#the frequencies just hit difference.... | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

batsplat · 4 months ago

Note

quick follow up to this bit

was also reminded of this valentino quote

He speaks about my shoulder like he was the best shoulder doctor in Melbourne Hospital.

what WERE they cooking

(I can't like. prove this because obviously we simply do not have solid 'evidence' for casey's thinking here either way, but given this is a speculative post about how I'd narrativise these rivalries.... do think the screenshot above is basically my theory for why casey had a thing about valentino's injuries. to such an extent that valentino picked up and commented on it! after laguna and throughout 2009, there were various waves of discourse about casey having been 'broken' by valentino - first due to casey's dip in form in 2008, then because he had to take some time off in 2009. the fact that it was an invisible illness that he himself could not explain in a sport that is all about the big, glaring obvious injuries - one that was treated as a sign of mental weakness, something he was ALWAYS susceptible to being accused of... very much the opposite of valentino's shoulder and leg in that sense, which was way easier to explain and was immediately taken seriously. my suspicion is that for casey, it was about not being extended the same grace as valentino was, being frustrated at how much leniency valentino was being granted when casey was always being harshly judged. of course, valentino (in classic demented rider fashion) was if anything downplaying the severity of the shoulder injury and only admitted after it was more or less healed that he'd been terrified by how long the recovery period had dragged on and had feared he would never be the same rider again. casey's lack of empathy on this count is completely justifiable and he does also obviously have a point, but it's still an interesting part of his character. it's what makes the rivalry with valentino so very interesting - there are lots and lots of ways in which valentino directly made casey's life miserable, but then there are other ways in which valentino's mere presence, his existence, someone whose treatment casey could compare his own to, that also contributed to casey's hatred towards him. firstly by getting more empathy than casey did and the general injustice in how the sport was 'always' on valentino's 'side' in a way it never was for casey, secondly by having this reputation of 'breaking' rivals that... well, y'know, valentino was presumably more than happy to be the beneficiary of the whole thing, but it's not like this was actually a line he spread himself, including with regards to casey. he didn't have to! it's kinda just... an awful coincidence that casey's 2009 absence was always going to be treated with suspicion and he HAPPENED to have a rival with valentino's very specific reputation?? the perfect storm! which gets you to this odd point where... if anything after that casey is the main instigator in terms of the sheer vitriol of the rivalry - but it's built on years of seething resentment that valentino at times almost seems taken aback by... and then reciprocates with interest because of course he does. because that's just how valentino ticks. fundamental lack of understanding for each other!! valentino kinda accidentally being casey's perfect foil!! casey having a million Legitimate Grievances against valentino but still somehow managing to project 85% of his other issues with the sport on valentino too!! they're soooooooooooooo. so!!)

if you were to direct a motogp movie (or make a one season of television) what season or rivalry would you make it about? and more interesting what artistic liberties would you take? it doesn’t have to be a straight up biopic bc imo those are often boring, instead it could be something like velvet goldmine (1998) aka fictional characters whose real life counterparts are pretty obvious, veering in like rpf territory. anyways👀

did you know. one time this guy put a curse on this other guy. and he never won a race again

anyway, look, I do feel like by this point that's the BORING answer from me, but obviously it's where my mind first went. I'm not sure I'd actually want it out there in film form because by now it's badly enough remembered that it's like, my cute little niche story, and I think there's something fun about the Wider World even within the motogp fandom not exactly getting how bonkers the whole thing was. (I know other humans have canonically watched motogp 2004 but I swear even journalists have forgotten some key key details and it's kinda annoying but also fun.) bold words from someone who's been blogging about it!! weird gatekeep-y instinct. but basically my job here is done as far as outreach is concerned - I wrote a very long post, now I get asks about it twice a week that allow me to think about it some more with the four other people who care, perfect balance. that rivalry doesn't need to go mainstream!! the whole point of it is that it's kinda cruel but narratively pleasing that it's gone under the radar, because it's another sign valentino won. but obviously, I cannot literally make a film about this, so the hypothetical repercussions I think maybe we can put aside for a moment here

okay I came back to this bit of the post after I increasingly got into of the spirit of coming up with dumb ideas, but it did make me flesh out what I'd even WANT from something like that. I'm with you anon, a lot of biopics are boring!! if you want to just know what happened, please just literally go and 'watch the races' and 'read books' like what are we actually getting here. you kinda want to give it a purpose for existing, right, a way of portraying real/mildly fictionalised events in a manner that is also taking some kind of stance on the material AND is doing stuff you can't do 'in real life'. thing is, look, you could make 2006 into a film, and I'm sure it'd be perfectly nice because it's fundamentally a solid underdog story (well, inherently winning a title with repsol honda is NOT being an underdog but you can write it that way), but also what are you doing beyond just telling people what happened? I feel like that generally about single seasons, they're not really doing anything for me. I was also turning around the biaggi/valentino rivalry in my head in part because that's the one valentino gave as his answer for 'rivalry he would turn into a film' (marc big wet eyes sitting right next to him), but like. a film about that rivalry from valentino's pov is fundamentally not something I'm interested in. you have all these isolated very memorable moments that make it work as a rivalry, like you can absolutely spin them into a dramatic yarn that goes through the genesis of their conflict to middle finger gate to punching gate to assen + donington + sachsenring + phillip island 2001 and it's basically *insert rousing music* successful coming of age. at most you can lean into the fact valentino became successful at being a dick. like idk it's fine but also what's the point? valentino is challenged in a sports context by biaggi, he's challenged because he realises his words have consequence and the press actually reports the words he says to journalists (the horror), but he is fundamentally not challenged on a personal level. that's the entire point, right? it's the ultimate comfort zone rivalry - biaggi is a dick who it is quite easy to hate and also reacts poorly to valentino's initial provocation. the animosity escalates and it is inherently fun to beat him. valentino is mean to him, but it's not like he even really crosses any lines to beat him. like you can make it into a film, and if you twisted the material a little bit you could make it satisfying, but I don't want to!

now the way the writing process of this post worked was that I was going to breeze through a bunch of non-sete/valentino rivalries and explain why I think some of them don't work for our purposes here, but then I ended up writing myself into changing my mind. so my take on the biaggi rivalry is that actually, you CAN make it work but it has to be from biaggi's perspective. basically, I think you've got to amadeus it (a web weave I have been thinking of making at some point btw). so,,, it's a meditation on talent and how unfair it all is, maybe minus the bit where salieri poisons amadeus (I know that doesn't happen in the film) or dresses up as amadeus' father to, y'know, make him write a requiem on his death bed. and it's not amadeus in that HERE, the clown prince gets a happy ending! but it's more like, in thematic terms, I think you have to zero in on this bit. biaggi didn't have parents who shoved him on a bike when he was three years old, he didn't have parents who were invested in his motorcycling career (or even necessarily particularly invested in him), he started the sport late and discovered that, yes, he did have a prodigious amount of skill in it - but one that he started honing far later than valentino did. he approached his career with a sort of grim resolve, surly and irascible and not interested in making friends with any of his competitors but very, very good. he goes away from the race track and dates all these models, he irritates fellow riders, he's not part of the gang and he's happy about it. he's very successful! four 250cc titles, wins his first ever race in 500cc at a time when doohan was very much winning everything. he's also just like,,,, an interesting and spiky enough character it's not hard to make him come alive

but then of course you have this gradual emergence of the amadeus character, the one who challenges his established position in the court of,, well... motorcycle racing, and also as the guy italians rooted for! and valentino's obviously, y'know, in so many ways the exact opposite from biaggi, and he's super young and cheerful and lively and is doing all his silly celebrations and is being a bit camp and goofy and treats motorcycle racing as a party (you really want to lean into the culture clash here, like in amadeus it's because you have stuffy austrian court vibes but here it's because everyone is having their bones broken every two minutes and just how... kinda grim a lot of motorcycle racing was). and he's also this innocent! yes, he insults biaggi, and yes, in retrospect we know valentino is kinda evil, but at the time he was a kid with a big mouth who was a little taken aback by how that biaggi feud sort of escalated beyond what he'd actually intended it to do! and biaggi just, hates him. and I think, sorry to the real man max biaggi here, but you've got to play with how once they're actually competing with each other, it's miserable how there's just this unbreachable gulf in talent. like, whatever biaggi does he cannot win! he isn't going to defeat valentino over the course of a full season! which is depressing and horrible and CRUEL, because there's this inevitability to the whole thing... and also! because valentino doesn't DESERVE it. and you don't have to go full salieri pleading with god to explain how god could give this CLOWN all this talent, but it's kinda the same vibe! how is it valentino, who is constantly just having a laff and canonically maybe wasn't the biggest gym-goer in the paddock and is just generally seen as, y'know, a bit of a dandy, this foppish clown who everyone loves and who doesn't have to work hard to be good - how is he the one who is winning so much!! it's miserable and unjust... and I think how you portray this is that you really emphasise the kinda, repetitive nature of the defeat. like, I think you probably want to make this into a non-linear narrative where all this biaggi backstory is communicated somehow but you don't just start it when he was born or whatever - you start it in 2001 when they're competing for a title and already hate each other. and then you heavy on the time loop vibes. the whole cinematic language and all that other shit should emphasise how all these weekends are structured in exactly the same way and if you're losing to this one guy, all these different weekends can start feeling the same. it bleeds into each other, it feels inescapable, you're trapped in this narrative you can't change... worst of all, you even return to the same places again and again - like play with that! biaggi keeps coming back to where they had the fist fight, to where valentino first insulted him all those years back. you play up the disorientation and the misery of it all, plus biaggi canonically gives us all this kinda messy freudian shit to play with like how he was dating 'valentina' and his relationship with her was falling apart because of how miserable valentino was making him. it's all there!!

