he is not good for you. he is not good for anyone, least of all himself. Yes, I wager he can be nice from time to time if he feels like it, but he is not kind, and you are too good to be just another addition to his inane collections. WHY are you wasting your time with some noble whelp instead of focusing on your studies, these last crucial years of your training??? did I teach you to be so careless with your duties?" and that's when resentment built up over years (especially since most of the actual nurturing part of parenting had been renn's domain and she'd been kind of helpless to help rye with the grief after he died beyond the odd watcher truism and awkward ‘chin up sport’ pat on the shoulder) finally broke its dams in rye's heart and made him snap back. (despite having some parallels here, the biggest difference between rye and taash’ base temperaments is probably that rye would never dream of talking back to any of the adults in his life growing up the way taash does with their mother lol he was more of the people pleaser who nevertheless couldn’t seem to please anyone/high masker. More given to Flight and Fawn than Fight overall, but with that repressed rage building up even banished to the deep even more for it, of course.)

so after he's shot back with uncharacteristic ferocity that "so when exactly am I going to get to have anything other than duty in my life? do I have to stay down here among the dead and wait until I join them to be allowed to have anything of my own at all??" and she's answered "...that is what the order asks of us, ella -- I mean, rye. watcher ingellvar" more perplexed to hear him raise his voice with her than angry in turn but completely at a loss for what to do with any of it........ there wasn't really much left to say. and so when the predicted catastrophe unfolded over the next few years like a very slow yet inevitable train crash with the relationship rye had hoped would be the big good thing that could make it all mean something turned increasingly toxic and controlling, there wasn't really anyone there to catch him as he crumbled nor help him pick up the pieces afterwards. (which then as now also has a lot to do with him not letting anyone in to help him; he did have some watcher friends who sort of tried but were gently rebuffed until they mostly gave up.) and that's partially why rye is the way that he is today probably. the first thing/person to get through to him and his depression after all this was varric almost a decade later, and that in turn is why the realization of what actually happened to varric sealed solas' fate so irrevocably.

I think rye and mage mentor did reconcile a bit before she died when he was in his early 30s, but in a way that mutually and ruefully included the understanding of the things they couldn’t be to each other and the acceptance of that. That might be the only funeral of someone close to him where he lead the ceremony, at her request — with renn he was just Baby and numb with grief, and with harding ( :’( im so sad) and varric he’s too torn up about it still and emmrich kindly steps in when the team come together to have a little memorial post-game for everyone lost. 

(re: the inferiority complexes and charm offensives: yes, max is who rye means when he tells illario he reminds him of his ex. (‘Not in a good way.’) And illario not unsympathetically is like ‘yeah I get that a lot’ and it’s ironically one of their most simpatico moments. During that interminable dellamorte family dinner party, they truly Got each other.)   

tl;dr: rye may have had a very bad relationship in his early twenties that almost ruined his life (he very nearly didn't finish his trials to become a watcher because of it, breaking up with max for good literally like. a week before the point of no return and having to do half a year's worth of work in that one fevered hungover week lmao, that orb he keeps in his room is a miracle in several ways) and that made him even weirder at intimacy than he already was naturally, but at least it permanently vaccinated him against the particular 'prove yourself to me and I'll give you my honest respect, trust and affection (prommy, this time for sure)' game that solas likes to play with people. I think even feeling the impulse to impress solas rise within him would make rye immediately nauseous and 'lmao nah baby I've been here before I've seen this room I've walked these floors and it sucked the first time around too. Fool me once shame on me fool me twice I’m ready to bite someone’s throat out actually.'

[zignifier]

Wrt LRB sometimes I'm so baffled by what people bother to ask me because my charitable assumption will be an image in my mind of the results of a search query using keywords in that question and what failures may have occurred in the transfer of information and I'll start talking like "What did you search for this? When I used [keywords] the results seemed pretty self-explanatory." Or like idk. Baseline I'll assume they've read some Bullshit that comes up when u search something. There are multiple things in this world if you use the most self-evident english search queries for you will just get misinformation. So maybe then I'll start talking as to counter those points instead and they're sooo lost and I'm like ??? and they're like I didn't bother to look it up I didn't search for any texts on this subject. And I'm like. How the fuck can you expect me to have a conversation about this then? We have to like. Have a baseline of implicit assumptions of understanding to talk about this how do you not CARE about that???

[bunnyboy-juice]

btw i dont tag posts about making out/kissing as cnc cus ik its not that for everyone but i do Not like kissing or making out so please know every makeout post i rb/make has been dipped in a vat of "this would make me so uncomfortable im wet over it"