to me mounders are found family but not in a standard siblings-esque dynamic or anything. particularly early on it’s like they have the unshakable camaraderie of like, college dormmates bonded through their mutual befuddlement of what shared teachers they have, or acquaintances stuck in a elevator together, or shipwreck survivors caught in the same stretch of land.
and it’s happenstantial up until they’re maybe a little too loyal a little too giving for what should ultimately amount to amicable neighbors. it’s happenstantial until they start to notice that they choose eachother over and over again, in their own ways. it’s that they care for eachother and they fight for eachother and they mourn for eachother as a whole and individually. and it’s fascinating.
just a few random thoughts on The Arrangement Astarion (cw: mentions of past abuse and trauma)
The way abuse can warp someone for life is often overlooked. This isn't just a journey about him dealing with intimacy (in all its forms) but also how to do it in spite of everything he went through. Putting up walls and not letting her in, but feeling the need to resort to sarcasm and to being snarky cause the vulnerability that comes with it is just too much to handle. She has already seen the ugly yet he keeps doing it, because when you've doing it for so long it becomes second nature and it's hard to unlearn this behaviour. How can people stay when they've seen the ugly? Well, some people do stay because they have seen the ugly and their love for you surpasses that. They'd ve damned if they allowed that to change their opinion of you.
However, this doesn't have be a life sentence for him. He can learn and better himself alongside her if he so chooses. There will be good days. There will be bad days. But the constant will be her by his side. And this isn't about anyone getting fixed. There are other ways to heal. Are those healthy, though? But still, no matter how uncertain things are, he can count on her love as a constant that can help him love the parts of him that he has grown to hate.
Is it easy? Does it happen overnight? Probably not. But there's always hope. There is always a way out. Even when he dissociates. Even when he's fearful of getting more intimate with her. Even when he remembers that she chose friendship over something else - it's never easy to be shown what you need to see instead of what you want to see. Astarion falls into this constant dichotomy and I think it's worth exploring 🫂
yeah baelor+ daeron+ the maidenvault inmates + aegon aemon and naerys are fascinating because they clearly are just like the biomagnification of the daemon and rhaenyra classique targaryen gothic house of horrors emotional and literal incest bloodcurse doomrot. except they never even met them.
like there is blood running dripping from the ceiling and every day something is shaping your bones just a bit more into the shape of your long-dead bloodthirsty volatile grandfather or your usurped autocrat grandmother and there’s something in the walls and you don’t know what’s happening or why. you’re hungry for something. but you don’t know what and you never will. there’s no way out whether it’s dying young in a war you started or living your entire life as a self-flagellating religious martyr while still inflicting harm on others or leaning full on into hedonism you are still wanting for something. you’re still hungry
Very silly sequel to my other Fuuta/Mikoto duet art -- it turns out both VAs were in this singing group anime together! (I haven't seen any other Milgram vas overlap songs, and now I've found two for them, huh...) I cut the songs together to make a fun little duet, but the individual versions are here: 🔥 ⚾
The outfits are courtesy of @clover0101 's au here :D