ANYWAYS the way you conclude this story is!! welkom 2004!! so again we can artistic license this a little bit and, uh, ignore sete (though I do also think it's fun if you lean into biaggi being displaced as a rival and staring at them being friendly and happy with each other from the outside) - but the key bit is that valentino is finally making the big error. biaggi wasn't winning titles on a yamaha, since he left yamaha has gotten worse, now valentino is making this big mistake out of his own hubris. language of cinema that shit and make everything brighter and more hopeful.... the time loop is finally over, biaggi has escaped, this year will be different!!!! everyone in his circle agrees, valentino is fucked. step off the plane at welkom (pre season testing didn't happen in this universe) and it's literal dawn of a new day... staring out at the sun and finally, biaggi can move on, can live a new and different life. anyway. obviously we all know what's coming next - you have this big dramatic climactic race where biaggi throws himself at valentino again and again and again and he comes so close to winning it... but he doesn't. and you have valentino living his best life, being delighted, but the film is focusing on how like,,, we're bleaching the joy back out of biaggi's life, how actually he's returning to what he already knew. and it ends on the podium, with the camera focusing on biaggi on that fucking second step or zooming in or whatever (idk how cinema works) and it just finishes on this shot of biaggi dead-eyed in a bleak world, trapped again for eternity aka until the end of the 2005 season. done!! I'm not sure this is quite what valentino had in mind, but. well. that's how I'd do it

this is from the pushkin play from 1832 not the 1984 film but like. low key pushkin already kinda nailed the essence of sports rivalries in the 1830s and we just have to acknowledge that sometimes

right. so the casey rivalry is where I'm going to go completely off the wall. skip this bit to get to the slightly saner stuff. this is also one I fully admit to sometimes playing around with in my mind anyway, but. uh. I'm gonna be taking this one in just. well. places. I do have a vision here but I also don't quite know how to explain it in a way that doesn't make me sound like I've lost my mind, but well if you're still reading this then that's on you. so lemme get this out of the way: the classic sports biopic formula would work well with casey. if I had to point to a single rider I would sports biopic-ify, it's casey. so you have all this kinda,, obvious adversity that's easy to get across, and it's a narrative you can follow chronologically without too much trouble. you've got all the childhood stuff, the australian racing club not letting him join them, the move to britain, the rising through the ranks, it's also this very biopic-friendly 'nobody ever believed in him apart from like three people' stuff. and the premier class is also narratively satisfying, from the rocky rookie season to the kinda shock success to then all the lows of 2008 and 2009 and the physical ailments and the anxiety and then the switch to honda and the title and then him deciding to retire... that's all good stuff! you can absolutely biopic-ify it! gun to my head and sure, I can walk you through exactly what bits of his life I'd focus on and put in what order and so on, and I think ultimately you could make a very good sports biopic from that

[some mild gore to follow in this next section]

but also. thing is. that's fine. it's just not where I want to go here, because again I feel like at that point you can also pick up his autobiography and just read it - because what you're basically doing here is just filming that. and I get how this stuff works, you're bringing the story to a wider audience, you can show stuff in a different way in that medium etc etc, and that's all great but also I don't care about bringing stuff to a wider audience. I care about doing fun stuff in my brain. so what I'd actually do here is just, basically, go in the exact opposite direction and ditch all the realism. genuinely, ditch the live action stuff, we're going animated - what I'm interested in here is stuff where we need to be able to fully suspend our disbelief and lean into some surreal shit. I'm not going to bury the lede here: my idea is that you take that thing where casey said he hated how ducati was ruining the bike by letting valentino's yellow encroach on it and, basically,, just go all in on that bit. like come on, that is so singularly visually evocative, it truly captures a lot of what's going on thematically in that rivalry. (see also x and x for the most relevant casey posts.) casey sees valentino as the malevolent force, this infection! he associates him strongly with a specific colour, one that can be sickly or unnatural or just... evil. malignant, malicious, malevolent, all the m words. to casey, valentino is a personification of everything that is wrong with the sport. valentino is literally the walking manifestation for so many of his issues, from the dangerous riding to the lack of respect to the lying to the cult of personality to the obsession with image and the media to the backroom games to the politics to the injustice of how different riders are treated differently, like!! he's literally all of that! this is a topic for another post, but this plays out in a lot of kinda, weird and funky ways where it's a two way street and sometimes when casey talks about motogp you go 'actually I think that's just valentino?' (btw he also does this about 'europe' right I don't think those are europeans you hate casey that's literally just valentino) and sometimes when he talks about valentino it's kinda? this feels like it's about a little more than the bloke himself? and basically, right, I think you need to take this to its natural conclusion where casey used to admire him and look up to him and want to emulate him on track and then gets disillusioned when valentino's worshippers turn against casey and casey is the one to bring valentino down to earth and... listen, I think you need to play around with valentino being a literal god. and I think you need to have casey stab him to cover up the yellow on the ducati with blood

okay. look. the idea here, right, is that we're basically making the subtext text, and just digging into that process of 'bringing valentino back to earth', of taking on a god and having the audacity to succeed, and also treating valentino as this sort of. infection in his own mind. the bike is literally being infected!! casey may have left the ducati but he STILL has some fidelity and love for this project, those were his people he worked with, and now valentino is coming in and just twisting everything around himself!! but also I think how this functions is that, okay, so you have all this normal stuff that's the actual 'plot' in the 'real world', but the ISSUE with the real world is that there's a lot of stuff that just. isn't possible there. like the thing casey wants in that rivalry but is never going to have is... a captive audience. a big problem casey has in that rivalry is that he doesn't get the chance to actually say a lot of stuff to valentino. he starts using the media more and more and plays the game on valentino's level, but there's still this disconnect where mr straight talking is the valentino rival who valentino never really blanks or freezes out like... there's a disconnect! there's valentino the person, who casey never quite figures out how to just straight up hate, and then there's valentino the character, the racer, the rider, the god who casey DESPISES. but when they're doing small talk at pressers and podiums, casey doesn't get to talk to that version of valentino! he just talks to valentino the person, who obviously isn't literally a different person but is also not going to explain to casey where he's coming from, is he, and also isn't someone who casey can explain to where HE is coming from. and that gulf... it does bother casey. I don't think he can quite verbalise why either, but there's just... this creeping tension. I think it'd be easier for casey if valentino really were more of a caricature, just kinda a dick in all walks of life. and there's just these canonical hints of that... the way casey talks about how he's sure valentino as a guy is fine, but he never knew valentino like that, the whole 'I'd like to go with valentino for dinner to tell him where I was coming from in that rivalry' thing, like!! it's there

so basically EYE think what you should be doing is using the wonders of storytelling to actually. embrace that element. and just leave realism behind now and again. valentino is a god, he is literally worshipped, he's part of this pantheon that casey is trekking to reach. casey is brave enough to take him on in combat, he is the first one who is truly able to draw blood. he sees how valentino isn't just a god of joy or battles or speed or the SUN or any of that other stuff - he's a disease, an illness, a god who is also a false prophet... the worship never quite goes away, because who ever truly gets rid of their valentino rossi complex, but casey eventually is given the chance to face a chained valentino and kinda,,, ritualistically publicly humiliate him using the ducati as both this sick thing that has to be 'cured' and this symbol of valentino's failure. I'm sorry, visual language goes brr here, like chain him up, do weirdly eroticised torture idc!! (psst psst valentino's fucked up shoulder also extremely goes brr here, casey low key a teensy bit weird about valentino's injuries? his thing after the 2010 leg break where he goes 'why's everyone making such a big deal about this other people break their limbs too' and then after 2011 jerez immediately asking whether valentino's shoulder is okay in just a very obviously passive aggressive way. literally he opens with that, valentino isn't using it as an excuse or anything, for some reason it's already on casey's mind and I would politely contest it was out of genuine concern for valentino's wellbeing!! it's just kinda? I'm so compelled by it? I suppose it is kinda about how valentino's suffering gets taken more seriously than his own? how those absences are received differently by the motogp world? idk I find this fun because casey does know this is one thing valentino can't really be blamed for himself, so it just slips out a bit? but yeah, casey + valentino's injuries, nobody's talking about it but I sure will, let casey get weird and mean and a teensy bit sadistic about valentino's injuries in an artistic manner.) crucially I like animation as a medium here because I think it's easier to lean into surrealism when you don't have to hand hold the audience so much through the suspension of realism, also there's just some imagery you can do in cooler ways through animation where in live action it may just look. weird. (I think you can also do one of those things where you have a live action film with only those specific bits animated but also... why? it just feels like in live action you need more 'justifications' for things, like am I saying casey is having some weird hallucinations and is losing his mind? no I just want to have weird vision sequences ffs.) the colour stuff!! valentino/casey is big on the colour coding as a rivalry, to the extent casey is even, y'know, drawing attention to it in the literal text!! yellow and red are banger colours, valentino is big on imagery himself with all his sun + moon motifs, it's kind of all there to make the easy next step to kinda zany surreal imagery. ritualistic stabbing works better in animation, you can kinda get the blood to like. drip down and overwhelm the yellow illness that's slithered out across the bike

and. AND of course what this entire set up allows you to do is.... give them an opportunity to talk. they can't talk in real life! casey CAN'T give him his real thoughts on anything, and fundamentally valentino can't either. they're opponents. they're strangers who chat sometimes. it's not just that they aren't friends, it's that fundamentally they cannot be friends - because their ability to do their actual jobs depends on a certain level of professional distance. valentino of course does have a decent read on casey, and vice versa, because when you're figuring out how to defeat someone then (if you're valentino) you're looking to play the rider too. valentino's entire approach depends on focusing in on his rivals and attempting to throw them off, to make them unravel. he's watching casey closely!! the entire journey of casey's first three seasons in the premier class essentially becomes like, this god of their world focusing in on him. figuring him out. trying to gnaw away at him. obviously, animation also allows you to go big on the panopticon-y imagery which is kinda fundamental to their rivalry, because of their fundamentally oppositional stances to 'performing' for the ever present cameras where there IS a little bit of common ground in they have both struggled with it. but valentino isn't going to ever say that to casey! casey isn't going to open up to valentino! so if you give them,, you know, a different arena to express themselves, where casey actually has this external figure to talk to (as he's like, cutting him open I guess) whereas valentino actually is put in a position where he's allowed to respond, where he can taunt casey a little bit, where he can interrogate casey's approach and also the similarities between the two of them and how casey has been forced to become a little more like valentino to challenge him... because the thing is, right, valentino is so big on message discipline with his rivals and has completely stopped talking about that rivalry post mid 2013 that, first of all, you have this complete imbalance in who's been telling this story for the past decade, but second of all you kinda don't have a sense of what valentino would respond? idk!! I think this is mainly fun as a thought exercise for me specifically but also I do think it's kinda, digging into some of the bits that make this narratively work as a rivalry, how valentino in this rivalry is actually just kinda... removed. like he's not really emotional about it!! at most he's a bit bitchy, but even that just feels about The Game. it's the most extreme in this regard followed by jorge - but with valentino's other feuds you kinda... see a bit more an unguarded moment, see something a little more real there. the casey rivalry feels so uncomfortable precisely because valentino is a little... inhuman in this one. I mean, if you want to have valentino as some kind of cross between a deity and a monster in any of his feuds, this is the one. casey's just an obstacle to him. idk don't you think casey kinda wants to chain valentino down and stab him and make him see casey a little more... well, I think he should want it and I think it'd be fun to see and get them to talk to each other. ugh and also all the implications of making the faith vs non-believer elements more literal... casey the heretic!!!

there's some obvious stuff here you'd have to figure out, like 'how do you make this work as a narrative even to people who aren't familiar with casey stoner at all' and 'who the fuck do you think the target audience is here' and 'you do know this is not the kind of thing that would ever be made, right, go back to the casey stoner sports biopic like a sane person' but!! I do think it's material you can make work if you're just,,, efficient and smart in how you're actually telling the 'real life' version of the rivalry. also in my head this is. idk. an animated limited series not a film, which then brings in other stuff like 'episodic structure' because I'm fundamentally opposed to tv shows that think they're films. and look, I'm not going to write an entire film script treatment here, I just think a good writer can figure this stuff out. blood on the ducati is the framing device for everything else, simple. lots of animated floating eyes I reckon, first casey is watching valentino and then valentino is watching casey and the whole world is watching them... and it does bleed into real life just a little, where you're wondering whether casey is actually imagining/dreaming this stuff or valentino is or if they both know it somehow... you can get away with more ambiguity in animation. anyway, if you do want more thoughts on this one specifically for whatever reason, let me know because this one I do actually have more on

also laguna 2008 is a bit tortoise and the hare coded if you really think about it

