#not to be confused with fae diarmuid alter

[akampana]

How does Diarmuid alter compare to Diarmuid in their treatment of artoria, how they show affection, etc?

This is kinda toxic, be warned. And I'm gonna answer this as if Diarmuid Alter here has just arrived into Chaldea, and so this begins just before his GudaTherapy. It's under the cut in case you don't wanna read that.

The whole thing with Diarmuid Alter is that he no longer has the capacity to restrain himself, and any feeling he gets goes from 0 to 100 insanely quickly.

He's a later iteration of Diarmuid ua Duibhne's spirit origin, a corrupted copy that was born the moment Kayneth El-Melloi Archibald forced him into Command Spell Suicide. Unlike his usual self that forgives and can be seen hanging around the likes of Fionn, Altermuid holds grudges, forever seeking revenge against those who scorned him.

For this reason, he doesn't trust anyone completely(not even Guda, not yet), he cannot stand his former king, refuses to work with the student that took up his professor's name, he's violent against Emiya(Assassin), and with Arturia...it's kind of complicated.

Diarmuid Alter's feelings for Arturia exist exactly on the boundary between love and loathing (because while she herself hadn't intended for Episode 16 to end the way it did, she was still there) It's a very thin line, and the constant pull on either direction slowly eats away at his mind.

Lancer/Saber Diarmuid's fondness for Arturia is translated into Altermuid's obsession with her. It messes him up that he can never decide whether he was to kiss her or kill her all he knows us that he wants to be the only one to do it.

This battle makes him insanely jealous of any Servant that has a defined relationship with Arturia, whether it is friendship, romantic love, or even hate. He flips out whenever it feels like someone's getting ahead of him with her. (Like for example, if Cú Alter leaves love bites, he turns murderous, but he has the same defensive reaction if say someone like Gawain gives Arturia cookies.)

Altermuid sometimes squeezes until it bruises, but it's always an accidental consequence, because he's unable to decide between wanting to dig his claws into her wrist or using it to pull her toward him. When he kisses her, his mind screams that he should loathe her existence, but at the same time, he can't stop. On the one hand, he wants to enact some sort of revenge upon her person, but on the other, he's aware it wasn't really her fault and he can't stand hurting her.

He's just stuck in an eternal loop made worse because Arturia represents both what he wants so desperately(a loyal person who abides by the same chivalric code) and detests so fervently (a leader who betrays and lets their selfish desires trample all over his honor). He wants her to be the former, but he's terrified she'll be the latter.

This puts him at odds with his other selves. He taunts them a lot, especially because neither Saber or Lancer leave visible marks out of consideration. They try to reprimand Alter because well, he is them but all he does is laugh just a bit madly and say and call them hypocrites. Because he is them, he knows exactly the extent of their lust and lives in the tiny, passing thoughts that still resent her for that final night in the 4th hgw.

After a lot of time and a lot of these explosive episodes where Diarmuid flip-flops between being extremely attached and protective and being destructive and distant Guda decides that they should be apart until Diarmuid Alter arrives at a state where being around Arturia doesn't immediately result in disaster. So Guda separated them.

Arturia would spend time in Card form while Diarmuid was out, and vice versa. On the rare occasion they were active at the same time, the other Servants kept them from each other.

Eventually, Diarmuid Alter realizes he misses her, but he can't be sure that he won't have a meltdown if he's around Arturia too long. One day, he goes to his servant quarters and finds a tiny white flower there for him, with a thin blue ribbon tied around it, and he knows who its from. The next day, Arturia gets two roses in return in her room.

They don't see each other for a very long time.

So yeah, pre-GudaTherapy stuff like that last doodle happen on the regular...now they have a long-distance thing, but that's it. just little tokens in each other's rooms. Just to remind them they haven't forgotten about the other, even when they're apart. For now, it's easier for Diarmuid to think about her when she's not around. Leaving gifts gives him the opportunity to figure out his feelings safely.

Ty for the ask!