#they dont give me much personally that ddpi pspi and ssps cant give me? so i am ambivalent

[inkwell-intermission]

slick x pickle ship dynamic possibilities. it's my rare pair and in my mind it works.

This is an interesting one because I think there are some ways they would work as a pairing, but I don't personally find them compelling or uniquely compatible

One thing about ddpi and ssps that relates to this is that I think Slick would have very little patience for PI- Pickle is very polite, a bit eccentric and cerebral, tends towards whimsical tangents if given the chance to ramble, and has little ability in hand to hand combat (with a gun is another story, but I think Slick vastly prefers a stabbing or beating, it's more intimate). Slick solves most of his problems with violence and I think he would find a nuanced and deep conversation about the nature of imagination, alcoholic effects and philosophy tedious, and I don't think he tolerates things he genuinely finds boring, because he can afford not to.

In a romantic or sexual relationship I also think Slick thrives on combat and conflict, pitchiness is second nature and first instinct to him, and what Sleuth offers him is physical resistance. He won't be easy to stab and get away with, he fights back, he offers conversation through action and quips that just make him more stabbable and a bigger target, and that kind of physicality and heat-butting is Slick's comfort zone and happy place. Bashing someone against a wall and having that person spit blood in his face and grin is like a marriage proposal to him

I can imagine Pickle having a fascination with Slick to an extent, but it would be very clear that his skittishness and verbose conversation above bravado and combativeness is something Slick likely would find annoying, and annoying Slick is a health risk that I don't think Pickle would want to take lightly

I think there's a way to approach them that could work, where Pickle essentially forces Slick to be gentle and patient and he needs to chill the hell out to spend time with him at all. Creating a soft side to him and so on? In the end I personally find Slick so self destructive and combative that he would much prefer to get into a knife fight with Sleuth in an alley and end up bandaging each other up exhausted afterwards that creates a moment of softness, care and intimacy than a relationship where he has to completely or mostly temper his preferred methods of expression, rather than indulge them vicariously and find moments between fights that make him realizes redrom might not be beyond his abilities.

TLDR; Anything I personally would get out of a sspi relationship I get from other ships I prefer along with much more, so while I think they have selective potential I don't find them as compelling as the Hannibal Lecter ass psychosexual dance ddpi or the playing "gay chicken" with your stupid sexy nemesis vibes ssps serves up. Not a bad ship, but not for me really.

HOWEVER. I can see Ms!sspi. that works. Innovator would put Scout's scrappy ass in a saw trap and be very intrigued by his puzzle solving skills when he gets out, and smitten when Scout slugs him in the eye before he escapes <3 mobswitch version is really fun and I think has a lot more potential thanks to the innovator personality difference and weird riddler energy