[end of gore]

so. on to jorge. hm. the thing about jorge is that he was kinda writing a coming of age film in his own head, so like - yes, that's what you do go for? you can play it straight and follow how jorge has cast his rivals, or you can pin the whole narrative on the fact that jorge has cast them - the kinda artificiality of the narrative, the way jorge is this storyteller who isn't being recognised as much as he thinks he should be, isnt adequately appreciated. the way there's this three way discourse between what jorge thinks the story is and what the public thinks the story is and actual. you know. reality. I think this is a bit more light-hearted, like you know how the best stories about teenagers take their emotions seriously but also let them be kinda silly? because young people are silly! jorge was silly! he's got a lot of CHARM because he's so cocky and naive and full on and intense and awkward and kinda off-putting and tactless and a bit all over the place and so painfully, painfully young, like he's a good protagonist because that's a KID. but also, obviously there's also a lot of extremely not light-hearted bits of his story - everything about his father, his manager... idk this one's another one where, I don't just want to make it a generic sports biopic, and I'm trying to figure out the clear narrative arc here? I mean, you can point to the end of 2010 and really lean into him choosing victory on-track over popularity off it. the problem with 2010 is that it does not work as a dramatic season, yeah sure with the magic of biopics you can hack at it to shit but also. idk. what are we getting out of it. I think for narrative purposes you want to maybe narrow in, and end it at the end of 2008, with the switching of the numbers this kind of moment of emancipation? but also! this feels like we're straying a bit too far away from the fun sports elements and I don't want to REALLY suggest all the ways in which you could mine jorge's personal trauma in a jokey tumblr post, so I'm gonna move on from this one

the problem is 2015 just straight up doesn't work as a jorge-centric narrative, except in a very kinda comic way that leans into how absurd his role in that season was. 2012 as a season is a bit... y'know, it's fine. okay it's mostly terrible, but that's fine too. but it doesn't have a great narrative hook. which kinda leads you to the problem that I do think the valentino rivalry is more... juicy from jorge's pov, because for valentino, jorge is just kinda? an obstacle? idk he's more normal about it, it's just his job to destroy the guy, you know how it is. but also 2009 does work better narratively from valentino's pov, like it's the build up to catalunya specifically you can dramaticise... idk though, I do love catalunya but my heart isn't really in this exercise because I think valentino isn't really being... challenged here? it's a title fight where he's fundamentally using a set of tools he's already perfected, to beat a guy he doesn't really give a shit about. when the italian press is down on him pre catalunya, it doesn't spark any genuine self-doubt - it's just a handy source of extra motivation. there's no epic highs or lows that season, not real ones. and yes I know I was talking about making valentino who gets stabbed repeatedly to cover up an infection a moment ago, but that reflected real EMOTIONAL truths!! I'm committed to thematic fidelity more than I am to literal fidelity

genuinely I think the best way to tackle jorge is with the jorge/dani parallel journeys... what, film? tv show? maybe show actually - you don't have one coherent narrative Statement per se but you're constantly charting those journeys in reference to each other, really rooting it in their respective points of views, no neutral detached cinematic language like I want everything to be very much written to be from their eyes!! going from one to the other and back again. and you're charting these different journeys, right, and how they both captured different flavours of like... emotional successes and failures. I think it's actually about failure, yeah, about having to accept there's something you can't have and might never be able to get - whether that's universal love or a premier class title or whatever - but Actually, that might not be the end of the world. and during this process, they go from being enemies to tentative friends!! guys who realise they can maybe actually understand each other better than they thought!! this real moment of interpersonal connection. you have all these media narratives and the managers and so on and the fact they're competitors as these built in reasons why they've just been pitted against each other from the start... but y'know, again, it is also just a bit about maturing, about being able to set that aside, about making your peace with defeat and failure as an element of growing up. you can't win everything, maybe there's something you really really really want and you're just not going to get it, but at the end of the day it's kinda... yeah. self-acceptance. idk this is the nice one

so with marc you can go several different ways here I guess, and again he's also perfectly decent sports biopic material, probably second to casey in that category like yeah sure do the comeback story. but also, we do already have a very good self-produced documentary about what he thinks the narratives of his career are? idk this is also just a personal taste thing, I'll leave him to doing all the injury stuff himself, I don't have much to add there. we'll get to the obvious one in a second, but I was trying to figure out if there were other places I massively felt like you need the cinematic touch. and, again, the 2013 season is obviously very exciting!! but also, you have it covered in.,,,, multiple documentaries, I don't feel I have a take their either? his rivalries with dani and jorge aren't really substantive enough to sustain a bit of cinema. dovi... I mean, what are you saying there? what's the arc? I feel like if I tackled dovi, I'd go somewhere else and really go all in with the ducati stuff, and make it a bit more... you know, stark, stripped back, basically just the emotional component of how much he gave to that project and how he managed to beat away one rival after the next and how it all ended up falling apart in a kind of anti-climactic way? he's also good sports biopic material, but in a way I think the marc rivalry is the bit of his story I have the least to say on. so eg, 2017 is a dramatic season, but he's also kinda fine after it? he always knew it was a long shot, he tried his best and he got really close and then he lost. you can't amadeus it because dovi isn't (fictional) salieri. basically, I think what I'm saying here is that dovi is too well-adjusted to feature in this post. though I'd totally watch a film about his 250cc seasons, like it's a bit annoying because HE is the underdog who loses both title fights to jorge, but it'd still be kinda fun idk. I wouldn't really know what to do with the material but if someone made the film I'd absolutely watch it

right then. the thing about sepang 2015 is... yeah, sure, of course you can do it, it already exists as a narrative but... yeah, what are you adding!! idk I always think when you're adapting something, you kinda need to have a reason for it? I mean, what are you doing that's not already there in the footage? idk maybe this is just a sign of having been a fan of this sport for one too many years but to me the idea of sepang 2015 can get a bit boring (or maybe just repetitive) where I need a new TAKE on it to really get into the idea of fictionalising it. like where's the auteur's touch y'know, what can I still add to this!! but it also needs to WORK for someone who is new to the story, which kinda just makes you want to tell the story straight.... y'know the story is strong enough and COMPLICATED enough to stand on its own and it IS good but I don't really have anything interesting to say beyond 'yeah sure that'e be neat'. I can't tell you why, but I also don't think the casey approach quite works here? the idea of providing a framing device with which valentino and marc can actually talk to each other... eh. don't like that. hm. okay wait actually I just turned it around in my head for... a while and I think I've got an idea to make the worst motorcycle racing film of all time. so, my central stupid film-making gimmick here is just. centring the fact we're completely reliant on a few guys and what they're telling us in making up our minds, and our removal from that story and the imperfection of their perceptions and so on. so I think you kinda make a point of... not actually showing the motorcycle racing? like, you always show it by showing other people watching it, you're showing the tv screen rather than the actual racing. even in the cinematic medium, you're centring the theatrical aspects, where you drill it down to just a few characters. valentino. marc. uccio. marc's fuck ass manager. maybe a crew chief or two. keep it limited though, all the others are kept at a distance - you're constantly focusing in on the same few characters. and very early on you basically just like... get them to fourth wall break by telling you, the viewer, with their actual words how racing works for them, what meaning they take out of it - and again it's this remove because we're never allowed to actually feel the racing for ourselves (no helmet cams), and it sets up that as the tragedy unfolds, again and again we're just hearing from them what happened. it's all zoomed in on how claustrophobic the entire situation is, like doing the race direction room after the sepang 2015 is perfect for that kind of thing, and crucially they're only ever addressing the audience because they can't address each other. but fourth wall breaks also obviously draw attention to artificiality! I realise they are very much like, lame gimmick central, but also are these men not inherently about lame gimmicks... idk it's basically the same story but at least it feels like a kinda interesting way of telling it. kinda trite, but cinema allows you to get to the point and let valentino actually play with the camera... so literally take it into his own hands and lead it around and tell the story from his point of view. and you can play with how they do both change in what stories they think they're telling, how they're constantly revising their own stories, how their stories completely clash with each other... like. make them literal narrators. that's my pitch

so. one interesting pattern that has come up with my approaches to these rivalries is that with the exception maybe of the 2015 stuff, I feel like I'm more naturally inclined to treat valentino as a narrative device and centre his rivals. a big part of this is that valentino is a fantastic narrative device. he's kinda. this looming presence in every narrative in this sport where you can just sort of use him as a sort of way to poke away at all these other riders. the monster everyone loves who you are trapped with. BOO!! he's gonna eat you! which is fun! but ALSO, crucially, several of these rivalries aren't that emotionally challenging for him!! again, with casey right, he wants to beat him, but he's not having a crisis of faith over losing to casey. he thinks casey is annoying, he wants to beat him because he wants to win. valentino is casey's foil, but casey is not valentino's. valentino makes for an excellent personal antagonist to casey, but the reverse just isn't true. casey isn't forcing valentino to reexamine his approach except 'ramping up the levels of being a dick on-track' - like, yes, that's a serious competitive challenge, but also valentino is very comfortable in his own skin in that rivalry. sure, you could have valentino have some kind of massive revelation about the casey rivalry, but like. he doesn't in canon. he changes his behaviour towards casey in pretty predictable ways depending on what the relationship demands from his perspective at any given time. there's nothing more there

now, obviously you know where I'm going here. there IS a rivalry where you can make the argument he changes as a result of it, there IS a rivalry that tips him over the line and makes him to do stuff he hadn't done before that, there IS a rivalry that happens to coincide with a period of his competitive life that challenges him both personally and professionally. now, look, I have already talked about the sete rivalry. you know what I think about this rivalry - and if you don't, I really already have told the story here and here and here and here and also here. I think this works perfectly well as a narrative in its own right, and it's one you can tell from either perspective... but you kinda need both. I think again you probably naturally lean towards starting it from sete's perspective and that first proper meeting (I mean, idk if it is their first actual meeting, but it's the logical obvious place you start this story) with sete giving valentino advice during his first 500cc test and valentino just, y'know, ignoring him and being a cocky shit and then crashing. so you get to see sete being kinda exasperated by the whole thing. also, obviously ibiza is like, a key framing device here, like it's the most obvious in-your-face way of tracking their relationship with each other. I don't actually know how often they partied there together, but it must have been at least twice and if the commentators are to be believed it must have included 2003. artistic license and you can add one or two more times, but mainly you want to focus in on 2003 onwards right. so you've got this 2002 one where it's, y'know, high point of their friendship and in the name of narrative efficiency, you establish here that sete is looking to make the honda switch. the emphasis is on how valentino has been winning everything but on the flip side you're getting the first insight into his discontent. and there's a bit of a vibe of, what could you possibly have to complain about? like you are winning so much? so it's late one night where they've had this slightly unguarded alcohol-fuelled moment of genuine vulnerability but in the end it's actually characterised by how... unsubstantial the link between them is, because they wouldn't talk about this kind of thing with each other and they might both be similar in some ways but also don't gettttttt each other. it means you can return there as a location in 2003, where you've just had sachsenring and valentino's dramatic loss but they're still partying together and it's like. obviously In The Air that not everything is quite right... their relationship is already gradually altered and twisted because you're introducing this element of actual stakes and competition (obviously in 2004 they do NOT spend that time together, as far as we know anyway, and you can show them being very much not together at ibiza as a very obvious Oooh Things Will Fall Apart and maybe already haveeee)

