#i'd talk about claire's absence in re6 but that probably has to do with how big the story was in re6

[knifefightandchill]

Okay so I’ve been biting my tongue but figured I might as well get it out already.

piers and chris vent under the cut

I feel like it’s important to point out that Piers was Chris’s lieutenant. He was directly under him. So yeah, he was a higher rank than the rest of the team, but not higher than Chris. And definitely not a high enough rank to have any sort of sway with the brass. If they want Chris back on the field, there’s absolutely nothing Piers can do to fight it.

But besides that;

Piers looks up to him, he cares about him. Hell, Chris scouted him, trained him. They were friends. So, I wouldn’t be surprised if he jumped at the chance to find him and bring him back.

He’s also a 26 year old soldier, I doubt he had any idea the extent of Chris’s mental issues. He’s drunk when Piers shows up after all. In fact, I doubt the BSAA cared or had the time to do a full psych work up on him before flinging him into Lanshiang.

Chris is unhinged, he’s reckless, he’s blinded by vengeance. But his actions are still his own fault. He shouldn’t be out in the field in any capacity. In fact, I feel like he shoulda been sedated and brought to a hospital. But he’s clear headed enough to know what he’s doing, he just doesn’t care about the consequences. He’s got tunnel vision. That’s not an excuse, that’s an explanation. He’s still responsible.

He tries to blame it all on Carla, but the blood of his own team in Lanshiang is also on his hands.

In fact, Piers points that out! “If you hadn’t been blinded by vengeance, we could have prevented some of those deaths.” Shit, they then get in a whole fight over it.

There’s another time I can think of off the top of my head where Piers points out he’s being reckless earlier on in the game. Chris shuts it down with the whole soldier thing.

So, if Piers knows something is wrong, why does he keep following him?

1; that’s his friend, 2; that’s his captain, and 3; if Chris goes out there on his own in the state that he’s in he will get himself killed.

I’m tired of this idea that Piers is some sort of powerful asshole that forces Chris into bad situations and is therefore responsible for all of Chris’s actions. It’s so dumb.

Piers isn’t some stupid manipulative person. From what we see he’s genuine, loyal, and even caring. He cared about continuing to fight the good fight, to help end bioterrorism. And he cared about Chris. He sacrificed himself for both. For the future.

I can understand loving a character a lot, but you can still recognize their faults. I love Chris, I do, but he did stupid shit and that’s on him. And that’s okay! Because fave characters aren’t always pure and innocent. and that’s fine! 

If you don’t like piers, then don’t like him. but don’t mischaracterize him to make others look good.

don’t make up some long-winded reason as to why and put it in the character tag for fuck’s sake. also talking about people who write him is unnecessary.

Because it’s rude to those who actually like the character. I thought that was an old tumblr rule to keep discourse out of the tags??  It feels so inflammatory. Which I’m sure it is. But it irritated me to the point where I bit the bait. fandom is supposed to be fun, if you’re gonna be negative like that keep it to yourself. 

[possessionisamyth]

Thought of Sherry and made myself sad because she was 10 (retconned from being 12) during the whole Raccoon City incident and didn't have her pseudo parents (Claire and Leon) for a week before she's being shifted into Simmons' hands.

I was thinking of what kind of lie and the strings of control Simmons would have to cast in order to make Sherry trust him. I can believe she was tutored the year the incident took place partially because they wanted to check her danger levels as a bioweapon and partially because she was a traumatized child so her mental state would need to be balanced before being thrown back into school. The best place for her would be private school the whole time. There's a level of control money brings, and Simmons would be able to pay off or make disappear anyone who might see something strange about her. He'd funnel her to private doctors and nurses for all her appointments where she might be out of school for a week here and there, but her absence and lack of work wouldn't be punished either because, again, money talks.

I can think of her as suspicious and untrustworthy of Simmons at the beginning because Leon promised to protect her, and she's hearing nothing from him. I'd think Simmons would extend an olive branch to keep that control and lie appropriately. If he says Leon abandoned her, it would incite rebellion, and he needed Sherry to trust him. He'd probably tell her Leon was paying for everything with his job so she could live a normal life. Her acceptance of this would come in tiny waves. She did hear other student's parents talk about how expensive tuition and supplies and uniforms are. She is getting the nicest toys whether they're limited edition or sold out before they appear in her room all wrapped up with a bow. She can decorate her room however she wants and anything she needs is provided quickly.

She can't see Simmons weaving the web where sometimes her gifts would read "From: Leon". It's not his handwriting, but Sherry wouldn't know. She doesn't get that an extended school vacation after breaking an arm which healed in a week instead of 6-8 weeks was a means of keeping up the air of normalcy to her peers. She's told over and over Leon's working hard to make sure she has the best of everything, and does she really want to stop him? Does she know what'll happen if she does? Suddenly it's like she's with her parents again. That if she makes too much of a fuss she'll cause problems for them. She'll cause problems for Leon. So she oh so gradually stops asking where he is and what he's doing and when she can see him. Besides, the excuses for why she can't know that information were getting old and tired anyway. "He just left the country", or "He's getting special training," or "He's moving again". It was like they weren't even trying to not lie to her.

Until Claire comes to visit. What better way for Simmons to cement the trust he needs then to let Sherry see the other important person in her life as much as she can? Which does work. When Claire visits on her school breaks and holidays, the lies do feel a lot more like the truth. Sherry doesn't expect Claire and Leon to be attached at the hip, but if Claire can visit while being busy with college, maybe Leon was as busy as Simmons said. It helps that Claire admits she also struggles getting in contact with Leon. So maybe Leon was almost always out of the country and getting training and working all hours since everything Sherry needed was so expensive. Maybe he was working so hard to make sure Sherry had the best life she could. Maybe she should stop trying to see deception that wasn't there and work hard herself to make sure Leon's efforts went to something good. So she stops asking for Leon except maybe around the milestone events like the 13th birthday and 16th birthday and 18th birthday, and highschool graduation, and college graduation, and by then? By then, all the little red flags of Simmons control hadn't registered until RE6 where the mask comes off.

She sees Leon for the first time in 15 years, and it's him telling her everything was a lie. Simmons was a traitor and never had her best interest in mind. Never had their best interest in mind, and too many things are happening for her to process the information. She just has to swallow it all.

What's worse is she probably would try her best not to beat herself up about it, but I don't know how well she'd succeed. The looping mantra of knowing at 10 years old she was right about the lies and fell for them anyway. Having the hindsight of an adult to notice every single time Simmons nudged her life this way or that way to make sure she did everything he wanted. Questioning how many of her decisions were her wanting to be better than her parents, to make Leon's effort worth it, to be as well-adjusted as she could be around Claire, how much was actually her and how much was Simmons' manipulation? How much of her choices and personhood were hers and not a result of what Simmons wanted her to be? Fingers crossed she took a long vacation after RE6, and a longer vacation to really comb through that contract Simmons definitely gave her for her current career.