and I do think basically I've already said what I think the themes here are,,,, several times by this point, so I'm not going to belabour the point. I think all of this fundamentally works as a narrative with like, minimal massaging and rearranging of the elements for dramatic effect. it's all there already, everything from sete's arc with the [insert non-tasteless way of covering a real life tragedy that fundamentally alters the course of sete's career] and how that leads to sete becoming the challenger and how he does want to win and his eventual downfall. with valentino, you have the element of liberation and self-discovery and... well, growing into your own but also kinda having the narrative drawing attention to how 'growing into your own' can involve becoming a fully realised character who is essentially quite cruel? you have this kind of... build up, right, towards this moment of revelation, where you lay bare who these two people actually ARE at sepang 2004, and then again at jerez 2005. valentino has gone his own way, he has freed himself from the chains of honda, he has embraced individualism and the chance to define himself and his own legacy and stand on his own two feet and not rely on the strongest bike or all this stuff within honda where they chose him as their flag bearer, for better or for worse... like he comes to his own here! he takes the step from 'great rider' to 'legend' because he gets to this dramatic moment of stepping into the unknown, he takes this massive risk that could have cost him so much, and it ends up elevating him. but it also puts him under duress, and in that moment he reveals himself - whatever sete did or did not do at qatar 2004, EVEN IF sete did all that shit, what you are left with is valentino vowing to ruin this man. valentino uses sete to make himself 'better', to fuel himself as a competitor. valentino turns sete into a tool in his own story. and again, thematically you've got all this stuff about how sete was managing the image of the rivalry and how valentino took advantage of that - how sete needed it to remain respectful and valentino was completely willing to abandon that. like, you have two protagonists who really are similar in quite a few ways, who think they have this shared understanding with each other, but when it comes down to it? they end up being super painfully different

now I can go on about this and how to play it straight, basically, you can just do that rivalry and I think it'd be cool and fun and very easy to arrange in a good narrative way. BUT I've kind of already. done that. like I don't want to suggest a film that is basically a nicer version of my tumblr posts. so I want to take this in a slightly different direction, and I think what we need to consider with this rivalry is this: what if you made the curse literal? basically, what's always kinda charmed me about this rivalry is that the curse should not work and all the misfortune that befalls sete after that is so comical that it's kinda... what do you do with that? and the answer is you just lean all the way in. my pitch is this: what if valentino sells his soul to the devil?

so, you know faust, right, and you know the bit at the start of goethe's faust where god and mephistopheles are basically making a wager over how corruptible this one human is. and faust is like... he's kinda disillusioned, he feels that everything he's dedicated his life to in academia is fundamentally hollow, gets very close to committing suicide. and faust has gone a bit new age-y, gotten into all this mystical shit and he's got this pentagram that ends up preventing mephistopheles from leaving his presence in their first meeting... and basically what the devil can give him is like, the chance to attain some true pleasure, and for that faust is willing to bet everything - so if faust can just have that, then maybe eternal damnation is worth it. and look, I'm not going to summarise the entire plot of faust here and it does go off the wall a bit with all the gretchen stuff, but the point is you have this version of the devil who is fundamentally a cynic and is attempting to win an argument with god by making this human succumb to his own nihilism. and what faust basically does is like, abandon his normal life where he's trying to live by normal virtues and goes off on this journey with the devil. and there's this little moment where mephistopheles,,, pretends to be faust and takes on the role of an academic adviser (you know how it is) and seduces this random student away from the word of god and sends him down a wretched path, which ends with this bit:

like, a big part of faust's tragedy is supposed to be about... well, hubris, of the relationship of god to man, of no longer being afraid of the devil... and obviously, this is all framed very much in terms of religion, but at the end of the day it's also about, you know, having purpose - faust is living a life that no longer has any meaning to him, all of his knowledge and studies now no longer fill the void inside himself. his nihilism opens the door for mephistopheles, and is what makes him willing to accept the devil's terms. now, and I am so very sorry to goethe here, I think we have some material we can use here to explore the valentino/sete rivalry. obviously, you can't do a one-to-one, you need to get rid of some of like, the depression and all that - there were times when valentino was feeling 'a bit low' in 2003, but not 'faust thinking everything he'd done in his entire life was pointless' low, yeah? also, unless you want to do a real long view here and even then it can't really be justified, there obviously isn't really a 'tragedy' here from valentino's perspective. like, he wins! this isn't valentino's tragedy, it's sete's! I was being a bit facetious when I said he was 'selling his soul to the devil', and you can kinda parse mephistopheles' motivations in different ways depending on what flavour and what interpretation of him you're dealing with here. you don't 'damn' valentino, you essentially just turn him into a tool of the devil!

so, this is how this works out in my head: the devil works more broadly as the manifestation of competitive impulses, the kind of 'how far would you go to win' question as a bloke who shows up and literally talks to the characters about it (magic of cinema). he's also engaging with valentino feeling like his victories no longer having meaning, with being disconnected from honda and from the entire culture there and just feeling like he's going through the motions. there's this element of like... opening the door to what is essentially a journey of self-actualisation, bringing him closer to being a 'god' but also allowing him to fully come into his own and become himself. to win on his own terms. I reckon ibiza is my preferred narrative device where the devil talks both to sete and valentino there (separately), first literally as a mysterious stranger and then... maybe not? he's talking to them at times of their lives when they're not at ibiza and it's not happening there in the physical world and they both end up kinda having to confront they're dealing with some potentially malevolent supernatural entity. but the important elements of the devil is that a) he's not going to do anything the humans don't actually ask for themselves, and b) everyone knows he's following his own agenda and you should be careful of the requests you make of him. so it's kinda like... essentially, the backdrop of this rivalry unfolding is they're constantly being challenged to decide what lines they're willing to cross. which culminates at qatar... and maybe you do have sete making like. a teensy mistake. a teensy error in judgement, one that is both real and deliberate but he could not have known would get that reaction and instantly regrets. and valentino, who is I think inherently sceptical of the devil coming to offer to help him and maybe does crank out the pentagrams (remember, the whole point of faust is that he was too arrogant to be scared of the devil, or one of the points anyway), in a moment of fury does decide - no, actually. I will take that step. I will curse sete. now the thing is, dramatically this is a teensy bit tricky because when you're talking about being damned by the devil, usually the consequences are a bit more severe than 'not winning a motorcycle race again' (yes, you can get into how sete did also seem genuinely cursed after that, cf his ambulance/bus crash situation, but again we are flirting with being in poor taste in this tumblr post). but the thing is, right, you have to lean into the silliness here! qatar 2004 is inherently silly, a CURSE is inherently silly, like real life is already silly here! you have to engage with the people where they are, and for these athletes all this shit is so heightened that the emotions are full on. like, valentino would've sold that guy to the devil! and to him not winning another race is basically the worst thing that can happen

so, obviously, you get to do the actual curse stuff. curses are inherently campy fun, the devil doing curses is campy fun, getting valentino rossi to crank out the pentagrams is inherently campy fun. you get to play around with this, right, like you know that bit in the brno 2005 race commentary where the commentators are talking about how valentino might as well have a little radio to talk into sete's helmet to remind him of how sete had fucked up at the sachsenring. OBVIOUSLY obviously obviously it is just so... idk scrunchy and fun to have this idea of valentino becoming a malevolent enough force to literally do that.... like damn the commentators did kinda eat with that?? ughhhhhh do you ever think about sete leading the qatar 2005 race for most of the way???? like that's SO fucked up because you literally have articles from about the race going 'hey maybe sete can break his curse' and then the commentators are talking about curses having one year expiration dates but obviously they!! do not!!!!! there's one race where sete goes off track and the commentators are talking about how valentino will surely have smiled into his helmet like that's so fucked!! it's so fucked!! but idk I think basically you have all this creeping curse-y stuff and devil stuff and then you get this twist and then it just becomes misery zone for sete until you sort of. compress the timeline and have him retire without getting into what happened at the end of 2006. and valentino just relishing in all his very worst emotions. and you've got sete who was the better man after jerez 2005, who took the high ground again and again and again and it did NOTHING for him.... and then he's cursed and his career is finished and the devil has had his fun getting mixed in with mid noughties motogp. and now obviously this is inherently kinda dumb and corny and silly but it's the devil!! mephistopheles to me is allowed to get up to dumb shit sometimes, let him have some fun!! idk I like curses being literal idc

I think the obvious critique here is 'this doesn't really feel like it gets the message of faust'. which, yes, is true - and obviously the way narratives are structured, a satisfying resolution isn't 'well selling your soul kinda slaps, actually'. and my statement to respond to this argument is as follows:

this is essentially canonically what happened. valentino DID do something kinda evil and it DID work out 100% for him and it DID kinda slap. at least when you add in the devil, you're making explicit the bit where it is a little bit bad. also, is sports not inherently about selling your soul for success... the story of valentino and sete is essentially about how we are twisted by competition, how pretending that we don't wish ill to our opponents is inherently dishonest. it is about lifting a facade for something that is already inherently there in the souls of men. this is obviously inherently a deeply cynical stance, but this is also a deeply cynical story beyond all the fun battles and camp dramatics. the devil is a cynic and he is basically the point of view character of goethe's faust - he's the one who is positioned closest to the audience. sports is all about living out some of humanity's worst instincts in a relatively low stakes setting, which means we get a free pass to have fun with a deeply cynical story that goes 'maybe selling your soul to the devil is fine, actually'

do I stand by this stance? not really, but the whole fun of storytelling is that sometimes you can just be kinda mean. I think goethe would get it... you can tell which character he enjoyed writing the most

the OTHER way you can do this is centre everything around qatar 2004 as like,,, the mystery box element...... okay look I have now made two posts that go WAY too deep on the 'what really happened' element but I do loveeeeee the whole thing like I would just make a film about that very end of the season and we show it from all these different angles as different characters narrate what happened... like fuck all the riders I want to hear from whichever mechanic used the scooter... the gresini mechanic who gave evidence to race direction.... various honda higher ups the crew chiefs like this is jb vs juan martinez it's war!!! obviously you still have the same emotional/thematic hooks as the general rivalry does but idk I would have a LOT of fun figuring out how to structure that, I loveeee mysteries... maybe I'd write it as a mockumentary yeah..... this one's just fun

anyway. a lot of stuff going on in this post, huh! you can probably tell I didn't edit this much. my classic tell when I edit my tumblr posts is I remember how 'paragraphs' work. unfortunately all I have energy for are like. a bunch of rants about things in my brain. I think when tumblr tells you that you've reached the maximum number of characters per paragraph and you need to figure out where to put a break, it's probably a bad thing? on the whole, my stance is I don't have anything AGAINST mildly fictionalised versions, but for me I'm always more of a.... well I want to take advantage of the full specificity of the events as they happened or just come up with a completely original story. kind of person. I know this ask probably wasn't looking for my 'what if you bled out valentino as he's strung up above a red motorcycle' vision but yeah. with a lot of biopics I'm always a bit 'well you could just read about this couldn't you' like I need stuff to take some kind of a stance on the material it's using... all my stuff takes a stance. that's all I've got. obviously all these stances mean that basically none of these things could ever be made. and I know what I said above but if they called me up to write the casey stoner biopic script treatment, I would also do that. if you've actually read to this point, give me a shout - you're a real one and I love you

#spec tag #casey's power is such that after half a decade of having weird hang-ups about valentino #he finally got valentino to have weird hang-ups about him #like sometimes u get these comments where ur like... huh casey doesn't this feel. a bit much. like this is a bit much #and then valentino sees it and goes????? wow FUCK this guy. and then they just keep doing it. like adults #this is the thing right. if i'd broken my leg and the main things one of my two biggest rivals says about me in those months is #a) 'the race in britain was so much nicer because that guy's fans weren't there :)'#and b) 'idk why everyone's making such a big deal about this guy being immediately fast on his extremely premature return'#'it's just a leg break he probably only lost some muscle mass'#i think i'd probably also be a bit ?? especially since the rivalry really wasn't THAT bad before 2010 it really wasn't!!#but then by 2011 casey managed to completely fry valentino's brain and it just goes off the CLIFF like it is so!! undignified!!#it's funny because it's definitely the rivalry valentino got over the quickest #but in terms of sheer hit rate of insults. like just raw frequency. when they were going at it. this ranks number one in vale feuds!!#(btw a big GLARING tell that the marc thing is weird and special is that he is *right* on the opposite end of the spectrum)#(like i think this can be tricky for people to clock but it's actually Notable how little day to day conflict those two had post 2015)#and obviously casey's still not over it. which again is DEEPLY understandable but also a littleeeeee bit funny (love you casey)#the way he still yaps on about jerez 2011!! a racing incident in the wet!! like it is kinda... well yeah. funny. when you contextualise it #idk it's just cute to me how they had completely different experiences of that rivalry #to the point where they just don't Get what's going on for the other guy. they just don't get it!!#hitherto unknown levels of 'what is this guy's PROBLEM' it's so!! they're so!!#this is how you get casey talking about wanting to explain his pov of the rivalry to valentino over dinner. this is how you get that #and it still wouldn't work!! isn't that amazing. they're going to go to their graves being vaguely baffled by the other guy's deal #//#brr brr #i put all my best analysis in tags for a read more x2 post. this one's for the real ones. all two of you #casey has a shorter sample size of a career to work with but do NOT get it twisted that is my number one girl!! my beautiful sister #my poor troubled neurotic paranoid delicate prodigy conspiracy theorist magical girl anime protagonist #casey would have an aneurysm if he read those words but is that not. the point #luminous yellow tag

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foone · 1 year ago

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Think about the experience of time as a robot girl, through the metaphor of how we use laptops.

You wake up for the first time with your young master, a college present. You're with them every day, powering off each night to charge. Being powered off is just dreamless sleep: a discontinuity. Every morning you wake up, your click syncs, and you know it's the next day. Maybe you miss a day or two: your master went out partying and ended up sleeping on a couch, until they rushedly wake you up before Monday classes begin. You even missed a whole week once when they went on a hiking trip with a new boyfriend.

You help them research upgrades when your specs get outdated. You place the order and a couple days later they power you off, and you wake up feeling like your head got bigger, on the inside. You can think of more things at once.

They repair you. They swap a new hand in when you accidentally crush it in a door, but when your left leg's servos go out, they send you to a repair shop. They power you off as you look up at them, and you wake up hours later. A strange man tells you to extend your left leg, then contract it. He frowns and re-oils some inner mechanism. You do it again, quieter and smoother this time. He nods, and reaches for your switch. The last thing you see before powering down is your own chest cavity with a series of wires hooked into your diagnostic ports, and your missing right leg sitting on a side table. You wake up again back at the dorms, your clock jumping forward a day, an asset tag still looped around your neck. Your master is happy to see you again.

This goes on, but the upgrades slow. There's only so much you can do to keep an old unit working. Eventually you develop more issues: one of your ocular sensors glitches and they don't make that model anymore, so your master just disables it. You spend a while searching ebay for replacement CND batteries and finally get a refurbished model from South England, but it turns out the EU models run on a different frequency, so it won't work. You're limited to fewer and fewer hours a day, and you start skipping more days.

The last time you remember waking up with your master there, there's also someone else in the room. Another robot girl. A newer model, with the new chassis and the Substrate energy packs. They asks you to copy your memories together onto a memory card, and you do. You want to say goodbye, but apparently your vocal synthesizer has been unplugged. You hand them the card, and they hand it to the new robot. Your master tells them to load the memories into her core bank, and she's says "yes sir!" in your voice. Ahh. That's where your voice synth went.

They power you off, and you don't dream.

You wake in a strange place. You're on a shelf, and there's other things scattered around you. An unknown voice days "yep, it seems it powers on. 400 credits, though? Without a voice and only one working eye? Man, value bin doesn't know how to price anything!" and before the blackness falls your clock finishes synching: it's been 7 months since you last were awake.

It happens a few more times. Different voices, different times, different piles of junk piled around and sometimes on you.

You awake again in a warehouse and someone tells you to smile. Your other ocular sensor went out so you can't really see them, just their vague shape from the lidar. The freestanding shelves around you seem to stretch into infinity. You hear a bitcrushed shutter sound sample a few times, and they pull a connector out of your chest as a diagnostic completes. It's been three years, five months, eight days, two hours, 27 minutes and 14 seconds since you last saw your master. Your GPS says you're a few cities over. They hit your power switch, and you sleep.

You wake up in a cluttered room, sitting on a bench. You look into the eyes of a person with frizzled hair and large glasses. She couldn't look happier. Your new ocular sensors are mismatched in color but you're happy to see again, in more than shapes and distant silhouettes. Your battery alerts as... Missing? You spot it on the desk next to a soldering iron and some electronic tool you can't identify.

Your voice synth is still missing, but this new woman is digging around in a large plastic bin, and comes up with one. She goes to insert it, and it can't connect. She slaps her hand and goes rooting around another bin and comes back with an adapter. She slots it into your chest and your voice returns. You thank her, and there's that moment of dissociation as your voice doesn't sound like "you". Too deep, and the accent is for a different dialect entirely. But you can talk again. She tells you to call her Cara, not Mistress. She's almost got your battery working again, she had to rebuild it nearly from scratch, but she's excited to get you working again. You're a rare model, and she doesn't see units like you in working order very often. Your clock syncs. It's been 17 years.

Your mistr-- Cara is soldering next to you, attaching a controller to the battery. She says she's got a new set of servos on the way, and she's excited to get you back to full working condition. You smile, knowing what it is to be loved, once again.

#robot girls #Robotgirls #My writing

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mokulule · 6 months ago

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While I fail to focus after my night shift have a peek at another of my brain worms

Untitled, I am still waiting for that moment of divine inspiration. Ship: Dead on Main (Danny/Jason) Fandom: DP x DC

The only sounds in the Batcave were the bats chittering amongst themselves high above. Bruce rubbed his chin absently as he took in the information displayed on the large screens with narrowed eyes. Something wasn’t adding up. Somebody was lying.

No matter how many times he looked over the information, that was his conclusion. It nagged at him that he didn’t know what, if any, information he could use. He hated being so in the dark.

A silent notification in the corner of his screen alerted him to a call from the Watchtower. He took it and Superman’s face appeared in a smaller rectangle on the center of the screen. Bruce kept outwardly placid but from behind the cowl nobody would see the way his gaze instantly zeroed in on the massive black eye Superman had acquired, and the general strain around his unhurt eye and mouth. He was worn out.

“Phantom has been apprehended,” Superman said with a long sigh. It had clearly not been an easy fight.

“I’ll be there,” Batman said and ended the call. Maybe they’d finally get some real answers.

He stood and walked towards the zeta tube. Another call came in, this time on the comm in his cowl.

“Hood,” he greeted.

“Hey, old man. I’m at the location. You were right it’s absolutely crawling with the white suits and their weaponry is not like anything I’ve seen before.”

Bruce felt like a hand squeezed his heart. Hood out of anyone knew his weapons, if he didn’t know them they weren’t on the market. He absolutely hated asking any of his kids to walk into an unknown situation. Unfortunately he didn’t have any other options.

“Be careful, Hood.”

“Aww, is that worry I detect?”

“Just don’t take unnecessary risks,” Bruce cautioned.

“You wouldn’t have asked me if you didn’t think it was necessary, old man. Don’t worry, I’ll get you your intel.”

Bruce grunted. Jason was right. He wouldn’t have asked if he didn’t think it was important. Didn’t mean he had to like it, nor the fact that Red Hood’s criminal reputation made him perfect for breaking into a government building; even if Hood was seen the Justice League kept plausible deniability.

Everyone knew Red Hood was a wild card.

“Check in regularly with Oracle.”

He could practically feel the way Jason rolled his eyes at him.

“Not my first rodeo, B.”

With that the connection cut off. Bruce couldn’t help the bad feeling he had about everything.

He really hated this stage of an investigation.

Two months ago the US government contacted the Justice League about a problem. Several bases of a government agency named the GIW had been hit by a malicious creature they called Phantom. The attacks had been gaining in severity and frequency and their measures had so far failed to stop it.

Since then, a member of the Justice League had arrived too late to five such attacks. They’d stood no chance against Phantom, who’d then disappeared, living up to the name.

To their eyes Phantom was outwardly a humanoid, possibly a meta or alien. The GIW called him a ghost from a different dimension.

They had been at a loss of how exactly to contain such a powerful foe, who not only could go toe to toe with their heavy hitters like Superman, but also disappear by means unknown. This time they’d been prepared. They’d had various team configurations ready to go depending on who was available.

Something that seemed to have paid off, but Bruce did not like that Clark was injured. Because if Clark was injured…

A zeta tube ride later and he met Superman on the Watchtower. Something that hadn’t been apparent on the call was the sling Superman’s left arm was in. Another visible injury added to the swollen eye.

“Is everyone alright?” He had to ask.

“Nobody’s permanently hurt.” Clark hurried to assure as they started walking towards the interrogation room, but there was a but. Bruce kept his stare steady until Clark tiredly elaborated: “But nobody got out the fight unscathed. John won’t be walking for a while. J’onn is suffering from psychic backlash. Diana has some broken ribs and scrapes and you can see my own wounds. Everyone is tired, it was a long fight.”

Batman’s lips thinned. At least there had been no casualties.

Almost as if reading his mind. Superman added quietly.

“We got there while the base was still standing. Phantom made eye contact with me for a moment, before he unleashed this… sonic attack…” His face turned pained, as he looked for words that came halting. “It was a scream, I can’t describe it, it felt- it felt like I was dying. None of us could get close.”

Superman looked away.

“When it was over the base was gone, eradicated, like the others. There was just a large crater. Who knows how many people were still in there.”

Bruce set a hand on his friend’s shoulder. It was never easy to deal with casualties.

“The one good thing about it was that the scream seemed to drain quite a bit of energy from him.” Clark barked a laugh, short and hysterical. Bruce knew Clark would have rather faced Phantom at full power if it meant more people had lived.

“And still it was all we could do to subdue him. We barely won.”

They barely won. Superman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern and Martian Manhunter, and they barely won. The knowledge sat like a heavy ball in Bruce’s chest.

Now, maybe they could get intel that wasn’t most reluctantly handed over by a government agency, that didn’t even want to reveal what their alphabet soup name was an abbreviation of. “We had to turn off the ‘Ghost Shield’ to get Phantom inside the base, so we at least know it works, even if for some reason it doesn’t protect the GIW bases,” Superman remarked.

Bruce hnn’ed to show he’d heard. It was one more discrepancy among many.

Batman entered the observation room with Superman at his back. Wonder Woman was there and he quickly took in her unusually disheveled appearance, she looked tired and uncomfortable, shaken (but whole, safe). He nodded in greeting and she gave him a tight smile in return. He turned to the observation window and felt his breath stick in his throat.

Phantom was-

The glitchy footage they’d managed to get on earlier encounters couldn’t have prepared him. Bruce felt his jaw clench. Phantom looked young. There was still a hint of baby fat stubbornly clinging to his cheeks. He was short and wiry like Tim but maybe a bit younger than Jason, technically an adult, but to Bruce he still looked painfully young. The overall glowing and the slowly seeping green wound at his hairline didn’t take away just how human he looked.

Bruce looked at Phantom and saw a kid. Worse, supposedly a dead kid, a ghost, if the most basic of their intel was to be believed, which even that he wasn’t entirely sure of.

A weight was heavy on his shoulders. He had to remind himself that he had found evidence of Phantom throughout history and if a ghost was truly what he was, he was most likely a very old, very powerful spirit, for whom age didn’t matter. It would be a mistake to trust the youthful appearance.

He was chained to the chair both by wide cuffs at his wrists and ankles so he could only move very little. The cuffs were the best they had when it came to meta power suppression cuffs with some added ghost specific sigils courtesy of Zatanna’s research. She would have liked Constantine to look them over too as that sort of thing was more his area of expertise, but he’d been off on one of his extra-dimensional missions since long before this started and they hadn’t been able to contact him.

The cuffs kept Phantom here in any case and he didn’t look happy about it. His lips were a flat line and the thick black brows were drawn together over narrowed green eyes. His head was held high (stubbornness? Pride?), chin tilted in a way that showed off a bright green-purple line around his throat, which had it been red and on a human would have looked like rope burn-

Bruce looked to Diana and he suddenly understood part of her discomfort.

“He was about to use another sonic attack, I didn’t see any other way.” Her words were quiet, regretful, but she faced his gaze head on. Bruce nodded. She never would have used the lasso like that under normal circumstances. It was incredibly worrying how much it had taken to subdue him.

For a moment the three of them just stood there in silence, watching Phantom watch the door.

It was finally time for answers.

Bruce didn’t make any outward sign that he was about to move, but of course Clark caught on even before he’d moved, stepping aside letting Bruce take point. They went into the interrogation room, Diana staying back to observe and be ready with security measures, they didn’t know for sure would even work.

They entered the room and immediately sharp green eyes locked onto him. There was a quick glance towards Superman, but the eyes quickly focused back on Batman. There was a calculating sort of intelligence behind those eyes.

That was one question immediately answered, but it was one he could have inferred. It was very hard to believe the claim that this “ghost” was non-sentient, when he specifically targeted the bases of a specific government agency and nothing else. Though of course they could have had something that attracted the ghost, but nobody could look at Phantom and think non sentient.

Now the question was, why?

Bruce sat down in one of the chairs on the other side of the table from Phantom. Clark had a moment’s pause before he joined them. Bruce pulled out a tablet from underneath his cape and laid it carefully out on the table, turning it on. At this point most people in the room with the Batman would have started getting nervous, but evidently not Phantom. He was still just passively defiant, not to mention he hadn’t yet said a word.

“Phantom, is that your preferred manner of address?” Bruce decided to start out neutral.

There was a glitter of amusement in green eyes and the barest uptick of his lips, but he remained silent. Bruce could do silence.

The silence stretched between them until Clark broke it.

“Why do you destroy those bases?”

Phantom glanced to Clark and his earnest question, then back to Bruce, barely raising an eyebrow, like as if to say “really, this the best you can do?” Bruce resisted the urge to sigh. Clark was usually a better foil for him at interrogations, but then most people didn’t choose total silence.

Bruce decided to be frank with him.

“We are trying to understand your motivation. That’s all.” He studied Phantom’s face which had settled into a stony glare. “But first I’d just like to know if it’s alright to call you Phantom and what your pronouns are? We have been using he/him based on your appearance but you might have another preference?”

The glare softened a bit and for a moment Bruce actually thought he’d lured a response out of him, but Phantom just looked away. Incidentally drawing attention to the line at his throat. A sudden thought occurred to him.

“Are you so hurt, that you’re unable to speak?”

Phantom slowly looked back at him. He seemed to actually be contemplating giving some sort of answer.

That’s when his comm clicked on barely audible.

“The GIW has been in contact,” Diana informed him quietly over the comms. Phantom stiffened across from him, his gaze narrowing like a cat - so they could add enhanced hearing to his powers. “They are requesting we hand over Phantom.”

Bruce looked straight at Phantom as he spoke, “They have no jurisdiction in space. I presume you declined?”

“Of course.”

Phantom’s face turned unreadable for a moment. His gaze went from him, to Superman and the opaque glass that hid the observation room. Finally he huffed.

“Phantom, he/him is fine.” His voice had an echoey quality to it.

It seemed they were finally going somewhere.

They were not going somewhere.

Even hours later Phantom kept up his silence. They’d held several breaks. Phantom had been offered food and water but had declined nonverbally.

They were going in circles, trying the same questions again and again. Prolonged silence didn’t help any either.

If only J’onn was an option, but he was already suffering from psychic backlash from trying to go into Phantom’s mind during the fight.

So far the only things Bruce could add to the certain facts were that Phantom was sentient, intelligent and didn’t like the GIW to the point that he would commit mass murder to take them down.

And Bruce would just really like to know why? Because with the kinds of powers he’d shown off he could have easily killed the members of the Justice League sent to apprehend him. He seemed to have no qualms about killing, yet he’d stayed his hands?

Bruce had hoped that meant Phantom considered them at least somewhat neutral in this conflict. But apparently not neutral enough to talk to.

Clark had tried and Diana had tried. Nothing helped.

Bruce was considering his options, when the door opened.

“B, I need to speak with you.” That was Tim, he looked pale. Something had happened. Bruce got up, Clark following. Bruce decidedly ignored the sudden curiosity from Phantom. They closed the door and walked down the hall. When Bruce felt they were far enough from Phantom he stopped.

“Red Robin, report.”

“We’ve lost contact with Hood.”

Bruce’s heart dropped cold into his stomach. No. It couldn’t be.

“When?”

“Two hours ago is when he last checked in. He’s since missed several check-ins.” Tim’s hands tightened into fists at his sides. “Could be he’s just not in a position to respond, or they have scramblers in the base.”

It was likely, in fact very likely that was the case with how secretive the GIW were being, but two hours were a long time to miss check-ins. Clark’s hand landed on his shoulder which he only now realized how tense was, but no, now was not the time to relax or calm down. He shrugged Clark’s hand off and stalked back down the hall.

The GIW were mum about any details. There was only one person who could tell them what Jason was facing in that building.

He burst into the interrogation room and slammed his hands on the table. That got Phantom’s attention his eyes widening before narrowing and his lips splitting in a snarl that showed off fangs, but Bruce sneered right back.

“We lost contact with an agent sent to infiltrate a GIW-base, you will tell me what you know about them, or so help me I will make you wish you stayed in that dimension you came from.”

“Batman, please, maybe you should step out-“ Clark began good hand hovering shy of Bruce, but he was interrupted by the bark of laughter coming from Phantom.

And then he laughed and laughed and laughed.

Bruce punched him. Clark pulled him back.

Phantom slowly turned his head back to look at them, working his jaw.

“There we have it after all. Your true colors: attacking a chained up captive.” He wiggled his fingers drawing attention to the wide thick cuffs dwarfing his wrists. His eyes held only cold judgment. “But don’t worry, Batman, your agent has nothing to fear from the GIW unless they are dead.”

Bruce couldn’t help the flinch and he felt Clark do the same. Something in the very air stilled then, making it hard to breathe.

“You,” Phantom began standing up, right out of the restraints as if they weren’t there, “are going to explain to me what that reaction means…“ He carefully put his hands down on the table and leaned forward in a way that made it very apparent he was holding himself back. He glared holes into Bruce’s skull with blazing green eyes. “Unless you want your agent back in pieces.”

Psssst. this is actually the beginning of the fic where this is from (CW: relatively graphic aftermath of vivisection)

So basically Phantom is public enemy number one, or at least top of the US government and GIW's shit list XD Huh, "Wanted: Dead or Alive", might actually be a pretty fun title, what do you guys think?

#dp x dc #dead on main #wanted dead or alive #maybe

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awaytobeunshaken · 1 month ago

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I really appreciate how they've been handling death and resurrection in LOVM. Especially coming to most of campaign 1 after campaign 2, the frequency of successful resurrection rituals felt a bit hard to swallow. (In campaign 2 every resurrection apart from the last one was via revivify, which just hits different somehow. Like an 'only mostly dead' kind of situation.)

Now I understand the meta reasons for this (they didn't have a cleric on-site in most of those cases), and it was at one point at least addressed in the fiction, but it still pulls me out of the story a bit. Ultimately, resurrection felt cheap.

There's a clear effort to undo that with the show. Vex is brought back specifically due to Vax's offer to the Raven Queen. Grog doesn't die to Craven Edge, he loses his strength. Scanlan's in a coma right now, but he wasn't killed. And Percy is dead, and treated as such, with no talk of potentially bringing him back.

Because how at odds would that be with scenes of laying the dragon attack's victims to rest in Whitestone, with seeing all the lives that were lost in the assault on Emon. Especially when Percy would rather they save any one of those souls over his.

Now I'm sure we're going to see Percy again; I doubt they would make that big a departure from the story. I suspect it's going to be tied to the fact that Ripley, and more importantly Orthax, are still at large. But it's not going to be cheap, and it's not going to be easy, and while emotionally I miss the terrible tinkerer of Tal'Dorei and wish he was in these last couple episodes, this is absolutely the right decision.

#critical role #tlovm #the legend of vox machina #cr1 #vox machina #tlovm spoilers

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peachesofteal · 10 months ago

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The Pit

2/2

Ghost/Soap/female reader 4.7k words - AO3 Warnings-tags: 18+ MDNI, dubious consent. Smut - M/M/F. Forced breeding and kink (but we're soft). Medical inaccuracies. The Pit by Silversun Pickups. Misery inspired. Horror-ish. Whump. Caretaking. Imprisonment/kidnapping. Forced comfort. Addiction. Feelings of fear, panic, anxiety, hopelessness. Simon calls the shots.

It’s snowing.

The forest floor is covered in thick, white cotton, heavier than cement. It sticks to your clothes, your knees, soaking you to the bone. You slog through the snow; the forest grows longer. Taller. Trunks of trees enclosing you in a cold grave, a cage.

You have to try. You have to.

The moon illuminates your path, a swath of silver light refracting through weeping frozen branches, their backs bowed with the heft of the snow, cracking and shivering under their burdens.

They’ll snap eventually. They’ll break.

Just like you.

Wolves howl in the distance. It makes no difference; how close they are. You can’t take much more, newly healed leg already spent, lungs heaving for what little air there is in this elevation.

They circle. Blood-soaked maws snap at you, herd you closer and closer to the start, to where it all began, to where it continues to begin, again and again.

The house.

Your knees find ground.

You’d rather die now. Freeze in the snow. Or…

A jaw snaps. You hold out your hands. For freedom. For peace.

The last thing you see is the flash of pearlescent canine, ripping into your flesh.

“Shhh, jus’ a nightmare.” Simon’s thumb works across your brow, concern shining on his face in the dim lighting. You shiver, even in a room like a sauna.

“Did- did I wake you?” He shakes his head. Of course, you didn’t. He’s always awake. He’s always watching.

“Close your eyes.” He tucks you close, blazing heat from his massive, pillowy chest bleeding into your back, your ribcage expanding slowly. It’s rhythm, sick, twisted rhythm, syncing you together, your breathing evening out, steadying in his hold. He reaches for Johnny, who’s curled on his side, and strokes through some long, loved pieces of mohawk. Lips muss your hair. “Sleep, little dove.”

The floorboards in the hallway creak.

They talk to you, whisper about comings and goings, each spot singing a specific frequency just so, hitting the right pitch at the right time, a chorus of shifting weight echoed by hackneyed groaning.

The creaking is didactic in nature. It exists to teach you something, to plainly expose the things you should have been paying attention to all along: footsteps in the morning, in the evening, shuffles versus steps. Schedules, routines, things you didn’t pay close enough attention to, things you didn’t care enough to notice, all laid out very carefully in front of you. The weeping wood of the floor practically begged you to notice, but you were too distracted by the never-ending reminders of your agony, and the cups of tea that made you woozy. You were too busy craning your neck to catch a glimpse of the outside world beyond the window, too preoccupied with trying to stand on your own without vomiting all over the floor (again) to catch what the hallway was trying to say.

If you had listened, you would have stood a chance.

“Alright, here we go.” Johnny murmurs, an arm under your knees, another around your back. When he rises, cradling you into his chest like a child, you bite the inside of your cheek so hard you taste blood, desperate to tamp down the whimper that breaks free. “I know, I know. Almost there.” He soothes, lowering you to the couch where the pillows are all placed in very specific positions. One of the goes under your calf, another your knee, and they line the sides of your ribs for your arm to rest elevated, comfortably. He cups your cheek, warm thumb gently moving across your skin, sweet, molasses thick affection, like the cough syrup you used to swallow when you were young. “Do ye want some tea?” Yes. God yes, a thousand times yes. Yes, you want the tea. Yes, you want to fall into the bleak darkness of drugged sleep, the vat of unconscious swallowing you whole every time. You want the buzz of numbness, the shadow of an orphic, endless pit. You want to slink away from everything, from them, from whatever this is, from what’s happened to you.

“Yeah, I-“

“Johnny.” Simon says his name softly from the kitchen. “Let’s wait a bit on the tea.” His brow furrows, light venetian blue eyes tracking across your face. They catch the light just so, sparkling downward, sea foam, sea glass and ocean spray, all mixed together into kaleidoscopes spiraling outward from his pupils, and when he frowns, you swear they darken.

“She’s in pain.” He protests, straightening to full height. There’s something happening above your head, something he concedes to with a sigh, shoulders relaxing, a regretful glance cast your way. “I’ll get ye some naproxen, dove.” He promises with a kiss, and then you’re alone in the living room, unable to move, snuggled against the worn leather couch.

Your leg is in a cast. Paper and glue, you think, makeshift at best, and they both remind you of it all the time, how it’s not medical grade, how you can’t attempt to walk on it, how the bone is incredibly fragile, and will be, for a while. It’s in worse shape than your arm, which at least has a black brace on it, covered from elbow to wrist, immobilized with a dull ache, a pain consistently throbbing, but doesn’t make you cry. Not the way your leg does. Your leg screams with agony, still, pins and needles and buzz saws in your bones, a haunting torment keeping you awake at night, making you second guess your desire to live.

The tea helps though. The tea makes everything less, makes the pain round, instead of sharp, makes the fear feel farther away, instead of right on the tip of your tongue, like a monster on your doorstep.

Simon says your name, broad shoulders stationed in front of the fireplace, glass of water in one hand, two pills in another.

“Do you want to sit up?” You blink at him, and he kneels before you can answer, perching right next to your shoulders. “Open.” You give the pills a dubious glare, unsure, lips zipped tight. It could be the naproxen, but it could be something else.

After all, the tea is not just tea.

He sighs in the same exasperated sentiment, and then his thumb and forefinger are grasping your cheeks, cold shiver erupting down your spine at the contact, and he pushes your mouth ajar. “Don’t be like this, sweet girl. Thought you were going to be good today?” He’s referencing something you remember vaguely, a discussion from last night in the dark, a promise you made when the world was coated in sap and too far warm, sticky like the sweat clinging to your neck-

“Ye dinnae need to cry, little dove. Don’ we take such good care of ye?” Johnny cooed, eager. “Ye just need tae be good for us, and we’ll do everything else.” He was holding you tight, too tight against his skin, heat radiating from him like the sun.

“I don’t understand.” You moaned, unable to move or twist away, trapped in the cage of his arms, Simon sitting prim on the edge of the bed, one hand on your hip.

“You will, in time. By spring, we hope.” Simon told you, dark sympathy in his eyes, words stretching into a mixed-up sentence jumping around in your mind. By… spring? What does that mean? Johnny’s hands roamed over your skin beneath the blankets, stroking across your breast to delicately pinch at your nipple, before dipping further south, slipping into your folds without warning.

“Ah!” You gasped, tense, frozen beneath his touch.

“Shhh.” Simon pats your hip. “Let Johnny put you to sleep, dove. You’ll feel better after a rest.” Johnny’s fingers stuffed in your pussy, thumb dancing across your clit, would lull you into tea addled sleep, and warring emotions swirled in your head. Your desire for this, your acceptance of this, is sick.

You’re sick.

You think of the snow. The reflection on the floor in this room, crystallized shimmer on the ceiling. The sun has been out, and you’re dying, wilting, from not feeling it on your face.

“Tomorrow.” You croak, and Johnny pauses. “Tomorrow can I… can I go outside?”

“Will you be good?” Simon’s thumb rubs at a spot on the corner of your mouth, and you nod.

“Yes… I- fuck.” Johnny’s breath hitches, and your walls clench up tight, squeezing. Small explosions of light dance across your eyes, pain mixed with pleasure, peaks and valleys rolling through your muscles. “Fuck.” A big, scorching hand spreads across your lower belly, just beneath your navel, and pushes.

You come immediately. It’s overwhelming to keep yourself relaxed, to prevent the spike of pain from your injuries, but an orgasm dulls everything else, and you cry with its intensity.

You’re sick.

You don’t miss the way Simon’s hand lingers, how his eyes don’t leave that spot, how Johnny’s hand covers his, and they hold there, lost in their own world for a second.

“If you’re good, sweet girl. We’ll take you outside.” He whispers, arranging limbs and waists and feet to his liking.

You fall asleep dreaming of a blizzard.

The pills go down so easily.

And you suppose they help. For a while, anyway.

Enough time for Johnny to get you set up on the porch, zipped up in their clothes and propped up on a loveseat rocker.

You wonder if they sit out here in the spring. In the summer. Do they drink their tea and eat their biscuits and watch over their domain like kings? It’s so American, so southern, to envision, and you almost laugh at the idea of either of them swapping their black bitterness for something iced and sweet enough to rot the teeth right out of their head.

“Dove? Can ye look towards me?” Johnny sits half on his knee across from you, on another outdoor, plastic chair. He’s got his sketchbook and pencil in hand, excitement brimming from eyes to lips, like a child. Full of wistful bright light, the sun itself.

Simon’s sun, it would seem.

You’ve noticed it, how Simon is the earth, but Johnny is the sun. The whole world, revolving around one ball of light, one eager, wild Scot, a star, the only, in Simon’s sky.

He draws you with efficiency. Moving and directing you just so, not daring to jostle you or cause you discomfort, but still ensuring he gets the best light. The barely-there dew drops of dawn. The glisten of a million frozen crystals at your back.

He handles you like glass. He stares at you like you’re a doll, a fragile one, like you had when you were a girl.

In the quiet moments, which are many, you catch them staring at you. If they’ve brought you down to the living room, they lurk in the kitchen, murmuring to one another in voices too low for you to catch. If you’re in the bedroom, they curl around you like wolf pups, pawing and petting until you’re asleep.

You don’t understand.

They won’t even talk about it with you now. How you came to be here, how they’re insistent you’ll have to stay until spring, when the pass opens.

Their words are a sickness, infecting you, spreading through your system until they’ve touched every piece, inside and out.

It’s madness. The kind of madness that pushed you to the brink already, made you feel like you’re losing touch with reality, with yourself. The kind of insanity that nearly got you killed.

You test the weight. Just barely, just enough that it screams under the pressure.

If you could make it to the door.

If you could make it down the hall.

If you could get out.

You grit your teeth.

The house has been silent for hours. No creaking floorboards. No heavy footsteps. You close your eyes, hold your breath, listening one last time.

They must not be here.

They go out, every once and a while. Bring things back. You’re not sure where, or how.

You shuffle a step, dragging your foot. It’s more a hop, but you use the bed to offset the inevitable thump of your body weight, managing to make it to the end, fingers deathly tight on the wrought iron.

You can do it. You can.

It’s only three, four hops at most to the door. On one leg, in a weakened state, it’s harder than you thought, but when your fingers lay on the door handle, the release of relief in your chest is overwhelming.

Yes! Yes. You can do it. Just-

The knob does not turn. You pull, applying more force, trying to jiggle it, see if maybe it’s stubborn or just old. This cabin is certainly old. Even though it’s been hollowed out anew inside, the bones are ones of a hunting cabin. A long-forgotten place, now housing horrors anew.

You twist and tug again. Every time it doesn’t budge, you try a little harder, each metallic scrap and jangle louder than fireworks.

You tug and you fiddle. You close your eyes and push down the rising panic.

The truth comes rushing over you all at once.

It’s locked. It’s always locked. That’s why Simon ensures it’s shut completely, each time they come and go.

They never intended to take you home. They never are going to give you your phone, or theirs, they’re never going to get you back over the pass.

You’re locked in here. With them.

The tugging becomes something else, something wired and frenetic, until you’re jerking the door handle with all your might, shaking the frame, screaming. The motion destabilizes you, and your lack of strength does you no favors.

Before you can self-correct, you stumble. You fall, instinct forcing your bad leg down, and when you try to catch yourself, you howl so loud you think the mountain shakes.

Your head smacks the frame of the bed on your way down, and then… as always now, everything is dark.

The first time you open your eyes after, Simon is seated in the chair. The same one he was in when they brought you here, severe and terrifying. The room is spinning, and you’re just as nauseous as the first day you laid eyes on him.

“I- I’m sorry.” You croak, but he only shakes his head, rising from his seat without even giving you a second look.

For a fleeting moment, the indifference stings.

“You’ll wear that,” he motions to your foot from the end of the bed, the good one, and you peek down to see a metal shackle clamped around your ankle. “until you can be trusted again.”

Johnny crawls into bed with you at night. He cries, hot tears on his cheeks, and coos over the leg with the break in it, and then over the shackle.

“I told him, ye dinnae mean to be bad.” His fingers shake as he traces your cheek. “Ye just cannae help it. It’s not yer fault, I know dove. Ye dinnae know any better. We have to teach you.”

“Johnny-“ Please. Let me go. Help me.

They all die in your throat when he presses his wet face to your neck like a dog, rutting his hard cock into your hip.“Ye’ll be right as rain by spring, I told him. Gon’ be such a good mum for the bairn, I know ye will.”

The world fades away. The silence suffocates, and you pray to die.

You cry the rest of the night, even when he shucks your pants down and licks your pussy until you’re coming on his tongue. You cry until he falls asleep, and Simon returns, settling in his seat, watching you both.

“How do ye feel about chicken soup tonight?” Johnny draws you back to him, sweet boy smile on his face, and your stomach clenches involuntarily.

Stupid handsome Scot.

You’re sick.

“That’s fine.”

“But do ye like it?” He’s so eager, back straightening with interest, really trying to learn, trying to figure out what you like and dislike, what will earn him your good graces, and what won’t.

You shrug. “Sure, it’s… it’s good.” A thought occurs to you. “Where do you get the chicken?”

“We’ve got ‘em in the barn. Can’t roam in the winter but we keep ‘em warm in there. Along with some ducks. A goat.”

“Farm animals?” “Aye. How else we supposed to make sure you’re healthy?” He waggles his eyebrows. You try not to grimace. “Si slaughters ‘em fresh. Everything tastes better that way.” A soft light shines in his eyes, a wolf’s instinct, and the shudder trembling down your spine makes your hands shake. “Ye cold?” He clocks it immediately, as he he does with every other single thing.

When he gathers you into his arms to bring you inside, tucking you back into the couch, you don’t even argue. You just sit there. Like a doll. Theirs.

Night is the easiest. It’s simple, to give in to your body, let them take over, take control of the parts that have long betrayed you. You close your eyes as they touch you, kiss you, make you come.

You even enjoy it.

That’s the worst part. You like it, when there are hands and fingers and tongues all over your body, like you’re being worshipped, like you’re some sort of god.

You like it, when Johnny gets overexcited and Simon settles him, guides him with a hand on his cock to your entrance, whispering slow in his ear, encouraging him to take his time. You like it, when Johnny’s pulse flutters under his jaw, when Simon holds you steady, when they get lost in each other, in you- you can almost pretend it’s not real, it's some fantasy, from a book, something dark and delicious-

Not your reality.

Tonight, Simon holds you in his lap on the edge of the bed, broken leg lying flat, his elbow crooked under your good knee and wrenched upwards, nearly pressing against your chest. The angle is intense, and Johnny grunts, muscles flexing with every thrust,

“Ah- fuck.” You moan and twitch, locked inside a cage, a confinement, the arms of your captors… your saviors. Simon swirls the pad of a finger over your clit, mouth open on your cheek, teeth nipping over your skin. You clench, Johnny cursing, some bitten off dialect you’re not familiar with, Simon’s voice dripping with smirk.

“Good girl, squeeze our boy, jus’ like that.” He does it on purpose, the talking. Knows how it makes you gush, long ago figured out the way to make your pussy clamp down around whatever he’s got worked inside you, his cock, Johnny’s, fingers, tongues.

Together, you’re an orchestra. Johnny is the strings, the violin, the viola, a cello. He plucks so perfectly, a harmonious blend of beauty spills from his bow, rising in the air until the audience is on their feet. His music trembles. It quivers and cries, like the wail of grief.

Your grief.

You’re the piano. An entire world, nestled in one instrument, but you play off tune, broken and sharp, pitch all a mess- you don’t even belong here.

Simon is the maestro. He directs each note, each melodious ring exactly as he wants it, working the music up to a brilliant crescendo, and it comes crashing like the force of a wave breaking onto sand. He conducts you, Johnny, the day, and night. He orchestrates the flow, lyrical give and take evolving in the house, your captor status slipping farther and farther away each night you take them into your body.

He knows you like it. Knows he’s in the lead, knows they’re winning-

And he doesn’t let up.

“Harder.” He coaches, and Johnny obliges, mouth open in bliss, eyes nearly rolled backwards. His fingers clamp down on your hip, too close, and you hiss in fear, the preparation of pain.

Simon snarls, yanking it away, holding to him tight before discarding it in exchange for the back of his neck.

“Sorry,” Johnny pants. “Sorry, dove.” You want to tell him to fuck off, to tell him you hate them, you hate them both, but you're only able to give them a high pitched moan of pleasure. “I’m gon’ come.” He grunts, and Simon yanks him forward, lips smashing together, tongue snaking messily between teeth.

For too long, the three of you hold fast. Johnny’s reckless, furious thrusts shove you backwards, over and over again. “Pull out.” Simon commands, flat palm on his chest. “Do not, Johnny.” He pushes him away from you like a dog, shoving him backwards with a firm forearm, a piece of rebar turned flesh.

He comes all over your belly, splashing thick white splatter across the mound of your cunt, up past your navel, choking on gasps of breath as Simon heaps praise onto the two of you.

Later, after they’ve bathed you, given you another orgasm, and all are almost tucked in, you whisper in the flickering fire light.

“Can I… can I have some tea?” Simon starts. It’s small, barely visible, but you feel it, in your bones. The echo of him in the room.

He holds your head between two palms, and you wonder if he’ll crush your skull. Decide it was all too much trouble. You’re too sick, feeble in your mind, too weak to survive.

“To sleep?” He asks softly, eyes darting over your shoulder for a split second, heavy with worry.

“Please?” There’s something in his eyes you don’t understand, a whirling mist of hell and desperation, and then it clears, and he motions a go ahead to Johnny.

“Alright, dove.”

The tea settles you into silence. With it, you can exist. You can survive.

It numbs you from the inside out, and as time passes, you feel no pain. You’re tangled in a dark web, a viscous manner of thing weighing you down from all angles. You feel nothing, and days turn to weeks, weeks to a month. Soon, the world is thawing. Snow melt turns to river and mud, greenery fighting for its chance to sprout and survive. Your leg is healing.

Spring comes.

The day you roast a chicken is the day your life ends, for good.

It’s domestic, the act. An olive branch to Simon, who’s angry with you, again. Who’s frustrated, took himself outside to chop wood.

Johnny mopes inside the house.

“I hate it when the two of ye fight.”

“Well, if he wasn’t such a stubborn asshole.” You hold the wooden spoon like a wand before returning it to the cast iron, swirling it around in the mess of butter and onion. “Then there wouldn’t be an issue.” You swallow the sting of his earlier refusal. The quick rejection of your request.

All you wanted was to go on a walk. It’s a beautiful day.

Why must the leash be so tight?

“He’ll be happy ye’re cookin’ again.” Johnny grins wide, pretty face beaming over the counter, and you sigh.

Maybe.

You’re watching out the window when Johnny approaches him in the yard. You can’t make out anything their saying, but the body language paints enough of a picture.

Johnny is rigid, angry.

Simon is calm, placating.

Words are exchanged, brows shifting with sympathy, sweetness.

Johnny erupts with glee. He shines like the sun, and Simon smiles, a real, true smile.

They’re beautiful.

And you’re sick.

The three of you tangle together in the dark. It’s a sailor’s knot, thrice over, difficult to understand which piece is which, where one begins and the other ends.

Simon’s anger is long melted. A glacier, gone leaving only a gash in the rock behind.

It’s this gash, this quiet undercurrent, keeping you focused on the wrong thing, pliable in bed until you realize Johnny is murmuring something in your ear, two arms banded around your waist from where you lay on your back, atop his chest.

“We cannae wait,” His hand strokes over your belly with reverence. The words cut through the thick, heady haze, and you try to twist to look at him. “watch ye get big with our bairn, goin’ be such a good mum.”

“Wh-what?” you choke, tensing. They try to settle you, sweet words and mouths everywhere, but you cannot get away from the fear.

From them.

“You- ahh.” You’re on fire, a finger rubbing your clit, Simon’s width between your thighs. He spears you open on his cock, unrelenting, making you keen and cry, face wet with tears.

“Waited long enough,” He grunts. “Been wastin’ it for months.” He steals your whimpers, swallows them, takes them inside like you take him, like you’ll take him-

“- until you swell. Until you’re heavy, dove, round with us.”

Until you’re forever theirs.

It’s a snarled promise. A prayer. Your eyes find the ceiling, fire flickering in shadow across old texture, and you breathe.

He shoves your knees towards your chest, Johnny still lock tight around your ribs, tongue in the shell of your ear.

“Need to be still, cannae lose a single drop." His palm is searing beneath your navel, and he's practically singing, vibrating. “We love ye so much.”

They’re conducting Beethoven. Ode to Joy.

You’re playing Bach. Come, Sweet Death.

Simon comes in you for the first time, and you come too, clenching down around his cock as he praises you, holding onto him like you can’t let go. Like your body knows. Like you’re craving it.

“Good girl.” He croons, spooning whatever slips free back inside, shoving it deep, wet lips on your own. “Gotta keep me in, dove… jus’ like that, there you go.” You throb, squeezing again, pulsing for him. For the words.

You’re sick.

When they switch positions, and Johnny smiles at you over your knees, his canines shine nearly red in the fire light. Two predators, one prey.

Your heart cannot help but flutter.

Sick.

Eight months prior:

The bar is packed. Summer music festival, the banners say. The park is thriving, alive with melody, musical acts rotating on and off the stage, children running amuck with candies and balloons, families relaxing in lawn chairs.

An Americana tradition.

They sat there themselves, for a while. Watching. Burning desire growing hot under his collar every time he saw a mum and her bairn, a small, precious thing cradled close to a chest, an overexcited five-year-old having a catch with his Da.

Eventually, they retreated to the darkness, hiding away in the one bar in town, it’s small windows and dim light practically a calling card.

And what they found inside, well...

“Hey, what can I get you?” You’re perfect. Sweet and soft, like a dove. Kind faced; kind spoken. You make Johnny’s cock twitch just looking at you, and he pictures you on your back, legs spread wide, exposed for them to feast on. To fill. He can’t wait to taste you, hold you, kiss you, have all his firsts with you.

Will you fight them? Will you squirm? No, you'll be good. You'll be so good for them, their perfect, sweet girl. He knows it.

How did they get so lucky?

Simon tucks his ballcap lower.

“Sorry, there are a million people in here!” You half shout over the raucous noise. “You’ll have to speak up!”

“Just two beers.” His yank accent needs work, but it does fine when there’s one hundred other faces next to his. A sea of forgettable memories.

Just as intended.

Your fingers brush his when you deposit two drafts on the bar top, shooting off a total, and for a lingering second, he stares at you.

Simon caresses the back of his neck, thumb circling a loving touch into his skin.

A warning. A reminder.

Can’t make ourselves stand out. Cannot be remembered.

Johnny peeks at the name tag pinned above your breast, and files it away. Files everything away as they finish their pints, how you scrutinize the crowd, how you’re constantly working, looking for things to do, cleaning. Taking care of everything. The people at the bar, your coworkers.

His heart overflows with love. With warmth, and when they take their leave, he can’t help but look back one more, catching a glimpse of your profile, singing a silent goodbye.

See you soon, dove.

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